"I understand you. Oh! what a rash, ill-judging being he is! But I beg your pardon, and will say no more. Yet I must add, you are justified; but alas! what can justify him?" This conversation did not give me any additional courage to undertake and execute my task; especially as I had no reputation as an actress to lose, and other circumstances increased my timidity.--Lady Martindale had purposely reserved all her powers for this evening, and, as she herself said, she was very glad to have her performance witnessed by such a judge as Lord Charles Belmour--a man whose opinion, she knew, was looked up to in all circles as decisive, with regard to beauty, grace, and talents. No wonder, therefore, that to throw her spells round him was become the object of her ambition. Hitherto he had avoided her, and she seemed conscious that he did not admire her. Her only hope was, I believe, therefore, to charm him at once by a _coup de théâtre_; and while she convinced Pendarves that for him alone she should exert her various powers, her fascinating graces were in reality aimed at Lord Charles: so I thought and suspected,--and though jealousy blinds, it also very often enlightens. She was to begin the entertainments by acting a French proverb with a French gentleman, an _emigré_, who was staying at the house; and having no doubt of her transcendent powers, I felt very reluctant to enter into competition with her. Yet, was not the prize for which I strove my husband's admiration? But then was I not degrading myself from the dignity of a wife and a private gentlewoman, by putting myself into a competition like this? The question was difficult to answer, and while I was thus ruminating, the curtain drew up. I shall not describe her performance: suffice, that the exhibition was perfect. The dialogue was epigrammatic, and the scenes too short to let the attention flag. Every word, every gesture, every look told; and the curtain dropped amidst the loudest applauses. I could only see from the side-scene; but I saw enough to make me feel my own inferiority, and I went on for Letitia Hardy in a tremor of spirits of which I was quite ashamed; nor could the kindest of the audience applaud me, except from pity and the wish to encourage me; while I saw that Lord Charles could not even do that, and sat silent, and, I thought, uneasy. However, I recovered myself in the masquerade scene, though my voice when I sung still trembled with emotion; and now I was overwhelmed with plaudits, and even Lord Charles seemed pleased; for, as I was masked, I could examine the audience. Still the play went off languidly after the lively petite piece, and I saw I had mortified my husband's vanity, which my first performance had gratified.