"Oh," interrupted Zorilda, "do not accuse me of that which is foreign from my nature. Can any good or evil happen at Henbury in which I do not share? Are you not my benefactors? But you reject my sympathy with disdain, and then reproach me for the want of it. Let me prove how much I feel upon the present occasion by conjuring you not to commit yourself by writing such a letter as you propose to the steward. If, as I have heard you say, Mr. Hartland is heir to the estates, as well as to the title of Marchdale, you will owe nothing to the officiousness of this Humphries; but should Lord Marchdale have had power over his fortune, and exercised it to your disadvantage, how will this precipitancy advance your claims, or redress the evil? Again, a paralytic stroke is not always fatal. Lord Marchdale may recover, and then you are at the mercy of a sycophant who may turn your impatience to account with his master, and represent you in unfavourable colours, to your future ruin. Let me return your acknowledgments for a letter which you have opened in the absence of Mr. Hartland, and enter no farther into the subject of it." "You are right, Zoé; I forgive you," answered Mrs. Hartland; "make haste, give a guinea to the messenger, see that he is properly taken care of, and despatch him without delay." Zorilda executed the task which her own good sense and delicacy had suggested; but who can describe the state of her mind, when, having performed her commission, she had time to reflect on her own situation, rendered doubly precarious and painful, by the increased distance which she perceived the near prospect of rank and fortune would place between her and all she loved? Mr. Hartland returned, and even his phlegmatic temperament was excited by the news which awaited him. Visions of future greatness now absorbed the attention of him and his wife, though they took various hues, according with the difference of their characters. Mr. Hartland shewed no impatience, but, assuming a sort of sullen pomp, seemed to feel himself already in possession of the distinction which he anticipated; while Mrs. Hartland, in an agony of "hope deferred," endured a perpetual fever of mind from the restlessness and impotent activity of her disposition. Day after day passed without bringing farther tidings, and the _final_ account from Marchdale-court was necessary to allay those apprehensions which embittered her golden dreams.