"It is so long since I have heard from you, Albert, it is painful for me to write, scarcely knowing how far you may be interested in what I have to communicate--but I try to still my uneasiness--let me but see you, dear Albert, all will be forgotten, all will be forgiven; for I am your own true and affectionate /*[5] "ADELINE." */ "P.S. You will find us at Mamma's house in town." #/ A letter like this, breathing such trust and love, and so replete with genuine expression of delight in the prospect of meeting him, was indeed sufficient to make Lord Albert forget at once the poisonous theme which his ears rather than his reason had imbibed in his interview with Lady Hamlet. Impelled more by the eager anxiety of affection to behold the object of his late disquietude, than to see her for the purpose of convincing himself of her errors, he leapt with alacrity into his carriage, and drove towards London, without casting a thought on those he left behind. The mortification which Lady Hamlet Vernon felt was severe, in proportion as from its nature it admitted of no sympathy. She was, of course, ignorant of the cause of Lord Albert's destination being so suddenly changed from Wales to London; but in the blindness of her increasing passion, she resolved in the first moment of her despair to follow him thither. A cooler judgment, however, made her recollect that if she lost Lord Albert she had other friends to retain, a position in the gay world to lose, and that, at all events, it was not by pursuing him at that moment that any thing was to be gained; she therefore determined on remaining some days at Restormel, and making herself as agreeable as possible to the party that continued there. To one of Lady Hamlet Vernon's disposition this was no easy task. Violent and impetuous as she was by nature, left as she had been without any control, it was a very Herculean work to hide all the warring passions of jealousy and disappointed love beneath the semblance of a cool indifference--a disengaged mind. "What have you done with Lord Albert?" was Lady Baskerville's first question to her after the morning's salutation; "I hear he departed in violent haste at an undue hour this morning. He looks of such an imperturbable gravity, one does not understand his ever being brought to do any thing out of measure or rule." "I done with Lord Albert? my dear Lady Baskerville, you confer too much honour upon me to suppose that _I_ have any influence with him. I did not even know that he was gone; but if you are very much interested in his departure, perhaps Lord Ellersby can tell us something about it." She thought by this means to discover the cause of his sudden disappearance, and gratify her inquiries as being the curiosity of another.--"Lord Ellersby," she said, "Lady Baskerville is desirous to learn what wonderful event can have called Lord Albert away from us so very suddenly."