'
Oh! If Mrs Varden could have seen the virtuous gentleman as he said
these words, with indignation sparkling from his eyes--if she could have
heard his broken, quavering voice--if she could have beheld him as he
stood bareheaded in the sunlight, and with unwonted energy poured forth
his eloquence!
With a haughty face, but pale and trembling too, Emma regarded him in
silence. She neither spoke nor moved, but gazed upon him as though she
would look into his heart.
'I throw off,' said Mr Chester, 'the restraint which natural affection
would impose on some men, and reject all bonds but those of truth and
duty. Miss Haredale, you are deceived; you are deceived by your unworthy
lover, and my unworthy son.'
Still she looked at him steadily, and still said not one word.
'I have ever opposed his professions of love for you; you will do me
the justice, dear Miss Haredale, to remember that. Your uncle and myself
were enemies in early life, and if I had sought retaliation, I might
have found it here. But as we grow older, we grow wiser--bitter, I would
fain hope--and from the first, I have opposed him in this attempt. I
foresaw the end, and would have spared you, if I could.
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