nearly distorted by internal agony, that it gave a cast almost ghastly to her countenance. 'Why, Harleigh,' she cried, 'should you thus shun me? Have I not given back her plighted faith to Ellis? Yet I am not ignorant how tired you must be of those old thread-bare topics, bowls, daggers, poignards, and bodkins: but they have had their reign, and are now dethroned. What remains is plain, common, stupid rationality. I wish to converse with you, Albert, only as a casuist; and upon a point of conscience which you alone can settle. For this world, and for all that belongs to it, all, with me, is utterly over! I have neither care nor interest left in it; and I have no belief that there is any other. I am very composedly ready, therefore, to take my last nap. I merely wish to learn, before I return to my torpid ignorance, whether it can be a fact, that you, Harleigh, you! believe in a future state for mortal man? And I engage you by your friendship,—which I still prize above all things! and by your honour, which you, I know, prize in the same manner, to answer me this question, instantly and categorically.' 'Most faithfully, then, Elinor, yes! All the happiness of my present life is founded upon my belief of a life to come!'[Pg 571] [Pg 571] Elinor held up her hands. 'Astonishing!' she cried. 'Can judgment and credulity, wisdom and superstition, thus jumble themselves together! And in a head so clear, so even oracular! Give me, at least, your reasons; and see that they are your own!' Harleigh looked disturbed, but made not any answer. The wan face of Elinor was now lighted up with hues of scarlet. 'I feel,' she cried, 'the impropriety of this intrusion;—for who, if not I,—since we all prize most what we know least,—should respect happiness? When you have finished, however, your present conference, honour me, both of you, if you please,—that the period so employed may be less wearisome to either,—with a final one up stairs. Harleigh! A final one!' Harleigh was still silent. A yet deeper red now dyed the whole complexion of Elinor, and she added, 'If, to-day, you are too much engaged,—to-morrow will suffice. To-day, indeed, your solemn protestations of belief, upon a subject which to me, is a chaos,—dark,—impervious, impenetrable! has given ample employment to my ideas.' Repulsing, then, his silently offered arm, she returned, with Selina, to the chamber consigned to her by
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