Chapter XXXIV.

During the succeeding fortnight, the intercourse between the Moseleys and their new acquaintances increased daily.  It was rather awkward at first on the part of Emily; and her beating pulse and changing color too often showed the alarm of feelings not yet overcome, when any allusions were made to the absent husband of one of the ladies.  Still, as her parents encouraged the acquaintance, and her aunt thought the best way to get rid of the remaining weakness with respect to Denbigh was not to shrink from even an interview with the gentleman himself, Emily succeeded in conquering her reluctance; and as the high opinion entertained by Lady Laura of her husband was expressed in a thousand artless ways, an interest was created in her that promised in time to weaken if not destroy the impression that had been made by Denbigh himself.

On the other hand, Egerton carefully avoided all collision with the Moseleys.  Once, indeed, he endeavored to renew his acquaintance with John, but a haughty repulse almost produced a quarrel.

What representations Egerton had thought proper to make to his wife, we are unable to say; but she appeared to resent something, as she never approached the dwelling or persons of her quondam associates, although in her heart she was dying to be on terms of intimacy with their titled friends.  Her incorrigible mother was restrained by no such or any other consideration, and contrived to fasten on the Dowager and Lady Harriet a kind of bowing acquaintance, which she made great use of at the rooms.

The Duke sought out the society of Emily wherever he could obtain it; and Mrs. Wilson thought her niece admitted his approaches with less reluctance than that of any other of the gentlemen around her.  At first she was surprised, but a closer observation betrayed to her the latent cause.

Derwent resembled Denbigh greatly in person and voice, although there were distinctions easily to be made on an acquaintance.  The Duke had an air of command and hauteur that was never to be seen in his cousin.  But his admiration of Emily he did not attempt to conceal; and, as he ever addressed her in the respectful language and identical voice of Denbigh, the observant widow easily perceived, that it was the remains of her attachment to the one that induced her niece to listen, with such evident pleasure, to the conversation of the other.

The Duke of Derwent wanted many of the indispensable requisites of a husband, in the eyes of Mrs. Wilson; yet, as she thought Emily out of all danger at the present of any new attachment, she admitted the association, under no other restraint than the uniform propriety of all that Emily said or did.

“Your niece will one day be a Duchess, Mrs. Wilson,” whispered Lady Laura, as Derwent and Emily were running over a new poem one morning, in the lodgings of Sir Edward; the former reading a fine extract aloud so strikingly in the air and voice of Denbigh, as to call all the animation of the unconscious Emily into her expressive face.