But we must leave our baronet with his letter in his hand, gazing profoundly and anxiously on the blank left for the superscription, and must follow the perplexities of Reginald Darcy.

That good understanding which apparently existed between Emily and Captain Garland seemed rather to increase than to diminish after the little adventure we recorded in the last chapter.  It appeared that Miss Sherwood had taken Darcy at his word, and resolved not to think any the more kindly of him for his conduct on that occasion.  The captain was plainly in the ascendant.  It even appeared, from certain arrangements that were in stealthy preparation, that the happiness of the gallant lover would not long be delayed.  Messages of a very suspicious purport had passed between the Park and the vicarage.  The clerk of the parish had been seen several times at Lipscombe.  There was something in the wind, as the sagacious housekeeper observed; surely her young missus was not going to be married on the sly to the captain!  The same thought, however, occurred to Darcy.  Was it to escape the suit of Sir Frederic Beaumantle, which had been in some measure countenanced by her father, that she had recourse to this stratagem?—­hardly worthy of her, and quite unnecessary, as she possessed sufficient influence with her father to obtain his consent to any proposal she herself was likely to approve.  Had not the state of his own feelings made him too interested a party to act as counsellor or mediator, he would at once have questioned Emily on the subject.  As it was, his lips were closed.  She herself, too, seemed resolved to make no communication to him.  The captain, a man of frank and open nature, was far more disposed to reveal his secret:  he was once on the point of speaking to Darcy about his “approaching marriage;” but Emily, laying her finger on her lip, suddenly imposed silence on him.

One morning, as Darcy entered the breakfast-room, it was evident that something unusual was about to take place.  The carriage, at this early hour, was drawn up to the door, and the two young ladies, both dressed in bridal white, were stepping into it.  Before it drove off Miss Sherwood beckoned to Darcy.

“I have not invited you,” she said, “to the ceremony, because Captain Garland has wished it to be as private as possible.  But we shall expect your company at breakfast, for which you must even have the patience to wait till we return.”  Without giving any opportunity for reply, she drew up the glass, and the carriage rolled off.

However Darcy might have hitherto borne himself up by a gloomy sense of duty, by pride, and a bitter—­oh, what bitter resignation!—­when the blow came, it utterly prostrated him.  “She is gone!—­lost!—­Fool that I have been!—­What was this man more than I?” Stung with such reflections as these, which were uttered in such broken sentences, he rapidly retreated to the library, where he knew he should be undisturbed.  He threw himself into a chair, and planting his elbows on the table, pressed his doubled fists, with convulsive agony, to his brows.  All his fortitude had forsaken him:  he wept outright.