Alice, or the Mysteries — Book 07

								

innocuously on the elasticity of twenty-six.  He did not, therefore, heed
the rain that drenched him to the skin, and neglected to change his dress
till he had finished reading some letters and newspapers which awaited
his return at Lisle Court.  The consequence of this imprudence was, that
the next morning when he woke, Lord Vargrave found himself, for almost
the first time in his life, seriously ill.  His head ached violently,
cold shiverings shook his frame like an ague; the very strength of the
constitution on which the fever had begun to fasten itself augmented its
danger.  Lumley--the last man in the world to think of the possibility of
dying--fought up against his own sensations, ordered his post-horses, as
his visit of survey was now over, and scarcely even alluded to his
indisposition.  About an hour before he set off, his letters arrived; one
of these informed him that Caroline, accompanied by Evelyn, had already
arrived in Paris; the other was from Colonel Legard, respectfully
resigning his office, on the ground of an accession of fortune by the
sudden death of the admiral, and his intention to spend the ensuing year
in a Continental excursion.  This last letter occasioned Vargrave
considerable alarm; he had always felt a deep jealousy of the handsome
ex-guardsman, and he at once suspected that Legard was about to repair to
Paris as his rival.  He sighed, and looked round the spacious apartment,
and gazed on the wide prospects of grove and turf that extended from the
window, and said to himself, "Is another to snatch these from my grasp?"
His impatience to visit Mrs. Leslie, to gain ascendency over Lady
Vargrave, to repair to Paris, to scheme, to manoeuvre, to triumph,
accelerated the progress of the disease that was now burning in his
veins; and the hand that he held out to Mr. Hobbs, as he stepped into his
carriage, almost scorched the cold, plump, moist fingers of the surveyor.
Before six o'clock in the evening Lord Vargrave confessed reluctantly to
himself that he was too ill to proceed much farther.  "Howard," said he
then, breaking a silence that had lasted some hours, "don't be alarmed; I
feel that I am about to have a severe attack; I shall stop at M-----
(naming a large town they were approaching); I shall send for the best
physician the place affords; if I am delirious to-morrow, or unable to
give my own orders, have the kindness to send express for Dr.
Holland,--but don't leave me yourself, my good fellow.  At my age, it is
a hard thing to have no one in the world to care for me in illness;
d-----n affection when I am well!"
After this strange burst, which very much frightened Mr. Howard, Lumley
relapsed into silence, not broken till he reached M-----.  The best
physician was sent for; and the next morning, as he had half foreseen and
foretold, Lord Vargrave was delirious!

CHAPTER VI.


NOUGHT under Heaven so strongly doth allure