Alice, or the Mysteries — Complete

								

her union with him would offer as an equivalent for her fortune. In
short, as was his wont, he strove to make the best of the new turn
affairs had taken. Though guardian to Miss Cameron, and one of the
trustees for the fortune she was to receive on attaining her majority,
he had not the right to dictate as to her residence. The late lord's
will had expressly and pointedly corroborated the natural and lawful
authority of Lady Vargrave in all matters connected with Evelyn's
education and home. It may be as well, in this place, to add, that to
Vargrave and the co-trustee, Mr. Gustavus Douce, a banker of repute
and eminence, the testator left large discretionary powers as to the
investment of the fortune. He had stated it as his wish that from one
hundred and twenty to one hundred and thirty thousand pounds should be
invested in the purchase of a landed estate; but he had left it to the
discretion of the trustees to increase that sum, even to the amount of
the whole capital, should an estate of adequate importance be in the
market, while the selection of time and purchase was unreservedly
confided to the trustees. Vargrave had hitherto objected to every
purchase in the market,--not that he was insensible to the importance
and consideration of landed property, but because, till he himself
became the legal receiver of the income, he thought it less trouble to
suffer the money to lie in the Funds, than to be pestered with all the
onerous details in the management of an estate that might never be his.
He, however, with no less ardour than his deceased relative, looked
forward to the time when the title of Vargrave should be based upon the
venerable foundation of feudal manors and seignorial acres.
"Why did you not tell me Lord Vargrave was so charming?" said Caroline
to Evelyn, as the two girls were sauntering, in familiar tete-a-tete,
along the gardens. "You will be very happy with such a companion."
Evelyn made no answer for a few moments, and then, turning abruptly
round to Caroline, and stopping short, she said, with a kind of tearful
eagerness, "Dear Caroline, you are so wise, so kind too; advise me, tell
me what is best. I am very unhappy."
Miss Merton was moved and surprised by Evelyn's earnestness.
"But what is it, my poor Evelyn," said she; "why are you unhappy?--you
whose fate seems to me so enviable."
"I cannot love Lord Vargrave; I recoil from the idea of marrying him.
Ought I not fairly to tell him so? Ought I not to say that I cannot
fulfil the wish that--oh, there's the thought which leaves me so
irresolute!--His uncle bequeathed to me--me who have no claim of
relationship--the fortune that should have been Lord Vargrave's, in the
belief that my hand would restore it to him. It is almost a fraud to
refuse him. Am I not to be pitied?"
"But why can you not love Lord Vargrave? If past the premiere
jeunesse, he is still handsome. He is more than handsome,--he has the