ternal separation to the death of her child. Her terror now worked
to such a degree upon her character, that she even, at times, half
resolved to speak to Venetia upon the subject, and contrive some
method of communicating her wishes to her father; but pride, the
habitual repugnance of so many years to converse upon the topic,
mingled also, as should be confessed, with an indefinite apprehension
of the ill consequences of a conversation of such a character on the
nervous temperament of her daughter, restrained her.

'My love!' said Lady Annabel, one day to her daughter, 'do you think
you could go out? The physicians think it of great importance that you
should attempt to exert yourself, however slightly.'

'Dear mother, if anything could annoy me from your lips, it would
be to hear you quote these physicians,' said Venetia. 'Their daily
presence and inquiries irritate me. Let me be at peace. I wish to see
no one but you.'

'But Venetia,' said Lady Annabel, in a voice of great emotion,
'Venetia--,' and here she paused; 'think of my anxiety.'

'Dear mother, it would be ungrateful for me ever to forget that. But
you, and you alone, know that my state, whatever it may be, and to
whatever it may be I am reconciled, is not produced by causes over
which these physicians have any control, over which no one has
control--now,' added Venetia, in a tone of great mournfulness.

For here we must remark that so inexperienced was Venetia in the
feelings of others, and so completely did she judge of the strength
and purity of their emotions from her own, that reflection, since the
terrible adventure of Rovigo, had only convinced her that it was no
longer in her mother's power to unite herself again with her other
parent. She had taught herself to look upon her father's burst of
feeling towards Lady Annabel as the momentary and inevitable result of
a meeting so unexpected and overpowering, but she did not doubt that
the stranger whose presence had ultimately so fatally clouded that
interview of promise, possessed claims upon Marmion Herbert which he
would neither break, nor, upon reflection, be desirous to question. It
was then the conviction that a reconciliation between her parents was
now impossible, in which her despair originated, and she pictured to
herself her father once more at Arqua disturbed, perhaps, for a day
or two, as he naturally must be, by an interview so sudden and so
harassing; shedding a tear, perhaps, in secret