Affected beyond measure, I half arose, and embraced his knees, while yet on my own.
"Yes, yes," cried he, looking earnestly in my face, "I see, I see thou art her child! she lives-she breathes,-she is present to my view!-Oh, God, that she indeed lived!-Go, child, go," added he, wildly starting, and pushing me from him: "take her away, Madam,-I cannot bear to look at her!" And then, breaking hastily from me, he rushed out of the room.
Speechless, motionless myself, I attempted not to stop him; but Mrs. Selwyn, hastening after him, caught hold of his arm: "Leave me, Madam," cried he, with quickness, "and take care of the poor child:-bid her not think me unkind; tell her, I would at this moment plunge a dagger in my heart to serve her: but she has set my brain on fire; and I can see her no more!" Then, with a violence almost frantic, he ran up stairs.
Oh, Sir, had I not indeed cause to dread this interview?-an interview so unspeakably painful and afflicting to us both! Mrs. Selwyn would have immediately returned to Clifton; but I entreated her to wait some time, in the hope that my unhappy father, when his first emotion was over, would again bear me in his sight. However, he soon after sent his servant to enquire how I did; and to tell Mrs. Selwyn he was much indisposed, but would hope for the honour of seeing her to-morrow, at any time she would please to appoint.
She fixed upon ten o'clock in the morning; and then, with a heavy heart, I got into the chariot. Those afflicting words, I can see her no more! were never a moment absent from my mind.
Yet the sight of Lord Orville, who handed us from the carriage, gave some relief to the sadness of my thoughts. I could not, however, enter upon the painful subject; but, begging Mrs. Selwyn to satisfy him, I went to my own room.
As soon as I communicated to the good Mrs. Clinton the present situation of my affairs, an idea occurred to her which seemed to clear up all the mystery of my having been so long disowned.
The woman, she says, who attended my ever-to-be-regretted mother in her last illness, and who nursed me the first four months of my life, soon after being discharged from your house, left Berry Hill entirely, with her baby, who was but six weeks older than myself. Mrs. Clinton remembers, that her quitting the place appeared, at the time, very extraordinary to the neighbours; but, as she was never heard of afterwards, she was by degrees quite forgotten.