"O what a voice is that!" exclaimed he, "it pierces my very soul!"
Mrs Delvile now came to the parlour door, and looked aghast at the situation in which she saw them: Cecilia again moved on, and reached the stairs, but tottered, and was obliged to cling to the banisters.
"O suffer me to support you," cried he; "you are not able to stand,-- whither is it you would go?"
"Any where,--I don't know,--" answered she, in faltering accents, "but if you would leave me, I should be well."
And, turning from him, she walked again towards the parlour, finding by her shaking frame, the impossibility of getting unaided up the stairs.
"Give me your hand, my love," said Mrs Delvile, cruelly alarmed by this return; and the moment they re-entered the parlour, she said impatiently to her son, "Mortimer, why are you not gone?"
He heard her not, however; his whole attention was upon Cecilia, who, sinking into a chair, hid her face against Mrs Delvile: but, reviving in a few moments, and blushing at the weakness she had betrayed, she raised her head, and, with an assumed serenity, said, "I am better,-- much better,--I was rather sick,--but it is over; and now, if you will excuse me, I will go to my own room."
She then arose, but her knees trembled, and her head was giddy, and again seating herself, she forced a faint smile, and said, "Perhaps I had better keep quiet."
"Can I bear this!" cried Delvile, "no, it shakes all my resolution!-- loveliest and most beloved Cecilia! forgive my rash declaration, which I hear retract and forswear, and which no false pride, no worthless vanity shall again surprise from me!--raise, then, your eyes--"
"Hot-headed young man!" interrupted Mrs Delvile, with an air of haughty displeasure, "if you cannot be rational, at least be silent. Miss Beverley, we will both leave him."
Shame, and her own earnestness, how restored some strength to Cecilia, who read with terror in the looks of Mrs Delvile the passions with which she was agitated, and instantly obeyed her by rising; but her son, who inherited a portion of her own spirit, rushed between them both and the door, and exclaimed, "Stay, madam, stay! I cannot let you go: I see your intention, I see your dreadful purpose; you will work upon the feelings of Miss Beverley, you will extort from her a promise to see me no more!"
"Oppose not my passing!" cried Mrs Delvile, whose voice, face and manner spoke the encreasing disturbance of her soul; "I have but too long talked to you in vain; I must now take some better method for the security of the honour of my family."