Clarissa Harlowe Samuel Richardson (most important books to read TXT) 📖

if a whole hecatomb of innocents, as the little plagues are called, shall atone for the broken promises and wicked artifices of this cruel creature!

Going home, as I did, with resolutions favourable to her, judge thou of my distraction, when her escape was first hinted to me, although but in broken sentences. I knew not what I said, nor what I did. I wanted to kill somebody. I flew out of one room into another, who broke the matter to me. I charged bribery and corruption, in my first fury, upon all; and threatened destruction to old and young, as they should come in my way.

Dorcas continues locked up from me: Sally and Polly have not yet dared to appear: the vile Sinclair⁠—

But here comes the odious devil. She taps at the door, thought that’s only ajar, whining and snuffling, to try, I suppose, to coax me into temper.

What a helpless state, where a man can only execrate himself and others; the occasion of his rage remaining; the evil increasing upon reflection; time itself conspiring to deepen it!⁠—O how I curs’d her!

I have her now, methinks, before me, blubbering⁠—how odious does sorrow make an ugly face!⁠—Thine, Jack, and this old beldam’s, in penitentials, instead of moving compassion, must evermore confirm hatred; while beauty in tears, is beauty heightened, and what my heart has ever delighted to see.⁠—

“What excuse!⁠—Confound you, and your cursed daughters, what excuse can you make?⁠—Is she not gone⁠—Has she not escaped?⁠—But before I am quite distracted, before I commit half a hundred murders, let me hear how it was.”⁠—

I have heard her story!⁠—Art, damn’d, confounded, wicked, unpardonable art, is a woman of her character⁠—But show me a woman, and I’ll show thee a plotter!⁠—This plaguey sex is art itself: every individual of it is a plotter by nature.

This is the substance of the old wretch’s account.

She told me, “That I had no sooner left the vile house, than Dorcas acquainted the siren” (Do, Jack, let me call her names!⁠—I beseech thee, Jack, to permit me to call her names!) “that Dorcas acquainted her lady with it; and that I had left word, that I was gone to doctors-commons, and should be heard of for some hours at the Horn there, if inquired after by the counsellor, or anybody else: that afterwards I should be either at the Cocoa-tree, or King’s-Arms, and should not return till late. She then urged her to take some refreshment.

“She was in tears when Dorcas approached her; her saucy eyes swelled with weeping: she refused either to eat or drink; sighed as if her heart would break.”⁠—False, devilish grief! not the humble, silent, grief, that only deserves pity!⁠—Contriving to ruin me, to despoil me of all that I held valuable, in the very midst of it.

“Nevertheless, being resolved not to see me for a week at least, she ordered her to bring up three or four French rolls, with a little butter, and a decanter of water; telling her, she would dispense with her attendance; and that should be all she should live upon in the interim. So artful creature! pretending to lay up for a week’s siege.”⁠—For, as to substantial food, she, no more than other angels⁠—Angels! said I⁠—the devil take me if she be any more an angel!⁠—for she is odious in my eyes; and I hate her mortally!

But O Lovelace, thou liest!⁠—She is all that is lovely. All that is excellent!

But is she, can she be gone!⁠—Oh! how Miss Howe will triumph!⁠—But if that little fury receive her, fate shall make me rich amends; for then will I contrive to have them both.

I was looking back for connection⁠—but the devil take connection; I have no business with it: the contrary best befits distraction, and that will soon be my lot!

“Dorcas consulted the old wretch about obeying her: O yes, by all means; for Mr. Lovelace knew how to come at her at any time: and directed a bottle of sherry to be added.

“This cheerful compliance so obliged her, that she was prevailed upon to go up, and look at the damage done by the fire; and seemed not only shocked by it, but, as they thought, satisfied it was no trick; as she owned she had at first apprehended it to be. All this made them secure; and they laughed in their sleeves, to think what a childish way of showing her resentment she had found out; Sally throwing out her witticisms, that Mrs. Lovelace was right, however, not to quarrel with her bread and butter.”

Now this very childishness, as they imagined it, in such a genius, would have made me suspect either her head, after what had happened the night before; or her purpose, when the marriage was (so far as she knew) to be completed within the week in which she was resolved to secrete herself from me in the same house.

“She sent Will with a letter to Wilson’s, directed to Miss Howe, ordering him to inquire if there were not one for her there.

“He only pretended to go, and brought word there was none; and put her letter in his pocket for me.

“She then ordered him to carry another (which she gave him) to the Horn Tavern to me.⁠—All this done without any seeming hurry: yet she appeared to be very solemn; and put her handkerchief frequently to her eyes.

“Will pretended to come to me with this letter. But thou the dog had the sagacity to mistrust something on her sending him out a second time; (and to me, whom she had refused to see); which he thought extraordinary; and mentioned his mistrusts to Sally, Polly, and Dorcas; yet they made light of his suspicions; Dorcas assuring them all, that her lady seemed more stupid with her grief, than active; and that she really believed she was a little turned in her head, and knew not what she did. But all of them depended upon her inexperience, her open temper, and upon her not making the least motion towards