“Even in my own mind,” said Cecilia, “I
can no longer defend him, for he could never have
been so eager to promote the interest of Sir Robert,
in the present terrible situation of his own affairs,
had he not been stimulated by some secret motives.
His schemes and his artifices, however, will now be
utterly lost upon me, since your warning and advice,
aided by my own suffering experience of the inutility
of all I can do for him, will effectually guard me
from all his future attempts.”
“Rest no security upon yourself,” said
Mr Monckton, “since you have no knowledge of
the many tricks and inventions by which you may yet
be plundered. Perhaps he may beg permission to
reside in your house in Suffolk, or desire an annuity
for his wife, or chuse to receive your first rents
when you come of age; and whatever he may fix upon,
his dagger and his bowl will not fail to procure him.
A heart so liberal as yours can only be guarded by
flight. You were going, you said, when I came,—and
whither?”
“To—to St James’s-square,”
answered she, with a deep blush.
“Indeed!—is young Delvile, then,
going abroad?”
“Abroad?—no,—I believe
not.”
“Nay, I only imagined it from your chusing to
reside in his house.”
“I do not chuse it,” cried Cecilia, with
quickness, “but is not any thing preferable
to dwelling with Mr Briggs?”
“Certainly,” said Mr Monckton coolly,
“nor should I have supposed he had any chance
with you, had I not hitherto observed that your convenience
has always been sacrificed to your sense of propriety.”
Cecilia, touched by praise so full of censure, and
earnest to vindicate her delicacy, after an internal
struggle, which Mr Monckton was too subtle to interrupt,
protested she would go instantly to Mr Briggs, and
see if it were possible to be settled in his house,
before she made any attempt to fix herself elsewhere.
“And when?” said Mr Monckton.
“I don’t know,” answered she, with
some hesitation, “perhaps this afternoon.”
“Why not this morning?”
“I can go out no where this morning; I must
stay with Mrs Harrel.”
“You thought otherwise when I came, you were
then content to leave her.”
Cecilia’s alacrity, however, for changing her
abode, was now at an end, and she would fain have
been left quietly to re-consider her plans: but
Mr Monckton urged so strongly the danger of her lengthened
stay in the house of so designing a man as Mr Harrel,
that he prevailed with her to quit it without delay,
and had himself the satisfaction of handing her to
her chair.
A MISER’S MANSION.
Mr Briggs was at home, and Cecilia instantly and briefly
informed him that it was inconvenient for her to live
any longer at Mr Harrel’s, and that if she could
be accommodated at his house, she should be glad to
reside with him during the rest of her minority.
