Of the existence of love Lady Audley had little conception; and she attributed her son’s conduct to wilful disobedience and obstinacy.  In proportion as she had hitherto found him complying and gentle, her wrath had kindled at his present firmness and inflexibility.  So bitter were her reflections on his conduct, so severe her animadversions on the being he loved, that Sir Edmund, fired with resentment, expressed his resolution of acting according to the dictates of his own will; and expressed his contempt for her authority in terms the most unequivocal.  Lady Audley, ignorant of the arts of persuasion, by every word she uttered more and more widened the breach her imperiousness had occasioned, until Sir Edmund, feeling himself no longer master of his temper, announced his intention of leaving the house, to allow his mother time to reconcile herself to the inevitable misfortune of beholding him the husband of Alicia Malcolm.

He instantly ordered his horses and departed, leaving the following letter for his cousin:—­

“I have been compelled by motives of prudence, of which you are the sole object, to depart without seeing you.  My absence became necessary from the unexpected conduct of Lady Audley, which has led me so near to forgetting that she was my mother, that I dare not remain, and subject myself to excesses of temper which I might afterwards repent.  Two years must elapse before I can become legally my own master, and should Lady Audley so far depart from the dictates of cool judgment as still to oppose what she knows to be inevitable, I fear that we cannot meet till then.  My heart is well known to you; therefore I need not enlarge on the pain I feel at this unlooked-for separation.  At the same time, I am cheered with the prospect of the unspeakable happiness that awaits me-the possession of your hand; and the confidence I feel in your constancy is in proportion to the certainty I experience in my own; I cannot, therefore, fear that any of the means which may be put in practice to disunite us will have more effect on you than on me.

“Looking forward to the moment that shall make you mine for ever, I remain with steady confidence:  and unspeakable affection, your

“EDMUND AUDLEY.”

With a trembling frame Alicia handed the note to Lady Audley, and begged leave to retire for a short time; expressing her willingness to reply at another moment to any question her aunt might choose to put to her with regard to her engagement with Sir Edmund.

In the solitude of her own chamber Alicia gave way to those feelings of wretchedness which she had with difficulty stifled in the presence of Lady Audley, and bitterly wept over the extinction of her bright and newly-formed visions of felicity.  To yield to unmerited ill-usage, or to crouch beneath imperious and self-arrogated power, was not in the nature of Alicia; and had Lady Audley been a stranger to her, the path of duty would have been less intricate.