For, might I not have believed that he, who thought he had cause to apprehend that he was on the point of losing a person who had cost him so much pains and trouble, would not hinder her, if possible, from returning? That he, who knew I had promised to give him up for ever, if insisted on as a condition of reconciliation, would not endeavour to put it out of my power to do so? In short, that he, who had artfully forborne to send for my letter (for he could not be watched, my dear) lest he should find in it a countermand to my appointment (as I myself could apprehend, although I profited not by the apprehension), would want a device to keep me with him till the danger of having our meeting discovered might throw me absolutely into his power to avoid my own worse usage, and the mischiefs which might have ensued, perhaps in my very sight, had my friends and he met?
But if it shall come out that the person within the garden was his corrupted implement, employed to frighten me away with him, do you think, my dear, that I shall not have reason to hate him and myself still more? I hope his heart cannot be so deep and so vile a one: I hope not: but how came it to pass, that one man could get out at the garden door, and no more? How, that that man kept aloof, as it were, and pursued us not; nor run back to alarm the house? My fright and my distance would not let me be certain; but really this single man had the air of that vile Joseph Leman, as I recollect.
You know, my dear, that your Clarissa’s mind was ever above justifying her own failings by those of others. God forgive those of my friends who have acted cruelly by me! but their faults are their own, and not excuses for mine. And mine began early: for I ought not to have corresponded with him.
You don’t know, nor can you imagine, my dear, how I am mortified! how much I am sunk in my own opinion! I, that was proposed for an example, truly, to others! Oh that I were again in my father’s house, stealing down with a letter to you; my heart beating with expectation of finding one from you!
• • •
This is the Wednesday morning I dreaded so much that I once thought of it as my doomsday: but of the Monday, it is plain, I ought to have been most apprehensive. Had I stayed, and had the worst I dreaded happened, my friends would then have been answerable, if any bad consequences had followed—but, now, I have this one consolation left me (a very sad one, you’ll say), that I have cleared them of blame, and taken it all upon myself!
You will not wonder to see this narrative so dismally scrawled. It is owing to different pens and ink, all bad, and written by snatches of time, my hand trembling too with fatigue and grief.
I will not add to the length of it, by the particulars of his behaviour to me, and of our conversation at St Albans and since; because those will come in course, in the continuation of my story; which no doubt you will expect from me.
Only thus much I will say, that he is extremely respectful, even obsequiously so, at present, though I am so much dissatisfied with him, and myself; that he has hitherto had no great cause to praise my complaisance to him. Indeed I can hardly at times bear the seducer in my sight.
The lodgings I am in are inconvenient. I shall not stay in them: so it signifies nothing to tell you how to direct to me hither. And where my next may be, as yet I know not.
He knows that I am writing to you; and has offered to send my letter, when finished, by a servant of his. But I thought I could not be too cautious, as I am now situated, in having a letter of this importance conveyed to you. Who knows what such a man may do? So very wicked a contriver! The contrivance, if a contrivance, so insolently mean! But I hope it is not a contrivance neither! Yet, be that as it will, I must say that the best of him, and of my prospects with him, are bad: and yet, having enrolled myself among the too-late repenters, who shall pity me?
Nevertheless, I will dare to hope for a continued interest in your affections (I shall be miserable indeed, if I may not!), and to be remembered in your daily prayers. I am, my dearest friend,
Your ever affectionate
CL. HARLOWE
Letter 95: MR LOVELACE TO JOSEPH LEMAN
Sat. April 8
Honest Joseph,
At length your beloved young lady has consented to free herself from the cruel treatment she has so long borne. She is to meet me without the garden door, at about four o’clock on Monday afternoon; as I told you she had promised. She has confirmed her promise. Thank God, she has confirmed her promise!
I shall have a chariot and six ready in the by-road fronting the private path to Harlowe Paddock; and several of my friends and servants not far off, armed to protect her, if there be occasion: but everyone charged to avoid mischief. That, you know, has always been my principal care.
All my fear is that when she comes to the point, the over-niceness of her principles will make her waver, and want to go back: although her honour is my honour, you know, and mine is hers. If she should, and I should be unable to prevail upon her, all your past services will avail nothing and she will be lost to me for ever: the prey, then, of that cursed Solmes, whose vile stinginess will never permit him to do good to any of the servants of the family.
I have no doubt of your fidelity, honest Joseph; nor of your zeal to serve an injured gentleman and an oppressed young lady. You see by the confidence I repose in you that I have not; more particularly, on this very important occasion, in which your assistance may crown the work: for if she wavers, a little innocent contrivance will be necessary.
Be very mindful, therefore, of the following directions: take them into your heart. This will probably be your last trouble, until my beloved and I are joined in holy wedlock: and then we will be sure to take care of you. You know what I have promised. No man ever reproached me for breach of word.
These, then, honest Joseph, are they:
Contrive to be in the garden in disguise, if possible, and unseen by your young lady. If you find the garden door unbolted, you’ll know that she and I are together although you should not see her go out at it. It will be locked, but my key shall be on the ground at the bottom of the door, without, that you may open it with yours as it may be needful.
If you hear our voices parleying, keep at the door, till I cry Hem, hem, twice: but be watchful for this signal, for I must not hem very loud, lest she should take it for a signal: perhaps in struggling to prevail upon the dear creature, I may have an opportunity to strike the door hard with my elbow, or heel, to confirm you. Then you are to make a violent burst against the door, as if you’d break it open, drawing backward and forward the bolt in a hurry: then, with another push, but with more noise than strength, lest the lock give way, cry out (as if you saw some of the family): Come up, come up, instantly!—Here they are! Here they are! hasten!—this instant hasten! And mention swords, pistols, guns, with as terrible a voice, as you can cry out with. Then shall I prevail upon her, no doubt, if loath before, to fly: if I cannot, I will enter the garden with her, and the house too, be the consequence what it will. But so ‘frighted, there is no question but she will fly.
When you think us at a sufficient distance (and I shall raise my voice, urging her swifter flight, that you may guess at that), then open the door with your key: but you must be sure to open it very cautiously, lest we should not be far enough off. I would not have her know you have a hand in this matter, out of my great regard to you.
When you have opened the door, take your key out of the lock, and put it in your pocket: then, stooping for mine, put it in the lock on the inside, that it may appear as if the door was opened by herself, with a key they’ll suppose of my procuring (it being new), and left open by us.
They should conclude she is gone off by her own consent, that they may not pursue us: that they may see no hopes of tempting her back again.
Tell the family that you saw me enter a chariot with her: a dozen, or more, men on horseback, attending us; all armed; some with blunderbusses, as you believe; and that we took the quite contrary way to that we shall take.
You
must tell them that your young lady seemed to run as fast off with me, as I with her. This will also confirm to them that all pursuit is in vain. An end will be hereby put to Solmes’s hopes: and her friends, after a while, will be more studious to be reconciled to her, than to get her back. So you will be an happy instrument of great good to all round. And this will one day be acknowledged by both families. You will then be every one’s favourite: and every good servant, for the future, will be proud to be likened to honest Joseph Leman.
Your assured friend,
R. LOVELACE
Letter 97: MR LOVELACE TO JOHN BELFORD, ESQ.
St Albans, Monday night
I snatch a few moments, while my beloved is retired (as I hope, to rest), to perform my promise. No pursuit!—nor have I apprehensions of any; though I must make my charmer dread that there will be one.
And now, let me tell thee that never was joy so complete as mine! But let me inquire! is not the angel flown away?
Oh no! she is in the next apartment!—securely mine!—mine for ever!
I knew that the whole stupid family were in a combination to do my business for me. I told thee that they were all working for me, like so many underground moles; and still more blind than the moles are said to be, unknowing that they did so. I myself, the director of their principal motions; which falling in with the malice of their little hearts, they took to be all their own.
But did I say my joy was perfect? Oh no! It receives some abatement from my disgusted pride. For how can I endure to think that I owe more to her relations’ persecutions than to her favour for me? Or even, as far as I know, to her preference of me to another man?
But let me not indulge this thought. Were I to do so, it might cost my charmer dear. Let me rejoice that she has passed the Rubicon: that she cannot return: that, as I have ordered it, the flight will appear to the implacables to be altogether with her own consent: and that, if I doubt her love, I can put her to trials as mortifying to her niceness, as glorious to my pride. For, let me tell thee, dearly as I love her, if I thought there was but the shadow of a doubt in her mind whether she preferred me to any man living, I would show her no mercy.
Letter 98: MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE TO MISS HOWE
Wednesday, April 12
I will pursue my melancholy story.
Being thus hurried to the chariot, it would have been to no purpose to have refused entering into it, had he not, in my fright, lifted me in as he did: and it instantly drove away a full gallop, and stopped not till it brought us to St Albans; which was just as the day shut in.
I thought I should have fainted several times by the way. With lifted-up hands and eyes, God protect me, said I often to myself! Can it be I that am here!—my eyes running over and my heart ready to burst with sighs as involuntary as my flight.
How different, how inexpressibly different, the gay wretch; visibly triumphing (as I could not but construe his almost rapturous joy) in the success of his arts! But overflowing with complimental flourishes, yet respectfully distant his address, all the way we flew; for that, rather than galloping, was the motion of the horses; which took, as I believe, a roundabout way, to prevent being traced.
I have reason to think there were other horsemen at his devotion; three or four different persons above the rank of servants galloping by us now and then, on each side of the chariot: but he took no notice of them; and I had too much grief, mingled with indignation, notwithstanding all his blandishments, to ask any questions about them, or anything else.
Think, my dear, what were my thoughts on alighting from the chariot; having no attendant of my own sex; no clothes but what I had on, and those little suited for such a journey as I had already taken, and was still further to take: neither hood nor hat, nor anything but a handkerchief about my neck and shoulders: fatigued to death: my mind still more fatigued than my body: and in such a foam the horses, that everyone in the inn we put up at guessed (they could not do otherwise) that I was a young giddy creature who had run away from her friends.
The gentlewoman of the inn, whom he sent into me, showed me another apartment; and seeing me ready to faint, brought me hartshorn and water; and then, upon my desiring to be left alone for half an hour, retired: for I found my heart ready to burst, on revolving everything in my thoughts: and the moment she was gone, fastening the door, I threw myself into an old great chair, and gave way to a violent flood of tears; which a little relieved me.
Mr Lovelace, sooner than I wished, sent up the gentlewoman, who pressed me in his name to admit my brother, or to come down to him: for he had told her I was his sister; and that he had brought me, against my will and without warning, from a friend’s house where I had been all the winter, in order to prevent my marrying against the consent of my friends; to whom he was now conducting me; and that, having given me no time for a travelling-dress, I was greatly offended at him.
The room I was in being a bedchamber, I chose to go down, at his repeated message, attended by the gentlewoman of the inn, to that in which he was. He approached me with great respect, yet not exceeding a brotherly politeness, where a brother is polite; and, calling me his dearest sister, asked after the state of my mind; and hoped I would forgive him; for never brother half so well loved a sister, as he me.
When we were alone, he besought me (I cannot say but with all the tokens of a passionate and respectful tenderness) to be better reconciled to myself, and to him. He repeated all the vows of honour and inviolable affection that he ever made me: he promised to be wholly governed by me in every future step: he asked me to give him leave to propose, whether I chose to set out next day to either of his aunts?
I was silent. I knew not what to say, nor what to do.
Whether I chose to have private lodgings procured me, in either of those ladies’ neighbourhood, as were once my thoughts?
In lodgings, I said, anywhere, where he was not to be.
He had promised this, he owned; and he would religiously keep to his word, as soon as he found all danger of pursuit over; and that I was settled to my mind. But if the place were indifferent to me, London was the safest and the most private: and his relations should all visit me there, the moment I thought fit to admit them.
I told him I wished not to go (immediately, however, and in the frame I was in, and likely not to be out of) to any of his relations: that my reputation was concerned to have him absent from me: that, if I were in some private lodging (the meaner the less to be suspected, as it would be known that I went away by his means; and he would be supposed to have provided me handsome accommodations), it would be most suitable both to my mind and my situation: that this might be best, I should think, in the country for me; in town for him.
If he might deliver his opinion, he said, since I declined going to any of his relations, London was the only place in the world to be private in. Every newcomer in a country town or village excited a curiosity: a person of my figure (and many compliments he made me) would excite more. Even messages and letters, where none used to be brought, would occasion inquiry.
I thought myself, I said, extremely unhappy. I knew not what to determine upon: my reputation now, no doubt, utterly ruined: destitute of clothes fit to be seen by anybody: my very indigence, as I might call it, proclaiming my folly to everyone who saw me: who would suppose that I had been taken at advantage, or had given an undue one; and had no power over either my will, or my actions: that I could not but think I had been dealt artfully with: that he had seemed to have taken what he might suppose the just measure of my weakness, founded on my youth and inexperience: that I could not forgive myself for meeting him: that my heart bled for the distresses of my father and mother on this occasion: that I would give the world, and all my hopes in it, to have been still in my father’s house, whatever had been my usage: that, let him protest and vow what he would, I saw something low and selfish in his love, that he could study to put a young creature upon making
such a sacrifice of her duty and conscience: when a person actuated by a generous love must seek to oblige the object of it in everything essential to her honour, and to her peace of mind.
Forgive me, madam.... Have I not, in your own opinion, hazarded my life to redeem you from oppression?
You may glory in your fancied merits, in getting me away; but the cause of your glory, I tell you plainly, is my shame.
No more shall you need to tell me of your sufferings, and your merits!—your all hours, and all weathers! For I will bear them in memory as long as I live; and, if it be impossible for me to reward them, be ever ready to own the obligation. All that I desire of you now is to leave it to myself to seek for some private abode: to take the chariot with you to London or elsewhere: and, if I have any further occasion for your assistance and protection, I will signify it to you, and be still further obliged to you.
You are warm, my dearest life! But indeed there is no occasion for it.
Then he began again to vow the sincerity of his intentions.
But I took him up short. I am willing to believe you, sir. It would be unsupportable but to suppose there were a necessity for such solemn declarations (at this he seemed to collect himself, as I may say, into a little more circumspection). If I thought there were, I would not sit with you here, in a public inn, I assure you, although cheated hither, as far as I know, by methods (you must excuse me, sir!) that the very suspicion that it may be so gives me too much vexation for me to have patience with you or with myself.
I broke from him to write to you my preceding letter; but refused to send it by his servant, as I told you. The gentlewoman of the inn helped me to a messenger, who was to carry what you should give him to Lord M.’s seat in Hertfordshire, directed for Mrs Greme the housekeeper there. And early in the morning, for fear of pursuit, we were to set out that way: and there he proposed to exchange the chariot and six for a chaise and pair of his own, which happened to be at that seat, as it would be a less-noticed conveyance.