your kindness is not to be accepted and that the happiness your company has hitherto given us is to be repaid by but i must not trust myself with words my dear we are to part my father has recollected an engagement that takes our whole family away on monday we are going to lord s near l abbey for a fortnight explanation and apology are equally impossible i cannot attempt either my dear cried her feelings as well as she could do not be so distressed a second engagement must give way to a first i am very very sorry we are to part so soon and so suddenly too but i am not offended indeed i am not i can finish my visit here you know at any time or i hope you will come to me can you when you return from this lord s come to it will not be in my power come when you can then made no answer and s thoughts to something more directly interesting she added thinking aloud monday so soon as monday and you off go well i am certain of i shall be able to take leave however i need not go till just before you do you know do not be distressed i can go on monday very well my father and mother s having no notice of it is of very little consequence the general will send a servant with me i dare say half the way and then i shall soon be at and then i am only nine miles from home ah were it settled so it would be somewhat less intolerable though in such common attentions you would have received but half what you ought but how can i tell you to morrow morning is fixed for your leaving us and not even the hour is left to your choice the very carriage is ordered and will be here at seven o clock and no servant will be offered you sat down breathless and speechless i could hardly believe my senses when i heard it and no displeasure no resentment that you can feel at this moment however justly great can be more than i myself � but i must not talk of what i felt oh that i abbey x could suggest anything in good god what will your father and mother say after you from the protection of real friends to this almost double distance from your home to have you driven out of the house without the considerations even of decent civility dear dear in being the bearer of such a message i seem guilty myself of all its insult yet i trust you will me for you must have been long enough in this house to see that i am but a mistress of it that my real power is nothing have i offended the general said in a faltering voice alas for my feelings as a daughter all that i know all that i answer for is that you can have given him no just cause of he certainly is greatly very greatly i have seldom seen him more so his temper is not happy and something has now occurred to it in an uncommon degree some disappointment some vexation which just at this moment seems important but which i can hardly suppose you to have any concern in for how is it possible it was with pain that could speak at all and it was only for s sake that she attempted it i am sure said she i am very sorry if i have offended him it was the last thing i would willingly have done but do not be unhappy an engagement you know must be kept i am only sorry it was not recollected sooner that i might have written home but it is of very little consequence i hope i earnestly hope that to your real safety it will be of none but to everything else it is of the greatest consequence to comfort appearance propriety to your family to the world were your friends the still in bath you might go to with comparative ease a few hours would take you p l abbey there but a journey of seventy miles to be taken post by you at your age alone oh die journey is nothing do not think about that and if we are to part a few hours sooner or later you know makes no difference i can be ready by seven let me be called in time saw that she wished to be alone and believing it better for each that they should avoid any further conversation now left her with i shall see you in the morning s swelling heart needed relief in s presence friendship and pride had equally restrained her tears but no sooner was she gone than they burst forth in torrents turned from the house and in such a way without any reason that could justify any apology that could for the the nay the insolence of it henry at a distance not able even to bid him farewell every hope every expectation from him suspended at least and who could say how long who could say when they might meet again and all this by such a man as general so polite so well bred and heretofore so particularly fond of her it was as incomprehensible as it was and grievous from what it could arise and where it would end were considerations of equal perplexity and alarm the manner in which it was done so hurrying her away without any reference to her own convenience or allowing her even the appearance of choice as to the time or mode of her travelling of two days the earliest fixed on and of that almost the earliest hour as if resolved to have her gone before he was stirring in the morning that he might 