"
She asked me, who that pretty genteel Miss was?--I said, a relation of
Lord Davers, who was entrusted lately to my care. "Then, Miss," said
her ladyship, and kissed her, "you are very happy."
Believing the Countess was desirous of being alone with me, I said,
"My dear Miss Goodwin, won't you go to your little nursery, my love?"
for so she calls my last blessing--"You'd be sorry the baby should cry
for you." For she was so taken with the charming lady, that she was
loth to leave us--But, on my saying this, withdrew.
When we were alone, the Countess began her story, with a sweet
confusion, which added to her loveliness. She said she would be
brief, because she should exact all my attention, and not suffer me
to interrupt her till she had done. She began with acknowledging, that
she thought, when she first saw Mr. B. at the masquerade, that he was
the finest gentleman she had ever seen; that the allowed freedoms of
the place had made her take liberties in following him, and engaging
him wherever he went. She blamed him very freely for passing for a
single man; for that, she said, since she had so splendid a fortune
of her own, was all she was solicitous about; having never, as she
confessed, seen a man she could like so well; her former marriage
having been in some sort forced upon her, at an age when she knew not
how to distinguish; and that she was very loth to believe him married,
even when she had no reason to doubt it.
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