Be thy crimes upon thy head! Once
more I ask thee, Am I, or am I not, at my own liberty now?

I offered to speak in defence of the women, declaring that they really
were the very persons----

Presume not, interrupted she, base as thou art, to say one word in thine
own vindication. I have been contemplating their behaviour, their
conversation, their over-ready acquiescences, to my declarations in thy
disfavour; their free, yet affectedly-reserved light manners: and now
that the sad event has opened my eyes, and I have compared facts and
passages together, in the little interval that has been lent me, I wonder
I could not distinguish the behaviour of the unmatron-like jilt, whom
thou broughtest to betray me, from the worthy lady whom thou hast the
honour to call thy aunt: and that I could not detect the superficial
creature whom thou passedst upon me for the virtuous Miss Montague.

Amazing uncharitableness in a lady so good herself!--That the high
spirits those ladies were in to see you, should subject them to such
censures!--I do must solemnly vow, Madam----

That they were, interrupting me, verily and indeed Lady Betty Lawrance
and thy cousin Montague!--O wretch! I see by thy solemn averment [I had
not yet averred it,] what credit ought to be given to all the rest. Had
I no other proof----

Interrupting her, I besought her patient ear. 'I had found myself, I
told her, almost avowedly despised and hated. I had no hope of gaining
her love, or her confidence. The letter she had left behind her, on her
removal to Hampstead, sufficiently convinced me that she was entirely
under Miss Howe's influence, and waited but the return of a letter from
her to enter upon measures that would deprive me of her for ever: Miss
Howe had ever been my enemy: more so then, no doubt, from the contents of
the letter she had written to her on her first coming to Hampstead; that
I dared not to stand the event of such a letter; and was glad of an
opportunity, by Lady Betty's and my cousin's means (though they knew not
my motive) to get her back to town; far, at the time, from intending the
outrage which my despair, and her want of confidence in me, put me so
vilely upon'--

I would have proceeded; and particularly would have said something of
Captain Tomlinson and her uncle; but she would not hear me further. And
indeed it was with visible indignation, and not without several angry
interruptions, that she heard me say so much.

Wou