The persons speaking sat
beneath the bank, out of sight. These persons, judging by their
voices, were Carwin and you. I will not repeat the dialogue. If
my sister was the female, Pleyel was justified in concluding you to
be indeed one of the most profligate of women. Hence his
accusations of you, and his efforts to obtain my concurrence to a
plan by which an eternal separation should be brought about between
my sister and this man."
I made Wieland repeat this recital. Here indeed was a tale to fill
me with terrible foreboding. I had vainly thought that my safety
could be sufficiently secured by doors and bars, but this is a foe
from whose grasp no power of divinity can save me! His artifices
will ever lay my fame and happiness at his mercy. How shall I
counterwork his plots or detect his coadjutor? He has taught some
vile and abandoned female to mimic my voice. Pleyel's ears were
the witnesses of my dishonor. This is the midnight assignation to
which he alluded. Thus is the silence he maintained when
attempting to open the door of my chamber, accounted for. He
supposed me absent, and meant, perhaps, had my apartment been
accessible, to leave in it some accusing memorial.
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