Page:Romance & Reality 2.pdf/138

136 miserable, every thing looked! She thought of writing to Mr. Delawarr, who had been named as her guardian, to Norville Abbey; but her head swam round—she could not see the paper before her. The noise from the servants' hall was rendered more acutely painful by her headach; for her aunt, partly with a view of annoying her niece, whom she disliked—as we always dislike those we have used ill—had left orders for a general regale. Most of the establishment were new. Mr. Arundel had pensioned off his few more ancient domestics; and his wife was not one whose service was a heritage. There was hence little to restrain their mirth or their intemperance. Loud bursts of laughter sounded through the hall. Emily rose to ring the bell, but sank down quite insensible. Something she remembered of partial revival, of motion in a carriage, of being conveyed to bed; but it was not till after some hours of stupor that she revived sufficiently to recognise her French bed at Norville Abbey, and Lady Mandeville bending anxiously over her pillow. Ill news travel fast; and Mrs. Arundel's marriage was like the sun in the child's riddle, for it went "round each house, and round each