Mr. Horton went to see her every day--felt the feeble little
pulse which seemed hardly to have force enough to beat--urged her to
struggle against apathy and inertia, to walk a little, to go for a long
drive every day, to live in the open air--to which instructions she paid
not the slightest attention. The desire for life was gone. Disappointed
in her ambition, betrayed in her love, humiliated, duped, degraded--a
social failure. What had she to live for? She felt as if it would have
been a good thing, quite the best thing that could happen, if she could
turn her face to the wall and die. All that past season, its triumphs,
its pleasures, its varieties, was like a garish dream, a horror to look
back upon, hateful to remember.
In vain did Mary and Hartfield urge Lesbia to join in their simple
pleasures, their walks and rides and drives, and boating excursions. She
always refused.
'You know I never cared much for roaming about these everlasting hills,'
she told Mary. 'I never had your passion for Lakeland. It is very good
of you to wish to have me, but it is quite impossible.
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