"Why then do you look at me so incredulously?" continued Rosabella; "I can have no motive for deceiving you; and yet you look as suspicious as though you thought I had. I own my behaviour towards you is changed; but remember the different circumstances in which I am now placed. Formerly I feared even to speak to you, lest my words should be deemed an encouragement of the pretensions I supposed you to entertain to my hand. Now that we are both free, that reason no longer exists; and besides, I feel grateful to you for declaring your sentiments so openly, and thus saving me from my uncle's displeasure. 'Can any thing be more simple?' as your friend Dr. Entwerfen would say."
Notwithstanding Rosabella's apparent openness, however, and the plausible reasons she gave for her conduct, Edric could not divest himself of the idea that she wished to get him out of the kingdom as speedily as possible, for some other motives than those she thought proper to avow. There likewise appeared some mystery in her speaking so confidently of the assistance of
