A Guardian's Protective Wisdom — Evelina, Or, the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World

Villars writes to Lady Howard on 27 May. He does not think she will be surprised that Madame Duval has been to Berry Hill. He would gladly have avoided the meeting, but after so long a journey he could not decently refuse her admittance. She came because of a letter in which he forbade Evelina to go to Paris. Very roughly she called him to account for the authority he had assumed. He declined to debate. He listened until she had tired herself, and then he asked the purport of the visit. She had come to make him give up the power she said he had usurped over her granddaughter, and she would not quit the place until she succeeded.

He spares Howard the particulars and keeps the result. When she found him firm against Paris, she insisted that Evelina live with her in London until Sir John Belmont's return. He remonstrated with all the energy he had. She lost her patience, and he his time. If he went on opposing her, she would instantly make a will and leave her fortune to strangers, though otherwise she meant her granddaughter to be her sole heiress. To him the threat seemed of little consequence. With a competency, of which Evelina is sure, his child might be as happy as with millions. The uncertainty of her future stops him. The connections she may form, the style of life she may be destined for, and the family she may belong to give the menace a weight he will not ignore. After a tedious discourse he compromised. Evelina is to pass one month with Madame Duval.

He never made a concession with so bad a grace, or so much regret. Duval's violence, her ignorance of propriety, the family she belongs to, and the company she is likely to keep are strong objections to her charge of the child. Nothing but his doubt of the right to deprive Evelina of so large a fortune would have made him listen. They parted equally discontented, she at what he refused, he at what he granted. He thanks Howard for her kindness to his ward, and he asks her to part with Evelina when Madame Duval claims the promise she has extorted.