The Garden Confrontation Reveals All — Evelina, Or, the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World

Evelina watches Lord Orville walking in the garden and will not go down until breakfast is ready. His compliments are then almost as cold as Lady Louisa's. Mrs. Beaumont, Lady Louisa, and Mrs. Selwyn talk as usual. Evelina sits disregarded, silent, and melancholy, like a cypher, whom, to nobody belonging, by nobody was noticed. She cannot bear the neglect. The moment the meal ends she leaves, and Sir Clement Willoughby, flying into the hall, stops her. He will neither leave her nor let her pass. She returns to the parlour because anything is better than remaining alone with him. Later she quits Mrs. Selwyn to saunter in the garden, finds the garden-gate open, and goes into an arbour. Willoughby is there. She would leave. He prevents her. His compliments swell into cruelty about the women of the house: Mrs. Beaumont laughed at, Lady Louisa ridiculed, Mrs. Selwyn hated, and Evelina's perfections blamed for making their faults glare. When she tries to go, he flings himself at her feet.

Lord Orville comes upon them and tells Sir Clement he cannot wish to detain Miss Anville by force. What the two men say next, Evelina learns because Mrs. Selwyn walks toward the arbour and stays within hearing. Willoughby treats a warm interest in Evelina as something that belongs to a father, a brother, or a lover. Orville owns that he has no such title, yet he has the warmest wishes to serve her and to see her happy. He says she is peculiarly situated, very young, and very inexperienced, and that what looked strange in her was inexperience, timidity, and a retired education. Her modest worth and fearful excellence, he says, need time. He asks whether such a young lady is a proper object to trifle with. Willoughby answers that he would fix upon her for a wife, and then draws back from a connection with a girl of obscure birth, whose only dowry is her beauty, and who is in a state of dependency. Orville will not discuss the point further. Selwyn, finding Evelina is not in danger, retires and later tells her what she heard.

At dinner Willoughby is absent and uneasy, watching Evelina and watching Orville. She turns from him with undisguised disdain. Not once does she dare meet Orville's eyes. All consciousness herself, she dreads his penetration, and she directs her own every way but towards his. She does not quit Mrs. Selwyn for the rest of the day. Tomorrow she expects Villars's directions, whether she is to return to Berry Hill, or once more to visit London.