'And Honor comes, a pilgrim gray,To deck the turf that wraps his clay.'
'And Honor comes, a pilgrim gray,To deck the turf that wraps his clay.'
"I did not think of paying this tribute to his memory; but that scene was so indelibly stamped on my mind, I could not help delineating it. It was then and there I first beheld your father.
"The barge was rowed by eight soldiers, dressed in uniform, and their oars all dipped and flashed with simultaneous motion. Nothing could be more harmoniously beautiful; but the restless spirit of Mrs. Lynn suggested a change.
"'Raise the sail,' she exclaimed, 'this is too monotonous. I prefer it a thousand times to rowing.'
"'I beg, I entreat, madam,' cried I, unable to repress my apprehensions, 'do not have it done now. I am very foolish, but I cannot help it, indeed I cannot.'
"I was not accustomed to the water as she was, having been absent so long; and even when a child, I had an unconquerable dread of sailing. She knew this, and it prompted her suggestion.
"'Affectation of fear may be pardoned in achild, Rosalie,' said she, with a sarcastic smile, 'but it is nevertheless very unbecoming.'
"'Do not indulge one apprehension,' exclaimed St. James, stepping over one of the seats and sitting down at my side. 'I am one of the best sailors in the world.Non timui—Cæsarem vehis.Give the sails to the winds, boys. I will make them my vassals.'
"His eyes beamed with conscious power, as the white sheet unrolled and swelled gracefully in the breeze. It was strange, all my fears were gone, and I felt as serene a confidence as if his vaunting words were true. The strong will, the magic smile were acting on me like a spell, and I yielded unresistingly to their influence.
"Mrs. Lynn would gladly have revoked her commands, since they had called forth such an expression of interest for me; but the boat swept on with triumphant speed, and even I participated in the exhilaration of its motion. Just before we reached the shore, Mrs. Lynn bent forward and took the flowers from the hand of St. James before he was aware of her design.
"'Is that mignonette which is so oppressively fragrant?' she asked, lifting the bouquet to her nose. She was seated near the side of the barge, and her head was gracefully inclined. Whether from accident or design, I think it was the latter, the flowers dropped into the river.
"In the flashing of an eye-glance, St. James leaped over the boat side, seized the flowers, held them up in triumph over his head, and swam to the shore. He stood there with dripping garments and smiling lips as we landed, while the paleness of terror still blanched my face, and its agitation palpitated in my heart.
"'I must deny myself the pleasure of escorting you to the threshold,' said he, glancing at me, while he shook the brine-drops from his arms. His head had not been submerged. He had held that royally above the waves. 'But,' added he, with graceful gallantry, 'I have rescued a trophy which I had silently vowed to guard with my life;—a treasure doubly consecrated by the touch of valor and the hand of beauty.'
"'Well,' exclaimed Mrs. Lynn, as soon as we were at home, tossing her bonnet disdainfully on the sofa, 'if I ever was disgusted with boldness and affectation I have been to-day. But one thing let me tell you, Miss Rosalie, if you cannot learn more propriety of manners, if you make such sickening efforts to attract the attention of strangers, I will never allow you to go in public, at least in company with me.'
"I was perfectly thunderstruck. She had never given such an exhibition of temper before. I had always thought her cold and selfish, but she seemed to have a careless good-nature, which did not prepare me for this ebullition of passion. I did not reflect that this was the first time I had clashed with her interests,—that inordinate vanity is the parent of envy, hatred, and all uncharitableness.
"I did not attempt to reply, but hastily turned to leave the room. She had been my father's wife, and the sacredness ofhisname shielded her from disrespect.
"'Stop, Miss,' she cried, 'and hear what I have to say. If Mr. St. James calls this evening, you are not to make your appearance. He was only making sport of your childishness to-day, and cares no more for you than the sands of the sea-shore. He is no company for you, I assure you. He is a gentleman of the world, and has no taste for the bread and butter misses just let loose from a boarding-school. Do you hear me?'
"'I do, madam.'
"'Do you mean to obey?'
"'I do, madam.'
"I will not attempt to describe my feelings that night as I sat alone in my room, and heard the voice of St. James mingling with my step-mother's, which was modulated to its sweetest, most seductive tone. The desolateness of my future life spread out before me. A home without love! Oh, what dreariness! Oh, what iciness! Had my father lived, how different it would have been. I thought of the happy vacation, when he opened his warm heart and took me in, and then I wept to think how cold the world seemed since he had left it.
"It was a midsummer's night, and all the windows were open to admit the sea-born breeze. They were open, but bars of gauze wire were put up at the windows and doors to exclude the mosquitos. A very small balcony opened out of my room, where I usually sat listening to the inspiring strains of the band, that, marching on the ramparts, sent their rich, thrilling notes in rolling echoes over the moonlight waves.
"It was playing now, that martial band, and the bay was one sheet of burning silver. I had never seen it look so resplendently beautiful, and I could not help thinking that beneath that gently rippling glory, there was peace for the sad and persecuted heart. As I sat there leaning on the railing, gazing into the shining depths of ocean, St. James passed. It was very early in the evening. Why had he left so soon? He started, paused, turned, and approached the balcony.
"'Why are you so cruel as to refuse to see me, after showing such knightly devotion to your cause?' he asked, leaning on the side of the balcony and looking earnestly in my face, on which the tear-drops were still glittering.
"'I have not refused,' I answered hastily, 'but do not wait to talk with me now. Mrs. Lynn would be much displeased; she would consider it very improper. I pray you not to think me rude, but indeed I must retire.'
"I rose in an agony of terror, lest my step-mother should hear his voice, and wreak her wrath on me.
"'Fear not,' he cried, catching my hand and detaining me. 'She is engaged with company, who will not hasten away as I have done. I will not stay long, nor utter one syllable that is not in harmony with the holy tranquillity of the hour. I am a stranger in name, but is there not something that tells you I was born to be your friend? I know there is,—I see it in your ingenuous, confiding eye. Only answer me one question,—Was it yourown will, or the will of another that governed your actions to-night?'
"'The will of another,' I answered. 'Let that be a sufficient reason for urging your departure. If I am forbidden to see you in the parlor, I shall certainly be upbraided for speaking with you here.'
"It was very imprudent in me to speak so freely of my step-mother's conduct. No questions of his should have drawn from me such an assertion. But I was so young and inexperienced, and I had been goaded almost to madness by her stinging rebukes. It was natural that I should wish to vindicate myself from the charge of rudeness her misrepresentations would bring against me.
"'I find you in sadness and tears,' said he, in a low, gentle tone; so low it scarcely rose above the murmuring waves. 'They should not be the companions of beauty and youth. Let me be your friend,—let me teach you how to banish them.'
"'No, no,' I cried, frightened at my own boldness in continuing the conversation so long. 'You are not my friend, or you would not expose me to censure. Indeed you are not.'
"'I am gone; but tell me one thing,—you are not a prisoner?'
"'O no; heaven forbid.'
"'You walk on the ramparts.'
"'Sometimes.'
"'Adieu,—we shall meet again.'
"He was gone, and sweetly lingered in my ear the echo of his gently persuasive voice. He had vanished like the bark that had just glided along the waters, and like that had left a wake of brightness behind.
"I could not sleep. Excitement kept me wakeful and restless. I heard the measured tread of the sentinel walking his 'lonely round,' and it did not sound louder than the beating of my own heart. Hark! a soft, breezy sound steals up just beneath my window. It is the vibration of the guitar,—a deeptoned, melodious voice accompanies it. It is the voice of St. James. He sings, and the strains fall upon the stilly night, soft as the silver dew.
"Gabriella, I told you with my dying lips never to unseal this manuscript till you were awakened to woman's destiny,—love. If you do not sympathize with my emotions, lay it down, my child, the hour is not yet come. If you have never heard a voice, whose faintest tones sink into the lowest depths of your soul,—if you have never met a glance, whose lightning rays penetrate to the innermost recesses of the heart, reseal these pages. The feelings with which you cannot sympathize will seem weakness and folly, and a daughter must not scorn a mother's bosom record.
"Remember how lonely, how unfriended I was. The only eye that had beamed on me with love was closed in death, the only living person on whom I had any claims was cruel and unkind. Blame me not that I listened to a stranger's accents, that I received his image into my heart, that I enthroned it there, and paid homage to the kingly guest.
"It is in vain to linger thus. I met him again and again. I learned to measure time and space by one line—where hewas, and where he wasnot. I learned to bear harshness, jeering, and wrong, because a door of escape was opened, and the roses of paradise seemed blushing beyond. I suffered him to be my friend—lover—husband."
I dropped the manuscript that I might clasp my hands in an ecstasy of gratitude—
"My God,—I thank thee!" I exclaimed, sinking on my knees, and repeating the emphatic words: "friend—lover-husband." "God of my mother, forgive my dark misgivings."
Now I could look up. Now I could hold the paper with a firm hand. There was nothing in store that I could not bear to hear, no misfortune I had not courage to meet. Alas! alas!
"Yes," continued my mother; "we were married within heaven dedicated walls by a man of God, and the blessing of the holy, blessed, and glorious Trinity was pronounced upon our union. Remember this, my dearly beloved child, remember that in the bosom of the church, surrounded by all the solemnities of religion, with the golden ring, the uttered vow, and on bended knee, I was wedded to Henry Gabriel St. James.
"My step-mother refused to be present. She had sufficient regard to the world's opinion to plead indisposition as an excuse; but it was a false one. She never forgave me for winning the love of the man whom she had herself resolved to charm, and from the hour of our introduction to the day of my marriage, my life was clouded by the gloom of her ill temper.
"We immediately departed for New York, where St. James resided, and our bridal home was adorned with all the elegancies which classic taste could select, and prodigal love lavish upon its idol. I was happy then, beyond the dream of imagination. St. James was the fondest, the kindest, the tenderest—O my God! must I add—the falsest of human beings? I did not love him then—I worshipped, I adored him. I have told you that my childish imagination was fed by wild, impassioned romances, and I had made to myself an ideal image, round which, like the maid of France, I hung the garlands of fancy, and knelt before its shrine.
"Whatever has been my after fate, I have known the felicity of loving in all its length and breadth and strength. And he, too, loved me passionately, devotedly. Strong indeed must have been the love that triumphed over principle, honor, and truth, that broke the most sacred of human ties, and dared the vengeance of retributive Heaven.
"St. James was an artist. He was not dependent entirely on his genius for his subsistence, though his fortune was not large enough to enable him to live in splendid indolence. He had been in Europe for the last few years, wandering amid the ruins of Italy, studying the grand old masters, summering in the valleys of Switzerland, beneath the shadow of its mountain heights, and polishing his bold, masterly sketches among the elegant artists of Paris.
"With what rapture I listened to his glowing descriptions of foreign lands, and what beautiful castles we built where we were to dwell together in the golden clime of Italy or the sunny bowers of France!
"At length, my Gabriella, you were given to my arms, and the deep, pure fountain of a mother's love welled in my youthful bosom. But my life was wellnigh a sacrifice to yours. For weeks it hung trembling on a thread slender and weak as the gossamer's web. St. James watched over me, as none but guardian angels could watch, and I had another faithful and devoted nurse, our good and matchless Peggy. To her unsleeping vigilance, her strong heart and untiring arm, I owe in a great measure the restoration of my health, or rather the preservation of my life; my health was never entirely renovated.
"When you were about five or six months old, St. James came to me with a troubled countenance. He was summoned away, very unexpectedly. He would probably be obliged to go as far as Texas before his return; he might be absent a month. Business of a perplexing nature, which it was impossible to explain then, called him from me, but he would shorten as much as possible the days of absence which would be dreary and joyless to him. I was overwhelmed with grief at the thought of his leaving me; my nerves were still weak, and I wept in all the abandonment of sorrow. I feared for him the dangers that beset the path of the traveller—sickness, death; but I feared not for his honor or truth. I relied upon his integrity, as I did upon the promises of the Holy Scriptures. I did hot urge him to explain the motives of his departure, satisfied that they were just and honorable.
"Oh! little did I think,—when he clasped me in a parting embrace when he committed us both so tenderly and solemnly to the guardianship of our Heavenly Father,—little did I think I should so soon seek to rend him from my heart as a vile, accursed monster; that I should shrink from the memory of his embraces as from the coils of the serpent, the fangs of the wolf. God in his mercy veils the future, or who could bear the burden of coming woe!
"A few days after his departure, as I was seated in the nursery, watching your innocent witcheries as you lay cradled in the lap of Peggy, I was told a lady wished to see me. It was too early an hour for fashionable calls, and I went into the parlor expecting to meet one of those ministering spirits, who go about on errands of mercy, seeking the aid of the rich for the wants of the poor.
"A lady was standing with her back to the door, seemingly occupied in gazing at a picture over the mantel-piece, an exquisite painting of St. James. Her figure was slight and graceful, and she struck me at once as having a foreign air. She turned round at my entrance, exhibiting a pale and agitated countenance; a countenance which though not beautiful, was painfully interesting. She had a soft olive complexion, and a full melancholy black eye, surcharged with tears.
"I motioned her to a seat, for I could not speak. Her agitation was contagious, and I waited in silent trepidation to learn the mystery of her emotion.
"'Forgave me this intrusion,' said she, in hesitating accents; 'you look so young, so innocent, so lovely, my heart misgives me. I cannot, I dare not.'
"She spoke in French, a language of which I was mistress, and I recognized at once the land of her birth. She paused, as if unable to proceed, while I sat, pale and cold as marble, wondering what awful revelation she would, but dared not make. Had she come to tell me of my husband's death,—was my first agonized thought, and I faintly articulated,—
"'My husband!'
"'Yourhusband! Poor, deluded young creature. Alas! alas! I can forgive him for deserting me, but not for deceiving and destroying you.'
"I started to my feet with a galvanic spring. My veins tingled as if fire were running through them, and my hair rose, startling with electric horror. I grasped her arm with a force she might have felt through covering steel, and looking her steadfastly in the face, exclaimed,—
"'Heismy husband; mine in the face of God and man. He ismyhusband, and the father of my child. I will proclaim it in the face of earth and heaven. I will proclaim it till my dying day. How dare you come to me with slanders so vile, false, unprincipled woman?'
"She recoiled a few steps from me, and held up her deprecating hands.
"'Have pity upon me, for I am very wretched,' she cried; 'were it not for my child I would die in silence and despair, rather than rouse you from your fatal dream, but I cannot see him robbed of his rights. I cannot see another usurping the name and place he was born to fill. Madam,' continued she, discarding her supplicating tone, and speaking with dignity and force, 'I am no false, unprincipled woman, inventing tales which I cannot corroborate. I am a wife, as pure in heart, as upright in purpose as you can be,—a mother as tender. Forsaken by him whom in spite of my wrongs I still too fondly love, I have left my native land, crossed the ocean's breadth, come a stranger to a strange country, that I might appeal to you for redress, and tell you that if you still persist in calling him your own, it will be in defiance of the laws of man and the canons of the living God.'
"As she thus went on, her passions became roused, and flashed and darkened in her face with alternations so quick they mocked the sight. She spoke with the rapid tongue and impressive gesticulation of her country, and God's truth was stamped on every word. I felt it,—I knew it. She was no base, lying impostor. She was a wronged and suffering woman;—and he,—the idol of my soul,—the friend, lover,husbandof my youth,—no, no! he could not be a villain! She was mad,—ha, ha,—she was mad! Bursting into a wild, hysteric laugh, I sunk back on the sofa, repeating,—
"'Poor thing, she is mad! I wonder I did not know it sooner.'
"'No, madam, I am not mad,' she cried, in calmer tones; 'I sometimes wish I were. I am in the full possession of my reason, as I can abundantly prove. But little more than three years since, I was married to Gabriel Henry St. James, in Paris, my native city, and here is the certificate which proves the truth of my assertion.'
"Taking a paper from her pocket-book, she held it towards me, so that I could read the writing, still retaining it in her own hand. I did not blame her,—oh, no! I should have done the same. I saw, what seemed blazing in fire, the names of Henry Gabriel St. James and Therésa Josephine La Fontaine united in marriage by the usual formula of the church.
"I did not attempt to snatch it from her, or to destroy the fatal paper. I gazed upon it till the characters swelled out like black chords, and writhed in snaky convolutions.
"'Do you recognize this?' she asked, taking from her bosom a gold case, and touching a spring. It flew open and revealed the handsome features of St. James, beaming with the same expression as when I first beheld him, an expression I remembered but too well. She turned it in the case, and I saw written on the back in gold letters, 'For my beloved wife, Therésa Josephine.'
"It was enough. The certificate might be a forgery, her tale a lie; but this all but breathing picture, these indubitable words, were proofs of blasting power. Cold, icy shiverings ran through my frame,—a cold, benumbing weight pressed down my heart,—a black abyss opened before me,—the earth heaved and gave way beneath me. With a shriek that seemed to breathe out my life, I fell forward at the feet of her whom I had so guiltlessly wronged."
Thus far had I read, with clenching teeth and rigid limbs, and brow on which chill, deadly drops were slowly gathering, when my mother's shriek seemed suddenly to ring in my ears,—the knell of a broken heart, a ruined frame,—and I sprang up and looked wildly round me. Where was I? Who was I?
Were the heavens turned to brass and the sun to blood, or was yon saffron belt the gold of declining day,—yon crimson globe, the sun rolling through a hazy, sultry atmosphere? What meant that long green mound stretching at my side, that broken shaft, twined with the cypress vine? I clasped both hands over my temples, as these questions drifted through my mind, then bending my knees, I sunk lower and lower, till my head rested on the grave. I was conscious of but one wish—to stay there and die. The bolt of indelible disgrace quivered in my heart; why should I wish to live?
I did not become insensible, but I was dead to surrounding objects, dead to the present, dead to the future. The past, the terrible, the inexorable past, was upon me, trampling me, grinding me with iron heel, into the dust of the grave. I could not move, for its nightmare weight crushed me. I could not see, for its blackness shrouded me; nor hear, for its shrieks deafened me. Had I remained long in that awful condition, I should have become a maniac.
"Gabriella!" said a voice, which at any other moment would have wakened a thrill of rapture, "Gabriella, speak,—look up. Why do you do this? Why will you not speak? Do you not hear me?"
I did try to speak, but my tongue seemed frozen. I did try to lift my head, but in vain.
Ernest Linwood, for it was he, knelt down by me, and putting his arms round me, raised me from the ground, without any volition of my own. I know not what state I was in. I was perfectly conscious; but had no more power over the movement of a muscle than if I were dead. My eyes were closed, and my head drooped on his breast, as he raised me, bowed by its own weight. I was in a kind of conscious catalepsy. He was alarmed, terrified. As he afterwards told me, he really believed me dead, and clasping me to him with an energy of which he was not aware, adjured me in the most tender and passionate manner to speak and tell him that I lived.
"Gabriella, my flower-girl, my darling!" he cried, pressing my cheek with those pure, despairing kisses with which love hallows death. Had I indeed passed the boundaries of life, for my spirit alone was conscious of caresses, whose remembrance thrilled through my being.
The reaction was instantaneous. The chilled blood grew warm and rushed through every vein with wild rapidity. Then I became physically conscious, and glowing with confusion I raised myself from my reclining position, and attempted to look up into the face of Ernest. But I could not do it. Contending emotions deprived me of the power of self-command.
"This is madness, Gabriella! This is suicide!" he exclaimed, lifting me from the grave, and still supporting me with his arm. "Why do you come here to nurse a grief so far beyond the limits of reason and religion? Why do you give your friends such exquisite pain, yourself such unnecessary misery?"
"Do not reproach me," I cried. "You know not what cause I have for anguish and despair."
"Despair, Gabriella! You cannot know the meaning of that word. Despair belongs to guilt, and even that is not hopeless. And why do you come to this lone place of graves to weep, as if human sympathy were denied to your sorrows? Is not my mother kind,—is not Edith tender and affectionate? Am not I worthy to be trusted, as a friend,—a protector,—a redresser; and if need be, an avenger of wrongs?"
"My own wrongs I might reveal; but those of the dead are sacred," I answered, stooping down and gathering up the manuscript, which was half concealed in the long, damp grass. "But do not think me ungrateful. What I owe to your mother and Edith words can never tell. In every prayer I breathe to heaven I shall call down blessings on their head. And you too,—you have been more than kind. I never can forget it."
"If it be not too presumptuous, I will unite your name with theirs, and pray that God may bless you, now and ever more."
"This will never do," said he, drawing me forcibly from the mournful place. "Youmustconfide in my mother, Gabriella. A dark secret is a plague spot in the heart. Confide in my mother. It is due to her maternal love and guardianship. And beware of believing that any thing independentof yourselfcan alienate her affections. Can you walk? If it were not for leaving you alone, I would go and return with the carriage."
"Oh, yes; I am quite well and strong again."
"Then lean on me, Gabriella. Shrink not from an arm which would gladly protect you from every danger and every wrong. Let us hasten, lest I utter words which I would not for worlds associate with a scene so cold and sad. Not where the shadow of death falls—no—not here."
He hurried me through the gate, and then paused.
"Rest here a moment," said he, "and recover your composure. We may meet with those who would wonder to see you thus, with your hair wildly flowing, your scarf loose and disordered."
"Thank you," I exclaimed, my thoughts coming to the surface, and resting there with shame. I had forgotten that my bonnet was in my hand, that my comb had fallen, leaving my hair loose and dishevelled. Gathering up its length, and twisting it in thick folds around my head, I confined it with my bonnet, and smoothing my thin scarf, I took his arm in silence, and walked on through the purple gloom of twilight that deepened before us. Slight shivers ran through my frame. The dampness of the grave-yard clung to me, and the night dews were beginning to fall.
"Are you cold, Gabriella?" he asked, folding my light mantle more closely round me. "You are not sufficiently protected from the dewy air. You are weary and chill. You do not lean on me. You do not confide in me."
"In whom should I confide, then? Without father, brother, or protector, in whom should I confide, if ungrateful and untrusting I turn from you?"
As I said this, I suffered my arm to rest more firmly on his, for my steps were indeed weary, and we were now ascending the hill. My heart was deeply touched by his kindness, and the involuntary ejaculations he uttered, the involuntary caresses he bestowed, when he believed me perfectly unconscious, were treasured sacredly there. We were now by the large elm-tree that shaded the way-side, beneath whose boughs I had so often paused to gaze on the valley below. Without speaking, he led me to this resting-place, and we both looked back, as wayfarers are wont to do when they stop in an ascending path.
Calmly the shadows rested on the landscape, softly yet darkly they rolled down the slope of the neighboring hills and the distant mountains. In thin curlings, the gray smoke floated upwards and lay slumberously among the fleecy clouds. Here and there a mansion, lifted above the rest, shed from its glowing windows the reflection of departing day. Bright on the dusky gold of the west the evening-star shone and throbbed, like a pure love-thought in the heart of night; and, dimly glimmering above the horizon, the giant pen seemed writing the Mene Tekel of my clouded destiny on the palace walls of heaven.
As we thus stood, lifted above the valley, involved in shadows, silent and alone, I could hear the beating of my heart, louder and louder in the breathing stillness.
"Gabriella!" said Ernest, in a low voice, and thatmaster-chordwhich no hand but his had touched, thrilled at the sound. "If the spot on which we stand were a desert island, and the valley stretching around us the wide waste of ocean, and we the only beings in the solitude of nature, with your hand thus clasped in mine, and my heart thus throbbing near, with a love so strong, so deep, it would be to you in place of the whole world beside,—tell me, could you be happy?"
"I could," was the low, irresistible answer; and my soul, like an illuminated temple, flashed with inward light. I covered my eyes to keep in the dazzling rays. I forgot the sad history of wrongs and disgrace which I had just been perusing;—I forgot that such words had breathed into my mother's ear, and that she believed them. I only remembered that Ernest Linwood loved me, andthatlove surrounded me with a luminous atmosphere, in which joy and hope fluttered their heavenly wings.
How slight a thing will change the current of thought! I caught a glimpse of the granite walls of Grandison Place, and darkened by the shades, they seemed to frown upon me with their high turret and lofty colonnade, so ancestral and imposing. Then I remembered Mrs. Linwood and Edith,—then I remembered my mother, myfather, and all the light went out in my heart.
"I had forgotten,—oh, how much I had forgotten," I cried, endeavoring to release myself from the arm that only tightened its hold. "Your mother never would forgive my presumption if she thought,—if she knew."
"My mother loves you; but even if she did not, I am free to act, free to choose, as every man should be. I love andreveremy mother, but there is a passion stronger than filial love and reverence, which goes on conquering and to conquer. She will not, she cannot oppose me."
"But Edith, dear Edith, who loves you so devotedly! She will hate me if I dare to supplant her."
"A sister never can be supplanted,—and least of all such a sister as Edith, Gabriella. If you do not feel that love so expands, so enlarges the heart, that it makes room for all the angels in heaven, you could not share my island home."
"If you knew all,—if I could tell you all," I cried,—and again I felt the barbed anguish that prostrated me at the grave,—"and youshallknow,—your generous love demands this confidence. When your mother has read the history of my parentage, I will place it in your hands; though my mother's character is as exalted and spotless as your own, there is a cloud over my name that will for ever rest upon it. Knowingthat, you cannot, you will not wish to unite your noble, brilliant destiny with mine. This hour will be remembered as a dream, a bright, but fleeting dream."
"What do I care for the past?" he exclaimed, detaining me as I endeavored to move on. "Talk not of a clouded name. Will not mine absorb it? What shaft of malice can pierce you, with my arm as a defence, and my bosom as a shield? Gabriella, it is you that I love, not the dead and buried past. You are the representative of all present joy and hope. I ask for nothing but your love,—your exclusive, boundless love,—a love that will be ready to sacrifice every thing but innocence and integrity for me,—that will cling to me in woe as in weal, in shame as in honor, in death as in life. Such is the love I give; and such I ask in return. Is it mine? Tell me not of opposing barriers; only tell me what your heart this moment dictates; forgetful of the past, regardless of the future? Is this love mine?"
"It is," I answered, looking up through fast-falling tears. "Why will you wring this confession from me, when you only know it too well?"
"One question more, Gabriella, for your truth-telling lips to answer. Is this love only given inreturn? Did it not spring spontaneously forth from the warmth and purity of your own heart, without waiting the avowal of mine? Gratitude is not love. It isstone, not bread, to a spirit as exacting as mine."
Again the truth was forced from me by his unconquerable will,—a will that opened the secret valves of thought, and rolled away the rock from the fountain of feeling. Even then I felt the despotism as well as the strength of his love.
I cannot, I dare not, repeat all that he uttered. It would be deemed too extravagant, too high-wrought. And so it was. Let woman tremble rather than exult, when she is the object of a passion so intense. The devotion of her whole being cannot satisfy its inordinate demands. Though the flame of the sacrifice ascend to heaven, it still cries, "Bring gifts to the altar,—bring the wine of the banquet,—the incense of the temple,—the fuel of the hearth-stone. Bring all, and still I crave. Give all, I ask for more."
Not then was this warning suggested. To be wildly, passionately loved, was my heart's secret prayer. Life itself would be a willing sacrifice to this devotion. Suspicion that stood sentinel at the door of Faith, Distrust that threw its shadow over the sunshine of truth, and Jealousy, doubting, yet adoring still, would be welcomed as household guests, if the attendants of this impassioned love. Such was the dream of my girlhood.
When we entered the lawn, lights began to glimmer in the house. I trembled at the idea of meeting Mrs. Linwood, or the Amazonian Meg. There was a side door through which I might pass unobserved, and by this ingress I sought my chamber and locked the door. A lamp was burning on the table. Had I lingered abroad so late? Had the absence of Ernest been observed?
I sat down on the side of the bed, threw off my bonnet and scarf, shook my hair over my shoulders, and pushed it back with both hands from my throbbing temples. I wanted room. Such crowding thoughts, such overflowing emotions, could not be compressed in those four walls. I rose and walked the room back and forth, without fear of being over-heard, on the soft carpet of velvet roses. What revelations had been made known to me since I had quitted that room! How low I had been degraded,—how royally exalted! A child unentitled to her father's name!—a maiden, endowed with a princely heart! I walked as one in a dream, doubting my own identity. But one master thought governed every other.
"He loves me!" I repeated to myself. "Ernest Linwood loves me! Whatever be the future, that present bliss is mine. I have tasted woman's highest, holiest joy,—the joy of loving and being beloved. Sorrow and trial may be mine; but this remembrance will remain, a blessed light through the darkness of time,—'a star on eternity's ocean.'"
As I passed and repassed the double mirror, my reflected figure seemed an apparition gliding by my side, I paused and stood before one of them, and I thought of the time when, first awakened to the consciousness of personal influence, I gazed on my own image. Some writer has said, "that every woman is beautiful when she loves." There certainly is a light, coming up from the enkindled heart, bright as the solar ray, yet pure and soft as moonlight, which throws an illusion over the plainest features and makes them for the moment charming. I saw the flower-girl of the library in the mirror, and then I knew that the artist had intended her as the idealization of Love's image.
And then I remembered the morning when we sat together in the library, and he took the roses from my basket and scattered the leaves at my feet.
A thundering rap at the door startled my meditations. I knew there was but one pair of knuckles in the house capable of beating such a tattoo, and I recoiled from admitting such a boisterous guest.
"Gabriella, Gabriella!" rung a voice through the passage. "Are you asleep? Are you dead? Open the door, pray, or I shall kill myself squeezing in through the key-hole."
With a deep sigh of vexation, I opened the door, and she sprang in with the momentum of a ball hurled by a bat.
"My dear creature!" she exclaimed, catching me round the waist and turning me to the light, "whathaveyou been doing? wherehaveyou been staying? Ill!—tired!—it is all a sham. He need not try to impose on me such a story as that. I never saw you look so brilliantly well. Your cheeks and lips are red like the damask rose, and your eyes,—I never saw such eyes before. Come here and look in the glass. Ill!—ha, ha!"
"I have been ill," I answered, shrinking from her reckless hand, "and I was very tired; I feel better now."
"Yes, I should think you did. You rested long enough by the way, Heaven knows; we saw you climbing the hill at sunset, and the lamps were lighted before you came in. I was going after you, but Mrs. Linwood would not let me. Ah! you have animated the statue, thou modern Pygmaliona. You have turned back into flesh this enchanted man of stone. Tell it in Gath, publish it in Askelon; but the daughters of fashion will mourn, the tribes of the neglected will envy."
"I cannot match you in brilliant speeches, Miss Melville."
"Call me Miss Melville again, if you dare. Call me Madge, or Meg; but as sure as you mount the stilts of ceremony, I will whisk you off at the risk of breaking your neck. Hark! there is the supper bell. Come, just as you are. You never looked so charming. That wild flow of the hair is perfectly bewitching. I don't wonder Mr. Invincible has grounded his weapons, not I. If I were a young man,—ha, ha!"
"I sometimes fear you are," I cried. At this remark she burst into such a wild fit of laughter, I thought she never would cease. It drowned the ringing of the bell, and still kept gushing over afresh.
"Ask Mrs. Linwood to excuse me from supper," said I; "I do not wish any, indeed I do not."
Well, I am not one of the air plants; I must have something more substantial than sentiment, or I should pine with green and yellow hunger, not melancholy. I never cried but once, that I recollect, and that was when a favorite black cat of mine was killed,—maliciously, villanously killed, by an old maid, just because she devoured her favorite Canary. No, with the daughter of Jephthah, I exclaimed,—
'Let my memory still be thy pride,And forget not I smiled as I died.'
'Let my memory still be thy pride,And forget not I smiled as I died.'
Shutting, or rather slamming the door, she bounded down the stairs with the steps of the chamois.
I had not finished my mother's history, but I had passed thebreakers. There could be nothing beyond so fearful and wrecking. The remainder was brief, and written at times with a weak and failing hand.
"How long I remained in that deadly swoon," continued the manuscript, "I know not. When I recovered, I was lying on my bed, with Peggy standing on one side and a physician on the other. As soon as I looked up, Peggy burst into tears.
"'Thank God!' she sobbed, 'I thought she was dead.'
"'Hush!' said the doctor; 'let her be kept perfectly quiet. Give her this composing draught, and let no one be admitted to her chamber,—not even her child.'
"Child! it all came back to me. Where was she, that dreadful woman? Starting up in bed, I looked wildly round the room for the haunting phantom,—she was not a reality,—I must have had a terrible dream.
"'Yes!' said the doctor, answering the expression of my countenance, 'you have had a shocking nightmare. Drink this, and you will awake refreshed.'
"Yielding passively, I drank the colorless fluid he offered me, and sinking back on my pillow passed into a deep and tranquil sleep. When I awoke, the silence and darkness of night brooded around me. My mind now was clear as crystal, and every image appeared with startling distinctness. I lay still and calm, revolving what course to pursue; and as I lay and revolved, doubts of the truth of her story grew stronger and stronger. All my husband's love and tenderness rose in remembrance, vindicating his aspersed honor. She had forged the tale,—she had stolen the picture,—she was an impostor and a wretch.
"At morning light, I awakened Peggy, and demanded of her what had occurred during my insensible state, and what had become of the strange woman. Peggy said that the piercing shrieks of the stranger brought her to the parlor, where I lay like a corpse on the carpet, and she kneeling over me, ringing her hands, and uttering unintelligible words.
"'You have killed her,' cried Peggy, pushing back the stranger, and taking me in her strong arms.
"'Je le sais, mon Dieu, je le sais,' exclaimed she, lifting her clasped hands to heaven. Peggy did not understand French, but she repeated the words awkwardly enough, yet I could interpret them.
"As they found it impossible to recall me to life, a physician was summoned, and as soon as he came the stranger disappeared.
"'Don't think of her anymore,' said Peggy; 'don't, Mrs. St. James,—I don't believe a word of her story,—she's crazy,—she's a lunatic, you may be sure she is,—she looked stark mad.'
"I tried to believe this assertion, but something told me she was no maniac. I tried to believe her an impostor,—I asserted she was,—but if so, she transcended all the actresses in the world. I could not eat, I could not bear you, my darling Gabriella, to be brought into my presence. Your innocent smiles were daggers to my heart.
"But she came again, Therésa, the avenger,—she came followed by a woman, leading by the hand a beautiful boy.
"Here was proof that needed no confirmation. Every infantine feature bore the similitude of St. James. The eyes, the smile, his miniature self was there. I no longer doubted,—no longer hesitated.
"'Leave me,' I cried, and despair lent me calmness. 'I resign all claims to the name, the fortune, and the affections of him who has so cruelly wronged us. Not for worlds would I remain even one day longer in the home he has desecrated by his crimes. Respect my sorrows, and leave me. You may return to-morrow.'
"'Oh, juste ciel!' she exclaimed. 'Je suis trés malheureuse.'
"Snatching her child in her arms, and raising it as high as her strength could lift it, she called upon God to witness that it was only for his sake she had asserted her legal rights; that, having lost the heart of her husband, all she wished was to die. Then, sinking on her knees before me, she entreated me to forgive her the wretchedness she had caused.
"'Iforgiveyou?' I cried. 'Alas! it is I should supplicate your forgiveness. I do ask it in the humility of a broken heart. But go—go—if you would not see me die.'
"Terrified at my ghastly countenance, Peggy commanded the nurse to take the child from the room. Therésa followed with lingering steps, casting back upon me a glance of pity and remorse. I never saw her again.
"'And now, Peggy,' said I, 'you are the only friend I have in the wide world. Yet I must leave you. With my child in my arms, I am going forth, like Hagar, into the wilderness of life. I have money enough to save me from immediate want. Heaven will guard the future.'
"'And where will you go?' asked Peggy, passing the back of her hand over her eyes.
"'Alas, I know not. I have no one to counsel me, no one to whom I can turn for assistance or go for shelter. Even my Heavenly Father hideth his face from me.'
"'Oh, Mrs. St. James!'
"'Call me not by that accursed name. Call me Rosalie. It was a dying mother's gift, and they cannot rob me of that.'
"'Miss Rosalie, I will never quit you. There is nobody in the world I love half as well, and if you will let me stay with you, I will wait on you, and take care of the baby all the days of my life.'
"Then she told me how she came from New England to live with a brother, who had since died of consumption, and how she was going back, because she did not like to live in a great city, when the doctor got her to come to nurse me in sickness, and how she had learned to love me so well she could not bear the thoughts of going away from me. She told me, too, how quiet and happy people could live in that part of the country; how they could get along upon almost nothing at all, and be just as private as they pleased, and nobody would pester them or make them afraid.
"She knew exactly how she came to the city, and we could go the same way, only we would wind about a little and not go to the place where she used to live, so that folks need ask no questions or know any thing about us.
"With a childlike dependence, as implicit as your own, and as instinctive, I threw myself on Peggy's strong heart and great common sense. With equal judgment and energy, she arranged every thing for our departure. She had the resolution and fortitude of a man, with the tenderness and fidelity of a woman. I submitted myself entirely to her guidance, saying, 'It was well.' But when I was alone, I clasped you in agony to my bosom, and prostrating myself before the footstool of Jehovah, I prayed for a bolt to strike us, mother and child together, that we might be spared the bitter cup of humiliation and woe. One moment I dared to think of mingling our life blood together in the grave of the suicide; the next, with streaming eyes, I implored forgiveness for the impious thought.
"It is needless to dwell minutely on the circumstances of our departure. We left that beautiful mansion, once the abode of love and happiness, now a dungeon house of despair;—we came to this lone, obscure spot, where I resumed my father's name, and gave it to you. At first, curiosity sought out the melancholy stranger, but Peggy's incommunicativeness and sound judgment baffled its scrutiny. In a little while, we were suffered to remain in the seclusion we desired. Here you have passed from infancy to childhood, from childhood to adolescence, unconscious that a cloud deeper than poverty and obscurity rests upon your youth. I could not bear that my innocent child should blush for a father's villany. I could not bear that her holy confidence in human goodness and truth should be shattered and destroyed. But the day of revelation must come. From the grave, whither I am hastening, my voice shall speak; for the time may come, when a knowledge of your parentage will be indispensable, and concealment be considered a crime.
"Should you hereafter win the love of an honorable and noble heart, (for such are sometimes found,) every honorable and noble feeling will prompt you to candor and truth, with regard to your personal relations. I need not tell you this.
"And now, my darling child, I leave you one solemn dying charge. Should it ever be your lot to meet that guilty, erring father, whose care you have never known, whose name you have never borne, let no vindictive memories rise against him.
"Tell him, I forgave him, as I hope to be forgiven by my Heavenly Father, for all my sins and transgressions, and my idolatrous love of him. Tell him, that now, as life is ebbing slowly away like the sands of the hour-glass, and I can calmly look back upon the past, I bless him for being the means of leading my wandering footsteps to the green fields and still pastures of the great Shepherd of Israel. Had he never prepared for me the bitter cup of sorrow, I had not perchance tasted the purple juice which my Saviour trod the wine-press of God's wrath to obtain. Had not 'lover and friend been taken from me,' I might not have turned to the Friend of sinners; the Divine Love of mankind. Tell him then, oh Gabriella! that I not only forgave, but blessed him with the heart of a woman and the spirit of a Christian.
"I had a dream, a strange, wild dream last night, which I am constrained to relate. I am not superstitious, but its echo lingers in my soul.
"I dreamed that your father was exposed to some mysterious danger, that you alone could avert. That I saw him plunging down into an awful abyss, lower and lower; and that he called on you, Gabriella, to save him, in a voice that might have rent the heavens; and then they seemed to open, and you appeared distant as a star, yet distinct and fair as an angel, slowly descending right over the yawning chasm. You stretched out your arms towards him, and drew him upward as if by an invisible chain. As he rose, the dark abyss was transformed to beds of roses, whose fragrance was so intensely sweet it waked me. It was but a dream, my Gabriella, but it may be that God destined you to fulfil a glorious mission: to lead your erring father back to the God he has forsaken. It may be, that through you, an innocent and injured child, the heart sundered on earth may be reunited in heaven.
"One more charge, my best beloved. In whatever situation of life you may be placed, remember our boundless obligations to the faithful Peggy, and never, never, be separated from her. Repay to her as far as possible the long, long debt of love and devotion due from us both. She has literally forsaken all to follow me and mine; and if there is a crown laid up in heaven for the true, self-sacrificing heart, that crown will one day be hers.
"The pen falls from my hand. Farewell trembles on my lips. Oh! at this moment I feel the triumph of faith, the glory of religion.