Wewill now step into the widow Grimshawe's cottage, and see how Sophy disposed of her guest.
The lower room was in profound darkness, and the little sempstress bade her companion stay at the door while she procured a light from the rush-candle, that always burnt in her mother's chamber above.
"Do not leave me in the dark!" he cried, in a voice of childish terror, and clutching at her garments. "I dare not be alone!"
"Nonsense! There are no ghosts here. I will not be gone an instant."
"Let me go with you."
"What! to my sick mother's bed-room? That cannot be. Perhaps," she continued, not a little astonished at his extreme timidity, "the ashes may still be alive in the grate. I think I perceive a faint glimmer; but you had better allow me to fetch a light from mother's room?"
"Oh no, not for the world. I beseech you to stay where you are."
Sophy knelt down by the hearth, and raking among the ashes succeeded at last in finding a live coal, which she blew into a blaze, and lighting a candle she had left on the table, placed it before him.
Her strange guest had sunk down into a large wooden arm-chair beside it, his head bent upon his clasped hands, his eyes shut, and traces of tears upon his death-pale cheeks; his lips were firmly compressed, and his countenance immovable and rigid.
Sophy gazed long and silently upon him. The sympathy of woman, be she good or bad, is always touched by the sight of a man's tears. Sophy was selfish and vain—all her faults might be comprised under those two heads; but she could not bear to witness sorrow and suffering without trying to alleviate it, unless it demanded the sacrifice of some personal gratification that she wanted strength of mind to relinquish.
The stranger had awakened her sympathy, which the knowledge that he was comparatively rich did not tend to diminish; and she examined his countenance with a degree of interest and attention which hitherto had been foreign to her nature, who had never seen anything to love or admire beyond herself.
For a person in his station, Noah Cotton was a remarkable man. His features were high and regular, his air and demeanour that of a gentleman;or rather of one who had been more used to mingle with gentlemen, than with the class to which his dress indicated him to belong. His age exceeded forty. His raven hair, that curled in close masses round his high temples, was thickly sprinkled with grey; his sallow brow deeply furrowed, but the lines were not those produced by sorrow, but care. He looked ill and unhappy, and though his dress was of the coarse manufacture generally adopted by the small yeoman or farmer, his linen was fine and scrupulously clean; in short, he was vastly superior to any of the men that frequented the "Brig's Foot."
"You are ill," said Sophy, laying her hand upon his shoulder, and speaking in a soft gentle tone. "Let me get you something to eat. I can give you some new bread, and a bowl of fresh milk."
"Thank you, my kind girl," he replied, unclosing his large, dark, melancholy eyes, and regarding her neat little figure, and fair, girlish face, with fixed attention,—"I am not hungry."
"Oh, do take a little." And Sophy placed the simple contents of the cupboard on the table before him. "It would give me real pleasure to see you eat."
"Then I will try to please you."
But, after taking a draught of the milk, Noah pushed the bowl from him, and turned gloomily to the fire, which was, now brightening into aruddy glow, throwing cheerful red gleams to every distant corner of the room.
"And did you really see the ghost?" asked Sophy, who was dying with curiosity to hear the tale from his own mouth. And she drew a low bench beside him, and gazed earnestly up into his face. "I thought the stories about it were all humbug,—a trick played off upon the public by that worthless scamp, Bob Mason."
The man started from his abstracted fit.
"Don't speak of it now, my pretty maid. Let you and I talk of something else."
"But I should like so to know all about it. You said, when you were coming to, out of that frightful fit, that it was the ghost of a Mr. Carlos."
"Then I was a fool!" muttered Noah; but, recovering himself, he said,—"I was one of the band of men who found the body of Squire Carlos, on the night he was murdered in his own plantation, by Bill Martin, a notorious smuggler and poacher. I was very young at the time; the Squire had been a kind friend to me and my mother; and the horrid sight made such a powerful impression on my mind, that it almost deprived me of my senses, and it has haunted me ever since. I see him at all hours of the day, but most generally the vision comes before me at night, and produces these terrible fits. The doctors call it disease—I think it fate."
"How dreadful!" and Sophy recoiled involuntarily a few paces from her guest.
There was a long silence. Sophy tried to shake off the chill which had fallen upon her heart by vigorously poking the fire. At length she ventured a glance at her silent companion. He was looking down intently at her.
"You seem pretty old," she said, with that bluntness so common to uneducated people, and from which those above them wince in disgust—"are you married?"
"No, my dear; a bachelor, at your service."
"If you had a wife and children, they would cure you of these strange fancies."
"Do you really think so?"
"I am sure of it."
There was another long silence.
Her companion heaved a deep, melancholy sigh, and his thoughts seemed to break out into words, without any intention on the part of their owner.
"I have plenty to keep both wife and children, and I would gladly marry to-morrow, if I thought any good woman would have me."
Sophy smiled, and looked down into her lap. She twisted the strings of her checked apron round her fingers, the apron itself into every possible shape. At length she started from her seat.
"Where are you going?" cried the stranger, in a tone of alarm.
"To make you up a bed."
"I would rather remain by the fire all night; if you will promise to stay with me."
"But my mother would wonder what had become of me. I must leave you, and go to bed."
Noah caught her little hand as she glided past him, and pulled her violently back—
"I will not part with you—you must stay."
"Bless me, how timid you are! How you shake and tremble! I cannot understand this fear in a big man like you."
"I should grow courageous if you were always by my side."
"Perhaps you would soon be as much afraid of me as of the ghost," said Sophy, looking up into his sad eyes with a playful smile.
"The ghost again! But tell me, my pretty maid, have you a sweetheart?"
"What girl of eighteen, who is not positively ugly, has not?" returned Sophy, evasively.
"But, one whom you prefer to all others?"
"I have never yet seen that fortunate individual."
"And is there no one for whom you feel any particular liking?"
"None, I assure you."
"Good," said Noah, musingly. "Have you a father?"
"He was drowned in a heavy gale, during the fishing season, some years ago."
"A mother?"
"Yes; but she has been bed-ridden with the palsy ever since father died. Grief for his sudden loss brought it on. There are no hopes of her ever regaining the use of her limbs now."
"Any brothers or sisters?"
"One sister, the hunchbacked girl you saw in the next house; the rest are all dead. I lost a young sister about six weeks ago. She was only sixteen years of age, and as good as she was beautiful. Every body loved and respected Charlotte, and she died so happily. It was well for her. I have often envied her since she left us. I never knew what an angel she was until after we lost her."
Noah sighed again, and was silent for some minutes. At length he said,—
"Is it only good people that die in peace?"
"I don't know," said Sophy. "Charlotte was the only person I ever saw die; and her last words to us I shall never forget. 'Dear ones,' she said, while a smile from heaven rested upon her lips, 'do not weep for me. These last moments of my life are the most joyful, the happiest I have ever known. I can now fully realize that peace which our blessed Redeemer promised to all His faithful followers—a peace which surpasseth human understanding. May that His peace and blessing rest upon you all.'"
Again Noah sighed, and covered his face with his hands, and remained so long in that attitude,that Sophy imagined he had fallen asleep. At length he raised his head, and said,—
"Your father is dead, your mother infirm and old, your only sister sickly and deformed, and yourself so young and pretty, with no brothers to protect or work for you,—how do you contrive, dear girl, to maintain yourself and them?"
"Alas! we are very poor," said Sophy, bursting into tears. "I do all I can to supply the wants of the family. I have to work day and night, and Mary too, who has a cruel mistress, in order to earn our bread, yet we are often on the point of starvation; both of us are tasked beyond our strength—and I for one am heartily weary of my life."
"Dear child,"—and Noah wound his arm about her waist, and kissed away the tears from her bright blue eyes,—"if you could love and cherish an old man—old at any rate to you, although barely turned of forty, I could give both you and your afflicted mother and sister a comfortable home. I have a pleasant cottage at F——, and fifty acres of good arable land, a horse and gig, six fine milch cows, and plenty of pigs and poultry, an income of two hundred per annum in the bank, which is increasing every year, simply because I have enough to supply my household without touching either capital or interest. This property I will settle upon you, at my death, if you will become my wife."
Sophy's hand trembled in his. A bright crimson suffused her cheek, her heart leaped wildly within her breast; but she could not find a word of answer.
"I have been a bachelor all my life," continued Noah, "and a dull, cheerless life it has been to me. I had a mother to take care of in her old age, and I loved her too well to place a wife over her, who had been so long the mistress of my home. She is only lately dead, and I feel lonely and sad without her. I have often thought that I could love a wife very much. I am sure I could love you. What say you to it, my girl? Is it to be a match?"
Sophy thought of the horse and gig, and the six cows, of the pigs and poultry, of the comfortable home; and above all this, she hugged closely to her heart the 200l.per annum that was to be hers, besides all the rest of the worldly goods and chattels, at his death. She looked down upon her faded, shabby calico dress, and round upon the scantily furnished room, and thought of the cold, dark winter nights that were coming, and how ill-prepared they were to meet them. She remembered the days of toil, the nights of waking, watching beside the feverish bed of a querulous old woman, and she knew how fretful and impatient she was, and how her soul abhorred the task; and she turned her bright eyes to the face of her melancholy lover, and placed her small hand inhis, and said in a low, soft voice, that was music to his heart,—
"I will try to love you, and will be your wife, if you will only be kind to mother and Mary, and take us from this hateful place."
Transported with joy, he promised all that she asked.
All night they sat by the fire, talking over the future prospects; and the next morning Sophia introduced Noah Cotton to her mother and sister, as her future husband, and bade them rejoice in their altered fortunes. Human nature is full of strange contradictions, and it so happened that the mother and sister did not rejoice; and instead of approving of the match, they remonstrated vehemently against it.
Sophy thought them foolish and ungrateful. She grew angry, and remained obstinately fixed to her purpose, and the affair ended in a family rupture.
Mrs. Grimshawe refused to live with Sophy, if she married Noah Cotton; and Mary could not leave her mother. Mary, who was a shrewd observer of human character, was greatly struck with the scene she had witnessed in the public house. She did not like Noah Cotton. She suspected him to be a bad man, who was labouring under the pangs of remorse rather than of disease. She had communicated these fears to her mother, and to this circumstance might be attributed hersteady refusal to sanction a marriage so advantageous, in a pecuniary point of view, to them all.
Sophy was determined to secure the rich husband, and have her own way; and the very next week she became the wife of the wealthy farmer, and the newly-wedded pair left —— in a neat gig to spend the honeymoon in Noah Cotton's rural homestead in the pretty parish of F——.
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Twentymonths passed away, and the young bride had never once been home to visit her old friends. Her mother grew more infirm and feeble every day, and pined sadly after her absent child; and the tears were often upon Mary's cheeks. Sophy's act of wilful disobedience had been forgiven from the hour that the thoughtless rebel had become a wife; but her neglect rankled in the heart of both mother and sister.
"She has forgotten us quite," said the ailing old woman. "The distance is not great. She might come, especially as her husband keeps a horse and chaise; and what are ten miles after all? I have often walked double that in my young days to see a friend, much more a mother and sister. Well, I shall not be here long,—I feel that. The day of my release will be welcome to me, and she will be sorry when I am gone that she neglected to come and see me."
Now, though Dorothy Grimshawe, in her nervous, querulous state, grumbled over the absenceof her daughter, she was never so dear to the heart of her faulty child as at the very time she complained of her neglect.
Sophy Cotton never knew the real value of a mother's love until she felt upon her own shoulders the cares and responsibilities of a house. She longed intensely to see her and Mary again, as the nice presents of butter, ham, and eggs that she was constantly sending to —— might have testified for her; but there were painful reasons that made a meeting with her mother and sister everything but desirable to the young wife.
She was changed since they parted. Her marriage had been contrary to their wishes. If she did not go over to —— in the chaise, she went nowhere else; never did the most loving bride keep more closely at home.
Once Mrs. Grimshawe asked of her daughter's messenger, a rough clodhopper, whom she had summoned to her bed-side in order to gratify her curiosity and satisfy her doubts, the reason of Mrs. Cotton's long silence—"Was she well?"
"Yes; but she had lost her rosy cheeks, and was not so blithe as when she first came to the porched-house."
"Did her husband treat her ill?"
"Na, na; he petted her like a spoilt child; yet she never seemed happy, or contented like."
"What made her unhappy then?"
"He could na just tell—women were queercreturs. Mayhap it was being an old man's wife that fretted her, and that was but natural, seeing that a pretty young thing like her might have got a husband nearer her own age, which, for sartain, would ha' been more to her taste."
"Was she likely to have any family?"
"No signs o' the like. It had na pleased the Lord to multiply Noah's seed upon the earth."
"Was he stingy?"
"Na, na; they had allers plenty to eat. He was a kind measter, an' good pay. There was only their two selves, and Mrs. Cotton was dressed like a lady, and had everything brave and new about her; but she looked mortal pale and thin, an' he b'lieved that she was in the consumption."
The man went his way, and the old woman talked to Mary about her daughter half the night. "She was always discontented with her lot," she remarked, "when single. Change of circumstances seldom changed the disposition. Perhaps it was Sophy's own fault that she was not happy."
Mary thought that her mother was right; but she felt so anxious about her sister, that she determined to leave her mother, for a few days, to the care of a kind neighbour, and walk over to F——, to ascertain how matters really stood. But her mother became seriously ill, which hindered her from putting this scheme into practice;and her uneasiness on her account banished Sophy and her affairs out of her mind.
Other events soon took place that made a material alteration in their circumstances. Mr. Rollins, their benefactor, died suddenly abroad, and, leaving no will, the pension allowed to Mrs. Grimshawe died with him. His nephew and heir had given them, through his steward, orders to quit their present abode, and poverty and the workhouse stared them in the face.
Hearing of their distress, Noah Cotton came over himself to see them, and generously offered them a home with him and his wife as long as they lived. This was done so kindly, that the sick woman forgot all her old prejudices, and she and Mary thankfully accepted his offer. But when the time came for their removal, the old woman was too ill to be taken from her bed, and the surly steward reluctantly consented that she might remain a few days longer.
Mary was anxious to leave the house. Since the appearance of old Mason's ghost, a most unpleasant notoriety was attached to it, and the most disorderly scenes were constantly being enacted beneath its roof. Persons had been robbed to a considerable amount upon the road leading to ——, which at last attracted the attention of the magistrates, and a large reward was offered for the apprehension of the person who performed the principal part in this disgracefuldrama. Still, no discovery was made, until one night Bob Mason was shot by Tom Weston, who had sworn to take the ghost alive or dead. The striking resemblance this profligate young man bore to his father, had enabled him to deceive many into the belief that he was the person he represented. His mother, who was not in the secret, had never been on good terms with her son since he had personated the ghost; and the remarks he made upon his father she considered as peculiarly insulting to herself; and his dreadful end drove her mad; and this nest of iniquity was broken up. Such is the end of the wicked.
Let us now relate what had happened at the Porched House, to change the worldly Sophy Grimshawe into a pale and care-worn woman. She did not love Noah Cotton when she consented to become his wife; but he was superior to her in wealth and station, and his presence inspired her with respect and awe. He was grave and taciturn, but to her he was invariably generous and kind. Every indulgence and luxury he could afford was lavishly bestowed on his young wife; and if he did not express his attachment with the ardour of a youthful lover, he paid her a thousand little tender attentions which sufficiently proved the depth of his affection and esteem.
He was grateful to her for marrying him; and Sophy was not insensible to his efforts to renderher comfortable and happy. But happy she was not, nor was ever likely to be.
Noah was a solitary man—had been so from his youth. He had been accustomed to live so many years with his old mother, and to mix so little with his neighbours, that it had made him silent and unsociable. After the first week of their marriage, he had particularly requested his young wife to try and conform to his domestic habits, and she endeavoured, for some time, to obey him. But, at her age, and with her taste for show and gaiety, it was a difficult matter; yet after awhile, she mechanically sunk into the same dull apathy, and neither went from home, nor invited a guest into the house.
Twelve months passed away in this melancholy, joyless sort of existence, when an old woman and her daughter came to reside in a cottage near them. Mrs. Martin was a kind, gossiping old body; her daughter Sarah, though some years older than Mrs. Cotton, was lively and very pretty, and gained a tolerably comfortable living for herself and her mother by dress-making. They had once or twice spoken to Sophy, on her way to the Methodist chapel, but never when her husband was present, and she was greatly taken by their manners and appearance.
"Noah, dear," she said, pressing his arm caressingly, as they were coming home one Wednesday evening from the aforesaid chapel, "may I inviteMrs. Martin and her daughter Sarah to drink tea with us? They are strangers, and it would but be kind and neighbourly to show them some little attention."
"By no means, Sophy," he cried, with a sudden start; "these people shall not enter my house."
"But why?"
"I have my reasons. They are no friends of mine. They are no strangers to me. They lived here long ago, and were forced to leave the place, after her son, a mischievous, turbulent fellow, was hung."
"Mrs. Martin's son hung!—what for? I thought they had been decent, respectable people!"
"There is no judging people by appearance," said Noah, bitterly. "I look a decent fellow, yet I have been a great sinner in my early days; and, with regard to these Martins, the less you have to do with them, Sophy, the better. I tell you, once for all, I will have no intimacy with them."
He spoke in a sterner voice than he had ever before used to his young wife. Sophy was piqued and hurt by his look and manner; and though she felt very curious to ask a thousand questions about these Martins, and on what score they had given him such offence, Noah grew so cross, and spoke so angrily, whenever she alluded to the subject, that she thought it most prudent to hold her tongue.
From the hour that these Martins came to reside at F——, Noah Cotton seemed a different creature. He was more sullen and reserved, and his attendance at the chapel was more frequent. His countenance, always pale and care-worn, now wore a troubled and anxious expression, and his athletic form wasted until he became perfectly haggard—the very spectre of his former self.
In spite of his stern prohibition, Sophy, if she did not ask the Martins to the house, often, during her husband's absence, slipped in to chat and gossip with them. Before long, her own countenance underwent a visible change, and her wasted figure and neglected dress led a stranger to suspect that she was either in a decline, or suffering from great mental depression.
Several weeks elapsed, and Mrs. Cotton had not been seen outside her dwelling by any of the neighbours. Mrs. Martin and Sarah wondered what ailed her, and both at length concluded that she must be seriously ill. But, as no doctor was seen visiting at the house, and Noah went about his farm as usual, this could hardly be the case. They were puzzled, and knew not what to think. At last, on the day that Noah went over to ——, in order to remove Mrs. Grimshawe and Mary to his own abode, the mystery was solved, and Sophy came across the road to visit her neighbours.
"Mercy, child! what aileth thee?" cried the old woman, hobbling to meet her, perfectly astonishedat the melancholy alteration which a few weeks of seclusion had made in Mrs. Cotton's appearance.
"You are ill, Mrs. Cotton," said Sarah, placing the easy-chair for her guest beside the fire.
"I have not felt well for some time," returned Sophy, trying to seem composed; "and now, the alarming illness of my poor mother has quite upset me, I would have gone with Noah to —— to see her, but indeed I was not able,"—and she burst into tears.
"How long has she been sick?" asked the inquisitive old dame.
"Only a few days. Noah took the horse and cart to fetch her and Mary home to live with us. It is kind of Noah—very kind. But, God forgive me! I almost wish they mayn't come."
"Why, child, it would cheer thee up a bit. I am sure thee wantest some one to take care o' thee."
"I would rather be alone," sighed the young wife.
"What has come over thee, Sophy Cotton?" said the old woman, coming up to her and laying her hand on her shoulder, while she peered earnestly into her face. "I never saw such a cruel change in a young cretur in the course of a few weeks! But there may be a cause—a natural cause," and she smiled significantly.
"No, no, thank goodness! You are wrong—quite wrong, Mrs. Martin. No child of mine willever sport upon my threshold, or gather daisies beside my door; and I am thankful—so thankful, that it is so!"
"That's hardly in natur'. Most o' womankind love young children—'specially their own."
"My dear Mrs. Cotton," said Sarah soothingly, "you look ill and miserable; do tell us what makes you so unhappy."
"Indeed, Sarah, I can't." And Sophy wept afresh.
"Is Noah cross to you?"
"Quite the reverse—he's the kindest of men."
"He looks very stern."
"His looks belie him."
"And do you love him?"
"If I did not, I should not be so miserable;" and Sophy laid her head down upon her knees and wept aloud.
"Mrs. Cotton, you distress us greatly," continued Sarah, taking her cold, passive hand. "Won't you tell a friend and neighbour the reason of this grief?"
But Sophy only wept as if her heart were breaking. The mother and daughter looked at each other.
The old woman returned again to the charge:—
"Tell one who loves thee like a mother."
A deep, long drawn sigh was the only answer.
"Speak out your mind, dear," said Sarah, pressing affectionately the thin, wasted hand that lay sopassively within her own. "It will ease your heart."
"Ah! if I thought that you would tell no one,"—and Sophy raised her death-pale face, and fixed her earnest eyes mournfully upon her interrogator,—"I would confide to you my trouble; but oh, if you were so cruel as to betray me, it would drive me mad."
"Sure we can be trusted, Mistress Cotton," and the old woman drew herself up with an air of offended dignity. "What interest could Sarah and I have to betray thee? we be no idle gossips going clacking from house to house about matters that don't concern us. What good could it do us to blab the secrets of other folk?"
"It is only anxiety for your welfare, dear Mrs. Cotton," whispered Sarah, "that makes us wish to know what it is that troubles you."
"I believe you, my kind friends," replied Sophy. "I know I should feel better if I had the thing off my mind. It is dreadful to bear such a burthen alone."
"Does not your husband know it?"
"That is what occasions me such grief; I dare not tell him what vexes me; I once hinted at it, and I thought he would have gone mad. You wonder why I look so pale and thin; how can it be otherwise, when I never get a sound night's rest?"
"What keeps you awake?" exclaimed both women in a breath.
"My husband! He does nothing but rave all night in his sleep about some person he murdered years ago."
The women exchanged significant glances.
"Oh, if you could but hear his dreadful cries—the piteous moans he makes—the frantic prayers he puts up to God to forgive him for his great crime, and take him out of the fires of hell, it would make your hair stand on end: it makes me shiver and tremble all over with fear. And then to see, by the dim light of the rush candle, (for he never sleeps in the dark,) the big drops of sweat that stand upon his brow and trickle down his ghastly face; to hear him grind and gnash his teeth in despair, and howl in a wild sort of agony, as he strikes at the walls with his clenched fists; it would make you pray, Mrs. Martin, as I do, for the light of day. Yes, yes, it is killing me—I know it is: it is horrible to live in constant dread of the coming night—to shrink in terror from the husband in whose bosom you should rest in peace."
"Doth this happen often?" asked Mrs. Martin.
"Every night for the last two months; ever since you came to live near us. He used always to be afraid of the dark, and sometimes made a noise in his sleep, but he never acted as he does now. Once I asked him what he was dreaming about, and why he always fancied that he had murdered some one, when asleep. He flew at me like a maniac, and swore that he would throttleme if he ever heard me ask such foolish questions again; that people could not commit murder in their sleep—that they must be wide awake to shed blood."
"Ay, ay," said the old woman with a malignant smile, "doubtless he knows. Does he ever mention the name of the person he murdered, in his sleep?"
"Constantly. Did you ever, Mrs. Martin, hear of a person of the name of Carlos?"
But the old woman did not answer. A change had passed over her face, as with a cry of triumph she sprang from her seat and clapped her hands in an ecstasy of joy—it might rather be termed, of gratified revenge. "Ay! 'tis out at last! 'tis out at last! My God, I thank thee! I thank thee! Yes, yes, 'Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord!' My Bill! my brave Bill! and thee hadst to die for this man's crime! but God has righted thee at last—at last, in spite of this villain's evidence, who swore that thy knife did the deed, when he plunged it himself into the rich man's heart. Ha, ha! I shall live to be revenged upon him—I shall, I shall!"
"What have I done!" shrieked the unhappy wife. "I have betrayed my husband into the hands of his enemies!" and she sunk down at the old woman's feet like one dead. Gloating over her anticipated revenge, Mrs. Martin spurned the prostrate form with her foot, as she scornfullycommanded her more humane daughter "to see after Noah Cotton's dainty wife, while she went to the magistrates to make a deposition of what she had heard."
Shocked beyond measure at what she had heard and seen, ashamed of her mother's violence, and sorry for Sophia's unhappy disclosure, as she well knew that, whether the actual murderer of Squire Carlos, or only an accomplice, her brother was a bad man, who deserved his fate, Sarah tenderly raised the fainting Sophy from the ground, and placed her on her own bed. Long before the miserable young woman returned to a consciousness of the result of her own imprudence, her husband, who had returned from —— without her sister or mother, was on his way to the County Gaol.
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Sophyreturned to her desolate home, the moment she recovered her senses; for the sight of the Martins filled her mind with inexpressible anguish. On entering the little keeping-room, she shut the door, and covering her head with her apron, sat down in Noah's chair by the old oak table, on which she buried her face in her hands, and remained silent and astonished during the rest of the day.
"Shall I sleep with you to-night, Mrs. Cotton?" said Sarah Martin, in a kind, soft voice; as towards the close of that long, blank day, she opened the door, and looked in upon
"That desolate widow—but not of the dead."
"That desolate widow—but not of the dead."
"That desolate widow—but not of the dead."
"No, Sarah, thank you; I would rather be alone," was the brief reply.
Sarah lingered with her hand still on the lock. Sophy shook her head impatiently, as much as to say, "Go, go, I must be obeyed; I know the worst now, and wish no second person to look upon my remorse—my grief—my bitter humiliation." Sarahunderstood it all. The door slowly closed, and Sophy was once more alone.
Many hours passed away, and the night without, dark and starless, had deepened around her cold hearth. Still Sophy sat there with her head bowed upon the table, in a sort of despairing stupor, unconscious of everything but the overwhelming sense of intense misery.
Then came painful thoughts of her past life; her frequent quarrels with her good sisters; her unkindness and neglect to her suffering mother; her ingratitude to God; and the discontented repinings over her humble lot, which had led to her present situation. She had sold herself for money; and the wealth she had so criminally coveted, was the price of blood, and from its envied possession no real enjoyment had flowed. The poverty and discomfort of her mother's cottage were small, when compared to the heart-crushing misery she at that moment endured.
Then she thought of her husband; thought of her selfish imprudence in betraying his guilt—that in his approaching trial she must appear as a principal witness against him; and that her testimony would, in all probability, consign him to the scaffold.
She felt that, however great the magnitude of his crime, he had bitterly repented of it long ago; that he had suffered untold agonies of remorse and contrition; that his punishment had been morethan his reason could well bear; that he had suffered more from the pangs of conscience than he ever could experience from the hands of man. All his kindness to her, since the day she became his wife, returned to her with a sense of tenderness she never had felt for him before. She never suspected how deeply she loved him, till she was forced to part from him for ever: her soul melted within her, and she shed floods of tears.
She saw him alone in the dark dungeon, surrounded by the frightful phantoms of a guilty conscience, with no pitying voice to soothe his overwhelming grief, or speak words of peace or comfort to his tortured spirit, and she thought, "I will go to him to-morrow; I will at least say to him, I pity you, my dear unhappy husband. I pray you to forgive me for the great evil I have brought upon you."
With this thought uppermost in her mind, the miserable Sophy, overcome by her long fast, and worn out by the excitement of the past day, fell into a profound sleep.
And lo, in the black darkness of that dreary room, she thought she beheld a bright shining light. It spread and brightened, and flowed all around her like the purest moonlight, and the centre condensed into a female form, smiling and beautiful, which advancing, laid a soft hand upon her head, and whispered in tones of ineffable sweetness,—
"Pray—pray forhimand thyself, and thou shalt find peace." The face and the voice were those of her dead sister Charlotte, and a sudden joy shot into her heart, and the vision faded away, and she awoke, and behold it was a dream.
Sophy rose up, and sank down upon the ground, and buried her face in her hands, and tried to pray, for the first time in her life, earnestly and truthfully, in the firm belief that He to whom she addressed her petition was able to help and save her, in her hour of need. Few and imperfect were her words; but they flowed from the heart, and He who looks upon the heart, gave an answer of peace.
Memory, ever faithful in the hour of grief, supplied her with a long catalogue of the sins and follies of a misspent life. Deeply she acknowledged the vanity and nothingness of those things in which she had once felt such an eager, childish delight; and she asked forgiveness of her Maker for a thousand faults that she had never acknowledged as faults before.
The world to the prosperous has many attractions. It is their paradise—they seek for no other; and to part with its enjoyments comprises the bitterness of death. Even the poor work on, and hope for better days. It is only the wounded in spirit, and sad of heart, that reject its allurements, and turn with their whole soul to God. Out of much tribulation they are new-born to life—thatbetter life promised to them by their Lord and Saviour.
Sophy was still upon her knees, when the grey light of a rainy October morning gradually strengthened into day. Gloomy and louring, it seemed to regard her with a cheerless scowl as, shivering with cold and excitement, she unclosed the door, and stepped forth into the moist air.
"How like my earthly destiny!" she sighed. "But there is a sun behind the dark clouds, and hope exists, even for a wretch like me."
The sound of horses' hoofs approaching rapidly struck upon her ear, and the next moment she had caught hold of the bridle of the nearest rider. They were the constables, who had conducted Noah to prison, returning to the village.
"Tell me," she cried, in a voice which much weeping had rendered hoarse, and almost inarticulate, "something about my poor husband—will he be hung?"
"Nothing more certain," replied the person thus addressed. "Small chance of escape for him. The foolish fellow has confessed all."
"Then he did really commit the murder?"
"Worse than that, Mistress, he drew his own neck out of the noose, and let another fellow suffer the death he richly deserved. By his own account, hanging is too good for such a monster. He should be burnt alive."
"May God forgive him!" exclaimed Sophy,wringing her hands. "Alas! alas! He was a kind, good man to me."
"Don't take on, my dear, after that fashion," said the other horseman, with a knowing leer. "You were no mate for a fellow like him. Young and pretty as you are, you will soon get a better husband."
Sophy turned from the speaker with a sickening feeling of disgust at him and his ribald jest, and staggered back into the house. She was not many minutes in making up her mind to go to her husband. Hastily packing up a few necessaries in a small bundle, she called the old serving-man, who had lived with her husband for many years, and bade him harness the horse, and drive her to B——.
The journey was long and dreary, for it rained the whole day. Sophy did not care for the rain; the dulness of the day was more congenial to her present feelings: the gay beams of the sun would have seemed a mockery to her bitter sorrow.
As they passed through the village, a troop of idle boys followed them into the turnpike road, shouting at the top of their voices,—
"There goes Noah Cotton's wife!—the murderer's wife! Look how grand she be in her fine chaise!"
"Ay," responded some human fiend, through an open window, loud enough to reach the ears of the grief-stricken woman; "but pride will have a fall."
The penitent Sophy wept afresh at these insults. "Oh," she sighed, "I deserve all this. I was too proud. But they don't know how miserable I am, or they would not causelessly inflict upon me another wound."
"Doan't take on so, Missus," said the good old serving-man, who, though he had said nothing to her on the subject, felt keenly for her distress. "Surely it's no fault o' yourn. You worn't born, I guess, when Measter did this fearsome deed. I ha' lived with Noe these fourteen years, an' I never 'spected him o' the like. He's about as queat a man as ever I seed. He wor allers kind to the dumb beasts on the farm, an' you know, Missus, that's a good sign. Some men are sich tyrants, that they must vent their bad humours on suffin. If the survant doan't cotch it, why the poor dumb creturs in their power do. Now I say, Noe wor a good Measter, both to man an' beast, an' I pray they may find him innocent yet."
Sophy had no hopes on the subject. She felt in her soul that he was guilty. The loquacity of honest Ben pained her, and in order to keep him silent, she remained silent herself, until they reached the metropolitan town of the county, in which the assizes were always held, which was not until late in the evening.
She could gain no admittance within the gaol that night, and Sophy put up at a small but neat public house near at hand. From the widow whokept the house, she heard that the assizes were to be held the following week, and that there was no doubt but what the prisoner, Noah Cotton, would be found guilty of murder. But her son, who was the gaoler, thought it more than probable that he would cheat the hangman, as he had scarcely tasted food since he had been in prison. Mrs. Cotton then informed the widow that she was the wife of the prisoner, and confided to her enough of her history to create for her a strong interest in the breast of the good woman. She did not fail to convey the same feeling with regard to Sophia to her son, who promised her an early interview with her husband on the following morning, and to do all for her and him that lay in his power.
Cheered with this promise, the weary traveller retired to her chamber, and slept soundly. Before six o'clock in the morning, she found herself in the presence of her husband.
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"Myhusband! my dear husband! and it was my imprudence that brought you to this!" cried Sophy, as she fell weeping upon the neck of the felon, clasping him in her arms, and kissing with passionate grief the tears from his haggard unshaven face.
"Hush! my precious lamb," he replied, folding her in his embrace. "It was not you who betrayed me, it was the voice of God speaking through a guilty conscience. I am thankful!—oh, so thankful that it has taken place—that the dreadful secret is known at last! I enjoyed last night the first quiet sleep I have known for years—slept without being haunted by him!"
"And with death staring you in the face, Noah?"
"What is death, Sophy, to the agonies I have endured?—the fear of detection by day—the eyes of the dead glaring upon me all night? No; I feel happy, in comparison, now. I have humbled myself to the dust—have wept and prayed for pardon, and oh, my sweet wife, I trust I am forgiven—have found peace!"
"When was this?" whispered Sophy.
"The night before last."
"How strange!" murmured Sophy. "We were together in spirit that night. I never knew how dear you were to me, Noah, until that night. How painful it would be to me to part with you for ever!"
"It was cruel and selfish in me, Sophy, to join your fate to mine,—a monster, stained with the blackest crimes. But I thought myself secure from detection; thought that my sin would never find me out, that I had managed matters with such incomparable skill that discovery was impossible, that the wide earth did not contain a witness of my guilt. Fool that I was! The voice of blood never sleeps; from out the silent dust it calls night and day in its ceaseless appeals for vengeance at the throne of God. I have heard it in the still dark night, and above the roar of the crowd in the swarming streets of London at noon-day; and ever felt a shadowy hand upon my throat, and a cry in my ear—Thou art the man!
"There were moments when, goaded to madness by that voice, I felt inclined to give myself up to justice, but pride withheld me, and the dismal fear of those haunting fiends chasing me through eternity, was a hell I dared not encounter. My soul was parched with an unquenchable fire; I was too hardened to pray."
"Noah," said Sophy, looking earnestly into hishollow eyes, "you are not a cruel man; you were kind to your old mother—have been very kind to me. How cameyouto commit such a dreadful crime?"
The man groaned heavily, as he replied—
"It was pride,—a foolish, false shame of low birth and honest poverty, that led me to the desperate act."
"I have felt something of this," said Sophy, and her tears flowed afresh. "I now see that sinful thoughts are but the seeds of sinful deeds, ripened and matured by bad passions. Perhaps I only needed a stronger temptation to be guilty of crimes as great as that of which you stand charged."
"Sophy," said her husband, solemnly, "I wish my fate to serve as a warning to others. Listen to me. In the long winter evenings after my mother died, I wrote a history of my life. I did this in fear and trembling, lest any human eye should catch me at my task, and learn my secret. But now that I am called upon to answer for my crime, I wish to make this sad history beneficial to my fellow-creatures.
"After I am gone, dear Sophy, and you return to F——, lose no time in taking to your home, and making comfortable, your poor afflicted mother and sister for the remainder of their days. This key" (and he drew one from his pocket) "opens the old-fashioned bureau in our sleeping-room.In the drawer nearest to the window you will find my will, in which I have settled upon you all that I possess. I have no relations who can dispute with you the legal right to this property. There is a slight indenture in the wood that forms the bottom of this drawer; press it hard with your thumb, and draw it back at the same time, and it will disclose an inner place of concealment, in which you will find a roll of Bank of England notes, to the amount of 500l.This was the money stolen from Mr. Carlos, the night I murdered him. It is stained with his blood, and I have never looked at it or touched it since I placed it there—upwards of twenty years ago. I never had the heart to use it, and I wish it to be returned to the family.
"In this drawer you will likewise find the papers containing an account of the circumstances which led to the commission of the crime. You and Mary can read them together; and oh! as you read, pity and pray for the unhappy murderer."
He stopped, and wiped the drops of perspiration from his brow; and the distress of his young wife almost equalled his own, as she kissed away the tears that streamed down his pale face. His breath came in quick, convulsive sobs, and he trembled in every limb.
"I feel ill," he said, in a faint voice; "these recollections make me so. There is astrangefluttering at my heart, as if a bird beat its wingswithin my breast. Sophy, my wife—my blessed wife! can this be death?"
Sophy screamed with terror, as he reeled suddenly forward, and fell to the ground at her feet. Her cries brought the gaoler to her assistance. They raised the felon, and laid him on his bed; but life was extinct. The agitation of his mind had been too great for his exhausted frame. The criminal had died self-condemned, under the arrows of remorse!
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Whoam I, that I should write a book?—a nameless, miserable and guilty man. It is because these facts stare me in the face, and the recollection of my past deeds goads me to madness, that I would fain unburthen my conscience by writing this record of myself.
I do not know what parish in England had the discredit of being my native place. I can just remember, in the far-off days of my early childhood, coming with my mother to live at F——, a pretty rural village in the fine agricultural county of S——. My mother was called Mrs. Cotton, and was reputed to be a widow, and I was her only child. Whether she had ever been married, the gossips of the place considered very doubtful. At that period of my life this important fact was a matter to me of perfect indifference.
I was a strong, active, healthy boy, quite able to take my own part, and defend my own rights, against any lad of my own age who dared to ask impertinent questions.
The great man of the village—Squire Carlos, ashe was called—lived in a grand hall, surrounded by a stately park, about a mile from F——, on the main road leading to London. His plantations and game preserves extended for many miles along the public thoroughfare, and my mother kept the first porter's-lodge nearest the village.
The Squire had been married, but his wife had been dead for some years. He was a tall, handsome man in middle life, and bore the character of having been a very gay man in his youth. It was whispered among the aforesaid village gossips, that these indiscretions had shortened the days of his lady, who loved him passionately; at any rate, she died in consumption before she had completed her twenty-fourth year, without leaving an heir to the estate, and the Squire never married again.
Mr. Carlos often came to the lodge,—so often, that he seldom passed through the gate on his way to and from the Hall without stepping in to chat with my mother. This was when he was alone; accompanied by strangers he took no notice of us at all. My mother generally sent me to open the gate. The gentlemen used to call me a pretty curly-headed boy, and I got a great deal of small change from them on hunting-days. I remember one afternoon, when opening the gate for a large party of gentlemen, with the Squire at their head, that one of them tapped my cheek with his riding whip, and exclaimed—
"By Jove! Carlos, that's a handsome boy."
"Oh, yes," said another; "the very picture of his father."
And the Squire laughed, and they all laughed; and when I went back into the lodge I showed my mother a handful of silver I had been given, and said—
"Mother, who was my father?"
"Mr. Cotton, of course," she answered gravely. "But why, Noah, do you ask?"
"Because I want to know something about him."
But my mother did not choose to answer impertinent questions; and, though greatly addicted to telling long stories, she seemed to know very little about the private memoirs of Mr. Cotton. She informed me, however, that he had been a fellow-servant with her in the Squire's employ; that he quarrelled with her shortly after I was born, and left her, and she did not know what had become of him, but she believed he went to America, and from his long silence, she concluded that he had been dead for some years. That out of respect for his services, Mr. Carlos had placed her in her present comfortable situation, and that I must show my gratitude to Mr. Carlos for all he had done for us, by the most dutiful and obliging behaviour. I likewise learned from her, that I was called Noah after my father.
This brief sketch of our family history was perfectly satisfactory to me at that time. I rememberfeeling a strong interest in my unknown progenitor, and used to build castles and speculate about his fate.
In the meanwhile, I found it good policy strictly to obey my mother's injunctions, and the alacrity which I displayed in waiting upon the Squire and his guests, never failed to secure a harvest of small coin, which gave me no small importance in the eyes of the lads in the village, who waited upon me with the same diligence that I did upon the Squire, in order no doubt to come in for a share of the spoil. Thus a love of acquiring without labour, and of obtaining admirers without any merit of my own, was early fostered in my heart, which led to a taste for fine dress and a boastful display of superiority, by no means consistent with my low birth and humble means.
In due time I was placed by Mr. Carlos at the village school, and the wish to be thought the first scholar in the school, and excel all my companions, stimulated me to learn with a diligence and determination of purpose, which soon placed me at the top of my class.
There was only one boy in the school who dared to dispute my supremacy, and he had by nature what I acquired with great toil and difficulty, a most retentive memory, which enabled him to repeat after once reading, a task which took me several days of hard study to learn. How I envied him this faculty, which I justly considered possessedno real merit in itself, but was a natural gift! It was not learning with him, it was mere reading. He would just throw a glance over the book, after idling half his time in play; and then walk up to the master, and say it off without making a single blunder. He was the most careless, reckless boy in the school, and certainly the cleverest. I hated him. I could not bear that he should equal, and even surpass me, when he took no pains to learn.
If the master had done him common justice, I should never have stood above him. But for some reason, best known to himself, he always favoured me, and snubbed Bill Martin, who in return played him a thousand impish tricks, and taught the other boys to rebel against his authority. Bill called me theobsneakiousyoung gentleman, and Mr. Bullen, the master, the Squire's Toady.
There was constant war between this lad and me. We were pretty equally matched in strength; for the victor of to-day, was sure to be beaten on the morrow. The boys generally took part with Martin. Such characters are always popular, and he had many admirers in the school. My aversion to this boy made me restless and unhappy. I really longed to do him some injury. Once, after I had given him a sound drubbing, he called me "a base-born puppy! a beggar, eating the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table."
Foaming with rage, for a wound to my pridewas far worse in my estimation, than any personal injury, I demanded what he meant by such insulting language, and he sneered in my face, and told me to go home and ask myvirtuousmother, as she doubtless was better qualified to give me the information I desired. And I did ask my mother, and she told me "I was a foolish boy to heed such nonsense, spoken in anger by a lad I had just thrashed; that Bill Martin was a bad fellow, and envious of my being better off than himself; that if I listened to such senseless lies about her, it would make her miserable, and I should never know a happy hour myself."
I felt that this was true. I loved my mother better than anything in the world. Her affection and kindness to me was boundless. She always welcomed me home with a smiling face, and I never received a blow from her hand in my life.
My mother was about six-and-thirty years of age. She must have been beautiful in youth, for she was still very pretty. Her countenance was mild and gentle, and she was scrupulously neat and clean. I was proud of my mother. I saw no woman in her rank that could be compared with her; and any insult offered to her I resented with my whole heart and strength. I was too young to ask of her an explanation of the frequency of the Squire's visits to our house; and why, when he came, I was generally despatched on some errandto the village; and had the real explanation been given, I should not have believed it.
Mr. Carlos had no family, but his nephew and niece came twice a-year to spend their holidays at the old hall. Master Walter, who was his heir, was a fine manly fellow, about my own age, and Miss Ella, who was two years younger, was a sweet, fair girl, as beautiful as she was amiable.
I had just completed my fourteenth year, and was tall and stout for my age. Whenever these young people were at the hall, I was dressed in my best clothes, and went up every day to wait upon them. If they went fishing, I carried their basket and rods, baited their hooks, and found out the best places for their sport,—and managed the light row boat if they wished to extend their rambles further down the river.
Often we left boat and tackle, and had a scamper through the groves and meadows. I found Miss Ella birds' nests and wild strawberries, and we used to laugh and chat over our adventures on terms of perfect equality; making a feast of our berries and telling fairy tales and ghost stories. Not unfrequently we frightened ourselves with these wild legends, and ran back to the boat, and the bright river, and the gay sunshine, as if the evil spirits we had conjured up were actually before us, and preparing to chase us through the dark wood. And then, when we gained the boat,we would stop and pant, and laugh at our own fears.
Walter Carlos was a capital shot, and very fond of all kinds of field-sports. His skill with a gun made me very ambitious to excel as a sportsman. Mr. Carlos was very particular about his game. He kept several gamekeepers, and was very severe in punishing all poachers who dared to trespass on his guarded rights;—yet, when his nephew expressed a wish that I might accompany him in his favourite diversion, to my utter astonishment and delight, he took out a licence for me, and presented me with a handsome fowling-piece, which I received on my birthday from his own hand.
"This, Noah," he said, "you may consider in the way of business, as it is my intention to bring you up for a gamekeeper."
Oh, what a proud day that was to me! With what delight I handled my newly-acquired treasure! How earnestly I listened to Joe, the head gamekeeper's, directions about the proper use of it! How I bragged and boasted to my village associates of the game thatI and Master Walterhad bagged in those sacred preserves that they dared not enter, for fear of those mysterious objects of terror—man-traps and spring guns!
"The Guy! he thinks that no one can shoot but himself," sneered Bill Martin, as he turned to a train of blackguards who were lounging withhim against the pales of the porter's lodge, as I, returned one evening to my mother's with my gun over my shoulder and a hare and a brace of pheasants in my hand. "I guess there be others who can shoot hares and pheasants, without the Squire's leave, as well as he. He fancies himself quite a gemman, with that fine gun over his shoulder, and the Squire's licence in his pocket."
These insulting remarks stirred up the evil passions in my breast. My gun was unloaded, but I pointed it at my tormentor, and told him to be quiet, or I'd shoot him like a dog. "Shoot and be —— to you!" says he, "it's a better death than the gallows, and that's what you'll come to."
This speech was followed by a roar of coarse laughter from his companions.
"I shall live to see you hung first!" I cried, lowering the gun, while a sort of prophetic vision of the far-off future swam before my sight. "The company you keep, and the bad language you use, are certain indications of the road on which you are travelling. I have too much self-respect, to associate with a blackguard like you."
"Dirty pride and self-conceit, should be the words you ought to use," quoth the impudent fellow. "My comrades are poor, but they arn't base-born sneaks like you."
With one blow I levelled him to the ground.Just at that moment the Squire rode up and prevented further mischief. That Bill Martin was born to be my evil genius. I wished him dead a hundred times a day, and the thought familiarized my mind to the deed. He was the haunting fiend, ever at my side to tempt me to commit sin.
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