Ma la fede degli AmantiÈ come l'Araba fenice;Che vi sia, ciaschun' lo dice.Ma dove sia, nessun lo sa.METASTASIO.
Ma la fede degli AmantiÈ come l'Araba fenice;Che vi sia, ciaschun' lo dice.Ma dove sia, nessun lo sa.
Ma la fede degli AmantiÈ come l'Araba fenice;Che vi sia, ciaschun' lo dice.Ma dove sia, nessun lo sa.
METASTASIO.
Meanwhile Lady Lodore had been enduring the worst miseries of ill-fated love. The illness of Lady Santerre, preceding her death, had demanded all her time; and she nursed her with exemplary patience and kindness. During her midnight watchings and solitary days, she had full time to feel how deep a wound her heart had received. The figure and countenance of her absent friend haunted her in spite of every effort; and when death hovered over the pillow of her mother, she clung, with mad desperation, to the thought, that there was still one, when this parent should be gone, to love her, even though she never saw him more.
Lady Santerre died. After the first burst of natural grief, Cornelia began to reflect that Lord Lodore might now imagine that every obstacle to their reconciliation was removed. She had looked upon her husband as her enemy and injurer; she had regarded him with indignation and fear;—but now she hated him. Strong aversion had sprung up, during the struggles of passion, in her bosom. She hated him as the eternal barrier between her and one who loved her with rare disinterestedness. The human heart must desire happiness;—in spite of every effort at resignation, it must aspire to the fulfilment of its wish. Lord Lodore was the cause why she was cut off from it for ever. He had foreseen that this feeling, this combat, this misery, would be her doom, in the deserted situation she chose for herself: she had laughed his fears to scorn. Now she abhorred him the more for having divined her destiny. While she banished the pleasant thoughts of love, she indulged in the poisoned ones of hate; and while she resisted each softer emotion as a crime, she opened her heart to the bitterest resentment, as a permitted solace; nor was she aware that thus she redoubled all her woes. It was under the influence of these feelings, that she had written to Mrs. Elizabeth Fitzhenry that harsh, decided letter, which Lodore received at New York. The intelligence of his violent death came as an answer to her expressions of implacable resentment. A pang of remorse stung her, when she thought how she had emptied the vials of her wrath on a head which had so soon after been laid low for ever.
The double loss of husband and mother caused Lady Lodore to seclude herself, not in absolute solitude, but in the agreeable retreat of friendly society. She was residing near Brighton, when Saville returned from America, and, with a heart beating high with its own desires, again beheld the mistress of his affections. His delicate nature caused him to respect the weeds she wore, even though they might be termed a mockery: they were the type of her freedom and his hopes; yet, as the tokens of death, they were to be respected. He saw her more beautiful than ever, more courted, more waited on; and he half despaired. How could he, the abstracted student, the man of dreams, the sensitive and timid invalid, ensnare the fancy of one formed to adorn the circles of wealth and fashion?
Thus it was that Saville and Cornelia were further off than ever, when they imagined themselves most near. Neither of them could afterwards comprehend what divided them; or why, when each would have died for the other's sake, cobweb barriers should have proved inextricable; and wherefore, after weathering every more stormy peril, they should perish beneath the influence of a summer breeze.
The pride of Cornelia's heart, hid by the artificial courtesies of society, was a sentiment resolved, confirmed, active, and far beyond her own controul. The smallest opposition appeared rebellion to her majesty of will; while her own caprices, her own desires, were sacred decrees. She was too haughty to admit of discussion—too firmly intrenched in a sense of what was due to her, not to start indignantly from remonstrance. It is true, all this was but a painted veil. She was tremblingly alive to censure, and wholly devoted to the object of her attachment; but Saville was unable to understand these contradictions. His modesty led him to believe, that he, of all men, was least calculated to excite love in a woman's bosom. He saw in Cornelia a beautiful creation, to admire and adore; but he was slow to perceive the tenderness of soul, which her disposition made her anxious to conceal, and he was conscious of no qualities in himself that could entitle him to a place in her affections. Except that he loved her, what merit had he? And the interests of his affection he was willing to sacrifice at the altar of her wishes, though his life should be the oblation necessary to insure their accomplishment.
This is not the description of true love on either side; for, to be perfect, that sentiment ought to exist through the entireness of mutual sympathy and trust: but not the less did their passionate attachment engross the minds of both. All might have been well, indeed, had the lovers been left to themselves; but friends and relations interfered to mar and to destroy. The sisters of Saville accused Lady Lodore ofencouraging, and intending to marry, the Marquess of C—. Saville instantly resolved to be no obstacle in the way of her ambition. Cornelia was fired with treble indignation to perceive that he at once conceded the place to his rival. One word or look of gentleness would have changed this; but she resolved to vanquish by other arms, and to force him to show some outward sign of jealousy and resentment. Saville had a natural dignity of mind, founded on simplicity of heart and directness of purpose. Cornelia knew that he loved her;—on that his claim rested: all that might be done to embellish and elevate her existence, he would study to achieve; but he could not enter into, nor understand, the puerile fancies of a spoiled Beauty: and while she was exerting all her powers, and succeeded in fascinating a crowd of flatterers, she saw Saville apart, abstracted from such vanities, pursuing a silent course; ready to approach her when her attention was disengaged, but at no time making one among her ostentatious admirers.
There was no moment of her life in which Cornelia did not fully appreciate her lover's value, and her own good fortune in having inspired him with a serious and faithful attachment. But she imagined that this must be known and acknowledged; and that to ask any demonstration of gratitude, was ungenerous and tyrannical. An untaught girl could not have acted with more levity and wilfulness. It was worse when she found that she was accused of encouraging a wealthier and more illustrious rival. She disdained to exculpate herself from the charge of such low ambition, but rather furnished new grounds for accusation; and, in the arrogance of conscious power, smiled at the pettiness of the attempts made to destroy her influence. Proud in the belief that she could in an instant dispel the clouds she had conjured athwart her heaven, she cared not how ominously the thunder muttered, nor how dark and portentous lowered the threatening storm. It came when she least expected it: convinced of the fallacy of his confidence, made miserable by her caprices, agonized by the idea that he only lingered to add another trophy to his rival's triumph, Saville, who was always impetuous and precipitate, suddenly quitted England.
This was a severe blow at first; but soon Cornelia smiled at it. He would return—he must. The sincerity of their mutual preference would overcome the petty obstacles of time and distance. She never felt more sure of his devotion than now; and she looked so happy, and spoke so gaily, that those who were more ready to discern indifference, than love, in her sentiments, assured the absent Saville, that Lady Lodore rejoiced at his absence, as having shaken off a burthen, and got rid of an impediment, which, in spite of herself, was a clog to her brilliant career. The trusting love that painted her face in smiles was a traitor to itself and while she rose each day in the belief that the one was near at hand which would bring her lover before her, dearer and more attached than ever, she was in reality at work in defacing the whole web of life, and substituting dark, blank, and sad disappointment, for the images of light and joy with which her fancy painted it.
Saville had been gone five months. It was strange that he did not return; and she began to ponder upon how she must unbend, and what demonstration she must make, to attract him again to her side. The Marquess of C—was dismissed; and she visited the daughters of Lord Maristow, to learn what latest news they had received of their brother. "Do you know, Lady Lodore," said Sophia Saville, "that this is Horatio's wedding-day? It is too true: we regret it, because he weds a foreigner—but there is no help now. He is married."
Had sudden disease seized on the frame-work of her body, and dissolved and scattered with poisonous influence and unutterable pains, the atoms that composed it, Lady Lodore would have been less agonized, less terrified. A thousand daggers were at once planted in her bosom. Saville was false! married! divided from her for ever! She was stunned:—scarcely understanding the meaning of the phrases addressed to her, and, unable to conceal her perturbation, she replied at random, and hastened to shorten her visit.
But no interval of doubt or hope was afforded. The words she had heard were concise, true to their meaning and all-sufficing. Her heart died within her. What had she done? Was she the cause? She longed to learn all the circumstances that led to this hasty marriage, and whether inconstancy or resentment had impelled him to the fatal act. Yet wherefore ask these things? It was over; the scene was closed. It were little worth to analyze the poison she had imbibed, since she was past all mortal cure.
Her first resolve was to forget—never, never to think of the false one more. But her thoughts never wandered from his image, and she was eternally busied in retrospection and conjecture. She was tempted at one time to disbelieve the intelligence, and to consider it as a piece of malice on the part of Miss Saville; then the common newspaper told her, that at the Ambassador's house at Naples, the Honourable Horatio Saville had married Clorinda, daughter of the Principe Villamarina, a Neapolitan nobleman of the highest rank.
It was true therefore—and how was it true? Did he love his bride? why else marry?—had he forgotten his tenderness towards her? Alas! it needed not forgetting; it was a portion of past time, fleeting as time itself; it had been borne away with the hours as they passed, and remembered as a thing which had been, and was no more. The reveries of love which for months had formed all her occupation, were a blank; or rather to be replaced by the agonies of despair. Her native haughtiness forsook her. She was alone and desolate—hedged in on all sides by insuperable barriers, which shut out every glimpse of hope. She was humbled in her own eyes, through her want of success, and heartily despised herself, and all her caprices and vanities, which had led her to this desart, and then left her to pine. She detested her position in society, her mechanism of being, and every circumstance, self-inherent, or adventitious, that attended her existence. All seemed to her sick fancy so constructed as to ensure disgrace, desertion, and contempt. She lay down each night feeling as if she could never endure to raise her head on the morrow.
The unkindness and cruelty of her lover's conduct next presented themselves to her contemplation. She had suffered much during the past years, more than she had ever acknowledged, even to herself; she had suffered of regret and sorrow, while she brooded over her solitary position, and the privation of every object on whom she might bestow affection. She had had nothing to hope. Saville had changed all this; he had banished her cares, and implanted hope in her heart. Now again his voice recalled the evils, his hand crushed the new-born expectation of happiness. He was the cause of every ill; and the adversity which she had endured proudly and with fortitude while it seemed the work of fate, grew more bitter and heavy when she felt that it arose through the agency of one, whose kind affection and guardianship she had fondly believed would hereafter prove a blessing sent as from Heaven itself, be to the star of her life.
This fit passed off; with struggles and relapses she wore down the first gush of sorrow, and her disposition again assumed force over her. She had found it difficult to persuade herself, in spite of facts, that she was not loved; but it was easy, once convinced of the infidelity of her lover, to regard him with indifference. She now regretted lost happiness—but Saville was no longer regretted. She wept over the vanished forms of delight, lately so dear to her; but she remembered that he who had called them into life had driven them away; and she smiled in proud scorn of his fleeting and unworthy passion. It was not to this love that she had made so tender and lavish a return. She had loved his constancy, his devotion, his generous solicitude for her welfare—for the happiness which she bestowed on him, and for the sympathy that so dearly united them. These were fled; and it were vain to consecrate herself to an empty and deformed mockery of so beautiful a truth.
Then she tried to hate him—to despise and to lessen him in her own estimation. The attempt recoiled on herself. The recollection of his worth stole across her memory, to frustrate her vain endeavours: his voice haunted—his expressive eyes beamed on her. It were better to forget. Indifference was her only refuge, and to attain this she must wholly banish his image from her mind. Cornelia was possessed of wonderful firmness of purpose. It had carried her on so long unharmed, and now that danger was at hand, it served effectually to defend her. She rose calm and free, above unmerited disaster. She grew proud of the power she found that she possessed of conquering the most tyrannical of passions. Peace entered her soul, and she hailed it as a blessing.
The clause in her husband's will which deprived her of the guardianship of her daughter had been forgotten during this crisis. Before, under the supposition that she should marry, she had deferred taking any step to claim her. The idea of a struggle to be made, unassisted, unadvised, and unshielded, was terrible. She had not courage to encounter all the annoyances that might ensue. To get rid for a time of the necessity of action and reflection, she went abroad. She changed the scene—she travelled from place to place. She gave herself up in the solitude of continental journies to the whole force of contending passions; now overcome by despair, and again repressing regret, asserting to herself the lofty pride of her nature.
By degrees she recovered a healthier tone of mind—a distant and faint, yet genuine sense of duty dawned upon her; and she began to think on what her future existence was to depend, and how she could best secure some portion of happiness. Her heart once again warmed towards the image of her daughter—and she felt that in watching the development of her mind, and leading her to love and depend on her, a new interest and real pleasure might spring up in life. She reproached herself for having so long, by silence and passive submission, given scope to the belief that she was willing to be a party against herself, in the injustice of Lodore; and she returned to England with the intention of instantly enforcing her rights over her child, and taking to her bosom and to her fondest care the little being, whose affection and gratitude was to paint her future life with smiles.
She called to mind Lady Santerre's worldly maxims, and her own experience. She knew that the first step to success is the appearance of prosperity and power. To command the good wishes and aid of her friends she must appear independent of them. She was earnest therefore to hide the wounds her heart had received, and the real loathing with which she regarded all things. She arrayed herself in smiles, and banished, far below into the invisible recesses of her bosom, the contempt and disgust with which she viewed the scene around her.
She returned to England. She appeared at the height of the season, in the midst of society, as beautiful, as charming, as happy in look and manner, as in her days of light-hearted enjoyment. She paused yet a moment longer, to reflect on what step she had better take on first enforcing her claim; but her mind was full of its intention, and set upon the fulfilment.
At this time, but a few days after her arrival in London, she went to the opera. She heard the name of Fitzhenry called in the lobby—she saw and recognized Mrs. Elizabeth—the venerable sister Bessy, so little altered, that time might be said to have touched, but not trenched her homely kindly face. With her, in attendance on her, she beheld Horatio Saville's favourite cousin—the gay and fashionable Edward Villiers. It was strange; her curiosity was strongly excited. It had not long to languish: the next morning Villiers called, and was readily admitted.
And as good lost is seld or never found.SHAKSPEARE.
And as good lost is seld or never found.
And as good lost is seld or never found.
SHAKSPEARE.
Lady Lodore and Villiers met for the first time since Horatio Saville's marriage. Neither were exactly aware of what the other knew or thought. Cornelia was ignorant how far her attachment to his cousin was known to him; whether he shared the general belief in her worldly coquetry, or what part he might have had in occasioning their unhappy separation. She could not indeed see him without emotion. He had been Lodore's second, and received the last dying breath of him who had, in her brightest youth, selected her from the world, to share his fortunes. Those days were long past; yet as she grew older, disappointed, and devoid of pleasurable interest in the present, she often turned her thoughts backward, and wondered at the part she had acted.
Similar feelings were in Edward's mind. He was prejudiced against her in every way. He despised her worldly calculations, as reported to him, and rejoiced in their failure. He believed these reports, and despised her; yet he could not see her without being moved at once with admiration and pity. The moon-lit hill, and tragic scene, in which he had played his part, came vividly before his eyes. He had been struck by the nobleness of Lodore's appearance—the sensibility that sat on his countenance—his gentle, yet dignified manners. Ethel's idolatry of her father had confirmed the favourable prepossession. He could not help compassionating Cornelia for the loss of her husband, forgetting, for the moment, their separation. Then again recurred to him the eloquent appeals of Saville; his eulogiums; his fervent, reverential affection. She had lost him also. Could she hold up her head after such miserable events? The evidence of the senses, and the ideas of our own minds, are more forcibly present, than any notion we can form of the feelings of others. In spite, therefore, of his belief in her heartlessness, Villiers had pictured Cornelia attired in dismal weeds, the victim of grief. He saw her, beaming in beauty, at the opera;—he now beheld her, radiant in sweet smiles, in her own home. Nothing touched—nothing harmed her; and the glossy surface, he doubted not, imaged well the insensible, unimpressive soul within.
Lady Lodore would have despised herself for ever had she betrayed the tremor that shook her frame when Villiers entered. Her pride of sex was in arms to enable her to convince him, that no regret, no pining, shadowed her days. The reality was abhorrent, and should never be confessed. Thus then they met—each with a whole epic of woe and death alive in their memory; but both wearing the outward appearance of frivolity and thoughtlessness. He saw her as lovely as ever, and as kind. Her softest and sweetest welcome was extended to him. It was this frequent show of frank cordiality which gained her "golden opinions" from the many. Her haughtiness was all of the mind;—a desire to please, and constant association with others, had smoothed the surface, and painted it in the colours most agreeable to every eye.
They addressed each other as if they had met but the day before. At first, a few questions and answers passed,—as to where she had been on the continent, how she liked Baden, &c.;—and then Lady Lodore said—"Although I have not seen her for several years, I instantly recognized a relative of mine with you yesterday evening. Does Miss Fitzhenry make any stay in town?"
The idea of Ethel was uppermost in Villiers's mind, and struck by the manner in which the woman of fashion spoke of her daughter, he replied, "During the season, I believe; I scarcely know. Miss Fitzhenry came up for her health; that consideration, I suppose, will regulate her movements."
"She looked very well last night—perhaps she intends to remain till she gets ill, and country air is ordered?" observed Lady Lodore.
"That were nothing new at least," replied Villiers, trying to hide the disgust he felt at her mode of speaking; "the young and blooming too often protract their first season, till the roses are exchanged for lilies."
"If Miss Fitzhenry's roses still bloom," said the lady, "they must be perennial ones; they have surely grown more fit for a herbal than a vase."
Villiers now perceived his mistake, and replied, "You are speaking of Mrs. Elizabeth Fitzhenry, as the good lady styles herself—I spoke of—her niece—"
"Has Ethel been ill?" Lady Lodore's hurried question, and the use of the christian name, as most familiar to her thoughts, brought home to Villiers's heart the feeling of their near relationship. There was something more than grating; it was deeply painful to speak to a mother of a child who had been torn from her—who did not know—who had even been taught to hate her. He wished himself a hundred miles off, but there was no help, he must reply. "You might have seen last night that she is perfectly recovered."
Lady Lodore's imagination refused to image her child in the tall, elegant, full-formed girl she had seen, and she said, "Was Ethel with you? I did not see her—probably she went home before the opera was over, and I only perceived your party in the crush-room—you appear already intimate."
"It is impossible to see Miss Fitzhenry and not to wish to be intimate," replied Villiers with his usual frankness. "I, at least, cannot help being deeply interested in every thing that relates to her."
"You are very good to take concern in my little girl. I should have imagined that you were too young yourself to like children."
"Children!" repeated Villiers, much amazed; "Miss Fitzhenry!—she is not a child."
Lady Lodore scarcely heard him; a sudden pang had shot across her heart, to think how strangers—how every one might draw near her daughter, and be interested for her, while she could not, without making herself the tale of the town, the subject, through the medium of news-papers, for every gossip's tea-table in England—where her sentiments would be scanned, and her conduct criticized—and this through the revengeful feelings of her husband, prolonged beyond the grave. Tears had been gathering in her eyes during the last moments; she turned her head to hide them, and a quick shower fell on her silken dress. Quite ashamed of this self-betrayal, she exerted herself to overcome her emotion. Villiers felt awkwardly situated; his first impulse had been to rise to take her hand, to soothe her; but before he could do more than the first of these acts, as Lady Lodore fancied for the purpose of taking his leave, she said, "It is foolish to feel as I do; yet perhaps more foolish to attempt to conceal from one, as well acquainted as you are with every thing, that I do feel pained at the unnatural separation between me and Ethel, especially when I think of the publicity I must incur by asserting a mother's claims. I am ashamed of intruding this subject on you; but she is no longer the baby cherub I could cradle in my arms, and you have seen her lately, and can tell me whether she has been well brought up—whether she seems tractable—if she promises to be pretty?"
"Did you not think her lovely?" cried Villiers with animation; "you saw her last night, taking my arm."
"Ethel!" cried the lady. "Could that be Ethel? True, she is now sixteen—I had indeed forgot"—her cheeks became suffused with a deep blush as she remembered all the solicisms she had been committing. "She is sixteen," she continued, "and a woman—while I fancied a little girl in a white frock and blue sash: this alters every thing. We have been indeed divided, and must now remain so for evermore. I will not injure her, at her age, by making her the public talk—besides, many, many other considerations would render me fearful of making myself responsible for her future destiny."
"At least," said Villiers, "she ought to wait on you."
"That were beyond Lord Lodore's bond," said the lady; "and why should she wait on me? Were she impelled by affection, it were well. But this is talking very simply—we could only be acquaintance, and I would rather be nothing. I confess, that I repined bitterly, that I was not permitted to have my little girl, as I termed her, for my plaything and companion—but my ideas are now changed: a dear little tractable child would have been delightful—but she is a woman, with a will of her own—prejudiced against me—brought up in that vulgar America, with all kinds of strange notions and ways. Lord Lodore was quite right, I believe—he fashioned her for himself and—Bessy. The worst thing that can happen to a girl, is to have her prejudices and principles unhinged; no new ones can flourish like those that have grown with her growth; and mine, I fear, would differ greatly from those in which she has been educated. A few years hence, she may feel the want of a friend, who understands the world, and who could guide her prudently through its intricacies; then she shall find that friend in me. Now, I feel convinced that I should do more harm than good."
A loud knock at the street door interrupted the conversation. "One thing only I cannot endure," said the lady hastily, "to present a domestic tragedy or farce to the Opera House—we must not meet in public. I shall shut up my house and return to Paris."
Mere written words express little. Lady Lodore's expressions were nothing; but her countenance denoted a change of feeling, a violence of emotion, of which Villiers hardly believed her capable; but before he could reply, the servant threw open the door, and her brow immediately clearing, serenity descended on her face. With her blandest smile she extended her hand to her new visitor. Villiers was too much discomposed to imitate her, so with a silent salutation he departed, and cantered round the park to collect his thoughts before he called in Seymour-street.
The ladies there were not less agitated than Lady Lodore, and displayed their feelings with the artlessness of recluses. The first words that Mrs. Elizabeth had addressed to her niece, at the breakfast table, were an awkwardly expressed intimation, that she meant instantly to return to Longfield. Ethel looked up with a face of alarm: her aunt continued; "I do not want to speak ill of Lady Lodore, my dear—God forgive her—that is all I can say. What your dear father thought of her, his last will testifies. I suppose you do not mean to disobey him."
"His slightest word was ever a law with me," said Ethel; "and now that he is gone, I would observe his injunctions more religiously than ever. But—"
"Then, my dear, there is but one thing to be done: Lady Lodore will assuredly force herself upon us, meet us at every turn, oblige you to pay her your duty; nor could you avoid it. No, my dear Ethel, there is but one escape—your health, thank God, is restored, and Longfield is now in all its beauty; we will return to-morrow."
Ethel did not reply; she looked very disconsolate—she did not know what to say; at last, "Mr. Villiers will think it so odd," dropped from her lips.
"Mr. Villiers is nothing to us, my dear," said aunt Bessy—"not the most distant relation; he is an agreeable, good-hearted young gentleman—but there are so many in the world."
Ethel left her breakfast untasted and went out of the room: she felt that she could no longer restrain her tears. "My father!" she exclaimed, while a passionate burst of weeping choked her utterance, "my only friend! why, why did you leave me? Why, most cruel, desert your poor orphan child? Gracious God! to what am I reserved! I must not see my mother—a name so dear, so sweet, is for me a curse and a misery! O my father, why did you desert me!"
Her calm reflections were not less bitter; she did not suffer her thoughts to wander to Villiers, or rather the loss of her father was still so much the first grief of her heart, that on any new sorrow, it was to this she recurred with agony. The form of her youthful mother also flitted before her; and she asked herself, "Can she be so wicked?" Lord Lodore had never uttered her name; it was not until his death had put the fatal seal on all things, that she heard a garbled exaggerated statement from her aunt, over whose benevolent features a kind of sacred horror mantled, whenever she was mentioned. The will of Lord Lodore, and the stern injunction it contained, that the mother and daughter should never meet, satisfied Ethel of the truth of all that her aunt said; so that educated to obedience and deep reverence for the only parent she had ever known, she recoiled with terror from transgressing his commands, and holding communication with the cause of all his ills. Still it was hard, and very, very sad; nor did she cease from lamenting her fate, till Villiers's horse was heard in the street, and his knock at the door; then she tried to compose herself. "He will surely come to us at Longfield," she thought; "Longfield will be so very stupid after London."
After London! Poor Ethel! she had lived in London as in a desert; but lately it had appeared to her a city of bliss, and all places else the abode of gloom and melancholy. Villiers was shocked at the appearance of sorrow which shadowed her face; and, for a moment, thought that the rencounter with her mother was the sole occasion of the tears, whose traces he plainly discerned. His address was full of sympathetic kindness;—but when she said, "We return to-morrow to Essex—will you come to see us at Longfield?"—his soothing tones were exchanged for those of surprise and vexation.
"Longfield!—impossible! Why?"
"My aunt has determined on it. She thinks me recovered; and so, indeed, I am."
"But are you to be entombed at Longfield, except when dying? If so, do, pray, be ill again directly! But this must not be. Dear Mrs. Fitzhenry," he continued, as she came in, "I will not hear of your going to Longfield. Look; the very idea has already thrown Miss Fitzhenry into a consumption;—you will kill her. Indeed you must not think of it."
"We shall all die, if we stay in town," said Mrs. Elizabeth, with perplexity at her niece's evident suffering.
"Then why stay in town?" asked Villiers.
"You just now said, that we ought not to return to Longfield," answered the lady; "and I am sure if Ethel is to look so ill and wretched, I don't know what I am to do."
"But there are many places in the world besides either London or Longfield. You were charmed with Richmond the other day: there are plenty of houses to be had there; nothing can be prettier or more quiet."
"Well, I don't know," said Aunt Bessy, "I never thought of that, to be sure; and I have business which makes our going to Longfield very inconvenient. I expect Mr. Humphries, our solicitor, next week; and I have not seen him yet. You really think, Mr. Villiers, that we could get a house to suit us at Richmond?"
"Let us drive there to-day," said Villiers; "we can dine at the Star and Garter. You can go in the britzska—I on horseback. The days are long: we can see every thing; and take your house at once."
This plan sounded very romantic and wild to the sober spinster; but Ethel's face, lighted up with vivid pleasure, said more in its favour, than what the good lady called prudence could allege against it. "Silly people you women are," said Villiers: "you can do nothing by yourselves: and are always running against posts, unless guided by others. This will make every thing easy—dispel every difficulty." His thoughts recurred to Lady Lodore, and her intended journey to Paris, as he said this: and again they flew to a charming little villa on the river's side, whither he could ride every day, and find Ethel among her flowers, alone and happy.
The excursion of this morning was prosperous. The day was warm yet fresh; and as they quitted town, and got surrounded by fields, and hedges, and trees, nature reassumed her rights, and awakened transport in Ethel's heart. The boyish spirits of Villiers communicated themselves to her; and Mrs. Elizabeth smiled, also, with the most exquisite complacency. A few inquiries conducted them to a pretty rural box, surrounded by a small, but well laid-out shrubbery; and this they engaged. The dinner at the inn, the twilight walk in its garden;—the fair prospect of the rich and cultivated country, with its silvery, meandering river at their feet; and the aspect of the cloudless heavens, where one or two stars silently struggled into sight amidst the pathless wastes of sky, were objects most beautiful to look on, and prodigal of the sweetest emotions. The wide, dark lake, the endless forests, and distant mountains, of the Illinois, were not here; but night bestowed that appearance of solitude, which habit rendered dear to Ethel; and imagination could transform wooded parks and well-trimmed meadows into bowery seclusions, sacred from the foot of man, and fresh fields, untouched by his hand.
A few days found Ethel and her aunt installed at their little villa, and delighted to be away from London. Education made loneliness congenial to both: they might seek transient amusements in towns, or visit them for business; but happiness, the agreeable tenor of unvaried daily life, was to be found in the quiet of the country only;—and Richmond was the country to them; for, cut off from all habits of intercourse with their species, they had but to find trees and meadows near them, at once to feel transported, from the thick of human life, into the most noiseless solitude.
Ethel was very happy. She rose in the morning with a glad and grateful heart, and gazed from her chamber window, watching the early sunbeams as they crept over the various parts of the landscape, visiting with light and warmth each open field or embowered nook. Her bosom overflowed with the kindest feelings, and her charmed senses answered the tremulous beating of her pure heart, bidding it enjoy. How beautiful did earth appear to her! There was a delight and a sympathy in the very action of the shadows, as they pranked the sunshiny ground with their dark and fluctuating forms. The leafy boughs of the tall trees waved gracefully, and each wind of heaven wafted a thousand sweets. A magic spell of beauty and bliss held in one bright chain the whole harmonious universe; and the soul of the enchantment was love—simple, girlish, unacknowledged love;—the love of the young, feminine heart, which feels itself placed, all bleakly and dangerously, in a world, scarce formed to be its home, and which plumes itself with Love to fly to the covert and natural shelter of another's protecting care.
Ethel did not know—did not fancy—that she was in love; nor did any of the throes of passion disturb the serenity of her mind. She only felt that she was very, very happy; and that Villiers was the kindest of human beings. She did not give herself up to idleness and reverie. The first law of her education had been to be constantly employed. Her studies were various: they, perhaps, did not sufficiently tend to invigorate her understanding, but they sufficed to prevent every incursion of listlessness. Meanwhile, during each, the thought of Villiers strayed through her mind, like a heavenly visitant, to gild all things with sunny delight. Some time, during the day, he was nearly sure to come; or, at least, she was certain of seeing him on the morrow; and when he came, their boatings and their rides were prolonged; while each moment added to the strength of the ties that bound her to him. She relied on his friendship; and his society was as necessary to her life, as the air she breathed. She so implicitly trusted to his truth, that she was unaware that she trusted at all—never making a doubt about it. That chance, or time, should injure or break off the tie, was a possibility that never suggested itself to her mind. As the silver Thames traversed in silence and beauty the landscape at her feet, so did love flow through her soul in one even and unruffled stream—the great law and emperor of her thoughts; yet more felt from its influence, than from any direct exertion of its power. It was the result and the type of her sensibility, of her constancy, of the gentle, yet lively sympathy, it was her nature to bestow, with guileless confidence. Those around her might be ignorant that her soul was imbued with it, because, being a part of her soul, there was small outward demonstration. None, indeed, near her thought any thing about it: Aunt Bessy was a tyro in such matters; and Villiers—he had resolved, when he perceived love on her side, to retreat for ever: till then he might enjoy the dear delight that her society afforded him.
Alas! he knowsThe laws of Spain appoint me for his heir;That all must come to me, if I outlive him,Which sure I must do, by the course of nature.BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.
Alas! he knowsThe laws of Spain appoint me for his heir;That all must come to me, if I outlive him,Which sure I must do, by the course of nature.
Alas! he knowsThe laws of Spain appoint me for his heir;That all must come to me, if I outlive him,Which sure I must do, by the course of nature.
BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.
Edward Villiers was the only child of a man of considerable fortune, who had early in life become a widower. From the period of this event, Colonel Villiers (for his youth had been passed in the army, where he obtained promotion) had led the careless life of a single man. His son's home was at Maristow Castle, when not at school; and the father seldom remembered him except as an incumbrance; for his estate was strictly entailed, so that he could only consider himself possessed of a life interest in a property, which would devolve, without restriction, on his more fortunate son.
Edward was brought up in all the magnificence of his uncle's lordly abode. Luxury and profusion were the elements of the air he breathed. To be without any desired object that could be purchased, appeared baseness and lowest penury. He, also, was considered the favoured one of fortune in the family circle. The elder brother among the Savilles rose above, but the younger fell infinitely below, the undoubted heir of eight thousand a year, and one of the most delightful seats in England. He was brought up to look upon himself as a rich man, and to act as such; and meanwhile, until his father's death, he had nothing to depend on, except any allowance he might make him.
Colonel Villiers was a man of fashion, addicted to all the extravagances and even vices of the times. He set no bounds to his expenses. Gambling consumed his nights, and his days were spent at horse-races, or any other occupation that at once excited and impoverished him. His income was as a drop of water in the mighty stream of his expenditure. Involvement followed involvement, until he had not a shilling that he could properly call his own.
Poor Edward heard of these things, but did not mark them. He indulged in no blameworthy pursuits, nor spent more than beseemed a man in his rank of life. The idea of debt was familiar to him: every one—even Lord Maristow—was in debt, far beyond his power of immediate payment. He followed the universal example, and suffered no inconvenience, while his wants were obligingly supplied by the fashionable tradesmen. He regarded the period of his coming of age as a time when he should become disembarrassed, and enter upon life with ample means, and still more brilliant prospects.
The day arrived. It was celebrated with splendour at Maristow Castle. Colonel Villiers was abroad; but Lord Maristow wrote to him to remind him of this event, which otherwise he might have forgotten. A kind letter of congratulation was, in consequence, received from him by Edward; to which was appended a postscript, saying, that on his return, at the end of a few weeks, he would consult concerning some arrangements he wished to make with regard to his future income.
His return was deferred; and Edward began to experience some of the annoyances of debt. Still no real pain was associated with his feelings; though he looked forward with eagerness to the hour of liberation. Colonel Villiers came at last. He spoke largely of his intended generosity, which was shown, meanwhile, by his persuading Edward to join in a mortgage for the sake of raising an immediate sum. Edward scarcely knew what he was about. He was delighted to be of service to his father; and without thought or idea of having made a sacrifice, agreed to all that was asked of him. He was promised an allowance of six hundred a year.
The few years that had passed since then were full of painful experience and bitter initiation. His light and airy spirit was slow to conceive ill, or to resent wrong. When his annuity remained unpaid, he listened to his father's excuses with implicit credence, and deplored his poverty. One day, he received a note from him, written, as usual, in haste and confusion, but breathing anxiety and regret on his account, and promising to pay over to him the first money he could obtain. On the evening of that day, Edward was led by a friend into the gambling room of a celebrated club. The first man on whom his eyes fell, was his father, who was risking and losing rouleaus and notes in abundance. At one moment, while making over a large sum, he suddenly perceived his son. He grew pale, and then a deep blush spread itself over his countenance. Edward withdrew. His young heart was pierced to the core. The consciousness of a father's falsehood and guilt acted on him as the sudden intelligence of some fatal disaster would have done. He breathed thick—the objects swam round him—he hurried into the streets—he traversed them one after the other. It was not this scene alone—this single act; the veil was withdrawn from a whole series of others similar; and he became aware that his parent had stepped beyond the line of mere extravagance; that he had lost honourable feeling; that lies were common in his mouth; and every other—even his only child—was sacrificed to his own selfish and bad passions.
Edward never again asked his father for money. The immediate result of the meeting in the gambling-room, had been his receiving a portion of what was due to him; but his annuity was always in arrear, and paid so irregularly, that it became worse than nothing in his eyes; especially, as the little that he received was immediately paid over to creditors, and to defray the interest of borrowed money.
He never applied again to Colonel Villiers. He would have considered himself guilty of a crime, had he forced his father to forge fresh subterfuges, and to lie to his own son. Brought up in the midst of the wealthy, he had early imbibed a horror of pecuniary obligation; and this fastidiousness grew more sensitive and peremptory with each added day of his life. Yet with all this, he had not learnt to set a right value upon money; and he squandered whatever he obtained with thoughtless profusion. He had no friend to whose counsel he could recur. Lord Maristow railed against Colonel Villiers; and when he heard of Edward's difficulties, offered to remonstrate and force his brother-in-law to extricate him: but here ended his assistance, which was earnestly rejected. Horatio's means were exceedingly limited; but on a word from his cousin, he eagerly besought him to have recourse to his purse. To avoid his kindness, and his uncle's interference, Edward became reserved: he had recourse to Jews and money-lenders; and appeared at ease, while he was involving himself in countless and still increasing embarrassments.
Edward was naturally extravagant; or, to speak more correctly, his education and position implanted and fostered habits of expense and prodigality, while his careless disposition was unapt to calculate consequences: his very attempts at economy frequently cost him more than his most expensive whims. He was not, like his father, a gambler; nor did he enter into any very reprehensible pleasures: but he had little to spend, and was thoughtless and confiding; and being always in arrear, was forced, in a certain way, to continue a system which perpetually led him further into the maze, and rendered his return impossible. He had no hope of becoming independent, except through his father's death: Colonel Villiers, meanwhile, had no idea of dying. He was not fifty years of age; and considering his own a better life than his son's, involuntarily speculated on what he should do if he should chance to survive him. He was a handsome and a fashionable man: he often meditated a second marriage, if he could render it advantageous; and repined at his inability to make settlements, which was an insuperable impediment to his project. Edward's death would overcome this difficulty. Such were the speculations of father and son; and the portion of filial and paternal affection which their relative position but too usually inspires.
Until he was twenty-one, Edward had never spent a thought upon his scanty resources. Three years had past since then—three brief years, which had a little taught him of what homely stuff the world is made; yet care and even reflection had not yet disturbed his repose. Days, months sped on, and nothing reminded him of his relative wealth or poverty in a way to annoy him, till he knew Ethel. He had been interested for her in America—he had seen her, young and lovely, drowned in grief—sorrowing with the heart's first prodigal sorrow for her adored father. He had left her, and thought of her no more—except, as a passing reflection, that in the natural course of things, she was now to become the pupil of Lady Lodore, and consequently, that her unsophisticated feelings and affectionate heart would speedily be tarnished and hardened under her influence. He anticipated meeting her hereafter in ball-rooms and assemblies, changed into a flirting, giddy, yet worldly-minded girl, intent upon a good establishment, and a fashionable partner.
He encountered her under the sober and primitive guardianship of Mrs. Fitzhenry, unchanged and unharmed. The same radiant innocence beamed from her face; her sweet voice was still true and heart-reaching in its tones; her manner mirrored the purity and lustre of a mind incapable of guile, and adorned with every generous and gentle sentiment. He drew near her with respect and admiration, and soon no other object showed fair in his eyes except Ethel. She was the star of the world, and he felt happy only when the light of her presence shone upon him. Her voice and smile visited his dreams, and spoke peace and delight to his heart. She was to him as a jewel (yet sweeter and lovelier than any gem) shut up in a casket, of which he alone possessed the key—as a pearl, of whose existence an Indian diver is aware beneath the waves of ocean, deep buried from every other eye.
There was all in Ethel that could excite and keep alive imaginative and tender love. In characterizing a race of women, a delightful writer has described her individually. "She was in her nature a superior being. Her majestic forehead, her dark, thoughtful eye, assured you that she had communed with herself. She could bear to be left in solitude—yet what a look was her's if animated by mirth or love! She was poetical, if not a poet; and her imagination was high and chivalrous."[1]The elevated tone of feeling fostered by her father, her worship of his virtues, and the loneliness of her life in the Illinois, combined to render her dissimilar to any girl Villiers had ever before known or admired. When unobserved, he watched her countenance, and marked the varying tracery of high thoughts and deep emotions pass over it; her dark eye looked out from itself on vacancy, but read there a meaning only to be discerned by vivid imagination. And then when that eye, so full of soul, turned on him, and affection and pleasure at once animated and softened its glances—when her sweet lips, so delicate in their shape, so balmy and soft in their repose, were wreathed into a smile—he felt that his whole being was penetrated with enthusiastic admiration, and that his nature had bent to a law, from which it could never again be liberated.
That she should mingle with the world—enter into its contaminating pursuits—be talked of in it with that spirit of depreciation and impertinence, which is its essence, was odious to him, and he was overjoyed to have her safe at Richmond—secure from Lady Lodore—shut up apart from all things, except nature—her unsophisticated aunt, and his own admiration—a bird of beauty, brooding in its own fair nest, unendangered by the fowler. These were his feelings; but by degrees other reflections forced themselves on him; and love which, when it has knocked and been admitted,willbe a tyrant, obliged him to entertain regrets and fears which agonized him. His hourly aspiration was to make her his own. Would that dear heart open to receive into its recesses his image, and thenceforward dedicate itself to him only? Might he become her lover, guardian, husband—and they tread together the jungle of life, aiding each other to thread its mazes, and to ward off every danger that might impend over them.
Bitter worldly considerations came to mar the dainty colours of this fair picture. He could not conceal from himself the poverty that must attend him during his father's life. Lord Lodore's singular will reduced Ethel's property to almost nothing: should he then ally her to his scanty means and broken fortune? His resolution was made. He would not deny himself the present pleasure of seeing her, to spare any future pain in which he should be the only sufferer; but on the first token of exclusive regard on her side, he would withdraw for ever.