How glorious are thy works, Parent of Good!The words came oozing out in the oiliest of his unctuous tones; and the elocutionist’s expansive glance fell first on the landscape patronizingly, then on the by-standers encouragingly. It was as though he said, “You may fall to, and admire now. I have asked a blessing.” Nothing more occurred worthy of note till they reached their destination in safety.Of course, “there never was such a place for a picnic;” but, as that has been said of about three hundred different spots in every civilized country of Europe, it is certainly not worth while describing this particular one. The luncheon went on very much as such things always do when the arrangements are perfect, the commissariat unexceptionable, and the guests hungry and happy.Mr. Fullarton, however, applied himself so assiduously to Champagne-cup that his sober-minded helpmate (the only person who took much notice of his proceedings) was filled with an uncomfortable wonder. At last, during a pause in the general conversation, he addressed Royston abruptly—there was a strange huskiness in his voice, and his lower lip kept trembling—“I heard from Naples this morning. My friend mentions having met Mrs. Keene there.”The major looked up at the speaker with the cool, indifferent glance that had often irritated him. “Indeed! I was not aware that my mother had got so far south yet. She wrote last from Rome.” The other tossed off his glass with an unsteady hand, and set it down sharply. “I never heard of your mother, sir,” he said; “I was speaking of—your wife.”Chapter divisionCHAPTER XVI.Toquarrel with a man over his cups, or in any wise to molest him in his drink, is an offense against the proprieties that even the good-natured Epicurean can not find it in his easy heart to palliate or pardon. On this point he speaks mildly, but very firmly:Natis in usum lætitiæ scyphisPugnare, Thracum est. Tollite barbarumMorem: verecundumque BacchumSanguineis prohibete rixis.The ghost of Banquo was an uncivilized spectre, or—strong as was the provocation—it would have confronted Macbeth in any other place sooner than the banqueting-hall. The worst deed in the life of a cruel, false king was the setting on of the black bull’s head before the doomed Douglases; and perhaps Pope Alexander, though singularly exempt from all vulgar prejudice, found it hard to obtain his own pontifical absolution for the poisoned wine in which he pledged the Orsini and Colonna. In these, and a hundred like instances, there was certainly the shadowy excuse of political expediency or necessity; but what shall we say of that individual who interrupts the harmony of a meeting solely to gratify his own private pique or pleasure? Truly, with such enormities Heaven “heads the count of crimes.” I consider the most abominable act of which Eris was ever guilty was the selection of that particular moment for the production of the golden apple. If she was bound to make herself obnoxious, she might have waited till the Olympians were sitting in conclave, or at least at home again. It was infamous to disturb them while doing justice to the talents of Peleus’scordon-bleu. I wish very much that injured and querulous [OE]none had met her somewhere on the slopes of Ida, and “given her a piece of her mind.”On these grounds I venture to hope that all well-regulated readers will concur with me in pronouncing Mr. Fullarton’s conduct totally indefensible. It would have been so easy to have communicated his intelligence to any that it might concern, discreetly, at a fitting place and time, instead of casting it into the midst of a convivial assembly like a fulminating ball. Under other circumstances, he would probably have taken the quieter course; but he had been smarting for some time under a succession of provocations, real and fancied, from Royston Keene, and his own misadventure that morning had filled the cup of irritation brimful. It was the old exasperating feeling—Earl Percy sees my fall.Whatever might be the cost, he could not make up his mind to let slip so fair a chance of embarrassing his imperturbable enemy. There is no saying what he would have given to see that marvelous self-command for once thoroughly break down. It is unfortunate that the best-laid plans can not always insure a triumph. The chaplain certainly did succeed in producing a “situation,” and in reducing most of the party to that uncomfortable frame of mind which is popularly described as “wishing one’s self any where;” but the person who seemed most completely unconcerned was the man at whom the blow was leveled.The major shook his head with a quick gesture46of impatience, just as if some insect had lighted on his forehead; beyond this, for any evidence of his being annoyed by it, Mr. Fullarton’s last remark might have related tomissionaryprospects or Chinese politics. The steady color on his swarthy face neither lost nor gained a shade. There was not a sign of anger, or shame, or confusion in his clear, bold eyes; and, when he answered, there was not one fresh furrow on the brow that, at lighter provocation, was so apt to frown.“I give you credit for being utterly ignorant of what you are talking about, Mr. Fullarton. You could not possibly guess how disagreeable the subject would be to me. As it can’t be in the least interesting to any one else, suppose we change it?”Just the same cold, measured voice as ever, with only a slight sarcastic inflection to vary the deep, grave tones; but a very close observer might have seen his fingers clench the handle of a knife while he was speaking, as if their gripe would have dinted the ivory.It was hardly to be expected that the rest of the party would emulate thesang-froidof the Cool Captain. Sailing under false colors is a convenient practice enough, and productive sometimes of many prizes; but divers penalties attach to its detection, on land as well as on sea. Indeed, it involves the necessity ofsomebody’sappearing as a convicted impostor. On the present occasion—as the actor for whom the character was cast utterly declined to play it—the part fell to poor Harry Molyneux, who certainly looked it to perfection. In all his little difficulties and troubles, when hard pressed, he was wont to fall back upon the reserve ofla mignonne, sure of meeting there with sympathy, if not with succor. He dared not do so now. He dared not encounter the reproach of the beautiful, gentle eyes that had never looked into his own otherwise than trustfully since they first told the secret that she loved him dearly. The half-smothered cry that broke from Fanny’s lips when the chaplain made his disclosure went straight to the heart of her treacherous husband. He felt as if he deserved that those pretty lips should never smile upon him again.Oh, all my readers!—masculine especially—whose patience has carried you thus far, remark, I beseech you, the dangers that attend any dereliction from the duty of matrimonial confidence. What right have we to lock up the secrets of our most intimate friends, far less our own, instead of pouring them into the bosom of theβαθύκολπος ἄκοιτις, which is capacious enough to hold them all, were they tenfold more numerous and weighty? Such reticence is rife with awful peril. In our folly and blindness, we fancy ourselves secure, while the ground is mined under our guilty feet, and the explosion is even now preparing, from which only ourdisjecta membrawill emerge. Of course, some cold-hearted caviler will begin to quote instances of carefully-planned and promising conspiracies, which miscarried solely because the details reached a feminine ear. It may have been so; but I don’t see what business conspiracies have to succeed at all. Long live the Constitution! Truly, such delightful confidences must be something one-sided, for the mildest Griselda of them all would be led as a “Martha to the Stakes” sooner than concede to her husband the unrestricted supervision of her correspondence. I have indeed a dim recollection of having heard ofonebride of seventeen, who, during the honeymoon, was weak and (selon les dames) wicked enough to submit to profane male eyes epistles received from the friends of her youth, in their simple entirety, instead of reading out an expurgated edition of the same. She had been brought up in a very dungeon of decorum by a terrible grandmother, a rigid moralist, whom no man ever yet beheld without a shiver; and during those first few weeks after her escape she was probably intoxicated by the novel sense of freedom, besides which, she was perfectly infatuated about “Reginald;” but all this could not exculpate her when arraigned before her peers. She lived long enough to repent and to reassert, to some extent, her lost matronly dignity, but she died very young—let us hope in fair course of nature. She had violated the first law of a guild more numerous and influential than that of the Freemasons. Examples are necessary from time to time, and, though theVehme-gerichtmay pity the offender, it may not therefore linger in its vengeance. Nevertheless, my brethren, our course is clear. Let us resign to the chatelaine the key of the letter-bag and the censorship thereof. If, after due warning, our light-minded friendswillwrite to us in terms that mislike that excellent and punctilious inspectress, they must aby it in the cold looks and bitter innuendoes which will be their portion when they come to us in the next hunting season. Our conscience, at least, will be pure and undefiled, and we shall pass to the end of our pilgrimagesans peur, though perchance, even then, notsans reproche. “Servitudes,” as Miggs, the veteran vestal remarked, “is no inheritance,” but there are natures who thrive rarely in this tranquil and inglorious condition. Such men live, as a rule, pretty contentedly to a great old age, and die in the odor of intense respectability. Salubrious, it seems, as well as creditable to the patient, is arégimeof moderate hen-pecking, only it is necessary that he should be of the intermediate species between Socrates and Georges Dandin.Mrs. Danvers would certainly have indulged openly in that immoderate exultation to which all minor prophets are prone when their predictions chance to be verified, but this was checked by her constitutional timidity. She was horribly afraid of the effect that the revelation might have on her patroness; therefore what precise meaning was implied by the complicated contortions of her countenance no mortal can guess or know. Her sensations probably resolved themselves into an excess of admiration for the pastor in his new character of a denouncer of detected guilt and champion of imperiled innocence, added to which was a vague desire to lanch her own anathema maranatha at Royston Keene.Dick Tresilyan took the whole thing with remarkable coolness, not to say complacency. He nodded his head, and smiled, and winked cunningly aside at Molyneux, as if to intimate that he had known all about it long ago, and, indeed, so far he had been admitted into the major’s confidence on the night when the latter was supposed to have “lost his head.” By what sophistries Royston had succeeded in masking his purpose and making his case good, even to such an unsuspicious mind and easy morality,47the devil could best tell, who in such schemes had rarely failed him.We have left Cecil to the last. My proud, beautiful Cecil—was she not born for better things than to be made the prize of all those plottings and counter-plottings—to surrender the key of her heart’s treasures to one who was unworthy to kiss the hem of her robe—and now to have her self-command tried so cruelly to gratify the wounded vanity of a weak, shallow enthusiast?She did not flinch or start when Mr. Fullarton’s words caught her ear, but a heavy, chill faintness stole over her, till she felt all her limbs benumbed, and every thing before her eyes grew misty and dim. The numbness passed away almost immediately, but still the figures around her appeared distorted and fantastically exaggerated; they seemed to be tossing and whirling round one steadfast centre, as the dead leaves in winter eddy round the marble head of a statue; that single centre-object remained, throughout, distinct and unaltered in its aspect, while all else was confused and uncertain—the face of Royston Keene. The sight of that face—not defiant or even stern, but immutable in its cold tranquillity—acted on Cecil as a magical restorative; it seemed as though he were able, by some mesmeric influence, to impart to her a portion of his own miraculous self-control. Before his reply to the chaplain was ended, she threw back her proud head with the old imperial gesture, as if scorning her own momentary weakness; no mist or shadow clouded the brilliant violet eyes; she might speak safely now, without risking a false note in the music. It was no light peril that she escaped; the betrayal of emotion under such circumstances would have weighed down a meeker spirit than The Tresilyan’s with a sense of ineffaceable shame; for remember—however marked her partiality for Keene might have been—there had been no suspicion of an engagement between them. Had she broken down then, she would not have forgiven Royston to her dying day: she neverdidforgive the chaplain. As it was—by a strange anomaly—at the very moment when she became aware of having been deluded and misled, in intention if not by actually spoken words—when she had most reason to hate or despise the “enemy who had done her this dishonor”—she felt his hold upon her heart strengthened, as though he had justified his right to command it. Not to women alone, but to all beautiful, wild creatures, the ancient aphorism applies: the harder they are to discipline, the better they love their tamer. Cecil thought, “there is not another man alive whose eyes could meet mine so daringly:” and the haughty spirit bowed itself, and did obeisance to its suzerain. Different in many respects as good can be from evil—in one, those two were as fairly matched as Thiodolf and Isolde. Who can tell what wealth of happiness might have been stored up for both, if they had only not met—too late?These two words seem to me the most of any that are written or spoken. They strike the key-note of so many human agonies, that they might form a motto, apter than Dante’s, for the gates of hell. Very few may hear them without a melancholy thrill; well—if they do not bring a bitter pang. Like those awful conjurations that blanched in utterance the lips of the boldest magi, they have a fearful power to wake the dead. Lo! they are scarcely syllabled when there is a stir in the grave-yard where sad or guilty memories lie buried; the air is alive with phantoms; the watcher may close his eyes if he will: not the less is he sensible of the presence of those pale ghosts that come trooping to their vengeance. Many, many hours must pass before the spell is learned that will send them back to their tombs again.Not long ago I heard a story that bears upon this. The man of whom it was told lost his love after he had fairly wooed and won her. It matters not what suspicion, or misconception, or treachery parted them; but parted they were for eight miserable years. Then the lady repented or relented, and came to her lover to make her confession. When she had done speaking, she looked up into his face: she saw no light of gladness or welcome there—only a deepening and darkening of the weary look of pain: the arms whose last tender clasp she had not forgotten yet, never opened to draw her to his breast. He bent his head down upon his shaking hands, and the heavy drops that are sometimes wrung from strong men in their agony began to trickle through his fingers. In old days he could never bear to see her sad for a moment; now, he sat as though he heard her not, while she lay at his feet, wailing to be forgiven. When he could perfectly control his voice he said,“More than once, in my dreams, I have seen you so, and I have heard you say what you have said to-day. I answered then as I answer now—I never can forgive you. I do not know that you would not regain your old ascendency; I believe you are as dangerous, and I as weak, as ever. But I do know that, the more fascinating I found you, the harder it would be to bear. Thinking of what I had missed through that accursed time of famine would drive me mad soon. I have got used to my present burden: I won’t give you the chance of making it heavier. Those tears of mine were selfish as well as childish; they were given to the happiness and hope that you killed eight years ago. Stay—we parted with a show of kindness then; we will not part in anger now.”He laid his lips on her forehead as he raised her up—a grave, cold, passionless kiss, such as is pressed on the brow of a dear friend lying in his shroud. They never met alone again.It is exasperating to think how long I have taken to describe events and emotions that passed in the space of a few minutes; but to place all thedramatis personæin their proper positions does take time, unless the stage-manager is very experienced. Will you be good enough to imagine the picnic broken up (notin confusion), and the “strayed revelers” on their way to Dorade? Nothing worthy of note occurred on the spot; a commonplace conversation having been started and maintained in a way equally creditable to all parties concerned.Chapter divisionCHAPTER XVII.Allthe inquiries that the chaplain had “felt it his duty” to make respecting the antecedents of Royston Keene had failed to elicit any thing48more discreditable than may be said of the generality of men who have spent a dozen years in rather a fast regiment, keeping up to the standard of the corps. Doubtless graver charges might have been imputed to him, if the whole truth had been known; but the living witnesses who could have proved them had good reasons for their silence. Whether successful or defeated, the Cool Captain was not wont to take the world into his confidence. As for betraying his own or another’s secrets—his lips were about as likely to dothatas those of an effigy on a tomb-stone.Naples was a cover that the reverend investigator had not drawn; so he was considerably startled by the following words in a letter from thence, received that morning: “I meet a lady constantly in society here, of whose history I am curious to know more. She is the wife of Major Keene, the famous Indiansabreur; but has been separated from him for several years. She never makes an allusion to his existence; it was by the merest chance that I heard this, and also that her husband is spending the winter at Dorade. Perhaps you can throw some light on the cause of the ‘separate maintenance?’ People are not particular here, and have no right to be; still, one would like to know. I fancy it can not be her fault; she is perfectly gentle in her manner, but rather cold—very beautiful too, in a placid, statuesque style.” It is not worth transcribing the writer’s farther speculations. If a silent, but ultra-fervent benediction can at all profit the person for whom it is intended, very few people have been so well paid for epistolary labor, as was, then, Mr. Fullarton’s correspondent. The reason why has already been explained.Well, he had made his greatcoupwithout carefully counting the cost—that financial pleasure was still to come. He could not help feeling that it had been ratherfiasco. The man whom he had purposed utterly to discomfit had throughout been provokingly at his ease; the best that could be made of it was, a drawn battle. A disagreeable consciousness crept over the chaplain of having made himself generally obnoxious, without reaping any equivalent advantage or even satisfaction. No one seemed to look kindly or admiringly at him since the disclosure, except Mrs. Danvers; and, glutton as he was of such dainties, the adulation of that exemplary but unattractive female began rather to pall on his palate. He was clear-sighted enough to be aware that Miss Tresilyan was probably offended with him beyond hope of reconciliation, but this did not greatly trouble him. He had been sensible for some time of the decay of his influence in that quarter. Last of all rose on his mind, with unpleasant distinctness, Cecil’s warning, “If I were a man, I should not like to have Major Keene as my enemy.” He had thrown the lance over that enemy’s frontier, and it was now too late to talk of truce. A dread of the consequences overcame him as he thought of the reprisals that might be exacted by the merciless and unscrupulous guerilla. True, it was not very evident what harm the latter could do him; nevertheless, he could not shake off a vague, depressing apprehension. More and more, as he strolled on, moodily musing, far in the rear of the rest, he felt inclined to appreciate the wisdom of the ancient proverb, “Let sleeping dogs lie.” Years afterward he remembered with what a startled thrill, raising his eyes at a sharp angle of the path, he found himself face to face with Royston Keene.For some seconds they contemplated each other silently—the priest and the soldier. A striking contrast they made. The one, heated, and excited, and nervous, both in appearance and manner, looking more like a culprit brought up for judgment than a pillar of the Established Church; the other, outwardly as undemonstrative as the rock against which he leaned—just a shade of paleness telling of the sharp mental struggle from which he had come out victorious—his whole bearing and demeanor precisely what might have been expected if he had been sitting on a court-martial.The absurdity of the position struck the chaplain as soon as he collected himself from his first surprise. It never would do forhimto look as if he had any thing to be ashamed of; so, summoning to his aid all the dignity of his office and his own self-importance, with a great effort, he spoke steadily:“I presume you wish to talk to me, Major Keene? I shall be glad to hear any thing that you may have to communicate or explain. It is my duty as well as my desire to be useful to any member of my congregation, however little disposed they may be to avail themselves of their privileges. Interested, as I must be in the welfare of all committed to my charge, I need hardly say that the course you have chosen to pursue here has caused me great pain and anxiety—I own, not so much for your sake as that of others, to whom your influence was likely to be pernicious. What I heard this morning makes matters look still worse. I wish I could anticipate any satisfactory explanation.”The oldex cathedrâfeeling came back upon him while he was speaking; his tone, gradually becoming rounder and more sonorous, showed this. Was he so besotted by sacerdotal confidence as to fancy that he could win that grim penitent to come to him to be confessed or absolved?Since the chaplain first saw him Royston had never changed his attitude. He was leaning with his shoulder against the corner of rock round which the path turned, standing half across it, so that no one could pass him easily. The dense blue cloudlets of smoke kept rolling out from his lips rapidly, but regularly, and his right hand twined itself perpetually in the coils of his heavy brown mustache. That gesture, to those who knew his temper well, was ever ominous of foul and stormy weather. He did not reply immediately, but, taking the cigar from his mouth, began twisting up the loose leaf in a slow, deliberative way. At last he said,“You did that rather well this morning. How much did you expect to get for it? My wife is liberal enough in her promises sometimes, when she wants to make herself disagreeable, but she don’t pay well. You might have driven a better bargain by coming to me. I would have given you more to have held your tongue.” His tone was such as the other had never heard him use—such as most people would be loth to employ toward the meanest dependent. No description can do justice to the intensity of its insolence; it made even Mr. Fullarton’s torpid blood boil resentfully.49“How dare you address such words to me?” he cried out, trembling with rage. “If it were not for my profession—”“Stop!” the other broke in, rudely; “you need not trouble yourself to repeat that stale clap-trap. You mean to say that, if I were not safe from your profession, I should not have said so much. It isn’t worth while lying to yourself, and I have no time to trifle. The converse is the truer way of putting it. You know better than I can tell you that, if you had been unfrocked, you would never have ventured half what you have done to day. You don’t stir from hence till this is settled. Do you suppose I’ll allow my private affairs to be made, again, an occasion for indulging your taste for theatricals?”The chaplain flushed apoplectically. He just managed to stammer out,“I will not remain another instant to listen to your blasphemous insults. If you mean to prevent me from passing, I will return another way.”ScornfullyHe turned; but thrilled with priestly wrath, to feelHis sacred arm locked in a grasp of steel.A bolder man might have got nervous, finding himself on a lonely hill-side, face to face with such an adversary, reading, too, the savage meaning of those murderous eyes. Remember that Mr. Fullarton held Royston capable of any earthly crime. His own short-lived anger was instantly annihilated; the sweat of mortal terror broke out over all his livid face; his lips could hardly gasp out an unintelligible prayer for mercy.The soldier’s stern face settled into an expression of contempt: in his gentlest moods he could find little sympathy for purely physical fear.“Don’t faint,” he said; “there is no occasion for it. Do you think I shall ‘slay you as I slew the Egyptian yesterday?’ Well, I have scanty respect for your office, especially when its privileges are abused. If it were not for good reasons, I would serve you worse than I did that drunken scoundrel who frightened you almost to death down there among the vines; but that don’t suit my purpose. Listen: if you dare to interfere again, by word, or deed, or sign, in the affairs of me and mine, I know a better way of making you repent it.”As soon as he saw that there was no real danger to life or limb, the chaplain’s composure began to return. He launched forth immediately into a gallant though incoherent defiance. Royston’s features never for an instant changed or softened in their scorn.“Fair words,” he retorted; “but I’ll make your bubbles burst. You don’t monopolizeallthe resources of the Private Inquiry Office;” and, stooping down, he whispered a dozen words in the other’s ear. They related to a charge brought against Mr. Fullarton years ago, so circumstantial and difficult to disprove that, with all the advantages of counter-evidence at hand, it had well-nigh borne him down. He knew right well that, if it were once revived here abroad, where the lightest suspicion is caught up and used so readily, the consequences would be nothing short of utter ruin. He was a poor man, with a large family. No wonder if he quailed.“You know—you know,” he gasped, “that it is a vile, cruel falsehood.”To do him justice, he spoke the simple truth there.With a cold, tranquil satisfaction, the major contemplated his victim’s agony.“I choose to know nothing about it, except that it carries more probability than most stories one hears. The world in general is, fortunately, not incredulous, and I have seen a man ‘broke’ on lighter evidence. Well, you will take your own course, and I shall take mine. I fancy we understand each other—at last.”By a superhuman effort the unlucky ecclesiastic did contrive to mutter something about his “determination to do his duty.” Royston listened to him with his worst smile.“I’ll take my chance about that,” he said. “I feel tolerably safe. Now I’ll leave you to settle the affair between your interest and your conscience.”He turned on his heel, and strode away without another word. Long after he was out of sight the chaplain stood fixed in the same attitude of panic-stricken, helpless despondency. By my faith! even in these degenerate days, we have petrifying influences left that may match the head of the Gorgon.Meanwhile, the others were wending slowly homeward, truly in a very different mood from that in which they had gone forth that morning. Even as no man can be pronounced happy till the hour of his death, so can no excursion or entertainment be called successful till night has fairly closed in. Caprice of climate is only one of the many sources of disappointment, and the event justifies so seldom our sanguine predictions that we have little right to complain of false and fallible barometers. It is worthy of remark how often these trifles illustrate that trite and time-honored simile of Life. The vessel starts gayly enough, heeling over gracefully to the land-wind in the old, approved fashion—“Youth at the prow, and pleasure at the helm”—there is not a misgiving in the heart of any of the passengers; they can not help pitying those left behind on the shore. What a cheery adieu they wave to the friends who come down to wish them “good-speed!” After a voyage more or less prolonged the same ship drifts in slowly shoreward, over the harbor-bar, under the calm of the solemn sunset. Even the deepening twilight can not disguise the evidences of a terrible “sea-change.” Not a trace of paint or gilding remains on the wave-worn, shattered timbers. Sails rent and cordage strained tell tales of many storm-gusts, or, perchance, of one tornado; and see! her flag is flying half-mast high: the corpse of the Pilot is on board. Let us stand aside, lest we meet the passengers as they land. It were worse than mockery to ask how the yachting trip has sped.Miss Tresilyan rode somewhat in advance of the rest, under her brother’s escort. Dick was a model in his own line, and other brothers-of-beauties might well imitate his moderation and discretion. He never thrust himself into the conversation, or into her presence, when there was a chance of his intrusion being ill-timed, but was always at hand when he was wanted: the slightest sign, or even a glance, from Cecil, brought him to her side, and there he would march for hours in silent but perfect satisfaction. On the present occasion he seemed disposed to be unwontedly talkative, and to indulge in certain speculations relative to the intelligence they50had just heard. It was true, he knew it before, but nothing had been disclosed to him beyond the simple fact that Royston was married, and married unhappily. Cecil checked him gently, but very decidedly.“I had rather not hear or say one word on the subject. It ought not to interest either of us. In good time, I suppose, we shall be told all that it is fitting we should know. Meanwhile, it would be very wrong to make conjectures. No one has any right to pry into Major Keene’s affairs if he chooses to keep them secret. I do not believe any one ever did so, even in thought, without repenting it. I dare say Mr. Fullarton will find this out soon, and I shall not pity him in the least. A personoughtto be punished who tries to startle people in that disagreeable way. Did you hear Fanny’s little shriek? I have not had time to laugh at her about it yet. The path is too narrow for two to ride abreast.”The light tone and manner of her last words might have deceived a closer observer than honest Dick Tresilyan. He lapsed into silence; but, after some time, his meditations assumed a cheerfully-roseate hue, as they resolved themselves into the fixed idea that Royston was lingering behind “to have it out with the parson.”Some distance in the rear walked Harry Molyneux, holding dutifully his wife’s bridle-rein. It was very touching to see the diffidence and humility with which he proffered his little attentions, which were accepted, as it were, under protest. The truth was thatla mignonnehad forgiven him already, and it was with great difficulty she refrained from telling him so, by word or smile. Her soft heart melted within her at the sight of the criminal’s contrition, and decided that he had done penance enough during the last half hour to atone for a graver misdemeanor; but she deferred asking for explanations till a more convenient season, when there should be no chance of interruption; and meanwhile, on grounds of stern political necessity,elle le boudait. (If any elegant scholar will translate that Gallicism for me literally, I shall feel obliged to him.)Fancy the sensations of a man fighting his frigate desperately against overwhelming odds, when he sees the outline of a huge “liner,” with English colors at the main, looming dimly through the smoke, close on the enemy’s quarter; or those of the commander of an untenable post when the first bayonets of the relieving force glitter over the crest of the hill, and you will have a fair idea of Harry’s relief as he looked back and saw Keene rapidly gaining on them with his swift, slashing stride. As he fell back and yielded his post to Royston, this was written so plainly on his face that the latter could not repress a smile; but there was little mirth in his voice when he addressed Fanny—she had never heard him speak so gently and gravely: “I know that you are angry with your husband, as well as with me, for keeping you in the dark so long. I must make his peace with you, even if I fail in making my own. He could not tell you one word without breaking a promise given years ago. If he had done so, in spite of the excuse of the strong temptation, I would never have trusted him again. Ah! I see you have done him justice already: that is good of you. Now for my own part. Why I did not choose to let you into the secret as soon as I began to know you well I can hardly say. Hal will tell you all about it, and you will see that, for once, I was more sinned against than sinning; so I was not afraid of your thinking worse of me for it. Perhaps the last thing that a man likes to confess is his one arch piece of folly, especially if he has paid for it as heavy a price as attaches to most crimes. I think I am not sorry that you were kept in the dark till now. The past has given me some pleasant hours with you that might have been darkened if you had known all. I wish you would forgive me. We have always been such good friends, and, in your sex at least, I can reckon so few.”If he had spoken with his ordinary accent, Fanny would scarcely have yielded so readily, but the strange sadness of his tone moved her deeply. A mist gathered in her gentle eyes as she looked at him for some moments in silence, and then held out a timid little tremulous hand.“I should not have liked you worse for knowing that you had been unhappy once,” she whispered; “but I ought never to have been vexed at not being taken into confidence. I don’t think I am wise or steady enough to keep secrets; only I wish—I do wish—that you had told Cecil Tresilyan.”He answered her in his old cool, provoking way, “I know what you mean to imply, but you do Miss Tresilyan less than justice, and me too much honor. What right have you to infer that I look upon her in any other light than a very charming acquaintance, or that she feels any deeper interest in to-day’s revelation than if she had heard unexpectedly that any one of her friends was married? Surprises are seldom agreeable, especially when they are so clumsily brought about. I am sure she has not told you any thing to justify your suspicions.”Fanny was the worst casuist out. She was seldom certain about her facts, and when she happened to be so, had not sufficient pertinacity or confidence to push her advantage. Her favorite argument was everad misericordiam. “I wish I could quite believe you,” she said, plaintively; “but I can’t, and it makes me very unhappy. You must see that you ought to go.”Her evident fear of him touched Royston more sharply than the most venomous reproach or the most elaborate sarcasm could have done; but he would not betray how it galled him. “Three days ago,” he replied, “I had almost decided on departure; now it does not altogether depend on me. But you need not be afraid. I shall not worry you long; and while I stay I have no wish, and, I believe, no power, to do any one any harm.” She looked at him long and earnestly, but failed to extract any farther confession from the impenetrable face. Keene would not give her the chance of pursuing the subject, but called up Harry to help him in turning the conversation into a different channel and keeping it there. Between the two they held the anxieties and curiosities of the oppressedmignonneat bay till they entered Dorade.They were obliged to pass the Terrasse on their way home: there, alone, under the shadow of the palms, sat Armand de Châteaumesnil. The invalid’s great haggard eyes fixed themselves observantly on Cecil Tresilyan as she went by. He51laid his hand on the major’s sleeve when he came to his side, and said, in a hoarse whisper, “Qu’as tu fait donc, pour l’atterrer ainsi?” The other met the searching gaze without flinching, “Je n’en sais rien; seulement—on dit que je suis marié.” If the Algerian had been told on indisputable authority that Paris and its inhabitants had just been swallowed up by an earthquake, he would only have raised his shaggy brows in a faint expression of surprise, exactly as he did now. “Tu es marié?” he growled out. “A laquelle donc des deux doit on compâtir—Madame ou Mademoiselle?” Yet he did not like Keene the worse for the impatient gesture with which the latter shook himself loose, muttering, “Je vous croyais trop sage, M. le Vicomte, pour vous amuser avec ces balivernes de romancier.”Fanny Molyneux and Cecil passed the evening togethertête-à-tête.That kind little creature had a way of taking other people’s turn of duty in the line of penitence and apology. On the present occasion she was remarkably gushing in her contrition, though her own guilt was infinitesimal; but she met with scanty encouragement. She had found time to extract from Harry all the details of the matrimonial misadventure, and wished to give her friend the benefit of them. Miss Tresilyan would not listen to a word. She did not attempt to disguise the interest she felt in the subject, but said that she preferred hearing the circumstances from Royston’s own lips. With all this her manner had never been more gentle and caressing: she succeeded at last in deluding Fanny into the belief that every body was perfectly heart-whole, and that no harm had been done, so that that nightla mignonneslept the sleep of the innocent, no misgivings or forebodings troubling her dreams. Those brave women!—when I think of the pangs that they suffer uncomplainingly, the agonies that they dissemble, I am inclined to esteem lightly our own claims to the Cross of Valor. How many of them there are who, covering with their white hand the dagger’s hilt, utter with a sweet, calm smile, and lips that never tremble, the falsehood holier than most outspoken truths—P[oe]tus non angit!When Cecil returned home Mrs. Danvers was waiting for her, ready with any amount of condolence and indignation. She checked all this, as she well knew how to do; and at last was alone in her own chamber. Then the reaction came on; with natures such as hers, it is a torture not to be forgotten while life shall endure.There were not wanting in Dorade admirers and sentimentalists, who were wont to watch the windows of The Tresilyan as long as light lingered there. How those patient, unrequited astronomers would have been startled if their eyes had been sharp enough to penetrate the dark recess where she lay writhing and prone, her stricken face veiled by the masses of her loosened hair, her slender hands clenched till the blood stood still in their veins, in an agony of stormy self-reproach, and fiery longing, and injured pride; or if their ears had caught the sound of the low, bitter wail that went up to heaven like the cry from Gehenna of some fair, lost spirit, “My shame—my shame!”Under favor of the audience, we will drop the curtain here. One of our puppets shall appear to-night no more. When a heroine is once on the stage, the public has a right to be indulged with the spectacle of her faults and follies, as well as of her virtues and excellences; yet I love the phantasm of my queenly Cecil too well to parade her discrowned and in abasement.Chapter divisionCHAPTER XVIII.Othereyes besides Cecil’s kept watch through the night that followed that eventful day. Royston’s never closed till the dawning. Sometimes sitting motionless, sunk in his gloomy meditations, sometimes walking restlessly to and fro, and cooling his hot forehead in the current of the fresh night air, he kept his mind on a perpetual strain, calculating all probable and improbable chances; and the dull red light was never quenched, that told of perpetually-renewed cigars.I fancy I hear an objection, springing from lips that are wont to be irresistible, leveled against such an atrocious want of sentiment. Fairest critic! we will not now discuss the merits or demerits of nicotine, considered as an aid to contemplation, or an anodyne; but do you allow enough for the force of habit? Putting aside the case of those Indian captives, who are allowed a pipe in the intervals of torment (for these poor creatures have had no advantages of education, and are beyond the pale of civilized examples), do you not know that men have finished their last weed while submitting to the toilette of the guillotine? We are told that a Spaniard has begged of his confessor a light for hispapelitowithin sight of a freshly dug grave, when the firing-party was awaiting him one hundred paces off with grounded arms.Only when the sky was gray did Royston lie down to rest; but he slept heavily late into the morning. His first act, when he rose, was to send a note to Cecil Tresilyan, begging her to meet him at a named place and time: she did not answer it, nevertheless he felt certain she would come. Assignations were no novelties to him, but he had gone forth to bear his part in more than one stricken field, where the chances of life and death were evenly poised, without any such despondency or uncertainty as clung to him then on his way to the appointed spot. He arrived there first, but he had not waited long when Cecil came slowly along the path that led into the heart of the woodland. As she drew near, Keene could not help thinking of the first time his eyes had lighted on her, mounting the zigzags of the Castle-hill. There was still the same elasticity of step, the same imperial carriage of the graceful head; but a less observant eye would have detected the change in her demeanor. The pretty petulance and provocative manner which, contrasting with the royalty of her form and feature, contributed so much to her marvelous fascinations, had departed, he feared, never to return.Many instances occur daily where the same painfully unnatural gravity exasperates us, when its cause can not be traced up to either guilt or sorrow. Ah! Lilla, there are many who think that your wild-flower wreath was a more becoming ornament than that diamond circlet—bridal52gift of the powerful baron. Sweet Eugenia! faces that were never absent from yourlevéesin old times you have missed at your court since you wedded Cæsar.Both were outwardly quite calm, but who can guess which of those two strong hearts was most conscious of tremor or weakness when Royston and Cecil met? His hand at least was the steadier, for her slight fingers quivered nervously in his grasp. He did not let them go till he began to speak.“Whatever your decision may be after hearing me, I shall always thank you for coming here. It was like you—to give me the chance of speaking for myself. At least no falsehood or misconception shall stand between us. Will you listen to my story?”“I came for no other purpose,” Cecil said, and she sat down on the trunk of a fallen olive: she knew there would be need to husband all her strength. Thinking of these things, in after days, she never forgot how carefully he arranged his plaid on the branches behind her, so as to keep off the gusts of wind that ever and anon blew sharply. At that very instant, as if there were some strange sympathy in the elements, the sun plunged into the bosom of a dull leaden cloud, and there came a growl of distant thunder.“I shall not tax your patience long,” Royston went on. “It shall only be the briefest outline. But do not interrupt me till I have ended; it is hard enough to have to begin and go through with it. I can not tell you why I married. Many people asked me the question at the time, and I have asked it of myself often since, but I never could find any satisfactory answer. The woman I chose was then very beautiful, and it was not a disadvantageous match, but I had seen fairer faces and fortunes go by without coveting them. I think a certain obstinacy of purpose, and an absurd pleasure in carrying off a prize (such a prize!) from many rivals was at the bottom of it all. In six months I began to appreciate the inconveniences of living with a statue; but I can say it truly, I never dreamed of betraying her. Yet I had temptations. Remember I was not yet twenty-two, and one does not bear disappointments well at that age. We had not been married quite a year when an officer in a native regiment died, up in the Hills, ofdelirium tremens. Do you know that, under such circumstances, there is always a commission appointed to examine the dead man’s papers. I could not help seeing that, for some days past, my wife’s manner had been strangely sullen and cold, but I had no suspicion of the truth. I don’t think I have ever been so surprised as when the president of the commission brought me a bundle of her letters. I never saw her paramour: he must have been more fool than scoundrel to have kept what he ought to have burned. I did not thank the man who gave me those papers, and I never spoke to him again. I only read one of them: it was written soon after our marriage. I went to my wife withthisin my hand. She listened to me in her own icy way, not denying or confessing any thing; but she defied me to prove actual infidelity either before or after my authority began. I could not do it, whatever I might think. I could only prove a course of lies andchicanerie, worked out by her and all her family, that would have sickened the most unscrupulous schemer alive. I told her I would never sleep under the same roof with her again. She laughed—if you could hear her laugh, you would excuse me for more than I have done—and said, ‘You can’t get a divorce.’ She was right there. So it was settled that we were to live apart without any public scandal. But her people would not accept this position. They sent a brother to bully me. It was an unwise move. My temper was wilder in those days, and I had strong provocation; yet I repent that I did not keep my hands off the throat of that wretched, blustering civilian. It was all arranged peacefully at last, and I have not seen her since, though I hear of her from time to time, as I did yesterday. This happened eleven long years ago, and she has never given me a chance of ridding myself of her since. She is always carefully circumspect, and so works out a patient revenge, though I believe I did her no wrong. You have heard all I dare to tell you, and all the truth. Judge me now.”For the last few minutes a great battle had been waging in Cecil Tresilyan’s heart. Can the wisest of us, before the armies meet, prophesy aright as to the issue of such an Armageddon?Twice she tried to speak, and found her voice rebellious; at last she answered, in a faint, broken tone, “I can not say how I pity you.”He threw back his lofty head in anger or disdain.“I will not accept groundless compassion, even from you. Do not deceive yourself. I have learned how to bear my burden; it scarcely cumbers me now. It has fretted me more in the last three weeks than it has done for years. I only wish you to decide whether I did very wrong in keeping back the knowledge of all this from you; and, if I have offended unpardonably, what my punishment shall be.”There was something more than reproach in the glance that flashed upon him out of the violet eyes; for an instant they glittered almost scornfully; her lip, too, had ceased to tremble, and the silver in her voice rang clear and true—“You are not afraid to ask that question—remembering many words addressed to me, each one of which was an insult—from you? You dare not yet dishonor me in your thoughts so far as to doubt how I should have actedat first, if I had known your true position. Or are you amusing yourself still at my expense? I had thought you more generous.”The gloom on Royston’s face deepened sullenly: though he had schooled himself up to a certain point of humility, even from her he could ill brook reproof.“Those insults were not premeditated, at least,” he retorted. “Have you not got accustomed yet to men’s losing their heads in your presence, and then talking as the spirit moved them? And you think I am amusing myself now.Merci!there runs something in my veins warmer than ice-water.”His accent was abrupt, even to rudeness, yet Cecil felt a thrill of guilty triumph as she heard it, and marked the shiver of passion that shot through the colossal frame from brow to heel. A more perfect specimen of immaculate womanhood might not have been insensible to that53acknowledgment of her power. But she shook her head in sorrowful incredulity.“You do less than justice to your self-control. But it is too late for reproaches. I forgive you for any wrong that you may have done me, even in thought or intention. I wish the past could be buried. For the future, I can say only this—we must part, and that instantly; it is more than time.”Keene had expected some such answer, and it did not greatly disconcert him. After pausing a second or two he said,“I did not ask you for your decision without meaning to abide by it. But it would be well to pause before you make it final. Remember—we shall not part for days, or months, if you send me away now. At least, you need not fear persecution. Yet it is difficult to reconcile one’s self to banishment. Will you not give me a chance of making amends for the folly you complain of? I can not promise that my words shall always be guarded, and my manner artificial; but I think I would rather keep your friendship than win the love of any living woman, and I would try hard never to offend you. Let us finish this at once. You have only to say ‘leave me,’ and I swear that you shall be obeyed to the letter.”On that last card hung all the issue of the game that he would have sold his soul to win; yet he spoke not eagerly, though very earnestly, and waited quietly for her reply, with a face as calm as death.Cecil ought not to have hesitated for an instant: we all know that. But steady resolve and stoical self-denial, easy enough in theory, are often bitterly hard in practice. It is very well to preach to the wayfarer that his duty is to go forward and not tarry. But fresh and green grow the grasses round the Diamond of the Desert; pleasantly over its bright waters droop the feathery palms. How drearily the gray arid sand stretches away to the sky-line! Who knows how far it may be to the next oasis? Let us rest yet another hour by the fountain.From any deliberate intention to do wrong Cecil was as pure as any canonized saint in the roll of virgins and martyrs; but if she had been a voluptuary as elaborate as La Pompadour, she could not have felt more keenly that her love had increased tenfold in intensity since it became a crime to indulge it. The passionate energy that had slumbered so long in her temperament was thoroughly roused at last, and would make itself heard clamorously enough to drown the still small voice, that said “beware and forbear.” Her principles were good, but they were not strong enough to hold their own. O pride of the Tresilyans! that had tempted to sin so many of that haughty house, when you might have saved its fairest descendant, was it the time to falter and fail? She looked up piteously in her great extremity; there was a prayer for help in her eyes, but between them and heaven was interposed a stern bronze face, not a line of it softening.At length the faint, broken whisper came—“God help me! Ican notsay it.”There was a pause, but not a stillness, for the beating of her companion’s heart was distinctly audible. Then Cecil spoke again in her own natural caressing tones:“You will be good and generous, I know. See how I trust you!”The thought of how their continued intimacy might touch her fair fame never seemed to suggest itself for an instant. Yet, remember, The Tresilyan was no longer a guileless, romantic girl, believing and hoping all things; she knew right well what scandals and jealousies lurk under the smooth surface of the society in which she had borne so prominent a part; she knew that there were women alive who would have given half their diamonds to have her at their mercy, and torment her at their will. Was it likely that such would let even a slander sleep? Let theRosièreof last season lay this reflection to her heart to temper the immoderation of triumph—“For every one of my victories I have made one mortal enemy.” Not only while in supremacy is the potentate obnoxious to conspiracies; the dagger is most to be dreaded when the dignity is laid down. All dethroned and abdicating dictators have not the luck of Sylla.Silently and unreservedly to accept such a sacrifice, while the offerer was resolved not to count the cost, transcended even the cynicism of Royston Keene. He grasped her arm as though to arrest her attention, and almost involuntarily broke from his lips words of solemn warning.“Let me go on my way alone, while there is time. It is hard to touch pitch and keep undefiled. Child, you are too pure to estimate your danger. If you remained as innocent as one of God’s angels, the world would still condemn you.”Her slender fingers twined themselves round his wrist, so tenderly!—and she bent down her soft cheek till its blush was hidden on his hand. Then she looked up in his face with a bright, trustful smile.“Great happiness can not be bought without a price. I fear no reproach so much as that of my own conscience. Do not think I delude myself as to the risk I am incurring. But if I am innocent, I shall never hear or heed what the world may say; if I am guilty, I have no right to complain of its scorn.”Hardened unbeliever as he was, Royston could have bowed himself there, and worshiped at her feet. But he would not confess his admiration, still less betray his triumph. He raised the little white hand that was free gently to his lips. Not with more reverent courtesy could he have done homage to an anointed queen.“I wish I were worthier of you,” he murmured, and no more was said then.As they walked slowly homeward, the sullen clouds broke away from the face of the sun; but a weatherwise observer could have told that the truce was only treacherous. The tempest bided its time.
How glorious are thy works, Parent of Good!
How glorious are thy works, Parent of Good!
The words came oozing out in the oiliest of his unctuous tones; and the elocutionist’s expansive glance fell first on the landscape patronizingly, then on the by-standers encouragingly. It was as though he said, “You may fall to, and admire now. I have asked a blessing.” Nothing more occurred worthy of note till they reached their destination in safety.
Of course, “there never was such a place for a picnic;” but, as that has been said of about three hundred different spots in every civilized country of Europe, it is certainly not worth while describing this particular one. The luncheon went on very much as such things always do when the arrangements are perfect, the commissariat unexceptionable, and the guests hungry and happy.
Mr. Fullarton, however, applied himself so assiduously to Champagne-cup that his sober-minded helpmate (the only person who took much notice of his proceedings) was filled with an uncomfortable wonder. At last, during a pause in the general conversation, he addressed Royston abruptly—there was a strange huskiness in his voice, and his lower lip kept trembling—
“I heard from Naples this morning. My friend mentions having met Mrs. Keene there.”
The major looked up at the speaker with the cool, indifferent glance that had often irritated him. “Indeed! I was not aware that my mother had got so far south yet. She wrote last from Rome.” The other tossed off his glass with an unsteady hand, and set it down sharply. “I never heard of your mother, sir,” he said; “I was speaking of—your wife.”
Chapter division
Toquarrel with a man over his cups, or in any wise to molest him in his drink, is an offense against the proprieties that even the good-natured Epicurean can not find it in his easy heart to palliate or pardon. On this point he speaks mildly, but very firmly:
Natis in usum lætitiæ scyphisPugnare, Thracum est. Tollite barbarumMorem: verecundumque BacchumSanguineis prohibete rixis.
Natis in usum lætitiæ scyphis
Pugnare, Thracum est. Tollite barbarum
Morem: verecundumque Bacchum
Sanguineis prohibete rixis.
The ghost of Banquo was an uncivilized spectre, or—strong as was the provocation—it would have confronted Macbeth in any other place sooner than the banqueting-hall. The worst deed in the life of a cruel, false king was the setting on of the black bull’s head before the doomed Douglases; and perhaps Pope Alexander, though singularly exempt from all vulgar prejudice, found it hard to obtain his own pontifical absolution for the poisoned wine in which he pledged the Orsini and Colonna. In these, and a hundred like instances, there was certainly the shadowy excuse of political expediency or necessity; but what shall we say of that individual who interrupts the harmony of a meeting solely to gratify his own private pique or pleasure? Truly, with such enormities Heaven “heads the count of crimes.” I consider the most abominable act of which Eris was ever guilty was the selection of that particular moment for the production of the golden apple. If she was bound to make herself obnoxious, she might have waited till the Olympians were sitting in conclave, or at least at home again. It was infamous to disturb them while doing justice to the talents of Peleus’scordon-bleu. I wish very much that injured and querulous [OE]none had met her somewhere on the slopes of Ida, and “given her a piece of her mind.”
On these grounds I venture to hope that all well-regulated readers will concur with me in pronouncing Mr. Fullarton’s conduct totally indefensible. It would have been so easy to have communicated his intelligence to any that it might concern, discreetly, at a fitting place and time, instead of casting it into the midst of a convivial assembly like a fulminating ball. Under other circumstances, he would probably have taken the quieter course; but he had been smarting for some time under a succession of provocations, real and fancied, from Royston Keene, and his own misadventure that morning had filled the cup of irritation brimful. It was the old exasperating feeling—
Earl Percy sees my fall.
Earl Percy sees my fall.
Whatever might be the cost, he could not make up his mind to let slip so fair a chance of embarrassing his imperturbable enemy. There is no saying what he would have given to see that marvelous self-command for once thoroughly break down. It is unfortunate that the best-laid plans can not always insure a triumph. The chaplain certainly did succeed in producing a “situation,” and in reducing most of the party to that uncomfortable frame of mind which is popularly described as “wishing one’s self any where;” but the person who seemed most completely unconcerned was the man at whom the blow was leveled.
The major shook his head with a quick gesture46of impatience, just as if some insect had lighted on his forehead; beyond this, for any evidence of his being annoyed by it, Mr. Fullarton’s last remark might have related tomissionaryprospects or Chinese politics. The steady color on his swarthy face neither lost nor gained a shade. There was not a sign of anger, or shame, or confusion in his clear, bold eyes; and, when he answered, there was not one fresh furrow on the brow that, at lighter provocation, was so apt to frown.
“I give you credit for being utterly ignorant of what you are talking about, Mr. Fullarton. You could not possibly guess how disagreeable the subject would be to me. As it can’t be in the least interesting to any one else, suppose we change it?”
Just the same cold, measured voice as ever, with only a slight sarcastic inflection to vary the deep, grave tones; but a very close observer might have seen his fingers clench the handle of a knife while he was speaking, as if their gripe would have dinted the ivory.
It was hardly to be expected that the rest of the party would emulate thesang-froidof the Cool Captain. Sailing under false colors is a convenient practice enough, and productive sometimes of many prizes; but divers penalties attach to its detection, on land as well as on sea. Indeed, it involves the necessity ofsomebody’sappearing as a convicted impostor. On the present occasion—as the actor for whom the character was cast utterly declined to play it—the part fell to poor Harry Molyneux, who certainly looked it to perfection. In all his little difficulties and troubles, when hard pressed, he was wont to fall back upon the reserve ofla mignonne, sure of meeting there with sympathy, if not with succor. He dared not do so now. He dared not encounter the reproach of the beautiful, gentle eyes that had never looked into his own otherwise than trustfully since they first told the secret that she loved him dearly. The half-smothered cry that broke from Fanny’s lips when the chaplain made his disclosure went straight to the heart of her treacherous husband. He felt as if he deserved that those pretty lips should never smile upon him again.
Oh, all my readers!—masculine especially—whose patience has carried you thus far, remark, I beseech you, the dangers that attend any dereliction from the duty of matrimonial confidence. What right have we to lock up the secrets of our most intimate friends, far less our own, instead of pouring them into the bosom of theβαθύκολπος ἄκοιτις, which is capacious enough to hold them all, were they tenfold more numerous and weighty? Such reticence is rife with awful peril. In our folly and blindness, we fancy ourselves secure, while the ground is mined under our guilty feet, and the explosion is even now preparing, from which only ourdisjecta membrawill emerge. Of course, some cold-hearted caviler will begin to quote instances of carefully-planned and promising conspiracies, which miscarried solely because the details reached a feminine ear. It may have been so; but I don’t see what business conspiracies have to succeed at all. Long live the Constitution! Truly, such delightful confidences must be something one-sided, for the mildest Griselda of them all would be led as a “Martha to the Stakes” sooner than concede to her husband the unrestricted supervision of her correspondence. I have indeed a dim recollection of having heard ofonebride of seventeen, who, during the honeymoon, was weak and (selon les dames) wicked enough to submit to profane male eyes epistles received from the friends of her youth, in their simple entirety, instead of reading out an expurgated edition of the same. She had been brought up in a very dungeon of decorum by a terrible grandmother, a rigid moralist, whom no man ever yet beheld without a shiver; and during those first few weeks after her escape she was probably intoxicated by the novel sense of freedom, besides which, she was perfectly infatuated about “Reginald;” but all this could not exculpate her when arraigned before her peers. She lived long enough to repent and to reassert, to some extent, her lost matronly dignity, but she died very young—let us hope in fair course of nature. She had violated the first law of a guild more numerous and influential than that of the Freemasons. Examples are necessary from time to time, and, though theVehme-gerichtmay pity the offender, it may not therefore linger in its vengeance. Nevertheless, my brethren, our course is clear. Let us resign to the chatelaine the key of the letter-bag and the censorship thereof. If, after due warning, our light-minded friendswillwrite to us in terms that mislike that excellent and punctilious inspectress, they must aby it in the cold looks and bitter innuendoes which will be their portion when they come to us in the next hunting season. Our conscience, at least, will be pure and undefiled, and we shall pass to the end of our pilgrimagesans peur, though perchance, even then, notsans reproche. “Servitudes,” as Miggs, the veteran vestal remarked, “is no inheritance,” but there are natures who thrive rarely in this tranquil and inglorious condition. Such men live, as a rule, pretty contentedly to a great old age, and die in the odor of intense respectability. Salubrious, it seems, as well as creditable to the patient, is arégimeof moderate hen-pecking, only it is necessary that he should be of the intermediate species between Socrates and Georges Dandin.
Mrs. Danvers would certainly have indulged openly in that immoderate exultation to which all minor prophets are prone when their predictions chance to be verified, but this was checked by her constitutional timidity. She was horribly afraid of the effect that the revelation might have on her patroness; therefore what precise meaning was implied by the complicated contortions of her countenance no mortal can guess or know. Her sensations probably resolved themselves into an excess of admiration for the pastor in his new character of a denouncer of detected guilt and champion of imperiled innocence, added to which was a vague desire to lanch her own anathema maranatha at Royston Keene.
Dick Tresilyan took the whole thing with remarkable coolness, not to say complacency. He nodded his head, and smiled, and winked cunningly aside at Molyneux, as if to intimate that he had known all about it long ago, and, indeed, so far he had been admitted into the major’s confidence on the night when the latter was supposed to have “lost his head.” By what sophistries Royston had succeeded in masking his purpose and making his case good, even to such an unsuspicious mind and easy morality,47the devil could best tell, who in such schemes had rarely failed him.
We have left Cecil to the last. My proud, beautiful Cecil—was she not born for better things than to be made the prize of all those plottings and counter-plottings—to surrender the key of her heart’s treasures to one who was unworthy to kiss the hem of her robe—and now to have her self-command tried so cruelly to gratify the wounded vanity of a weak, shallow enthusiast?
She did not flinch or start when Mr. Fullarton’s words caught her ear, but a heavy, chill faintness stole over her, till she felt all her limbs benumbed, and every thing before her eyes grew misty and dim. The numbness passed away almost immediately, but still the figures around her appeared distorted and fantastically exaggerated; they seemed to be tossing and whirling round one steadfast centre, as the dead leaves in winter eddy round the marble head of a statue; that single centre-object remained, throughout, distinct and unaltered in its aspect, while all else was confused and uncertain—the face of Royston Keene. The sight of that face—not defiant or even stern, but immutable in its cold tranquillity—acted on Cecil as a magical restorative; it seemed as though he were able, by some mesmeric influence, to impart to her a portion of his own miraculous self-control. Before his reply to the chaplain was ended, she threw back her proud head with the old imperial gesture, as if scorning her own momentary weakness; no mist or shadow clouded the brilliant violet eyes; she might speak safely now, without risking a false note in the music. It was no light peril that she escaped; the betrayal of emotion under such circumstances would have weighed down a meeker spirit than The Tresilyan’s with a sense of ineffaceable shame; for remember—however marked her partiality for Keene might have been—there had been no suspicion of an engagement between them. Had she broken down then, she would not have forgiven Royston to her dying day: she neverdidforgive the chaplain. As it was—by a strange anomaly—at the very moment when she became aware of having been deluded and misled, in intention if not by actually spoken words—when she had most reason to hate or despise the “enemy who had done her this dishonor”—she felt his hold upon her heart strengthened, as though he had justified his right to command it. Not to women alone, but to all beautiful, wild creatures, the ancient aphorism applies: the harder they are to discipline, the better they love their tamer. Cecil thought, “there is not another man alive whose eyes could meet mine so daringly:” and the haughty spirit bowed itself, and did obeisance to its suzerain. Different in many respects as good can be from evil—in one, those two were as fairly matched as Thiodolf and Isolde. Who can tell what wealth of happiness might have been stored up for both, if they had only not met—too late?
These two words seem to me the most of any that are written or spoken. They strike the key-note of so many human agonies, that they might form a motto, apter than Dante’s, for the gates of hell. Very few may hear them without a melancholy thrill; well—if they do not bring a bitter pang. Like those awful conjurations that blanched in utterance the lips of the boldest magi, they have a fearful power to wake the dead. Lo! they are scarcely syllabled when there is a stir in the grave-yard where sad or guilty memories lie buried; the air is alive with phantoms; the watcher may close his eyes if he will: not the less is he sensible of the presence of those pale ghosts that come trooping to their vengeance. Many, many hours must pass before the spell is learned that will send them back to their tombs again.
Not long ago I heard a story that bears upon this. The man of whom it was told lost his love after he had fairly wooed and won her. It matters not what suspicion, or misconception, or treachery parted them; but parted they were for eight miserable years. Then the lady repented or relented, and came to her lover to make her confession. When she had done speaking, she looked up into his face: she saw no light of gladness or welcome there—only a deepening and darkening of the weary look of pain: the arms whose last tender clasp she had not forgotten yet, never opened to draw her to his breast. He bent his head down upon his shaking hands, and the heavy drops that are sometimes wrung from strong men in their agony began to trickle through his fingers. In old days he could never bear to see her sad for a moment; now, he sat as though he heard her not, while she lay at his feet, wailing to be forgiven. When he could perfectly control his voice he said,
“More than once, in my dreams, I have seen you so, and I have heard you say what you have said to-day. I answered then as I answer now—I never can forgive you. I do not know that you would not regain your old ascendency; I believe you are as dangerous, and I as weak, as ever. But I do know that, the more fascinating I found you, the harder it would be to bear. Thinking of what I had missed through that accursed time of famine would drive me mad soon. I have got used to my present burden: I won’t give you the chance of making it heavier. Those tears of mine were selfish as well as childish; they were given to the happiness and hope that you killed eight years ago. Stay—we parted with a show of kindness then; we will not part in anger now.”
He laid his lips on her forehead as he raised her up—a grave, cold, passionless kiss, such as is pressed on the brow of a dear friend lying in his shroud. They never met alone again.
It is exasperating to think how long I have taken to describe events and emotions that passed in the space of a few minutes; but to place all thedramatis personæin their proper positions does take time, unless the stage-manager is very experienced. Will you be good enough to imagine the picnic broken up (notin confusion), and the “strayed revelers” on their way to Dorade? Nothing worthy of note occurred on the spot; a commonplace conversation having been started and maintained in a way equally creditable to all parties concerned.
Chapter division
Allthe inquiries that the chaplain had “felt it his duty” to make respecting the antecedents of Royston Keene had failed to elicit any thing48more discreditable than may be said of the generality of men who have spent a dozen years in rather a fast regiment, keeping up to the standard of the corps. Doubtless graver charges might have been imputed to him, if the whole truth had been known; but the living witnesses who could have proved them had good reasons for their silence. Whether successful or defeated, the Cool Captain was not wont to take the world into his confidence. As for betraying his own or another’s secrets—his lips were about as likely to dothatas those of an effigy on a tomb-stone.
Naples was a cover that the reverend investigator had not drawn; so he was considerably startled by the following words in a letter from thence, received that morning: “I meet a lady constantly in society here, of whose history I am curious to know more. She is the wife of Major Keene, the famous Indiansabreur; but has been separated from him for several years. She never makes an allusion to his existence; it was by the merest chance that I heard this, and also that her husband is spending the winter at Dorade. Perhaps you can throw some light on the cause of the ‘separate maintenance?’ People are not particular here, and have no right to be; still, one would like to know. I fancy it can not be her fault; she is perfectly gentle in her manner, but rather cold—very beautiful too, in a placid, statuesque style.” It is not worth transcribing the writer’s farther speculations. If a silent, but ultra-fervent benediction can at all profit the person for whom it is intended, very few people have been so well paid for epistolary labor, as was, then, Mr. Fullarton’s correspondent. The reason why has already been explained.
Well, he had made his greatcoupwithout carefully counting the cost—that financial pleasure was still to come. He could not help feeling that it had been ratherfiasco. The man whom he had purposed utterly to discomfit had throughout been provokingly at his ease; the best that could be made of it was, a drawn battle. A disagreeable consciousness crept over the chaplain of having made himself generally obnoxious, without reaping any equivalent advantage or even satisfaction. No one seemed to look kindly or admiringly at him since the disclosure, except Mrs. Danvers; and, glutton as he was of such dainties, the adulation of that exemplary but unattractive female began rather to pall on his palate. He was clear-sighted enough to be aware that Miss Tresilyan was probably offended with him beyond hope of reconciliation, but this did not greatly trouble him. He had been sensible for some time of the decay of his influence in that quarter. Last of all rose on his mind, with unpleasant distinctness, Cecil’s warning, “If I were a man, I should not like to have Major Keene as my enemy.” He had thrown the lance over that enemy’s frontier, and it was now too late to talk of truce. A dread of the consequences overcame him as he thought of the reprisals that might be exacted by the merciless and unscrupulous guerilla. True, it was not very evident what harm the latter could do him; nevertheless, he could not shake off a vague, depressing apprehension. More and more, as he strolled on, moodily musing, far in the rear of the rest, he felt inclined to appreciate the wisdom of the ancient proverb, “Let sleeping dogs lie.” Years afterward he remembered with what a startled thrill, raising his eyes at a sharp angle of the path, he found himself face to face with Royston Keene.
For some seconds they contemplated each other silently—the priest and the soldier. A striking contrast they made. The one, heated, and excited, and nervous, both in appearance and manner, looking more like a culprit brought up for judgment than a pillar of the Established Church; the other, outwardly as undemonstrative as the rock against which he leaned—just a shade of paleness telling of the sharp mental struggle from which he had come out victorious—his whole bearing and demeanor precisely what might have been expected if he had been sitting on a court-martial.
The absurdity of the position struck the chaplain as soon as he collected himself from his first surprise. It never would do forhimto look as if he had any thing to be ashamed of; so, summoning to his aid all the dignity of his office and his own self-importance, with a great effort, he spoke steadily:
“I presume you wish to talk to me, Major Keene? I shall be glad to hear any thing that you may have to communicate or explain. It is my duty as well as my desire to be useful to any member of my congregation, however little disposed they may be to avail themselves of their privileges. Interested, as I must be in the welfare of all committed to my charge, I need hardly say that the course you have chosen to pursue here has caused me great pain and anxiety—I own, not so much for your sake as that of others, to whom your influence was likely to be pernicious. What I heard this morning makes matters look still worse. I wish I could anticipate any satisfactory explanation.”
The oldex cathedrâfeeling came back upon him while he was speaking; his tone, gradually becoming rounder and more sonorous, showed this. Was he so besotted by sacerdotal confidence as to fancy that he could win that grim penitent to come to him to be confessed or absolved?
Since the chaplain first saw him Royston had never changed his attitude. He was leaning with his shoulder against the corner of rock round which the path turned, standing half across it, so that no one could pass him easily. The dense blue cloudlets of smoke kept rolling out from his lips rapidly, but regularly, and his right hand twined itself perpetually in the coils of his heavy brown mustache. That gesture, to those who knew his temper well, was ever ominous of foul and stormy weather. He did not reply immediately, but, taking the cigar from his mouth, began twisting up the loose leaf in a slow, deliberative way. At last he said,
“You did that rather well this morning. How much did you expect to get for it? My wife is liberal enough in her promises sometimes, when she wants to make herself disagreeable, but she don’t pay well. You might have driven a better bargain by coming to me. I would have given you more to have held your tongue.” His tone was such as the other had never heard him use—such as most people would be loth to employ toward the meanest dependent. No description can do justice to the intensity of its insolence; it made even Mr. Fullarton’s torpid blood boil resentfully.49
“How dare you address such words to me?” he cried out, trembling with rage. “If it were not for my profession—”
“Stop!” the other broke in, rudely; “you need not trouble yourself to repeat that stale clap-trap. You mean to say that, if I were not safe from your profession, I should not have said so much. It isn’t worth while lying to yourself, and I have no time to trifle. The converse is the truer way of putting it. You know better than I can tell you that, if you had been unfrocked, you would never have ventured half what you have done to day. You don’t stir from hence till this is settled. Do you suppose I’ll allow my private affairs to be made, again, an occasion for indulging your taste for theatricals?”
The chaplain flushed apoplectically. He just managed to stammer out,
“I will not remain another instant to listen to your blasphemous insults. If you mean to prevent me from passing, I will return another way.”
ScornfullyHe turned; but thrilled with priestly wrath, to feelHis sacred arm locked in a grasp of steel.
Scornfully
He turned; but thrilled with priestly wrath, to feel
His sacred arm locked in a grasp of steel.
A bolder man might have got nervous, finding himself on a lonely hill-side, face to face with such an adversary, reading, too, the savage meaning of those murderous eyes. Remember that Mr. Fullarton held Royston capable of any earthly crime. His own short-lived anger was instantly annihilated; the sweat of mortal terror broke out over all his livid face; his lips could hardly gasp out an unintelligible prayer for mercy.
The soldier’s stern face settled into an expression of contempt: in his gentlest moods he could find little sympathy for purely physical fear.
“Don’t faint,” he said; “there is no occasion for it. Do you think I shall ‘slay you as I slew the Egyptian yesterday?’ Well, I have scanty respect for your office, especially when its privileges are abused. If it were not for good reasons, I would serve you worse than I did that drunken scoundrel who frightened you almost to death down there among the vines; but that don’t suit my purpose. Listen: if you dare to interfere again, by word, or deed, or sign, in the affairs of me and mine, I know a better way of making you repent it.”
As soon as he saw that there was no real danger to life or limb, the chaplain’s composure began to return. He launched forth immediately into a gallant though incoherent defiance. Royston’s features never for an instant changed or softened in their scorn.
“Fair words,” he retorted; “but I’ll make your bubbles burst. You don’t monopolizeallthe resources of the Private Inquiry Office;” and, stooping down, he whispered a dozen words in the other’s ear. They related to a charge brought against Mr. Fullarton years ago, so circumstantial and difficult to disprove that, with all the advantages of counter-evidence at hand, it had well-nigh borne him down. He knew right well that, if it were once revived here abroad, where the lightest suspicion is caught up and used so readily, the consequences would be nothing short of utter ruin. He was a poor man, with a large family. No wonder if he quailed.
“You know—you know,” he gasped, “that it is a vile, cruel falsehood.”
To do him justice, he spoke the simple truth there.
With a cold, tranquil satisfaction, the major contemplated his victim’s agony.
“I choose to know nothing about it, except that it carries more probability than most stories one hears. The world in general is, fortunately, not incredulous, and I have seen a man ‘broke’ on lighter evidence. Well, you will take your own course, and I shall take mine. I fancy we understand each other—at last.”
By a superhuman effort the unlucky ecclesiastic did contrive to mutter something about his “determination to do his duty.” Royston listened to him with his worst smile.
“I’ll take my chance about that,” he said. “I feel tolerably safe. Now I’ll leave you to settle the affair between your interest and your conscience.”
He turned on his heel, and strode away without another word. Long after he was out of sight the chaplain stood fixed in the same attitude of panic-stricken, helpless despondency. By my faith! even in these degenerate days, we have petrifying influences left that may match the head of the Gorgon.
Meanwhile, the others were wending slowly homeward, truly in a very different mood from that in which they had gone forth that morning. Even as no man can be pronounced happy till the hour of his death, so can no excursion or entertainment be called successful till night has fairly closed in. Caprice of climate is only one of the many sources of disappointment, and the event justifies so seldom our sanguine predictions that we have little right to complain of false and fallible barometers. It is worthy of remark how often these trifles illustrate that trite and time-honored simile of Life. The vessel starts gayly enough, heeling over gracefully to the land-wind in the old, approved fashion—“Youth at the prow, and pleasure at the helm”—there is not a misgiving in the heart of any of the passengers; they can not help pitying those left behind on the shore. What a cheery adieu they wave to the friends who come down to wish them “good-speed!” After a voyage more or less prolonged the same ship drifts in slowly shoreward, over the harbor-bar, under the calm of the solemn sunset. Even the deepening twilight can not disguise the evidences of a terrible “sea-change.” Not a trace of paint or gilding remains on the wave-worn, shattered timbers. Sails rent and cordage strained tell tales of many storm-gusts, or, perchance, of one tornado; and see! her flag is flying half-mast high: the corpse of the Pilot is on board. Let us stand aside, lest we meet the passengers as they land. It were worse than mockery to ask how the yachting trip has sped.
Miss Tresilyan rode somewhat in advance of the rest, under her brother’s escort. Dick was a model in his own line, and other brothers-of-beauties might well imitate his moderation and discretion. He never thrust himself into the conversation, or into her presence, when there was a chance of his intrusion being ill-timed, but was always at hand when he was wanted: the slightest sign, or even a glance, from Cecil, brought him to her side, and there he would march for hours in silent but perfect satisfaction. On the present occasion he seemed disposed to be unwontedly talkative, and to indulge in certain speculations relative to the intelligence they50had just heard. It was true, he knew it before, but nothing had been disclosed to him beyond the simple fact that Royston was married, and married unhappily. Cecil checked him gently, but very decidedly.
“I had rather not hear or say one word on the subject. It ought not to interest either of us. In good time, I suppose, we shall be told all that it is fitting we should know. Meanwhile, it would be very wrong to make conjectures. No one has any right to pry into Major Keene’s affairs if he chooses to keep them secret. I do not believe any one ever did so, even in thought, without repenting it. I dare say Mr. Fullarton will find this out soon, and I shall not pity him in the least. A personoughtto be punished who tries to startle people in that disagreeable way. Did you hear Fanny’s little shriek? I have not had time to laugh at her about it yet. The path is too narrow for two to ride abreast.”
The light tone and manner of her last words might have deceived a closer observer than honest Dick Tresilyan. He lapsed into silence; but, after some time, his meditations assumed a cheerfully-roseate hue, as they resolved themselves into the fixed idea that Royston was lingering behind “to have it out with the parson.”
Some distance in the rear walked Harry Molyneux, holding dutifully his wife’s bridle-rein. It was very touching to see the diffidence and humility with which he proffered his little attentions, which were accepted, as it were, under protest. The truth was thatla mignonnehad forgiven him already, and it was with great difficulty she refrained from telling him so, by word or smile. Her soft heart melted within her at the sight of the criminal’s contrition, and decided that he had done penance enough during the last half hour to atone for a graver misdemeanor; but she deferred asking for explanations till a more convenient season, when there should be no chance of interruption; and meanwhile, on grounds of stern political necessity,elle le boudait. (If any elegant scholar will translate that Gallicism for me literally, I shall feel obliged to him.)
Fancy the sensations of a man fighting his frigate desperately against overwhelming odds, when he sees the outline of a huge “liner,” with English colors at the main, looming dimly through the smoke, close on the enemy’s quarter; or those of the commander of an untenable post when the first bayonets of the relieving force glitter over the crest of the hill, and you will have a fair idea of Harry’s relief as he looked back and saw Keene rapidly gaining on them with his swift, slashing stride. As he fell back and yielded his post to Royston, this was written so plainly on his face that the latter could not repress a smile; but there was little mirth in his voice when he addressed Fanny—she had never heard him speak so gently and gravely: “I know that you are angry with your husband, as well as with me, for keeping you in the dark so long. I must make his peace with you, even if I fail in making my own. He could not tell you one word without breaking a promise given years ago. If he had done so, in spite of the excuse of the strong temptation, I would never have trusted him again. Ah! I see you have done him justice already: that is good of you. Now for my own part. Why I did not choose to let you into the secret as soon as I began to know you well I can hardly say. Hal will tell you all about it, and you will see that, for once, I was more sinned against than sinning; so I was not afraid of your thinking worse of me for it. Perhaps the last thing that a man likes to confess is his one arch piece of folly, especially if he has paid for it as heavy a price as attaches to most crimes. I think I am not sorry that you were kept in the dark till now. The past has given me some pleasant hours with you that might have been darkened if you had known all. I wish you would forgive me. We have always been such good friends, and, in your sex at least, I can reckon so few.”
If he had spoken with his ordinary accent, Fanny would scarcely have yielded so readily, but the strange sadness of his tone moved her deeply. A mist gathered in her gentle eyes as she looked at him for some moments in silence, and then held out a timid little tremulous hand.
“I should not have liked you worse for knowing that you had been unhappy once,” she whispered; “but I ought never to have been vexed at not being taken into confidence. I don’t think I am wise or steady enough to keep secrets; only I wish—I do wish—that you had told Cecil Tresilyan.”
He answered her in his old cool, provoking way, “I know what you mean to imply, but you do Miss Tresilyan less than justice, and me too much honor. What right have you to infer that I look upon her in any other light than a very charming acquaintance, or that she feels any deeper interest in to-day’s revelation than if she had heard unexpectedly that any one of her friends was married? Surprises are seldom agreeable, especially when they are so clumsily brought about. I am sure she has not told you any thing to justify your suspicions.”
Fanny was the worst casuist out. She was seldom certain about her facts, and when she happened to be so, had not sufficient pertinacity or confidence to push her advantage. Her favorite argument was everad misericordiam. “I wish I could quite believe you,” she said, plaintively; “but I can’t, and it makes me very unhappy. You must see that you ought to go.”
Her evident fear of him touched Royston more sharply than the most venomous reproach or the most elaborate sarcasm could have done; but he would not betray how it galled him. “Three days ago,” he replied, “I had almost decided on departure; now it does not altogether depend on me. But you need not be afraid. I shall not worry you long; and while I stay I have no wish, and, I believe, no power, to do any one any harm.” She looked at him long and earnestly, but failed to extract any farther confession from the impenetrable face. Keene would not give her the chance of pursuing the subject, but called up Harry to help him in turning the conversation into a different channel and keeping it there. Between the two they held the anxieties and curiosities of the oppressedmignonneat bay till they entered Dorade.
They were obliged to pass the Terrasse on their way home: there, alone, under the shadow of the palms, sat Armand de Châteaumesnil. The invalid’s great haggard eyes fixed themselves observantly on Cecil Tresilyan as she went by. He51laid his hand on the major’s sleeve when he came to his side, and said, in a hoarse whisper, “Qu’as tu fait donc, pour l’atterrer ainsi?” The other met the searching gaze without flinching, “Je n’en sais rien; seulement—on dit que je suis marié.” If the Algerian had been told on indisputable authority that Paris and its inhabitants had just been swallowed up by an earthquake, he would only have raised his shaggy brows in a faint expression of surprise, exactly as he did now. “Tu es marié?” he growled out. “A laquelle donc des deux doit on compâtir—Madame ou Mademoiselle?” Yet he did not like Keene the worse for the impatient gesture with which the latter shook himself loose, muttering, “Je vous croyais trop sage, M. le Vicomte, pour vous amuser avec ces balivernes de romancier.”
Fanny Molyneux and Cecil passed the evening togethertête-à-tête.That kind little creature had a way of taking other people’s turn of duty in the line of penitence and apology. On the present occasion she was remarkably gushing in her contrition, though her own guilt was infinitesimal; but she met with scanty encouragement. She had found time to extract from Harry all the details of the matrimonial misadventure, and wished to give her friend the benefit of them. Miss Tresilyan would not listen to a word. She did not attempt to disguise the interest she felt in the subject, but said that she preferred hearing the circumstances from Royston’s own lips. With all this her manner had never been more gentle and caressing: she succeeded at last in deluding Fanny into the belief that every body was perfectly heart-whole, and that no harm had been done, so that that nightla mignonneslept the sleep of the innocent, no misgivings or forebodings troubling her dreams. Those brave women!—when I think of the pangs that they suffer uncomplainingly, the agonies that they dissemble, I am inclined to esteem lightly our own claims to the Cross of Valor. How many of them there are who, covering with their white hand the dagger’s hilt, utter with a sweet, calm smile, and lips that never tremble, the falsehood holier than most outspoken truths—P[oe]tus non angit!
When Cecil returned home Mrs. Danvers was waiting for her, ready with any amount of condolence and indignation. She checked all this, as she well knew how to do; and at last was alone in her own chamber. Then the reaction came on; with natures such as hers, it is a torture not to be forgotten while life shall endure.
There were not wanting in Dorade admirers and sentimentalists, who were wont to watch the windows of The Tresilyan as long as light lingered there. How those patient, unrequited astronomers would have been startled if their eyes had been sharp enough to penetrate the dark recess where she lay writhing and prone, her stricken face veiled by the masses of her loosened hair, her slender hands clenched till the blood stood still in their veins, in an agony of stormy self-reproach, and fiery longing, and injured pride; or if their ears had caught the sound of the low, bitter wail that went up to heaven like the cry from Gehenna of some fair, lost spirit, “My shame—my shame!”
Under favor of the audience, we will drop the curtain here. One of our puppets shall appear to-night no more. When a heroine is once on the stage, the public has a right to be indulged with the spectacle of her faults and follies, as well as of her virtues and excellences; yet I love the phantasm of my queenly Cecil too well to parade her discrowned and in abasement.
Chapter division
Othereyes besides Cecil’s kept watch through the night that followed that eventful day. Royston’s never closed till the dawning. Sometimes sitting motionless, sunk in his gloomy meditations, sometimes walking restlessly to and fro, and cooling his hot forehead in the current of the fresh night air, he kept his mind on a perpetual strain, calculating all probable and improbable chances; and the dull red light was never quenched, that told of perpetually-renewed cigars.
I fancy I hear an objection, springing from lips that are wont to be irresistible, leveled against such an atrocious want of sentiment. Fairest critic! we will not now discuss the merits or demerits of nicotine, considered as an aid to contemplation, or an anodyne; but do you allow enough for the force of habit? Putting aside the case of those Indian captives, who are allowed a pipe in the intervals of torment (for these poor creatures have had no advantages of education, and are beyond the pale of civilized examples), do you not know that men have finished their last weed while submitting to the toilette of the guillotine? We are told that a Spaniard has begged of his confessor a light for hispapelitowithin sight of a freshly dug grave, when the firing-party was awaiting him one hundred paces off with grounded arms.
Only when the sky was gray did Royston lie down to rest; but he slept heavily late into the morning. His first act, when he rose, was to send a note to Cecil Tresilyan, begging her to meet him at a named place and time: she did not answer it, nevertheless he felt certain she would come. Assignations were no novelties to him, but he had gone forth to bear his part in more than one stricken field, where the chances of life and death were evenly poised, without any such despondency or uncertainty as clung to him then on his way to the appointed spot. He arrived there first, but he had not waited long when Cecil came slowly along the path that led into the heart of the woodland. As she drew near, Keene could not help thinking of the first time his eyes had lighted on her, mounting the zigzags of the Castle-hill. There was still the same elasticity of step, the same imperial carriage of the graceful head; but a less observant eye would have detected the change in her demeanor. The pretty petulance and provocative manner which, contrasting with the royalty of her form and feature, contributed so much to her marvelous fascinations, had departed, he feared, never to return.
Many instances occur daily where the same painfully unnatural gravity exasperates us, when its cause can not be traced up to either guilt or sorrow. Ah! Lilla, there are many who think that your wild-flower wreath was a more becoming ornament than that diamond circlet—bridal52gift of the powerful baron. Sweet Eugenia! faces that were never absent from yourlevéesin old times you have missed at your court since you wedded Cæsar.
Both were outwardly quite calm, but who can guess which of those two strong hearts was most conscious of tremor or weakness when Royston and Cecil met? His hand at least was the steadier, for her slight fingers quivered nervously in his grasp. He did not let them go till he began to speak.
“Whatever your decision may be after hearing me, I shall always thank you for coming here. It was like you—to give me the chance of speaking for myself. At least no falsehood or misconception shall stand between us. Will you listen to my story?”
“I came for no other purpose,” Cecil said, and she sat down on the trunk of a fallen olive: she knew there would be need to husband all her strength. Thinking of these things, in after days, she never forgot how carefully he arranged his plaid on the branches behind her, so as to keep off the gusts of wind that ever and anon blew sharply. At that very instant, as if there were some strange sympathy in the elements, the sun plunged into the bosom of a dull leaden cloud, and there came a growl of distant thunder.
“I shall not tax your patience long,” Royston went on. “It shall only be the briefest outline. But do not interrupt me till I have ended; it is hard enough to have to begin and go through with it. I can not tell you why I married. Many people asked me the question at the time, and I have asked it of myself often since, but I never could find any satisfactory answer. The woman I chose was then very beautiful, and it was not a disadvantageous match, but I had seen fairer faces and fortunes go by without coveting them. I think a certain obstinacy of purpose, and an absurd pleasure in carrying off a prize (such a prize!) from many rivals was at the bottom of it all. In six months I began to appreciate the inconveniences of living with a statue; but I can say it truly, I never dreamed of betraying her. Yet I had temptations. Remember I was not yet twenty-two, and one does not bear disappointments well at that age. We had not been married quite a year when an officer in a native regiment died, up in the Hills, ofdelirium tremens. Do you know that, under such circumstances, there is always a commission appointed to examine the dead man’s papers. I could not help seeing that, for some days past, my wife’s manner had been strangely sullen and cold, but I had no suspicion of the truth. I don’t think I have ever been so surprised as when the president of the commission brought me a bundle of her letters. I never saw her paramour: he must have been more fool than scoundrel to have kept what he ought to have burned. I did not thank the man who gave me those papers, and I never spoke to him again. I only read one of them: it was written soon after our marriage. I went to my wife withthisin my hand. She listened to me in her own icy way, not denying or confessing any thing; but she defied me to prove actual infidelity either before or after my authority began. I could not do it, whatever I might think. I could only prove a course of lies andchicanerie, worked out by her and all her family, that would have sickened the most unscrupulous schemer alive. I told her I would never sleep under the same roof with her again. She laughed—if you could hear her laugh, you would excuse me for more than I have done—and said, ‘You can’t get a divorce.’ She was right there. So it was settled that we were to live apart without any public scandal. But her people would not accept this position. They sent a brother to bully me. It was an unwise move. My temper was wilder in those days, and I had strong provocation; yet I repent that I did not keep my hands off the throat of that wretched, blustering civilian. It was all arranged peacefully at last, and I have not seen her since, though I hear of her from time to time, as I did yesterday. This happened eleven long years ago, and she has never given me a chance of ridding myself of her since. She is always carefully circumspect, and so works out a patient revenge, though I believe I did her no wrong. You have heard all I dare to tell you, and all the truth. Judge me now.”
For the last few minutes a great battle had been waging in Cecil Tresilyan’s heart. Can the wisest of us, before the armies meet, prophesy aright as to the issue of such an Armageddon?
Twice she tried to speak, and found her voice rebellious; at last she answered, in a faint, broken tone, “I can not say how I pity you.”
He threw back his lofty head in anger or disdain.
“I will not accept groundless compassion, even from you. Do not deceive yourself. I have learned how to bear my burden; it scarcely cumbers me now. It has fretted me more in the last three weeks than it has done for years. I only wish you to decide whether I did very wrong in keeping back the knowledge of all this from you; and, if I have offended unpardonably, what my punishment shall be.”
There was something more than reproach in the glance that flashed upon him out of the violet eyes; for an instant they glittered almost scornfully; her lip, too, had ceased to tremble, and the silver in her voice rang clear and true—
“You are not afraid to ask that question—remembering many words addressed to me, each one of which was an insult—from you? You dare not yet dishonor me in your thoughts so far as to doubt how I should have actedat first, if I had known your true position. Or are you amusing yourself still at my expense? I had thought you more generous.”
The gloom on Royston’s face deepened sullenly: though he had schooled himself up to a certain point of humility, even from her he could ill brook reproof.
“Those insults were not premeditated, at least,” he retorted. “Have you not got accustomed yet to men’s losing their heads in your presence, and then talking as the spirit moved them? And you think I am amusing myself now.Merci!there runs something in my veins warmer than ice-water.”
His accent was abrupt, even to rudeness, yet Cecil felt a thrill of guilty triumph as she heard it, and marked the shiver of passion that shot through the colossal frame from brow to heel. A more perfect specimen of immaculate womanhood might not have been insensible to that53acknowledgment of her power. But she shook her head in sorrowful incredulity.
“You do less than justice to your self-control. But it is too late for reproaches. I forgive you for any wrong that you may have done me, even in thought or intention. I wish the past could be buried. For the future, I can say only this—we must part, and that instantly; it is more than time.”
Keene had expected some such answer, and it did not greatly disconcert him. After pausing a second or two he said,
“I did not ask you for your decision without meaning to abide by it. But it would be well to pause before you make it final. Remember—we shall not part for days, or months, if you send me away now. At least, you need not fear persecution. Yet it is difficult to reconcile one’s self to banishment. Will you not give me a chance of making amends for the folly you complain of? I can not promise that my words shall always be guarded, and my manner artificial; but I think I would rather keep your friendship than win the love of any living woman, and I would try hard never to offend you. Let us finish this at once. You have only to say ‘leave me,’ and I swear that you shall be obeyed to the letter.”
On that last card hung all the issue of the game that he would have sold his soul to win; yet he spoke not eagerly, though very earnestly, and waited quietly for her reply, with a face as calm as death.
Cecil ought not to have hesitated for an instant: we all know that. But steady resolve and stoical self-denial, easy enough in theory, are often bitterly hard in practice. It is very well to preach to the wayfarer that his duty is to go forward and not tarry. But fresh and green grow the grasses round the Diamond of the Desert; pleasantly over its bright waters droop the feathery palms. How drearily the gray arid sand stretches away to the sky-line! Who knows how far it may be to the next oasis? Let us rest yet another hour by the fountain.
From any deliberate intention to do wrong Cecil was as pure as any canonized saint in the roll of virgins and martyrs; but if she had been a voluptuary as elaborate as La Pompadour, she could not have felt more keenly that her love had increased tenfold in intensity since it became a crime to indulge it. The passionate energy that had slumbered so long in her temperament was thoroughly roused at last, and would make itself heard clamorously enough to drown the still small voice, that said “beware and forbear.” Her principles were good, but they were not strong enough to hold their own. O pride of the Tresilyans! that had tempted to sin so many of that haughty house, when you might have saved its fairest descendant, was it the time to falter and fail? She looked up piteously in her great extremity; there was a prayer for help in her eyes, but between them and heaven was interposed a stern bronze face, not a line of it softening.
At length the faint, broken whisper came—“God help me! Ican notsay it.”
There was a pause, but not a stillness, for the beating of her companion’s heart was distinctly audible. Then Cecil spoke again in her own natural caressing tones:
“You will be good and generous, I know. See how I trust you!”
The thought of how their continued intimacy might touch her fair fame never seemed to suggest itself for an instant. Yet, remember, The Tresilyan was no longer a guileless, romantic girl, believing and hoping all things; she knew right well what scandals and jealousies lurk under the smooth surface of the society in which she had borne so prominent a part; she knew that there were women alive who would have given half their diamonds to have her at their mercy, and torment her at their will. Was it likely that such would let even a slander sleep? Let theRosièreof last season lay this reflection to her heart to temper the immoderation of triumph—“For every one of my victories I have made one mortal enemy.” Not only while in supremacy is the potentate obnoxious to conspiracies; the dagger is most to be dreaded when the dignity is laid down. All dethroned and abdicating dictators have not the luck of Sylla.
Silently and unreservedly to accept such a sacrifice, while the offerer was resolved not to count the cost, transcended even the cynicism of Royston Keene. He grasped her arm as though to arrest her attention, and almost involuntarily broke from his lips words of solemn warning.
“Let me go on my way alone, while there is time. It is hard to touch pitch and keep undefiled. Child, you are too pure to estimate your danger. If you remained as innocent as one of God’s angels, the world would still condemn you.”
Her slender fingers twined themselves round his wrist, so tenderly!—and she bent down her soft cheek till its blush was hidden on his hand. Then she looked up in his face with a bright, trustful smile.
“Great happiness can not be bought without a price. I fear no reproach so much as that of my own conscience. Do not think I delude myself as to the risk I am incurring. But if I am innocent, I shall never hear or heed what the world may say; if I am guilty, I have no right to complain of its scorn.”
Hardened unbeliever as he was, Royston could have bowed himself there, and worshiped at her feet. But he would not confess his admiration, still less betray his triumph. He raised the little white hand that was free gently to his lips. Not with more reverent courtesy could he have done homage to an anointed queen.
“I wish I were worthier of you,” he murmured, and no more was said then.
As they walked slowly homeward, the sullen clouds broke away from the face of the sun; but a weatherwise observer could have told that the truce was only treacherous. The tempest bided its time.