“This noble gentleman, Lord Titus here,Is in opinion, and in honor, wronged;That in the rescue of Lavinia,With his own hand did slay his youngest son”
“This noble gentleman, Lord Titus here,Is in opinion, and in honor, wronged;That in the rescue of Lavinia,With his own hand did slay his youngest son”
“This noble gentleman, Lord Titus here,
Is in opinion, and in honor, wronged;
That in the rescue of Lavinia,
With his own hand did slay his youngest son”
Titus Andronicus.
The elder Montigny, wrathful and irresolute, and like a beast in the toils, had yesterday again visited the advocate on the same errand as before, and with a like unsatisfactory result. But instead of returning to Mainville he had proceeded to the Duchatel Manor House; partly for counsel, but chiefly to ascertain whether its owner—who, he deemed, had an equal interest with himself in the removal of Amanda—would join with him in furnishing the demanded dower. The subject was broached privately to the shrewd and worldly André, who on hearing it propounded swore indignantly at the advocate's audacity, and roundly refused to accede to any such appropriation of his substance: so after fierce denunciations of the insolence of upstart English adventurers, and censure of the infatuation of young fellows in affairs of the heart, the theme was dropped for the present, and the remainder of the day spent in looking over the estate, and in those attentions that are usually bestowed on a visitor, be he ever so familiar a one, much more when he is both distinguished and in prospective relationship. The next day the topic was resumed, but this time in the presence of Samson Duchatel, as he sat yawning between asleep and awake, but who, on hearing the conversation, aroused himself, and bade Montigny be easy, and not dream of endowing the foreigner, since he, Samson, had already secured the troublesome fair one. Montigny took little notice of this, thinking it to be but the jest or boast, or, at furthest, merely the loose announcement of the intention of the unscrupulous giant; who soon afterwards invited him to walk abroad. The company of Samson was not coveted by the more refined and anxious Seigneur, but the former pressed him, and he thought that locomotion might divert his mind from the contemplation of the coming degradation and folly of his son. He consented, and issuing from the ancient and flower-festooned porch of the Manor House, they walked along in mid-morning of late September, the drowsy charms of the summer's faded foliage just awakening to a resurrection in the glorified beauty of Autumn; and, almost in silence, they proceeded along the road or lane, till they came to the dubious dwelling where, some hours before, Amanda was left a prisoner. The sullen and sloven-looking female who had received her was now dressed in gaudy attire, and saluted them as they entered, at the same time casting a look of enquiry and surprise into the face of Samson, and of suspicion on the Seigneur.
“Bring up the body of your prisoner;” growled the former, loudly, as he threw his huge frame into an arm-chair. “Come, habeas corpus, habeas corpus. Now, if we had Alphonse here,” he continued, “he could repeat the whole writ in Latin. Habeas corpus, habeas corpus,” muttered the puzzled savage, fumbling in his brains for the context, “habeas corpus, habeas corpus;—” then, relinquishing the vain search, and addressing himself to the woman, at the same time elevating his voice, he vociferated: “Hillo, come, lady sheriff, bring up the body of your prisoner, I say;” when, as if in obedience to the call of a magician, a door opened, and from an inner room, with face flushed, brow dark and fretted with indignation, lips pouting, breast heaving, and her eyes overflowing with tears, in bounded his sister, Seraphine Duchatel, exclaiming: “And is this the creature that has stood between me and Claude? and brought here, too, to flout me to my face! I'll not endure it;” and she burst into a fresh torrent of tears.
“Who has stood between you, girl?” enquired the brother, half teasingly, half tenderly: “if there be a stump between here and Mainville that hinders you from driving your carriage thither, tell me, and we'll pull it up as quickly as Doctor Lanctot would pull you a tooth out.”
“You have done well, indeed,” continued the angry girl, weeping, and not minding his clumsy badinage, “you have done well indeed, to bring her here to answer me, to scorn me, to defy me, to parade herself before me, to stand in my presence as proud as any peacock,—only not half so beautiful.”
“Fine feathers make fine birds, Phin,” drily retorted her brother.
“She is not fine, and if she be, she shall be plucked of her finery;” exclaimed the sister: “I'll tear her eyes out; what business has she to look atme, and speak so insolently? I'll have her face flayed; her hair shall be plucked up by the roots;” and she stamped with her little foot.
“We'll have her scalped, girl!” condoled her brother.
“Yes, this is the way you always think to manage me; by laughing at me,” cried the spoiled child, in renewed agony of tears.
“Why, what is the matter?” demanded the Seigneur, wondering, and startled by these threatening allusions: “What is the meaning of all this, Samson?”
“Oh,” answered the latter, striving to perpetrate a pun, “Only that we have brought Phin a handmaiden, and she finds her handsomer than is agreeable;—but there is many a servant comelier than the mistress.”
“Let me behold this Paragon,” said the Seigneur, at the same time rising, and moving towards the door of the inner room, that had been left ajar by the rude Seraphine, in her indignant exit. Pushing it slowly open, he beheld Amanda, with half-averted form, seated upon a chair, her head bowed, but her face wearing an expression of proud serenity mixed with grief. His first impulse was to retire; but pity, respect, admiration, and even awe, bound him to the spot, and he remained gazing till curiosity and commiseration alike combined to induce him to address a figure so incongruous with that mean place, and whose majestic sorrow seemed too sacred for interruption.
“Young lady, by your leave; pray pardon me; but can a stranger be of service to you?” he at length enquired.
Amanda looked upward. “Oh, if you are, as you seem to be, a gentleman, do not leave me;” she exclaimed beseechingly, as she slowly rose and approached him: “do not leave me, but convey me back to Stillyside, from whence I have been stolen by that man. Oh, sir, you do not know with what a load of thanks its owner will repay you, should you rescue me from this base durance.”
The seigneur looked enquiringly at Samson, but the latter seemed more disposed to wait to see how the seigneur regarded the appeal, than to reply to the tacit question.
“Why have you been brought hither, and against your will?” resumed the seigneur, respectfully.
“I am as yet ignorant of the cause;” she answered: “I do not know, I cannot divine, why I am here a prisoner.”
“She does know;” fiercely interrupted the sobbing Seraphine, “She does, she does,” she reiterated, and seemed disposed to fly at her tooth and nail. “She knows she is a bold and wicked creature,—she, she, she; she is a, a,—I don't know what she is;” she cried, spurting out the last words in a paroxysm of sorrow and vexation, and flung herself into a chair sobbing hysterically, with toilet and temper alike disordered.
“Calm yourself, Seraphine,” said the Seigneur.
“Yes, calm thyself, girl,” echoed the ponderous Samson. “Why, what a wild duck thou art, sister, flapping and quacking because an unshotted barrel has been fired at thee. She is an unshotted gun, she has no name; and what is a thing without a name? nothing: for if it were something it would have been called something. What thing is there—that is a thing—that has not got what a pudding has? a name,” and he laughed till his sides shook, and drawing a pouch from his pocket, took thence a quid of tobacco, and put it into his cheek, at the same time playfully offering another to the outraged Seraphine, who petulently dashed it from his fingers, and affected to bridle at the insult.
Meantime Amanda stood in silent sadness, and the Seigneur, who had been watching her during the heartless flirtation between the brother and sister, advanced one pace into the room, and said: “I know your story, and have reason to be angry, not so much with you as with my son, whom, I believe, you are acquainted with, one Claude Montigny.” Amanda turned away her face and blushed.
Meantime Amanda stood in silent sadness, and the Seigneur advanced one pace into the room.
“You do know him I perceive,” the Seigneur continued, “and if by chance he has happened to know you I do not blame him, much less can I blame yourself: but, lady, remember,” and the proud Montigny advanced, and bending over her whilst his voice fell, as if it were intended for her ear alone, said “remember, we are not all of the same degree, though Heaven has fashioned all of the same clay. The proudest and the wealthiest in Canada might hail you as a daughter; but old prescription, antecedents, prospects, all combine to render impossible your union with my son.”
Amanda blushed yet deeper, and both of them stood for awhile embarrassed, but at length she said falteringly, and glowing like a crimson poppy in her confusion:
“I own it just that you should urge these large considerations; yet, believe me, sir, I have been passive in this matter, and have not sought your son's acquaintance; neither, indeed, has he, if he be rightly judged, (and you would not wrong your son), perhaps, sought mine; for it would seem there are amities that Providence provides for us, without our will or knowledge. It was accident that brought us face to face; as we observe the sun and moon—that are separate in their seasons, and withal so different in their glory's given degree—brought monthly, and as if fortuitously, though, in reality, by eternal, fixed design, into conjunctive presence amidst the sky.
Yet who shall blame the sun and moon for that?
“None,” said the Seigneur.
“Then let no one blame your son and me,” continued Amanda, “if Heaven, perhaps to try us, has ordained that our paths should cross each other, as might two strange and diverse celestial bodies pass apparently too hazardously near each other in their appointed orbits. For the rest, forgive me, sir, and may He who best knows what is for the benefit of his creatures, and who sometimes for their good, sees it right that they should suffer wrongfully, assist me. Since this has pleased Him, I bow, and bear it the best I may, and trust too, that He will, in His good pleasure, deliver me from this that He has permitted to fall upon me, my present sad and dangerous estate of a poor prisoner here.”
“Heaven will indeed rescue you from this infamous restraint, and I will gladly be its minister,” returned the Seigneur, melted almost to love with pity, and dropping a tear; “none shall detain you here; you are safe. Let me, myself—if thereby to some extent may be atoned to you the wrong you have sustained in being hurried hither—conduct you to your guardian.”
“And raise the devil!—ay, and bring him here: her guardian is his half brother,” suddenly roared Samson in surprise and terror. “No, Montigny, she has given too much trouble in the catching to be so lightly released. Besides, is she to be still allowed to stand between her betters. Leave her with me.”
“Yes, leave her with Samson,” cried the sulking Seraphine, starting up in her chair. “He has known better girls, and handsomer, too;—umph! how much men can be mistaken. It is wonderful that Claude should covet her. Take her to her guardian! fie, Monsieur Montigny,” and half turning away in her seat with scorn and disgust, she cast a look of ineffable hatred and disdain at the suppliant Amanda, whilst the woman of the house fixed her jealousy-filled eyes on Samson as he murmurred: “She shall not go: she is my prisoner.”
“She must return with me, sir,” said the Seigneur, quietly but firmly. “Are you not aware how great is the penalty that you have incurred by this disgraceful scandal? Think it fortunate if you shall be able in any way to compound for it with the lady's guardian. Seraphine, mollify your indignation towards one who has not meant to thwart you. Return to the hall with your brother, whilst I conduct this injured lady to the parsonage, to remain there until I can escort her home, and (as I hope) with the aid of her intercession, obtain the pardon of her cruel abductors.”
“It is you that is cruel:” cried the weeping Seraphine: “it is Claude that is cruel. Not meant to thwart me! shehasthwarted me, and you encourage her, you justify her, Monsieur Montigny.”
“We will crucify her,” cried Samson.
“Say no more,” commanded the seigneur: “you are both of you ignorant of the heinous nature of what you have done. Her guardian has the power to punish you. Tremble lest he should exercise it.” And, with these words, he gave his arm to Amanda, and, passing amidst the scowling trio, led her from the place.
“Confess the truth.”
“Confess the truth.”
“Confess the truth.”
Measure for Measure.
“You would pluck out the heart of my mystery.”
“You would pluck out the heart of my mystery.”
“You would pluck out the heart of my mystery.”
Hamlet.
Claude Montigny rode to Stillyside and back, and was again with the advocate within the hour. To conceive the terror and outcry in that quiet dwelling, when its inmates ascertained that Amanda was missing, let the reader recall the commotion in the castle of Macbeth, when on the morning following his fatal entrance beneath its battlements, it is discovered that the royal Duncan has been murdered. As vehement and as wild as when the distracted Macduff, in frantic tones and with wringing hands, declares to the assembling sons and thanes of the ill-starred monarch, that, “confusion now has made its masterpiece, most sacrilegeous murder has broken open the Lord's anointed temple, and stolen hence the life o' the building,” was the outcry and disorder on the discovery of Amanda's absence; and the wail and lamentation rung in Claude's ear as he rode away from the gate to return to Montreal, where, still pacing the library, the advocate anxiously awaited him. By the ratiocination, as well as by the intuition, of the old man, the seigneur of Mainville was reasonably to be suspected of being at least an accessory to the stealing of Amanda. Claude, too, was not unvisited by suspicions of his father's complicity; but thrust the dishonoring doubts from him, as might a suffering saint dismiss hard thoughts of the dealings of Providence towards himself. Each thought more than he expressed to the other, but at length the advocate communicated to Claude his injurious suspicions, acquainting him with the fact and nature of his father's visits to his office; when Claude, in turn, informed the advocate of the long cherished project of an alliance between the houses of Duchatel and Montigny. This information not only confirmed, but widened the field of the advocate's fears. He was aware also of the lawless character of Duchatel's sons; and recollected to have heard that the youngest was a comrade of Narcisse, who, he likewise knew, entertained a covert spite against Amanda, and, for his mother's sake, a rankling dislike of Mona Macdonald. Against both of these his umbrage might be supposed to have been heated by his recent ignominious expulsion from Stillyside; and to gratify this resentment he might now be executing some scheme of revenge, wherein, from his intimacy with the young Duchatel, he could know that that family had cause to be ready to assist him. Here was a clue to the recovery of his ward:—in legal parlance, here was a prima facie case; and it but remained to find and prosecute the criminals. To seize his son, and, by threats or promises, extract a confession from him was the first idea. But where was the errant and suspected Narcisse to be found? His father knew he was absent, so the mother was summoned. She came, but advanced no further than the threshold of the room, and fell a trembling with fear, behaviour that she would fain have dissembled to be from cold, for, with the divination with which guilt endows its subject, she at once knew that the stranger was the young Montigny, and herself had been cited in order to suffer a searching cross-examination.
“Woman,” said the advocate sternly, and wheeling his arm-chair round so as to face her, “Woman, where is your son?”
“Helas!” she exclaimed, and shrugged her shoulders, as much as to say, “I don't know where he is;” and smiled a rueful smile.
“No grinning now,” cried the lawyer, raising his finger and shaking it at her, and frowning as he was wont to do when he wished to intimidate a witness, “no grinning now, madam. Will you pretend to say you know nothing of where he was last night, where he is at present?”
“Helas!” again exclaimed the affrighted Babet: “sir you forget yourself. Last night? Why it is yet night. Open the shutters and put out the lamp, and you will still be in darkness. Let me return to bed.”
“Babet Blais, many a better woman than you have I wished bedridden,” the advocate cried with bitterness. “Beshrew me, but your answer. Remember I am flint if you are steel, hence the less often we are smitten together in this enquiry, the fewer may be the revealing sparks. Babet Blais, here is an affair of blackest tinder, whereon your bated breath has blown already, until it glows upon your guilty face, as grimly as the lurid East that brews a rainy day, to you the type of tears.”
Babet Blais, here is an affair of blackest tinder, whereon your bated breath has blown already, until it glows upon your guilty face.
“What do you mean?” demanded the half mystified and still dissembling woman, in terror.
“What do I mean? I mean that you shall tell me where your son was during the last night, and where he is now.”
“Where he isnow?” echoed Babet, “Last night? it is now night, or only just near dawning.”
“Yes, we are near the dawning,” mocked the old man, with loud, relentless equivoque. “Madam, shed here the sunbeams of your highest intelligence; clear the dull atmosphere of your soul from fog; and let us see and hear respecting this occurrence, all that yourself have seen, and heard, and known.”
“Master, I know nothing,” said she, “what affair?” enquired the woman, fitfully.
“Is Narcisse at home?” bellowed the advocate, quivering with excitement, and red to the roots of his white hair with wrath. “Evil betide me that he should have ever made here his home;” he continued. “Who called him hither? I? No, no; I called for aught that might see fit to come, conditioned that it came in human guise; but yonder frothy fool, yon swarthy pigmy, I did not summon him. I called for anything of earth, but Heaven (to punish me) straight passed the unhallowed call to hell, that sent me up a demon.” The apartment resounded with the last word, and still the old man's voice was heard like the departing rumble of a thunder peal, as he continued, with clasped hands and upturned eyes, whilst his countenance assumed an air of singular elevation, passionately exclaiming: “Oh, that a man who could have entertained the gods with high conceits and philosophic parle,—could have communed with spirits of the skies, should be assailed and pestered from the pit!—Go on, woman, we will exorcise you, we will purge you, though you be fouler than the Augean stable, that had been left uncleaned for thirty years; ay, though you be as foul as is the stall that holds the grimy company of the lost, and which goes uncleaned for ever. Proceed, I charge thee!” and the fierce-eyed lawyer sat dilated and erect in his chair, glaring upon her like a serpent rearing its crest from amidst its coils, as he waited for an answer.
“I cannot, I know no further,” she said at length with meek doggedness.
“What say you?” exclaimed the advocate, almost screaming with astonishment.
“I know no further; I know nothing,” she replied.
“Assist me, patience, to confound this creature! Nothing! you know all;” he shouted. “All, I say, all; for never had such a mother such a son, but he did pour out all his purposes, all the infernal cornucopia, into her breast from his. You have no secrets between you; you, his mother, know all his course; his thoughts, intents, conspiracies and plots; his loves, his hates, his loose, irregular life; his merry moments, and his moods of malice. I charge thee, tell us where he was last night, where yesterday, where he is now, and where he will be to-morrow.”
“Monsieur, I know no more, know nothing,” cried the woman, appealing to Claude. “My master is mad,” and, bursting into tears, began: “Here have I been his housekeeper twenty years—”
“Twenty years too long,” vociferated the advocate. “One half the period that heaven was vexed with a stiff-necked generation have I endured you, Babet. Housekeeper! eh? Keeper of the King's conscience next, a she Lord Chancellor,—but continue: call yourself Keeper of the Seals, and mistress—or master either—of the Rolls, so you unroll your secret. Tell all you may; empty your flask of falsehood, then at the bottom we may find some sediment of truth. Commence; don't count upon concealment. I will wring the truth from you, though it shall ooze out drop by drop, and each drop be a portion of your life.”
Babet was still silent, but the lawyer pursued:
“Oh, toad, ugly and venomous, you have a precious jewel in your head; deliver it; discover to myself and to this gentleman all that you know about your son's late conduct. Speak, or you shall have your closed lips forced apart, or there shall be found and set you such tormenting penance, that you shall sue with speed to make confession. What! still silent? Bathe no longer that face with tears. Out on thee, crocodile! Oh, that those trite tears were scales, falling, to leave you bare and vulnerable to arrows of adjurement; then, with patience I could see them fall as fast as flakes of snow in winter, till thou wert as white as Judge's ermine with them! Creature, hast thou nothing plausible, nothing for us, nothing for him, nor me?”
“Nothing for you, nor for this gentleman,” she answered quietly.
“Do not imagine him to be so gentle, neither. Though he dwells staid and silent, he is a roaring lion, that should I let slip may soon devour thee, Babet. Overweening woman, you do not know how much you and yours have wronged him,” said the advocate.
Claude had heard all this without speaking, but now he interposed, to try persuasion.
“Good Babet,” said he, soothingly, “if you are aware of anything untoward of Monsieur's ward, and will declare it, I guarantee to you, not only a condonation for your son, if he have in any shape conspired against her, but a reward so weighty for yourself, that you shall bless the hour that you were awoke so early to be scolded. What do you know of the lost lady of Stillyside?”
At these words a smile covered her face, as if of satisfaction at good news; then, shrugging her shoulders, she languidly asked: “Is she missing?” and added, “Helas! then others have an absent child, as well as I,” and shook her head; and, with another shrug, continued, as if subsiding into herself, and in a tone of combined decision and sadness: “I know nothing of the lady, nothing of my boy. Heaven grant my son is safe, my poor Narcisse, and that he may not return and meet his cruel father, who so hates him;” and she brushed away a tear from her cheek.
“Heaven grant indeed we do not meet at present!” ejaculated the foiled advocate; “for if we did, I might so far exceed a parent's punitory privilege, that I should win but blame from the blind world instead of sympathy. Begone, vampire,” and she vanished like a ghost at cockcrow.
That smile of her's at the mention of Amanda missing, had been caught by the advocate's keen eye, and convinced him that she and her son were accessories to the felony of the night. Brief consultation now sufficed between him and Claude, who also felt convinced of her complicity. Light began to glimmer amidst the darkness of the situation, and, as it kindled into a dreary dawn, as might a new scene amongst dissolving views, shadowy and sinistrous amidst it seemed to loom the figures of the Duchatels; and, before the sun had risen, Claude, winged equally with hope and indignation, was posting towards Montboeuf. The advocate threw himself upon a couch, and he would fain have thrown up his brief of that day, but it was for a case involving capital punishment, and, at the eleventh hour, to have deserted his client would have brought upon himself, not only professional dishonor, but guilt. Hence, with heavy heart and unwilling faculties he bent his attention to the study of the important case, whilst at intervals he swallowed a portion of the morning's meal, that at the usual hour was silently placed before him; and at last, with an inexpressible sadness and boding, he left the stillness of his home for the walls of the busy and exciting arena of the criminal court.
“Oh, what a rash and bloody deed is this!”
“Oh, what a rash and bloody deed is this!”
“Oh, what a rash and bloody deed is this!”
Hamlet.
“Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye”
“Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye”
“Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye”
Macbeth.
The Court had been opened, and was crowded with lawyers, petit jurors, witnesses, and excited spectators. A criminal trial of such interest as the present one had not occurred there for years; and the business in the Civil Courts had virtually been adjourned, so great was the determination of the pleaders therein to be present, and witness the conducting of a case so calculated to call forth the powers of the renowned and venerable advocate. All conspired to show that an extraordinary scene was to be enacted there that day. The Judge was more than usually grave, attentive and deliberate; the Crown Prosecutor wary, and complete in his preparations; the legal, technical, and clerical grounds of exception and demur, before the Crown was allowed to take up the burden of proof, were entered and explored by the advocate, as one who reconnoitres before committing his feet to dark and dangerous precincts, where any one of his advancing steps may prove to be fatal.
And now the case had been laid before the jury, and the witnesses for the prosecution, each as he testified touching the fearful crime laid to the charge of the prisoner at the bar, were being subjected to the terrible ordeal of a cross-examination by the advocate; who all eye all ear appeared, as in his earlier days; quick to detect, prompt to demand, stern to insist, at watch and ward at every point; so that his client seemed to have found in him an irresistible champion, and the crowd, to all of whom he was familiar, considered his success as certain, just as the veteran soldiery anticipate a triumph from the General, who has so often led them to victory that they deem him to have become invincible. But to the thoughtful and more observant, at times he showed signs of preoccupation, strangely at variance with his present undoubted supremely master mood; and as the trial proceeded these fits of wandering from the point increased in duration and intensity. An anxious expression settled on his countenance; his usually energetic but measured movements when he was thus engaged became irregular and nervous; and he frequently cast glances towards the entrance, as if expecting the arrival of some one; and twice in the midst of withering cross-examinations, stopped short at the sight of individuals elbowing their way through the crowd; gazing upon them enquiringly and with an air of expectation, until, passing, they became embedded in the serried mass of spectators; when, with a look of disappointment, he resumed his task, and again with consummate talent and characteristic vigor, did battle for his client, whose dark distinction in the dock went nigh unnoticed, from the settled attention bestowed on his defender, just as the prominently exhibited prize is sometimes overlooked and temporarily forgotten, in the observation compelled to the rare skill shown by the competing players.
But whilst the father was thus tasking every power of his trained intellect, and crowning his career with forensic fires, that now, in the evening of his genius, burned even more signally, than they had done in the midst of its meridian splendors;—whilst thus calling upon his great gifts, that, like to antique jewels brightened by abrasion in the wearing, shone yet the more from the polish of experience; and while lending a legal learning that, as a rapier which, ever ready and ever in requisition, has acquired no rust, was the more available from long practice combined with intuitive tact;—whilst all this was passing in high and public court, the ignoble son was awaking in a low lodging; weary and stiff after the raid of the past night, anxious and timid from a sense of guilt, and fearful of a future calling to account. His first wish was to discover whether his sire was yet informed of the disappearance of his ward. He knew that his father was retained in the trial which had been fixed for that day, and had there been any whom he could conveniently have sent to ascertain whether or not the advocate was in court, he would have despatched one thither, but he could prevail upon none about him to go for love, and money he had none to offer. His mother, alarmed at her master's discovery of the participation by Narcisse in their successful conspiracy, and not knowing where to find the latter, had despatched a messenger to the lodging of their bold and insolent accomplice, Alphonse Duchatel, requesting him to warn her son to avoid his father during that day. But the messenger failed to find him, and Narcisse at last arose, dressed, and, prompted by a curiosity that overcame his apprehensions, approached the Court House.
Meantime the advocate, tortured by increasing alarm, and with his imagination filling with tragic touches the picture of the possible fate of Amanda, had lost both recollection and temper; and for the first time when conducting a cross-examination, had been not merely baffled, but successfully bearded and insulted by an irritated witness, to relieve himself from whom, he was obliged abruptly to bid him leave the box. The occurrence stung him to the quick, though he strove to hide his chagrin;—no wonder. Taken at disadvantage, and in a moment of weakness, the old pleader was obliged to perceive that the wager of mental duel between himself and the witness had been decided against him; and to feel that, in an unsought encounter and fair affray, he had been publicly worsted. To add to his mortification, the witness walked from the box with the air of a conqueror, and cast an insolent look of triumph around the court and upon his antagonist, whose discomfiture was so signal as to be evident to judge, jurors, witnesses, spectators, all. Still more to increase the advocate's perturbation, the heat of the court had become excessive, and the rebuff—which, at an earlier period of his career, and with an unwounded heart, would have provoked only such a grim and threatening smile as a powerful wrestler might wear, when, in the careless security of proud contempt, he had been thrown by a boy—now, in the self-esteem of age and the anguish of bereavement, moved him almost to madness. Seizing his gown, he half cast it from his form, regardless of decorum, and stood the picture of misery, rage, and scorn.
Just then the court arose for a brief recess. Glad to breathe for a moment the fresher air, the spectators retired, the jury returned into their room, the sheriff and the crown prosecutor sauntered to their respective offices, the panel of petit jurors escaped in a body, the prisoner withdrew from the front of the dock, and sat unseen, pondering his chances between the gallows and an acquittal;—even the criers of the court abandoned their posts, and the younger members of the bar, who usually gathered round the advocate on these occasions, greeting him with pleasant compliments, and polite and reverent attentions, seeing him thus moody, drifted to the lobby, and in it paid court to some other, and secondary legal luminary who was there holding his levee. For awhile the advocate was left alone; then, emerging through the large folding doors into the corridor or lobby, now cumbered with the gossipping groups, through which he passed, solitary and in his gown, like Caesar in his robe passing through the midst of the conspirators, he proceeded past the doors of the offices occupied by the various crown officials. None spoke to the old man, he spoke to none, but his breast burned in agony, and a cloud was on his brow, like the smoke that wreathes around the crater of a volcano. His eyes seemed to shoot forth sparks, and his lips were muttering. Anger and sorrow were upon his face, but, turning a corner in the building, he was now hidden from the view of the multitude, and strode along the main corridor towards the huge double staircase that, midway therein, wound down to the dim entrance hall, that was divided by ponderous doors from the esplanade between the building and the busy street. A low, massive balustrade guarded the bridge-like portion of the corridor that hung between the heads of the twin flights of stairs, and whence, on looking down, was seen the paved abyss below. Approaching this part, what did he behold but the truant Narcisse, unconscious of his presence, ascending one of these flights of stairs. At the sight of him the gloomy elements of his soul seemed to flash within him and explode, rending all resolution of restraint, and leaving him a puppet of some destructive power, as he stood eyeing his son's approach, as the cat eyes that of the marauding mouse, motionless, allowing the culprit to draw near, until, detected, he stood, too nigh to retreat, too terrified to advance, and, as the fascinated bird drops into the open jaws of the serpent, fell resistless into the grasp of the advocate's extended hand. Then, as the firedamp when met by the miner's candle must explode, or as the liberated lightning must rend the cloud, though the latter be near Jove's throne, so the frenzied father, regardless, nay, forgetful, of the place, the time, the occasion, of himself and natural ties, assailed the scared Narcisse, clutching him by the throat with the strength of a maniac, and pushing him backwards against the balustrade, and holding him there transfixed, while, with eyes seething with wrath beneath the blanched, and big, umbrageous brows, and showing like a sudden opening of the infernal pit, he cried: “Demon, degenerate dog, where hast thou been walking to and fro in the earth? whom helping to devour? Ah, son of Satan, ah! Aroint thee, Imp, Abortion.”
Demon! degenerate dog! where hast thou been walking to and fro on the earth?
The astonished wretch strove to reply, but terror and strangulation forbade him; and the enraged parent, like an incarnate storm, at arm's-length shook him, as the dog shakes the rat which it has caught, or the lion its prey; and each moment the shuddering youth, hearing his father's deep curses, and stiffening with horror, was urged further and yet further over the abyss, and still with aimless, outstretched arms, and disparted, claw-like fingers, strove to clutch the advocate's gown; while with upturned and beseeching eyes starting from their sockets, and still half on the balustrade and half in air, with nothing but the grasp of his adversary retaining him, he hung, while the arm that held him quivered, and surged uneasily from side to side, as if irresolute whether to plunge him or to draw him back; until a growl of satisfaction, followed by an execration, gurgling in the advocate's throat, announced the coming climax: the arm was jerked outwards, the clenched fingers unclutched themselves, like an automaton's, and the miserable mannikin tumbled with a yell down to the stones beneath. An instant all was silent, then a faint groan rose from the bruised form, that the next moment lay on the bloody flags a senseless corpse. Drawing a loud sigh of indescribable relief, after his fearful and protracted agitation, the advocate—and now murderer—stood glaring downwards with fixed eyes and yet clenched teeth; then, sickening at the horrid sight which loomed beneath, turned and leaned for support against the balustrade over which he had cast his child. Hearing the noise of the scuffle, some stragglers from the mixed crowd on the lobby came running to the spot, and one enquired of the advocate if he were seized with a sudden sickness. But he only pointed downwards to where lay his ill-fated victim; and shook his head, looking all woebegone, in mad, mute misery. Astonished, some descended, and bearing the body up the stairs, laid it on a bench that stood against the wall, and opposite its destroyer; while a still increasing and motley multitude, including jurors, witnesses, constables, criers, counsellors, clerks of the court, crown prosecutor, sheriff, and lastly, the judge himself, hurrying, gathered round the scene of the catastrophe. A surgeon who happened to have been subpoened upon the current trial, opened a vein, but the blood refused to flow; and a barrister, stripping himself of his gown, threw it over the body as a pall. No one dared enquire the origin of what he saw, until the judge arriving, demanded: “Who has done this?”
“I,” feebly answered the advocate, ghastly pale, and yet leaning for support on the fatal balustrade. Alas! what a change! His countenance was grown haggard, and his white hair hung dishrevelled about his collapsed visage, like icicles round the pinched countenance of Winter. Despair was in his look, and he uttered the name of Amanda, and gazed bewildered around him, as if awaking from a sorrowful dream; and now began to whimper, to gaze upon the pall-like gown, and now to call upon the spirit that had flown—as a scared bird from a bush—forth from the body that lay beneath it.
“Narcisse,” he feebly cried, “Narcisse, my son,—for thou wert yet my son,—Narcisse, Narcisse,” he reiterated piteously; and the Sheriff advanced in his purple gown, and girt with his golden hilted sword, laid his hand on the shoulder of the old man, the lately proud advocate, but now wretched culprit, as a sign of his being put under arrest. But none else moved; the Sheriff himself shrinking from ordering the constable to give effect to the signal. All seemed transfixed with pain or chained with horror, as in tremulous tones of touching tenderness the slayer continued to call upon the dead.
“Narcisse, my son, my son,” he cried in agony; “Oh, I have killed thee, child; oh, thou art dead, dead, dead.—But thou didst steal thy sister; yes, I know thou didst; ay, that thou didst, and hast delivered her to dishonor, therefore have I killed thee. Come, Amanda, come hither, dearest, and behold thy brother; behold thy father, see what he has done, and all for thee. Yes, I did it, all you curious crowd. Amanda, oh, where art thou? let me see thee ere I die: Amanda dear, Amanda;” and at the words, Amanda, leaning on the arm of Claude, and followed by the elder Montigny and André Duchatel, appeared upon the corridor, a sweet smile playing upon her features, and hastening forwards she fell upon the neck of her guardian, who was still leaning against the balustrade, pale, haggard and forlorn. Her companions, restrained by astonishment and fear, gazed aloof and mute, whilst the wretched criminal, eyeing them with a look of misery and suspicion, in a tone of inexpressible sadness at length exclaimed:
“Come you to see me, then, before I die; do you come to triumph over me, Seigneur Montigny? Look, see there, but do not touch it, for it is abhorred, abominable, a foul spirit, a black imp of hell. Amanda, art thou found?—Do not tremble, girl, do not weep; my daughter, child, for, without a figure, thou art my daughter; art, to the very letter, love, my child. Oh, we have much to tell each other; see what I have done—but hear me, then condemn me. Oh, Amanda, it is bliss to see, to feel thee here;—but here, here in this breast is sadness. I have been a rash and hasty fool, a madman, if you will, but no, no murderer; we kill mere vermin, we exterminate rats, roaches; and what worse than that is this which I have done. Pshaw, he was a reptile, a black beetle that came flying against me. He, my son! Oh, slander, where wilt thou not cast thy slime? the thing that the deceitful, wily woman palmed upon me, he my son, thy brother? preposterous conception. Yet sad has been the creature's end; and sad, sad, sad, I felt this morning when I left my home, with a presentiment which seemed to say, that I should never enter it again; and that presentiment is now fulfilled. Fate urged me on. Unnatural hate has pushed me to the ledge, and now I sink to lose myself in the abyss. Oh, foul fate! this deed foul, foul! Fair, fair Amanda, close thine eyes on this enormity; or be content to see it, yet not understand it, for knowledge here would surely drive thee mad.”
“Oh, sir, am I not mad, delirious?” enquired Amanda: “Oh, my kind guardian, my good angel, more than father, friend. What have you done? you have done nothing evil!” and she sobbed upon his bosom, and Claude stood transfixed and silent, until his eyes meeting those of the advocate, he demanded passionately:
“Sir, what may this mean; what horrible allusions drop like venom from your tongue; whence comes this change; tell me, I charge you, sir, why are you now so shaken, so wandering in your noble intellect, even mad; you whom I left this morning, sad indeed, yet sane?”
“I do not know whether I was sane or not when I did what I have done, or whether I am so just now; but for this scene, which must appear most strange to you, see there what shall explain it all,” replied the advocate; and the gown was partially withdrawn from the corpse by one of the spectators, and Claude with his male companions gazed upon it aghast, whilst Amanda turning away in terror and uttering a feeble moan, hid her face in the old man's breast.
“How has this happened?” Claude demanded at last with a voice hoarse and guttural with abhorrence; and the advocate shrugging his shoulders cynically replied:
“A bruise, a fatal fall; strange that he should have died of it. It has been said, the lower in the scale of being, the higher the tenacity of life. Yet here is an inferior intelligence dies of as little corporeal damage, as might a poet or a philosopher. There is no certainty in speculation, for by this experiment it has been proved, that the bulls-eye in the stable window, in falling is as fragile as the palace's clearest pane of crystal. Who would have thought it? A dunce, that no one would have branded for having brains, has from a mere tumble given up the ghost. Bury him, bury him; I am sorry for it, but cannot howl,” and at these last words a howl was heard from below, and soon Babet Blais came rushing along the corridor, wringing her hands, and frantically demanding: “Where is he, where is my boy, my sweet Narcisse?” and threw herself upon the corpse of her son. The advocate looked on with a bitter smile, and when he beheld her covering with kisses the cold, coarse features, exclaimed: “How these things love each other!—but when he was alive she would give him the food out of her mouth, draw for him the blood from her veins, sacrifice the immortal soul in her body with lies and patent perjury and crookedest excuses, if so was that she might screen him and his faults, deceiving me.—Beshrew thee, woman!—but wherefore should I curse thee? thou art what thou wert made to be, even as I am that which I was made to be, a desolation and a miserable man:” and when he ceased Babet started from her knees, and, looking on him with new born fierceness, cried: “Monster, not master; man killer, son killer,—oh, you have killed my own, my dear Narcisse! murdered my son, my boy, my child, my only joy:” and she again cast herself upon the body, and, with her face nestling in the dead bosom, sobbed and wept aloud.
The advocate seemed softened, and, looking at Claude, demanded: “Who is there that shall not fulfil his fate? for this I was born, and for it I shall die.” The sheriff again essayed to remove him, but he sank at his touch, as the dust of an ancient corpse falls before the breath of the outer atmosphere, and with mortality moulding his visage: “Stay,” he said, “let me die here; death has arrested me, he needs no warrant.” A spasm passed over his face, his frame slightly quivered; and looking beseechingly at Claude, the latter bent tenderly over him, and he thus began: “It were foolish in me to suppose that you have not heard of my irregularities. You will not be astonished, then, when I call this girl my child, no longer my mere ward, but mine own child, so late acknowledged. Amanda, child,”—and his voice faltered, while he spoke with increasing difficulty,—“will you acknowledge me in this disgrace, receiving with the name of father that of felon? Mona Macdonald is your mother, to whom I have promised marriage till my way down to perdition is paved with broken oaths, as false as her love was true, and as hot as was the fire which fell from heaven, when Elijah strove with Baal's prophets, and that licked up the water in the trench, as did those burning oaths of mine so often dry up her tears. Give me your hand, Claude; Seigneur Montigny, give me yours. I see a change within you towards this lady. Stand not between her and your son, as you would wish no sin to stand betwixt yourself and Heaven at Judgment.” Then in a low tone meant only for Claude's ear, he whispered, gasping: