THE MERCIFUL INSANITY.
Every sense
Had been o'erstrung by pangs intense,
And each frail fibre of her brain,
(As bowstrings when, relaxed by rain,
The erring arrow launch aside,)
Sent forth her thoughts all wild and wide.--BYRON.
They were awakened by the drawing of bolts and turning of locks outside
their door, and by the voice of the warden, saying:
"Go in, Kitty, and see if they are up. I will stay outside and guard the
door."
And then the same middle-aged widow whom they had seen on the previous
night entered the room.
Beatrix being fully awakened, turned anxiously to look at her friend.
Sybil was lying also wide awake, but very quiet.
"What sort of a place is this, Beatrix?" she inquired, and then
immediately relapsed into lethargy, as if she had forgotten her
question.
"Thank Heaven!" fervently exclaimed Sybil's friend, "she is still
shielded."
"Which of you two ladies is in for it?" inquired the warden's daughter,
coming forward.
"We are both 'in for it,'" answered Beatrix, a little scornfully, "and
one of us is about as guilty as the other."
"Oh, I didn't know that," muttered the woman, who took the lady's words
in good faith. "I didn't know there was more than one concerned; but
what I meant to ask was, which is Mrs. Berners? Because there is a trunk
come for her, which father thinks it contains clothes and other
necessaries that she may need at once."
"Very likely. Let your father push it through the door, and I will see
to its contents. And oh! for Heaven's sake, my good woman, let us have
some breakfast as soon as possible," entreated Miss Pendleton.
The woman promised to comply with her request, and left the room.
The trunk was pushed in, and the door closed, locked, and bolted again.
Beatrix went to examine the consignment. There was a letter directed to
Mrs. Berners, unsealed and tied to the handle, together with the key of
the trunk.
Beatrix took both off and carried them to her friend, saying "Here is
the key of a box that has come for you, and here is a letter, dear
Sybil, from your husband, I suppose; will you read it?"
Sybil opened the letter, gazed at it with dreamy eyes, and followed the
lines with her glances, but without taking in their meaning.
Sad enough this would have seemed to Miss Pendleton at any other time;
but now, every evidence of her friend's failing mind was welcome to her,
and to all who loved the unhappy young wife.
"Shall I read it for you, dear?" inquired Beatrix, tenderly, taking the
letter from her hand.
"Yes, read it," answered Sybil, rousing herself, for an instant, to some
little interest in the matter, and then sinking back into indifference.
Beatrix read aloud. The letter was only an earnestly affectionate
greeting from the husband to the wife, telling her that he had sent her
a box of needful articles, and that he himself would come to see her as
soon as the doors should be opened to visitors. It was a cautiously
written letter, so worded as to humor her hallucination, in case she
should still imagine herself to be in a country house instead of the
county prison.
As Beatrix ended each sentence, she looked around to see if Sybil was
listening.
Ah! no; after the first few lines had been read, her attention wandered,
and at the end of the note she astonished the reader, by saying:
"I am very thirsty, Beatrix."
"Then, dear, let me help you to rise and dress; and you shall have some
tea. They are rough people we are stopping with, so I requested them to
bring our breakfast up here," said Miss Pendleton, artfully, and laying
aside the note.
Sybil submitted to the services of her friend. And then for the first
time Beatrix noticed that in this victim's case physical weakness was
now added to mental infirmity. Body and mind were both failing together.
"Well, so best," thought Sybil's true friend.
By the time they were both dressed, there was another sound of turning
locks and drawing bolts, and then the warden's daughter brought in the
tray of breakfast, while the warden himself stood outside on guard.
Notwithstanding the awful situation, both these young women were able to
take a little breakfast--poor Sybil because she was quite insensible of
the horrors of her position, and Miss Pendleton because, with all her
sorrowful sympathy for her companion, she had the appetite of a healthy
young woman who had been fasting some eighteen hours.
Soon after the breakfast was over and the service cleared away, Mr.
Berners came. Again bolts and bars were drawn, and the husband was
ushered in by the warden to see his wife.
Lyon Berners shook hands with Beatrix Pendleton, and then passed at once
to Sybil, who sat in a state of reverie on the side of her bed.
"You have come for me at last, Lyon?" she said. "The people here are
very kind, but I am very glad you have come, for I want to go home."
"Dear Sybil," he replied, embracing her, and humoring her delusion. "You
are not well enough to go home yet; you must stay here a little longer."
"Yes," she said, looking up for a moment, and then relapsing into
silence and reverie.
Mr. Berners exchanged a glance with Miss Pendleton.
At the same moment the warden put his head in at the door, and beckoned
Mr. Berners to come out into the passage.
"Well," inquired the latter, when he was outside.
"Well, sir," said the warden, "you know she must go into a regular cell
to-day. I can't help it. I wish I could. I pity the poor lady! I do! I
pity her, whether she did it or not! And I can't help _that_ either! So
please the Lord, I'll do all I can to comfort her and her friends,
consistent with my duty to the higher powers. So come along, sir, if
you please, and I'll show you a corridor where there is no other
prisoner now confined, and you can choose the best cell for her
yourself."
Lyon Berners bowed and followed his conductor across the broad passage
and down another one which was at right angles with the first. Here all
the cells were vacant. The warden unlocked several for inspection.
The last cell opened was at the north-east angle of the building. It was
twice the size of the others, and had, beside its door, two narrow
grated windows--one on the north, looking out upon the Black river, and
the other on the east, upon Bird creek.
"Here, sir, now, is a large, cool, well-aired cell, where we used to
confine as many as a half a dozen prisoners together, when we was full.
But as you see, there is nobody at all in all this corridor. So we can
put her in this, and if you like to go to the cost of having it scrubbed
and white-washed, why, I'll have it done this morning. Likewise, if you
would wish to put in a comfort or two, in way of furniture, there'll be
no objection to that neither. There'll be no objection to nothing that
don't interfere with her safe keeping, you understand, sir?"
"Yes, I understand and thank you. Pray, have every article of this
furniture removed, have the room thoroughly ventilated and cleansed, and
while you are doing that I will go up to Black Hall, and send down all
that is necessary to make this room decent for my poor wife. Heaven
grant that it may prove her death-room!" added the heart-broken husband
to himself.
The warden promised compliance with all these requests, and then the two
returned to Sybil's room.
"I must leave you, dear, now, for a few hours, but I will certainly be
back at the end of that time," said Mr. Berners, caressing his enfeebled
wife as he took leave of her.
In the course of that day, the large north-east cell was transformed
into as clean and comfortable a bed-room as money and labor could make
it. The floor was covered with straw matting, the windows shaded with
white muslin curtains.
Besides the fresh bed and bedding, there was a small bureau, a
washstand, a toilet set, book-table, writing-desk, dressing-case, and
work-box; a guitar, with some music, and a small choice collection of
books.
All these comforts were collected there as much for Miss Pendleton's
sake as for Sybil's.
The room did not look in the least like a prison-cell, nor was there any
legal necessity that it should.
It was late in the afternoon when Sybil and her devoted friend were
transferred to the new quarters.
"What is this for?" inquired Sybil, rousing herself a little, when she
found she was about to be removed.
"Oh, you know, dear, that we have been sleeping in the daughter's room,
and keeping her out of it, and now she wants her own, and so they have
fixed up another one for us," said Miss Pendleton, soothingly, as she
drew her friend's arm within her own and led her on after the warden,
who walked before them with a large bunch of keys in his hand.
"Why, here are all my things!" said Sybil, startled to unusual interest
by the sight of her personal effects arranged in the new cell.
"Yes, dear," whispered Miss Pendleton, as she put Sybil gently down into
the rocking-chair--"yes, dear. You know Lyon fears that it will be some
time before you are able to go home, and these people are too poor to
make you comfortable, so he sent these things for them to fix up this
room for you."
"Beatrix," said Sybil, putting her hands up to her temples.
"What is it, dear?"
"My head is very bad."
"Does it ache?"
"No; but it is so queer; and I have had a horrid dream--oh! a horrid,
ghastly dream; but I can't recall it."
"Don't try, my darling; you took cold in the storm last night, and you
are not well now; so turn your thoughts away from your disagreeable
dream, and fix them upon something else," said Beatrix soothingly,
although at heart she was very much alarmed, as it was probable that the
sight of her favorite little effects had started a train of associations
that might bring her back to perfect sanity and to utter agony.
At that moment, too, there was a diversion. Lyon Berners entered the
cell, bringing in a basket of fruit and flowers.
"From your own garden and conservatories, my dear Sybil. Until you are
well enough to go home, you must have some of your home comforts brought
here," he said, as he set the elegant basket down on a stand, and went
and embraced her.
"Yes; thank you very much, dear Lyon. When do you think I will be well
enough to go home?" she asked, and then, without giving the slightest
attention to her husband's affectionate answer, she dropped at once into
a deep and dreamy state of abstraction.
Miss Pendleton beckoned Mr. Berners to come to her at one of the
windows.
"What is it?" inquired Lyon, anxiously.
"She came very near a consciousness of her position just now, when she
first recognized her property, but the peril passed away. And now we
must be very careful to foster this merciful insanity that shields her
from misery. And as one precaution, I wish you would ask the warden to
oil these rusty bolts and bars, and make them work noiselessly. She has
never noticed that she is locked and bolted in, and I wish her never to
notice it, or to suspect it."
"Thanks, a thousand thanks, dear Beatrix! I will follow your
suggestions," said Mr. Berners, warmly grasping her hand.
Then the warden turned to the visitor, and told him that the hour had
come for locking up the prison for the night.
Mr. Berners went back to his wife and took an affectionate leave of her.
She let him go, with even less of opposition than on the preceding
evening, for it seemed as if her fitful rise towards sensibility had
reacted in a deeper fall into apathy.
Lyon Berners returned to his desolate home. Among all who were affected
by the condemnation of Sybil Berners, there was none who suffered such
agony of mind as that which nearly drove her husband to frenzy. If
Sybil's terrible trials and unspeakable sorrows had resulted in a mild
and merciful insanity, that vailed her mind from any knowledge of the
deep horrors of her position, Lyon's utter anguish of spirit had stung
him to a state of desperation that incited the wildest schemes and the
most violent remedies.
As he lay tossing in his sleepless bed each night, he felt tempted to go
and seek out that band of outlaws, and to bribe them to the half of his
fortune to make a night attack upon the prison, and forcibly rescue his
beloved wife.
There was, however, a serious objection to this plan; for besides its
unlawfulness and its uncertainty of success, it was impracticable, from
the fact that no one--not even the most experienced thief-catchers--had
been able to find the lost clue to the retreat of the robbers. Since
their flight from the ruined house, four months previous, they had never
been heard of.
Sometimes, as Sybil's husband lay groaning in anguish on his pillow, he
was strongly tempted to procure some drug that would give her a quick
and easy death, and save her from the horrors to come.
But Lyon Berners resisted this dark temptation to commit a deadly sin.
More frequently still, when his agony seemed greater than he could bear,
he would feel a desperate desire to put a period to his own wretched
existence.
But then came the devoted spirit that whispered for _her_ sake he must
live and suffer, as long as she should have to live and suffer.
All these dark trials and temptations tortured Lyon Berners in those
sleepless, awful nights he spent alone in his desolate home.
But in the morning, when he would go and visit Sybil in the prison, he
not only exerted all his mental powers of self-control, but he called in
the aid of powerful sedative drugs to produce the calmness of manner
with which he wished to meet his wife.
Meanwhile, as the days passed, Sybil sank deeper and deeper into apathy.
Her hallucination was now complete. She imagined that, in company with
her husband and their friends, she had been at church one Sabbath
afternoon, when a tremendous storm of thunder, lightning, rain, and wind
came up, and that they had all been obliged to take refuge in a country
house for the night, and that she herself had been taken ill from the
exposure, and had to remain there until she could get well enough to go
home. As the days passed and the hallucination grew, she lost all count
of time, and always thought that she had arrived "last Sunday," and was
going home "to-morrow!"
Miss Pendleton was permitted to remain with her, and Mr. Berners was
allowed to visit her every day.
So some weeks had passed, when one day a terrible event occurred.
It was early in the morning: the prison doors were just opened for the
admission of visitors, and Lyon Berners had just entered the lower hall,
on his way to the warden's office, to get that old man to conduct him to
Sybil's cell, when he was overtaken and accosted by the sheriff:
"On your way to your wife, Mr. Berners? That is well. She will need you
at this hour," said Mr. Fortescue, after the usual morning greeting.
"What is the matter?" inquired Lyon Berners hurriedly, and in great
alarm.
"For Heaven's sake, compose yourself now! You will need all your
self-possession, for her sake, as well as for your own. Come into the
warden's office with me. He also must go with us to her cell."
In great distress of mind, Mr. Berners followed the sheriff into the
warden's office.
Old Mr. Martin, who was at his desk, came to meet the visitors.
"One moment, Martin. I will see you in one moment. Just now, I wish to
speak to Mr. Berners," said the sheriff, as he drew Lyon Berners aside.
"What is it now?" inquired Sybil's husband, in an agony of alarm for her
sake.
"Can you not surmise?" compassionately suggested the sheriff.
"I--Oh, great Heaven!--I dare not!" he exclaimed, throwing up his hands
and clasping his head.
"You must know that the petition sent up to the Governor for her pardon
has been returned with an adverse decision."
"I feared it! Oh, heaven!"
"Oh, try to be firm! I must now tell you the worst. The petition did not
come down alone--" The speaker paused an instant, and then added gravely
and compassionately:
"There was another document came down with it--a document that I must
read to her."
"THE DEATH WARRANT!"
Lyon Berners uttered these words with such a groan of anguish and
despair as seemed to have rent his soul and body asunder as he reeled
and caught at the window frame for support, and then dropped into a
chair by its side.
"Mr. Berners, for her sake! for heaven's sake! bear up now! Martin, a
glass of brandy here! quick!"
The warden who always kept a bottle on his desk, hurriedly filled a
tumbler half full of brandy, and hastened up with it.
"Drink it! drink it all!" said the sheriff, putting the glass into Mr.
Berners' hand.
Lyon Berners drank the strong and fiery spirit, feeling it no more than
if it had been water.
A few moments passed, during which Mr. Berners struggled hard for
self-control, while the warden in a low voice inquired:
"What is it?"
"_The death warrant!_"
As the sheriff whispered these awful words, the warden clasped his
hands, saying fervently:
"_Now may the Lord help them both!_"
Then the sheriff turned to Mr. Berners, who had again sank upon a chair,
and was still striving to recover himself, and he kindly inquired:
"Are you ready now to go with us to her cell? She will need your support
in this trying hour."
"Heaven give me strength! Yes, I am ready!" said Mr. Berners.
And the ministers of fate went to take the death warrant to the cell of
Sybil Berners.