IT seemed the laurel chaste and stubborn oak,
And all the gentle trees on earth that grew,
It seemed the land, the sea, and heaven above,
All breathed out fancy sweet, and sighed out love.
FAIRFAX'S _Tasso_.
AT De Montaigne's villa, Evelyn, for the first time, gathered from the
looks, the manners, of Maltravers that she was beloved. It was no longer
possible to mistake the evidences of affection. Formerly, Maltravers had
availed himself of his advantage of years and experience, and would warn,
admonish, dispute, even reprove; formerly, there had been so much of
seeming caprice, of cold distance, of sudden and wayward haughtiness, in
his bearing; but now the whole man was changed,--the Mentor had vanished
in the Lover; he held his being on her breath. Her lightest pleasure
seemed to have grown his law, no coldness ever alternated the deep
devotion of his manner; an anxious, a timid, a watchful softness replaced
all his stately self-possession. Evelyn saw that she was loved; and she
then looked into her own heart.
I have said before that Evelyn was gentle, even to _yieldingness_; that
her susceptibility made her shrink from the thought of pain to another:
and so thoroughly did she revere Maltravers, so grateful did she feel for
a love that could not but flatter pride, and raise her in her
self-esteem, that she felt it impossible that she could reject his suit.
"Then, do I love him as I dreamed I could love?" she asked herself; and
her heart gave no intelligible reply. "Yes, it must be so; in his
presence I feel a tranquil and eloquent charm; his praise delights me;
his esteem is my most high ambition;--and yet--and yet--" she sighed and
thought of Legard; "but _he_ loved me not!" and she turned restlessly
from that image. "He thinks but of the world, of pleasure; Maltravers is
right,--the spoiled children of society cannot love: why should I think
of him?"
There were no guests at the villa, except Maltravers, Evelyn, and Lord
and Lady Doltimore. Evelyn was much captivated by the graceful vivacity
of Teresa, though that vivacity was not what it had been before her
brother's affliction; their children, some of whom had grown up,
constituted an amiable and intelligent family; and De Montaigne himself
was agreeable and winning, despite his sober manners and his love of
philosophical dispute. Evelyn often listened thoughtfully to Teresa's
praises of her husband,--to her account of the happiness she had known in
a marriage where there had been so great a disparity of years; Evelyn
began to question the truth of her early visions of romance.
Caroline saw the unequivocal attachment of Maltravers with the same
indifference with which she had anticipated the suit of Legard. It was
the same to her what hand delivered Evelyn and herself from the designs
of Vargrave; but Vargrave occupied nearly all her thoughts. The
newspapers had reported him as seriously ill,--at one time in great
danger. He was now recovering, but still unable to quit his room. He
had written to her once, lamenting his ill-fortune, trusting soon to be
at Paris; and touching, with evident pleasure, upon Legard's departure
for Vienna, which he had seen in the "Morning Post." But he was
afar--alone, ill, untended; and though Caroline's guilty love had been
much abated by Vargrave's icy selfishness, by absence and remorse, still
she had the heart of a woman,--and Vargrave was the only one that had
ever touched it. She felt for him, and grieved in silence; she did not
dare to utter sympathy aloud, for Doltimore had already given evidence of
a suspicious and jealous temper.
Evelyn was also deeply affected by the account of her guardian's illness.
As I before said, the moment he ceased to be her lover, her childish
affection for him returned. She even permitted herself to write to him;
and a tone of melancholy depression which artfully pervaded his reply
struck her with something like remorse. He told her in the letter that
he had much to say to her relative to an investment, in conformity with
her stepfather's wishes, and he should hasten to Paris, even before the
doctor would sanction his removal. Vargrave forbore to mention what the
meditated investment was. The last public accounts of the minister had,
however, been so favourable, that his arrival might be almost daily
expected; and both Caroline and Evelyn felt relieved.
To De Montaigne, Maltravers confided his attachment, and both the
Frenchman and Teresa sanctioned and encouraged it. Evelyn enchanted
them; and they had passed that age when they could have imagined it
possible that the man they had known almost as a boy was separated by
years from the lively feelings and extreme youth of Evelyn. They could
not believe that the sentiments he had inspired were colder than those
that animated himself.
One day, Maltravers had been absent for some hours on his solitary
rambles, and De Montaigne had not yet returned from Paris, which he
visited almost daily. It was so late in the noon as almost to border on
evening, when Maltravers; on his return, entered the grounds by a gate
that separated them from an extensive wood. He saw Evelyn, Teresa, and
two of her children walking on a terrace immediately before him. He
joined them; and, somehow or other, it soon chanced that Teresa and
himself loitered behind the rest, a little out of hearing. "Ah, Mr.
Maltravers," said the former, "we miss the soft skies of Italy and the
beautiful hues of Como."
"And, for my part, I miss the youth that gave 'glory to the grass and
splendour to the flower.'"
"Nay; we are happier now, believe me,--or at least I should be, if--But I
must not think of my poor brother. Ah, if his guilt deprived you of one
who was worthy of you, it would be some comfort to his sister to think at
last that the loss was repaired. And you still have scruples?"
"Who that loves truly has not? How young, how lovely, how worthy of
lighter hearts and fairer forms than mine! Give me back the years that
have passed since we last met at Como, and I might hope!"
"And this to me who have enjoyed such happiness with one older, when we
married, by ten years than you are now!"
"But you, Teresa, were born to see life through the Claude glass."
"Ah, you provoke me with these refinements; you turn from a happiness you
have but to demand."
"Do not--do not raise my hopes too high," cried Maltravers, with great
emotion; "I have been schooling myself all day. But if I _am_ deceived!"
"Trust me, you are not. See, even now she turns round to look for you;
she loves you,--loves you as you deserve. This difference of years that
you so lament does but deepen and elevate her attachment!"
Teresa turned to Maltravers, surprised at his silence. How joyous sat
his heart upon his looks,--no gloom on his brow, no doubt in his
sparkling eyes! He was mortal, and he yielded to the delight of
believing himself beloved. He pressed Teresa's hand in silence, and,
quitting her abruptly, gained the side of Evelyn. Madame de Montaigne
comprehended all that passed within him; and as she followed, she soon
contrived to detach her children, and returned with them to the house on
a whispered pretence of seeing if their father had yet arrived. Evelyn
and Maltravers continued to walk on,--not aware, at first, that the rest
of the party were not close behind.
The sun had set; and they were in a part of the grounds which, by way of
contrast to the rest, was laid out in the English fashion; the walk
wound, serpent-like, among a profusion of evergreens irregularly planted;
the scene was shut in and bounded, except where at a distance, through an
opening of the trees, you caught the spire of a distant church, over
which glimmered, faint and fair, the smile of the evening star.
"This reminds me of home," said Evelyn, gently.
"And hereafter it will remind me of you," said Maltravers, in whispered
accents. He fixed his eyes on her as he spoke. Never had his look been
so true to his heart; never had his voice so undisguisedly expressed the
profound and passionate sentiment which had sprung up within him,--to
constitute, as he then believed, the latest bliss, or the crowning
misery, of his life! At that moment, it was a sort of instinct that told
him they were _alone_; for who has not felt--in those few and memorable
hours of life when love long suppressed overflows the fountain, and seems
to pervade the whole frame and the whole spirit--that there is a magic
around and within us that hath a keener intelligence than intellect
itself? Alone at such an hour with the one we love, the whole world
besides seems to vanish, and our feet to have entered the soil, and our
lips to have caught the air, of Fairyland.
They were alone. And why did Evelyn tremble? Why did she feel that a
crisis of existence was at hand?
"Miss Cameron--Evelyn," said Maltravers, after they had walked some
moments in silence, "hear me--and let your reason as well as your heart
reply. From the first moment we met, you became dear to me. Yes, even
when a child, your sweetness and your fortitude foretold so well what you
would be in womanhood; even then you left upon my memory a delightful and
mysterious shadow,--too prophetic of the light that now hallows and wraps
your image! We met again,--and the attraction that had drawn me towards
you years before was suddenly renewed. I love you, Evelyn! I love you
better than all words can tell! Your future fate, your welfare, your
happiness, contain and embody all the hopes left to me in life! But our
years are different, Evelyn; I have known sorrows,--and the
disappointments and the experience that have severed me from the common
world have robbed me of more than time itself hath done. They have
robbed me of that zest for the ordinary pleasures of our race,--which may
it be yours, sweet Evelyn, ever to retain! To me, the time foretold by
the Preacher as the lot of age has already arrived, when the sun and the
moon are darkened, and when, save in you and through you, I have no
pleasure in anything. Judge, if such a being you can love! Judge, if my
very confession does not revolt and chill, if it does not present to you
a gloomy and cheerless future, were it possible that you could unite your
lot to mine! Answer not from friendship or from pity; the love I feel
for you can have a reply from love alone, and from that reasoning which
love, in its enduring power, in its healthful confidence, in its
prophetic foresight, alone supplies! I can resign you without a murmur;
but I could not live with you and even fancy that you had one care I
could not soothe, though you might have happiness I could not share. And
fate does not present to me any vision so dark and terrible--no, not your
loss itself; no, not your indifference; no, not your aversion--as your
discovery, after time should make regret in vain, that you had mistaken
fancy or friendship for affection, a sentiment for love. Evelyn, I have
confided to you all,--all this wild heart, now and evermore your own. My
destiny is with you."
Evelyn was silent; he took her hand, and her tears fell warm and fast
upon it. Alarmed and anxious, he drew her towards him and gazed upon her
face.
"You fear to wound me," he said, with pale lips and trembling voice.
"Speak on,--I can bear all."
"No, no," said Evelyn, falteringly; "I have no fear but not to deserve
you."
"You love me, then,--you love me!" cried Maltravers wildly, and clasping
her to his heart.
The moon rose at that instant, and the wintry sward and the dark trees
were bathed in the sudden light. The time--the light--so exquisite to
all, even in loneliness and in sorrow--how divine in such companionship!
in such overflowing and ineffable sense of bliss! There and then for the
first time did Maltravers press upon that modest and blushing cheek the
kiss of Love, of Hope,--the seal of a union he fondly hoped the grave
itself could not dissolve!