LOST.
Mr. Reynolds immediately paused, and regarded this group for some
moments with an air of singular sagacity and archness.
"I say, young fellow," ejaculated he, at length, with an evident effort
to attain distinctness of utterance, "that sort of thing won't do, you
know."
Bressant looked up and recognized the rustic bacchanalian for the first
time. He had always had a peculiar antipathy to this young gentleman;
but at this moment it was intensified into a loathing. How could he ask
assistance from such a degraded creature as this?
The recognition had been mutual, and Mr. Reynolds, tacking unsteadily
around, brought himself to bear in such a position as to catch a fair
view of Sophie's face, with the spot of blood on her chin. The first
glance so terrified him, that he utterly, forsook his footing, and came
abruptly to the ground, never once taking his eyes from the face, all
the way. But the shock of his fall, and the awful solemnity of what he
saw, sobered him considerably. He turned to Bressant, and eyed him with
anxious earnestness.
"Why, you're the fellow she's engaged to, ain't you? What on earth's
been the row? She ain't dead, is she? How did she get here? In her
wedding-rig, too, by golly!"
Bressant's frame vibrated with a savage impulse; but Mr. Reynolds, not
being of a sensitive temperament, was not at all disconcerted.
"Well, say, I guess she'd better be fetched home, first thing," said he,
bestirring himself to arise from the chilly seat he had taken. "Lucky I
happened along, too. Guess you was hoping I might, wasn't you? Well, you
hoist her under the arms, and I'll hang on by the feet--ain't that it?
and we'll have her into the sleigh in no time."
"Don't touch her!" said the other, fiercely. "Let her alone, you drunken
fool!"
"Now, look here, Mr. Bressant," rejoined Bill Reynolds, resting his
hands on his knees, and looking intently in Bressant's face, "I may not
be rich and a swell, like you are; but I guess I'm an honest man, any
way, as much as ever you be; and I ain't insulting nobody by helping
take home a poor frozen girl. I don't care if she is engaged to you. You
don't mean to keep her here till morning do you? and seeing she ain't
married yet, I guess the right place for her to be in, is her father's
house."
Perhaps it was the moonlight, glinting on Bill's immovable eye-glasses,
that gave extraordinary impressiveness to his words; or it may have been
Bressant's reflection, that this young country bumpkin, sullied with
drink, coarse and ignorant though he was, would have probably found his
sense of equality in no way diminished, had he known more of the facts
to which the present catastrophe was a sequel; at all events, he made no
further objections. His manner changed to an almost submissive
humbleness, and, without more words, he helped Bill to place the
insensible woman in the sleigh.
"That's the talk," remarked Mr. Reynolds, as he drew the sleigh-robe
over her. "Now, then, Mr. Bressant, just you jump in and hold on to her,
and I'll lead the horse along. We'll be there in half a shake."
"No," replied Bressant, after a mental conflict as violent as it was
brief; "I'll lead the horse myself." The only pleasure now left to this
young man was to insult and torture himself to the utmost of his
ingenuity. He had forfeited all right to protect or care for Sophie, and
it was with a savage satisfaction that he resigned it to Bill Reynolds,
as being the worthier and better man. It was the quixoticism of
self-degradation, but was doubtless not without some wholesome
influence.
In three minutes more they were at the Parsonage-gate. They made a
stretcher of the sleigh-robe, and carried Sophie in on it. The gate,
flapping-to behind them, sounded like a fretful and querulous complaint.
As they mounted the porch-steps, which creaked and crackled beneath
their weight, the door was opened by Cornelia, in her travelling-dress.
Her face expressed so vividly the unspeakable horror which she felt as
her eyes rested on her sister's half-opened lids, that Bressant, seeing
it, was stricken anew with the perception of his own misery. As Cornelia
looked up from the pure and innocent features--which never had worn an
awful and forbidding expression until now, when all power of expression
was gone--her glance and Bressant's met; but, after a moment's
encounter, both dropped their eyes, with an involuntary shudder. Their
trial and sentence were condensed into so seemingly brief a space.
But Bill Reynolds neither dealt in nor appreciated such refinements upon
the good old ways of communicating sentiments.
"Good-evening, Miss Valeyon," exclaimed he. "I guess we didn't expect to
see one another again to-night. Pray don't imagine, miss, that I bear
you any grudge. At times like this personal considerations don't
count--not with me. I'll shake hands with you, Miss Valeyon, first
chance I get, and we'll be just as much friends as ever we was before.
That's the right way, I guess."
The door of the guest-chamber stood open, and the sleigh-robe, with its
burden, was laid upon the bed whereon Bressant had spent so many weary
days. Then the voice of the professor, who had been awakened by the
noise and the sound of feet, was heard from the top of the stairs,
demanding to know what was the matter.
"Come down," said Bressant, stepping to the guest-chamber door. "Be
quick!"
He spoke more slowly and deeply than was his wont. In spite--or perhaps
in consequence--of his abasement, forlornness, and unworthiness, he
showed a dignity and impressiveness which were novel in him. The
boyishness, vivacity, and motion, had quite vanished. There were a depth
and hollowness in his eyes which gave a singular power to his face.
There must have been a vein of genuine strength and nobleness in the
man, or he would have been too much crushed to show any thing but weak
despair or brutal sullenness. Had Professor Valeyon's attention been
directed to the point, he might have recognized his pupil as being now
thoroughly grounded in the elements of emotional experience.
The old gentleman, in dressing-gown and slippers, came thumping hastily
down-stairs, in response to Bressant's summons. The strange solemnity in
the latter's tone, no less than the ominousness of the hour, probably
gave him premonition of some disaster. He reached the threshold of the
room, and paused a moment there, settling his spectacles with trembling
fingers, and looking from one silent face to another. The room was
lighted only by the declining moon, which shone coldly through the
windows. The bed, and that which was on it, were in shadow. In an
instant or two, however, the professor's eyes made the discovery to
which none of those who stood about had had the nerve to help him. And
then the old man proved himself to be the most stout-hearted of them
all. He only said "Sophie" in a voice so profoundly indrawn as scarcely
to be audible; then walked unfalteringly across the room, bent over the
bed, and proceeded to examine whether there were yet life in his
daughter or not. Even the moonlight seemed to wait and listen.
"Bring a candle," said be, presently, breaking the awful silence.
Cornelia brought it, and the warmer light inspired a sickly flicker of
hope into the expectant faces. The little ormolu-clock on the
mantel-piece whirred, and struck half-past one. As the ring of the last
stroke faded away, Professor Valeyon raised himself, and turned his face
toward the others. So strongly did his soul inform his harsh and
deeply-lined features, that it seemed, for a moment, as if there were a
majestic angel where he stood.
"Be of good cheer," quoth the old man--for no smaller words than those
which Christ had spoken seemed adequate to clothe his thought; "she is
not dead; we shall hear her speak again."
Bressant threw up his arms, as if about to shout aloud; but only gave
utterance to a gasping breath, and, stepping backward, leaned heavily
against the wall, near the door. Cornelia, standing in the centre of the
room, broke into quivering, lingering sobs, opening and clinching her
hands, which hung at her side. Bill Reynolds, however, being overcome
with joy, at once gave intelligible manifestation of it.
"Good enough!" cried he, slapping his leg, and looking from one to
another with a giggle of relief. "Bully for her! Bless you, _I_ knew
Sophie Valeyon warn't dead. Speak again! I believe you. _She'll_ tell us
what's the matter, I guess."
Professor Valeyon rapidly and collectedly gave his directions as to what
steps were to be taken, and in a few minutes every thing was being done
that skill could do. Snow was brought in to encourage back the life it
had dismayed, and camphor and coffee awaited their turn to take part in
the resuscitation. Slow and reluctant it was, like dragging a dead
weight up from an unknown depth. More than another hour had passed away
before Sophie's eyelids quivered, and a slight tremor moved her lips.
By-and-by she opened her eyes, slowly and uncertainly, let them close
again, and once more opened them; and, after several inaudible efforts,
there came, like an echo from an immeasurable distance, one word, twice
repeated:
"Bressant! Bressant!"
They looked around for him, but he was not in the room, nor in the
house. Questioning among themselves, none could tell whether it were an
hour or a minute since he had departed. When life began to take fresh
hold on her he had so loved and wronged, his heart had failed him, and,
without a word, he had gone out and away. But not to escape; for on no
heart was the weight of sorrow and suffering so heavy as on his.