Yet burns the sun on high beyond the cloud;
Each in his southern cave,
The warm winds linger, but to be allowed
One breathing o’er the wave,
One flight across the unquiet sky;
Swift as a vane may turn on high,
The smile of heaven comes on.
So waits the Lord behind the veil,
His light on frenzied cheek, or pale,
To shed when the dark hour is gone.
--LYRA INNOCENTIUM
On the afternoon on which Guy expected an answer from Mr. Edmonstone,
he walked with his fellow pupil, Harry Graham, to see if there were any
letters from him at Dr. Henley’s.
The servant said Mrs. Henley was at home, and asked them to come in and
take their letters. These were lying on a marble table, in the hall; and
while the man looked in the drawing-room for his mistress, and sent one
of the maids up-stairs in quest of her, Guy hastily took up one, bearing
his address, in the well-known hand of Mr. Edmonstone.
Young Graham, who had taken up a newspaper, was startled by Guy’s loud,
sudden exclamation,--’
‘Ha! What on earth does this mean?’
And looking up, saw his face of a burning, glowing red, the features
almost convulsed, the large veins in the forehead and temples swollen
with the blood that rushed through them, and if ever his eyes flashed
with the dark lightning of Sir Hugh’s, it was then.
‘Morville! What’s the matter?’
‘Intolerable!--insulting! Me? What does he mean?’ continued Guy, his
passion kindling more and more. ‘Proofs? I should like to see them!
The man is crazy! I to confess! Ha!’ as he came towards the end, ‘I
see it,--I see it. It is Philip, is it, that I have to thank. Meddling
coxcomb! I’ll make him repent it,’ added he, with a grim fierceness of
determination. Slandering me to them! And that,’--looking at the words
with regard to Amy,--‘that passes all. He shall see what it is to insult
me!’
‘What is it? Your guardian out of humour?’ asked his companion.
‘My guardian is a mere weak fool. I don’t blame him,--he can’t help it;
but to see him made a tool of! He twists him round his finger, abuses
his weakness to insult--to accuse. But he shall give me an account!’
Guy’s voice had grown lower and more husky; but though the sound sunk,
the force of passion rather increased than diminished; it was like the
low distant sweep of the tempest as it whirls away, preparing to return
with yet more tremendous might. His colour, too, had faded to paleness,
but the veins were still swollen, purple, and throbbing, and there was
a stillness about him that made his wrath more than fierce, intense,
almost appalling.
Harry Graham was dumb with astonishment; but while Guy spoke, Mrs.
Henley had come down, and was standing before them, beginning a
greeting. The blood rushed back into Guy’s cheeks, and, controlling his
voice with powerful effort, he said,--
‘I have had an insulting--an unpleasant letter,’ he added, catching
himself up. ‘You must excuse me;’ and he was gone.
‘What has happened?’ exclaimed Mrs. Henley, though, from her brother’s
letter, as well as from her observations during a long and purposely
slow progress, along a railed gallery overhanging the hall, and down a
winding staircase, she knew pretty well the whole history of his anger.
‘I don’t know,’ said young Graham. ‘Some absurd, person interfering
between him and his guardian. I should be sorry to be him to fall in his
way just now. It must be something properly bad. I never saw a man in
such a rage. I think I had better go after him, and see what he has done
with himself.’
‘You don’t think,’ said Mrs. Henley, detaining him, ‘that his guardian
could have been finding fault with him with reason?’
‘Who? Morville? His guardian must have a sharp eye for picking holes, if
he can find any in Morville. Not a steadier fellow going,--only too much
so.’
‘Ah!’ thought Mrs. Henley, ‘these young men always hang together;’ and
she let him escape without further question. But, when he emerged from
the house, Guy was already out of sight, and he could not succeed in
finding him.
Guy had burst out of the house, feeling as if nothing could relieve
him but free air and rapid motion; and on he hurried, fast, faster,
conscious alone of the wild, furious tumult of rage and indignation
against the maligner of his innocence, who was knowingly ruining him
with all that was dearest to him, insulting him by reproaches on his
breaking a most sacred, unblemished word, and, what Guy felt scarcely
less keenly, forcing kind-hearted Mr. Edmonstone into a persecution so
foreign to his nature. The agony of suffering such an accusation, and
from such a quarter,--the violent storm of indignation and pride,--wild,
undefined ideas of a heavy reckoning,--above all, the dreary thought of
Amy denied to him for ever,--all these swept over him, and swayed him
by turns, with the dreadful intensity belonging to a nature formed for
violent passions, which had broken down, in the sudden shock, all the
barriers imposed on them by a long course of self-restraint.
On he rushed, reckless whither he went, or what he did, driven forward
by the wild impulse of passion, far over moor and hill, up and down,
till at last, exhausted at once by the tumult within, and by the
violent bodily exertion, a stillness--a suspension of thought and
sensation--ensued; and when this passed, he found himself seated on
a rock which crowned the summit of one of the hills, his handkerchief
loosened, his waistcoat open, his hat thrown off, his temples burning
and throbbing with a feeling of distraction, and the agitated beatings
of his heart almost stifling his panting breath.
‘Yes,’ he muttered to himself, ‘a heavy account shall he pay me for this
crowning stroke of a long course of slander and ill-will! Have I not
seen it? Has not he hated me from the first, misconstrued every word and
deed, though I have tried, striven earnestly, to be his friend,--borne,
as not another soul would have done, with his impertinent interference
and intolerable patronizing airs! But he has seen the last of it!
anything but this might be forgiven; but sowing dissension between me
and the Edmonstones--maligning me there. Never! Knowing, too, as he
seems to do, how I stand, it is the very ecstasy of malice! Ay! this
very night it shall be exposed, and he shall be taught to beware--made
to know with whom he has to deal.’
Guy uttered this last with teeth clenched, in an excess of deep,
vengeful ire. Never had Morville of the whole line felt more deadly
fierceness than held sway over him, as he contemplated his revenge,
looked forward with a dire complacency to the punishment he would wreak,
not for this offence alone, but for a long course of enmity. He sat,
absorbed in the plan of vengeance, perfectly still, for his physical
exhaustion was complete; but as the pulsations of his heart grew
less wild, his purpose became sterner and more fixed. He devised its
execution, planned his sudden journey, saw himself bursting on Philip
early next morning, summoning him to answer for his falsehoods. The
impulse to action seemed to restore his power over his senses. He looked
round, to see where he was, raising his head from his hands.
The sun was setting opposite to him, in a flood of gold,--a ruddy ball,
surrounded with its pomp of clouds, on the dazzling sweep of horizon.
That sight recalled him not only to himself, but to his true and better
self; the good angel so close to him for the twenty years of his life,
had been driven aloof but for a moment, and now, either that, or a still
higher and holier power, made the setting sun bring to his mind, almost
to his ear, the words,--
Let not the sun go down upon your wrath,
Neither give place to the devil.
Guy had what some would call a vivid imagination, others a lively faith.
He shuddered, then, his elbows on his knees, and his hands clasped over
his brow, he sat, bending forward, with his eyes closed, wrought up in a
fearful struggle; while it was to him as if he saw the hereditary demon
of the Morvilles watching by his side, to take full possession of him
as a rightful prey, unless the battle was fought and won before that red
orb had passed out of sight. Yes, the besetting fiend of his family--the
spirit of defiance and resentment--that was driving him, even now, while
realizing its presence, to disregard all thoughts save of the revenge
for which he could barter everything--every hope once precious to him.
It was horror at such wickedness that first checked him, and brought him
back to the combat. His was not a temper that was satisfied with half
measures. He locked his hands more rigidly together, vowing to compel
himself, ere he left the spot, to forgive his enemy--forgive him
candidly--forgive him, so as never again to have to say, ‘I forgive
him!’ He did not try to think, for reflection only lashed up his sense
of the wrong: but, as if there was power in the words alone, he forced
his lips to repeat,--
‘Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against
us.’
Coldly and hardly were they spoken at first; again he pronounced them,
again, again,--each time the tone was softer, each time they came more
from the heart. At last the remembrance of greater wrongs, and worse
revilings came upon him, his eyes filled with tears, the most subduing
and healing of all thoughts--that of the great Example--became present
to him; the foe was driven back.
Still he kept his hands over his face. The tempter was not yet defeated
without hope. It was not enough to give up his first intention (no great
sacrifice, as he perceived, now that he had time to think how Philip
would be certain to treat a challenge), it was not enough to wish no ill
to his cousin, to intend no evil measure, he must pardon from the bottom
of his heart, regard him candidly, and not magnify his injuries.
He sat long, in deep thought, his head bent down, and his countenance
stern with inward conflict. It was the hardest part of the whole battle,
for the Morville disposition was as vindictive as passionate; but, at
last, he recovered clearness of vision. His request might well appear
unreasonable, and possibly excite suspicion, and, for the rest, it was
doing a man of honour, like Philip, flagrant injustice to suspect him of
originating slanders. He was, of course, under a mistake, had acted, not
perhaps kindly, but as he thought, rightly and judiciously, in making
his suspicions known. If he had caused his uncle to write provokingly,
every one knew that was his way, he might very properly wish, under his
belief, to save Amabel; and though the manner might have been otherwise,
the proceeding itself admitted complete justification. Indeed, when Guy
recollected the frenzy of his rage, and his own murderous impulse, he
was shocked to think that he had ever sought the love of that pure
and gentle creature, as if it had been a cruel and profane linking of
innocence to evil. He was appalled at the power of his fury, he had
not known he was capable of it, for his boyish passion, even when
unrestrained, had never equalled this, in all the strength of early
manhood.
He looked up, and saw that the last remnant of the sun’s disk was just
disappearing beneath the horizon. The victory was won!
But Guy’s feeling was not the rejoicing of the conquest, it was more the
relief which is felt by a little child, weary of its fit of naughtiness,
when its tearful face is raised, mournful yet happy, in having won true
repentance, and it says, ‘I _am_ sorry now.’
He rose, looked at his watch, wondered to find it so late; gazed round,
and considered his bearings, perceiving, with a sense of shame, how far
he had wandered; then retraced his steps slowly and wearily, and did not
reach South Moor till long after dark.