Dire was his thought, who first in poison steeped
The weapon formed for slaughter--direr his,
And worthier of damnation, who instilled
The mortal venom in the social cup,
To fill the veins with death instead of life.
Anonymous.
“Upon my Word, Mr. Francis Osbaldistone,” said Miss Vernon, with the air
of one who thought herself fully entitled to assume the privilege of
ironical reproach, which she was pleased to exert, “your character
improves upon us, sir--I could not have thought that it was in you.
Yesterday might be considered as your assay-piece, to prove yourself
entitled to be free of the corporation of Osbaldistone Hall. But it was a
masterpiece.”
“I am quite sensible of my ill-breeding, Miss Vernon, and I can only say
for myself that I had received some communications by which my spirits
were unusually agitated. I am conscious I was impertinent and absurd.”
“You do yourself great injustice,” said the merciless monitor--“you have
contrived, by what I saw and have since heard, to exhibit in the course
of one evening a happy display of all the various masterly qualifications
which distinguish your several cousins;--the gentle and generous temper
of the benevolent Rashleigh,--the temperance of Percie,--the cool courage
of Thorncliff,--John's skill in dog-breaking,--Dickon's aptitude to
betting,--all exhibited by the single individual, Mr. Francis, and that
with a selection of time, place, and circumstance, worthy the taste and
sagacity of the sapient Wilfred.”
“Have a little mercy, Miss Vernon,” said I; for I confess I thought the
schooling as severe as the case merited, especially considering from what
quarter it came, “and forgive me if I suggest, as an excuse for follies I
am not usually guilty of, the custom of this house and country. I am far
from approving of it; but we have Shakspeare's authority for saying, that
good wine is a good familiar creature, and that any man living may be
overtaken at some time.”
“Ay, Mr. Francis, but he places the panegyric and the apology in the
mouth of the greatest villain his pencil has drawn. I will not, however,
abuse the advantage your quotation has given me, by overwhelming you with
the refutation with which the victim Cassio replies to the tempter Iago.
I only wish you to know, that there is one person at least sorry to see a
youth of talents and expectations sink into the slough in which the
inhabitants of this house are nightly wallowing.”
“I have but wet my shoe, I assure you, Miss Vernon, and am too sensible
of the filth of the puddle to step farther in.”
“If such be your resolution,” she replied, “it is a wise one. But I was
so much vexed at what I heard, that your concerns have pressed before my
own,--You behaved to me yesterday, during dinner, as if something had
been told you which lessened or lowered me in your opinion--I beg leave
to ask you what it was?”
I was stupified. The direct bluntness of the demand was much in the style
one gentleman uses to another, when requesting explanation of any part of
his conduct in a good-humoured yet determined manner, and was totally
devoid of the circumlocutions, shadings, softenings, and periphrasis,
which usually accompany explanations betwixt persons of different sexes
in the higher orders of society.
I remained completely embarrassed; for it pressed on my recollection,
that Rashleigh's communications, supposing them to be correct, ought to
have rendered Miss Vernon rather an object of my compassion than of my
pettish resentment; and had they furnished the best apology possible for
my own conduct, still I must have had the utmost difficulty in detailing
what inferred such necessary and natural offence to Miss Vernon's
feelings. She observed my hesitation, and proceeded, in a tone somewhat
more peremptory, but still temperate and civil--“I hope Mr. Osbaldistone
does not dispute my title to request this explanation. I have no relative
who can protect me; it is, therefore, just that I be permitted to protect
myself.”
I endeavoured with hesitation to throw the blame of my rude behaviour
upon indisposition--upon disagreeable letters from London. She suffered
me to exhaust my apologies, and fairly to run myself aground, listening
all the while with a smile of absolute incredulity.
“And now, Mr. Francis, having gone through your prologue of excuses, with
the same bad grace with which all prologues are delivered, please to draw
the curtain, and show me that which I desire to see. In a word, let me
know what Rashleigh says of me; for he is the grand engineer and first
mover of all the machinery of Osbaldistone Hall.”
“But, supposing there was anything to tell, Miss Vernon, what does he
deserve that betrays the secrets of one ally to another?--Rashleigh, you
yourself told me, remained your ally, though no longer your friend.”
“I have neither patience for evasion, nor inclination for jesting, on the
present subject. Rashleigh cannot--ought not--dare not, hold any language
respecting me, Diana Vernon, but what I may demand to hear repeated. That
there are subjects of secrecy and confidence between us, is most certain;
but to such, his communications to you could have no relation; and with
such, I, as an individual, have no concern.”
I had by this time recovered my presence of mind, and hastily determined
to avoid making any disclosure of what Rashleigh had told me in a sort of
confidence. There was something unworthy in retailing private
conversation; it could, I thought, do no good, and must necessarily give
Miss Vernon great pain. I therefore replied, gravely, “that nothing but
frivolous talk had passed between Mr. Rashleigh Osbaldistone and me on
the state of the family at the Hall; and I protested, that nothing had
been said which left a serious impression to her disadvantage. As a
gentleman,” I said, “I could not be more explicit in reporting private
conversation.”
She started up with the animation of a Camilla about to advance into
battle. “This shall not serve your turn, sir,--I must have another answer
from you.” Her features kindled--her brow became flushed--her eye glanced
wild-fire as she proceeded--“I demand such an explanation, as a woman
basely slandered has a right to demand from every man who calls himself a
gentleman--as a creature, motherless, friendless, alone in the world,
left to her own guidance and protection, has a right to require from
every being having a happier lot, in the name of that God who sent _them_
into the world to enjoy, and _her_ to suffer. You shall not deny me--or,”
she added, looking solemnly upwards, “you will rue your denial, if there
is justice for wrong either on earth or in heaven.”
I was utterly astonished at her vehemence, but felt, thus conjured, that
it became my duty to lay aside scrupulous delicacy, and gave her briefly,
but distinctly, the heads of the information which Rashleigh had conveyed
to me.
She sate down and resumed her composure, as soon as I entered upon the
subject, and when I stopped to seek for the most delicate turn of
expression, she repeatedly interrupted me with “Go on--pray, go on; the
first word which occurs to you is the plainest, and must be the best. Do
not think of my feelings, but speak as you would to an unconcerned third
party.”
Thus urged and encouraged, I stammered through all the account which
Rashleigh had given of her early contract to marry an Osbaldistone, and
of the uncertainty and difficulty of her choice; and there I would
willingly have paused. But her penetration discovered that there was
still something behind, and even guessed to what it related.
“Well, it was ill-natured of Rashleigh to tell this tale on me. I am like
the poor girl in the fairy tale, who was betrothed in her cradle to the
Black Bear of Norway, but complained chiefly of being called Bruin's
bride by her companions at school. But besides all this, Rashleigh said
something of himself with relation to me--Did he not?”
“He certainly hinted, that were it not for the idea of supplanting his
brother, he would now, in consequence of his change of profession, be
desirous that the word Rashleigh should fill up the blank in the
dispensation, instead of the word Thorncliff.”
“Ay? indeed?” she replied--“was he so very condescending?--Too much
honour for his humble handmaid, Diana Vernon--And she, I suppose, was to
be enraptured with joy could such a substitute be effected?”
“To confess the truth, he intimated as much, and even farther
insinuated”--
“What?--Let me hear it all!” she exclaimed, hastily.
“That he had broken off your mutual intimacy, lest it should have given
rise to an affection by which his destination to the church would not
permit him to profit.”
“I am obliged to him for his consideration,” replied Miss Vernon, every
feature of her fine countenance taxed to express the most supreme degree
of scorn and contempt. She paused a moment, and then said, with her usual
composure, “There is but little I have heard from you which I did not
expect to hear, and which I ought not to have expected; because, bating
one circumstance, it is all very true. But as there are some poisons so
active, that a few drops, it is said, will infect a whole fountain, so
there is one falsehood in Rashleigh's communication, powerful enough to
corrupt the whole well in which Truth herself is said to have dwelt. It
is the leading and foul falsehood, that, knowing Rashleigh as I have
reason too well to know him, any circumstance on earth could make me
think of sharing my lot with him. No,” she continued with a sort of
inward shuddering that seemed to express involuntary horror, “any lot
rather than that--the sot, the gambler, the bully, the jockey, the
insensate fool, were a thousand times preferable to Rashleigh:--the
convent--the jail--the grave, shall be welcome before them all.”
There was a sad and melancholy cadence in her voice, corresponding with
the strange and interesting romance of her situation. So young, so
beautiful, so untaught, so much abandoned to herself, and deprived of all
the support which her sex derives from the countenance and protection of
female friends, and even of that degree of defence which arises from the
forms with which the sex are approached in civilised life,--it is scarce
metaphorical to say, that my heart bled for her. Yet there was an
expression of dignity in her contempt of ceremony--of upright feeling in
her disdain of falsehood--of firm resolution in the manner in which she
contemplated the dangers by which she was surrounded, which blended my
pity with the warmest admiration. She seemed a princess deserted by her
subjects, and deprived of her power, yet still scorning those formal
regulations of society which are created for persons of an inferior rank;
and, amid her difficulties, relying boldly and confidently on the justice
of Heaven, and the unshaken constancy of her own mind.
I offered to express the mingled feelings of sympathy and admiration with
which her unfortunate situation and her high spirit combined to impress
me, but she imposed silence on me at once.
“I told you in jest,” she said, “that I disliked compliments--I now tell
you in earnest, that I do not ask sympathy, and that I despise
consolation. What I have borne, I have borne--What I am to bear I will
sustain as I may; no word of commiseration can make a burden feel one
feather's weight lighter to the slave who must carry it. There is only
one human being who could have assisted me, and that is he who has rather
chosen to add to my embarrassment--Rashleigh Osbaldistone.--Yes! the time
once was that I might have learned to love that man--But, great God! the
purpose for which he insinuated himself into the confidence of one
already so forlorn--the undeviating and continued assiduity with which he
pursued that purpose from year to year, without one single momentary
pause of remorse or compassion--the purpose for which he would have
converted into poison the food he administered to my mind--Gracious
Providence! what should I have been in this world, and the next, in body
and soul, had I fallen under the arts of this accomplished villain!”
I was so much struck with the scene of perfidious treachery which these
words disclosed, that I rose from my chair hardly knowing what I did,
laid my hand on the hilt of my sword, and was about to leave the
apartment in search of him on whom I might discharge my just indignation.
Almost breathless, and with eyes and looks in which scorn and indignation
had given way to the most lively alarm, Miss Vernon threw herself between
me and the door of the apartment.
“Stay!” she said--“stay!--however just your resentment, you do not know
half the secrets of this fearful prison-house.” She then glanced her eyes
anxiously round the room, and sunk her voice almost to a whisper--“He
bears a charmed life; you cannot assail him without endangering other
lives, and wider destruction. Had it been otherwise, in some hour of
justice he had hardly been safe, even from this weak hand. I told you,”
she said, motioning me back to my seat, “that I needed no comforter. I
now tell you I need no avenger.”
I resumed my seat mechanically, musing on what she said, and recollecting
also, what had escaped me in my first glow of resentment, that I had no
title whatever to constitute myself Miss Vernon's champion. She paused to
let her own emotions and mine subside, and then addressed me with more
composure.
“I have already said that there is a mystery connected with Rashleigh, of
a dangerous and fatal nature. Villain as he is, and as he knows he stands
convicted in my eyes, I cannot--dare not, openly break with or defy him.
You also, Mr. Osbaldistone, must bear with him with patience, foil his
artifices by opposing to them prudence, not violence; and, above all, you
must avoid such scenes as that of last night, which cannot but give him
perilous advantages over you. This caution I designed to give you, and it
was the object with which I desired this interview; but I have extended
my confidence farther than I proposed.”