"All other passions have their hour of thinking,
And hear the voice of reason. This alone
Breaks at the first suspicion into frenzy,
And sweeps the soul in tempests."--_Shakspeare._
The day that Alice left, Helen felt very sad and lonely, but she
struggled with her feelings, and busied herself as much as possible with
the household arrangements. Mrs. Gleason took her into the chamber which
Mittie had been occupying alone, and showed her every thing that had
been prepared for her accommodation as well as her sister's. Helen was
unbounded in her gratitude, and thought the room a paradise, with its
nice curtains, tasteful furniture and airy structure.
When night came on, Helen retired early to her chamber, leaving Mittie
with Clinton. She left the light burning on the hearth, for the memory
of the lonely spinster, invoking by her song the horrible being, who
descended, piece-meal, down the chimney, had not died away. That was the
very chamber in which Miss Thusa used to spin, and recite her dreadful
tales, and Helen remembered them all. It had been papered, and painted,
and renewed, but the chimney was the same, and the shadows rested there
as darkly as ever.
When Mittie entered the room, Helen was already in that luxurious state
between sleeping and waking, which admits of the consciousness of
enjoyment, without its responsibility. She was reclining on the bed,
shaded by the muslin curtains, with such an expression of innocence and
peace on her countenance, it was astonishing how any one could have
marred the tranquillity of her repose.
The entrance of her sister partially roused her, and the glare of the
lamp upon her face completely awakened her.
"Oh! sister!" she cried, "I am so glad you have come. It is so long
since we have slept together. I have been thinking how happy we can be,
where so much has been done for our comfort and luxury."
"You can enjoy all the luxuries yourself," said Mittie, "and be welcome
to them all. I am going to sleep in the next room, for I prefer being
alone, as I have been before."
"Oh! Mittie, you are not going to leave me alone; you will not, surely,
be so unkind?"
"I wonder if I were not left alone, while Alice was with you, and I
wonder if I complained of unkindness!"
"But _you_ did not care. You are not dependent on others. I am sure if
you had asked me, I would have spread a pallet on the floor, rather than
have left you alone."
"Helen, you are too old now to be such a baby," said Mittie,
impatiently; "it is time you were cured of your foolish fears of being
alone. You make yourself perfectly ridiculous by such nonsense."
She busied herself gathering her night-clothes as she spoke, and took
the lamp from the table.
Helen sprang from the bed, and stood between Mittie and the door.
"No," said she, "if we must separate, I will go. You need not leave the
chamber which has so long been yours. I do dread being alone, but alas!
I must be lonely wherever I am, unless I have a heart to lean upon. Oh!
Mittie, if you knew how I _could_ love you, you would let me throw my
arms around you, and find a pillow on your sisterly breast."
She looked pleadingly, wistfully at Mittie, while tears glittered in her
soft, earnest eyes.
"Foolish, foolish child!" cried Mittie, setting down the lamp
petulantly, and tossing her night-dress on the bed--"stay where you are,
but do not inflict too much sentiment on me--you know I never liked it."
"No," said Helen, thoughtfully, "I might disturb you, and perhaps if I
once conquer my timidity, I shall be victor for life. I should like to
make the trial, and I may as well begin to-night as any time. I do not
wish to be troublesome, or intrude my company on any one."
Helen's gentle spirit was roused by the arbitrary manner in which Mittie
had treated her, and she found courage to act as her better judgment
approved. She was sorry she had pleaded so earnestly for what she might
have claimed as a right, and resolved to leave her sister to the
solitude she so much coveted.
With a low, but cold "good night," she glided from the apartment, closed
the door, passed through the passage, entered a lonely chamber, and
kneeling down by the bedside, prayed to be delivered from the bondage of
fear, and the haunting phantoms of her own imagination. When she laid
her head upon the pillow, she felt strong in the resolution she had
exercised, glad that she had dared to resist her own weak, irresolute
heart. She drew aside the window curtains and let the stars shine down
brightly on her face. How could she feel alone, with such a glorious
company all round and about her? How could she fear, when so many
radiant lamps were lighted to disperse the darkness? Gradually the quick
beating of her heart subsided, the moistened lashes shut down over her
dazzled eyes, and she slept quietly till the breaking of morn. When she
awoke, and recalled the struggles she had gone through, she rejoiced at
the conquest she had obtained over herself. She was sure if Arthur
Hazleton knew it, he would approve of her conduct, and she was glad that
she cherished no vindictive feelings towards Mittie.
"She certainly has a right to her preferences," she said; "if she likes
solitude, I ought not to blame her for seeking it, and I dare say my
company is dull and insipid to her. I must have seemed weak and foolish
to her, she who never knew what fear or weakness is."
As she was leaving her room, with many a vivid resolution to conquer her
besetting weaknesses, her step-mother entered, unconscious that the
chamber had an occupant. She looked around with surprise, and Helen
feared, with displeasure.
"Mittie preferred sleeping alone," she hastened to say, "and I thought
she had a prior right to the other apartment."
"Selfish, selfish to the heart's core!" ejaculated Mrs. Gleason. "But,
my dear child, I cannot allow you to be the victim of an arbitrary will.
The more you yield, the more concessions will be required. You know
not, dream not, of Mittie's imperious and exacting nature."
"I begin to believe, dear mother, that the discipline we most need, we
receive. I did feel very unhappy last night, and when I entered this
room, the dread of remaining all alone, in darkness and silence, almost
stopped the beatings of my heart. It was the first time I ever passed a
night without some companion, for every one has indulged my weakness,
which they believed constitutional. But after the first few moments--a
sense of God's presence and protection, of the guardianship of angels,
of the nearness of Heaven, hushed all my fears, and filled me with a
kind of divine tranquillity. Oh! mother, I feel so much better this
morning for the trial, that I thank Mittie for having cast me, as it
were, on the bosom of God."
"With such a spirit, Helen," said her step-mother, tenderly embracing
her, "you will be able to meet whatever trials the discipline of your
life may need. Self-reliance and God-reliance are the two great
principles that must sustain us. We must do our duty, and leave the
result to Providence. And, believe me, Helen, it is a species of
ingratitude to suffer ourselves to be made unhappy by the faults of
others, for which we are not responsible, when blessings are clustering
richly round us."
Helen felt strengthened by the affectionate counsels of her step-mother,
and did not allow the cloud on Mittie's brow to dim the sunshine of
hers. Mindful of the warnings of the young doctor, she avoided Clinton
as much as possible, whose deep blue eyes with their long sable lashes
often rested on her with an expression she could not define, and which
she shrunk from meeting. True to her promise she visited Miss Thusa once
a day, and took her spinning lessons, till she could turn the wheel like
a fairy, and manufacture thread as smooth and silky as her venerable
teacher. She insisted on bleaching it also, and flew about among the
long grass, with her bright watering pot, like a living flower sprung up
in the wilderness.
She was returning one evening from the cabin at a rather later hour than
usual, for she was becoming more and more courageous, and could walk
through the woods without starting at every sound. The trees were now
beginning to assume the magnificent hues of autumn, and glowed with
mingled scarlet, orange, emerald, and purple. There was such a
brightness, such a glory in these variegated dyes, that they took away
all impression of loneliness, and the crumpling of the dry, yellow
leaves in the path had a sociable, pleasant sound. She hoped Arthur
Hazleton would return before this jewelry of the woods had faded away,
that she might walk with him through their gorgeous foliage, and hear
from his lips the deep moral of the waning season. She reached the gray
rock where Arthur had seated her, and sitting down on a thick cushion of
fallen leaves, she remembered every word he had said to her the evening
before his departure.
"Why are you sitting so mute and lonely here, fair Helen?" said a
musical voice close to her ear, and Clinton suddenly came and took a
seat by her side. Helen felt embarrassed by his unexpected presence, and
wished that she could free herself from it without rudeness.
"I am gazing on the beauty of the autumnal woods," she replied, her
cheeks glowing like the scarlet maple leaves.
"I should think such contemplation better fitted one less young and
bright and fair," said Clinton. "Miss Thusa, for instance, in her
time-gray home.
"I am sure nothing can be brighter or more glorious than these colors,"
said Helen, making a motion to rise. It seemed to her she could see the
black eyes of Mittie gleaming at her through the rustling foliage.
"Do not go yet," said Clinton. "This is such a sweet, quiet hour--and it
is the first time I have seen you alone since the morning after your
arrival. What have I done that you shun me as an enemy, and refuse me
the slightest token of confidence and regard?"
"I am not conscious of showing such great avoidance," said Helen, more
and more embarrassed. "I am so much of a stranger, and it seemed so
natural that you should prefer the society of Mittie, I considered my
absence a favor to both."
"Till you came," he replied, in a low, persuasive accent, "I did find a
charm in her society unknown before, but now I feel every thought and
feeling and hope turned into a new channel. Even before you came, I
felt you were to be my destiny. Stay, Helen, you shall not leave me till
I have told you what my single heart is too narrow to contain."
"Let me go," cried Helen, struggling to release the hand which he had
taken, and springing from her rocky seat. "It is not right to talk to me
in this manner, and I will not hear you. It is false to Mittie, and
insulting to me."
"I should be false to Mittie should I pretend to love her now, when my
whole heart and soul are yours," exclaimed the young man, vehemently. "I
can no more resist the impulse that draws me to you, than I can stay the
beatings of this wildly throbbing heart. Love, Helen, cannot be forced,
neither can it be restrained."
"I know nothing of love," cried Helen, pressing on her homeward path,
with a terror she dared not betray, "nor do I wish to know--but one
thing I do know--I feel nothing but dread in your presence. You make me
wretched and miserable. I am sure if you have the feelings of a
gentleman you will leave me after telling you this."
"The more you urge me to flee, the more firmly am I rooted to your side.
You do not know your own heart, Helen. You are so young and guileless.
It is not dread of me, but your sister's displeasure that makes you
tremble with fear. You cannot fear me, Helen--you _must_, you _will_,
you _shall_ love me."
Helen was now wrought up to a pitch of excitement and terror that was
perfectly uncontrollable. Every word uttered by Clinton seemed burned
in--on her brain, not her heart, and she pressed both hands on her
forehead, as if to put out the flame.
"Oh! that Arthur Hazleton were here," she exclaimed, "he would protect
me."
"No danger shall reach you while I am near you, Helen," cried Clinton,
again endeavoring to take her hand in his--but Helen darted into a side
path and ran as fleetly and wildly as when she believed the glittering,
fiery-eyed viper was pursuing her. Sometimes she caught hold of the
slender trunk of a tree to give her a quicker momentum, and sometimes
she sprang over brooklets, which, in a calmer moment, she would have
deemed impossible. She felt that Clinton had slackened his pursuit as
she drew near her home, but she never paused till she found herself in
her own chamber, where, sinking into a chair, she burst into a passion
of tears such as she had never wept before. Shame, dread, resentment,
fear--all pressed so crushingly upon her, her soul was bowed even to the
dust. The future lowered so darkly before her. Mittie--she could not
help looking upon her as a kind of avenging spirit--that would forever
haunt her.
While she was in this state of ungovernable emotion, Mittie came in,
with a face as white and rigid as marble, and stood directly in front of
her.
"Why have you fled from Clinton so?" she cried, in a strange, harsh
tone. "Tell me, for I will know. Tell me, for I have a right to know."
Helen tried to speak, but her breathless lips sought in vain to utter a
sound. There was a bright, red spot in the centre of both cheeks, but
the rest of her face was as colorless as Mittie's.
"Speak," cried Mittie, stamping her foot, with an imperious gesture,
"and tell me the truth, or you had better never have been born."
"Ask me nothing," she said at length, recovering breath to answer, "for
the truth will only make you wretched."
"What has he said to you?" repeated Mittie, seizing the arm of Helen
with a force of which she was not aware. "Have you dared to let him talk
to you about love?"
"Alas! I want not his love. I believe him not," cried Helen; "and, oh!
Mittie, trust him not. Think of him no more. He does not love you--is
not worthy of you."
Mittie tossed Helen's arm from her with a violence that made her writhe
with pain--while her eyes flashed with the bale-fires of passion.
"How dare you tell me such a falsehood?" she exclaimed, "you little,
artful, consummate hypocrite. He never told you this. You have been
trying to supplant me from the moment of your arrival, trying to make
yourself appear a victim, a saint--a martyr to a sister's jealous and
exciting temper. I have seen it all. I have watched the whole, day after
day. I have seen you stealing off to Miss Thusa's--pretending to love
that horrible old woman--only that you might have clandestine meetings
with Clinton. And now you are seeking to shake my confidence in his
faith and truth, that you may alienate him more completely from me."
"Oh! Mittie--don't," cried Helen, "don't for Heaven's sake, talk so
dreadfully. You don't mean what you say. You don't know what you are
doing."
"I tell you I do know--and you shall know to your cost, you little wolf
in lamb's clothing," cried Mittie, growing more and more frantic as she
yielded to the violence of her passions. "It was not enough, was it, to
wind yourself round the young doctor with your subtle, childish ways,
till you have made a fool of him with all his wisdom, treating him with
a forwardness and familiarity that ought to make you blush at the
remembrance--but you must come between me and the only being this side
of Heaven I ever cared for? Take care of yourself; get out of my way,
for I am growing mad. The sight of you makes me a maniac."
Helen was indeed terrified at an exhibition of temper so unparalleled.
She rose, though her limbs trembled so she could scarcely walk, and took
two or three steps towards the door.
"Where are you going?" exclaimed Mittie.
"You told me to leave you," said Helen, faintly, "and indeed I cannot
stay--I ought not to stay, and hear such false and cruel things. I will
not stay," she exclaimed, with a sudden and startling flash of
indignation; "I will not stay to be so insulted and trampled on. Let me
pass."
"You shall not go to Clinton."
"Let me pass, I say," cried Helen, with a wild vehemence, that
contrasted fearfully with her usual gentleness. "I am afraid of you,
with such daggers in your tongue."
She rushed passed Mittie, flew down stairs, into the sitting room, in
the presence of her father, step-mother, and Clinton, who was sitting as
if perfectly unconscious of the tempest he had roused.
"Father, father," she exclaimed, throwing herself into his arms. "Oh,
father."
Nothing could be more startling than her appearance. The bright spot on
her cheek was now deepened to purple, and her eyes had a strange,
feverish lustre.
"Why, what is the meaning of this?" cried Mr. Gleason, turning in alarm
to his wife.
"Something must have terrified her--only feel of her hands, they are as
cold as ice; and look at her cheeks."
"She seems ill, very ill," observed Clinton, rising, much agitated;
"shall I go for a physician?"
"I fear Doctor Hazleton is not yet returned," said Mrs. Gleason,
anxiously. "I think she is indeed ill--alarmingly so."
"No, no," cried Helen, clinging closer to her father, "don't send for
Doctor Hazleton--anybody in the world but him. I cannot see him."
"How strange," exclaimed Mr. Gleason, "she must be getting delirious.
You had better carry her up stairs," added he, turning to his wife, "and
do something to relieve her, while I go for some medical advice. She is
subject to sudden nervous attacks."
"No, no," cried Helen, still more vehemently, "don't take me up stairs;
I cannot go back; it would kill me. Only let me stay with you."
Mr. Gleason, who well remembered the terrible fright Helen had suffered
in her childhood--her fainting over her mother's corpse--her
imprisonment in the lonely school-house--believed that she had received
some sudden shock inflicted by a phantom of her own imagination. Her
frantic opposition to being taken up stairs confirmed this belief, and
he insisted on his wife's conveying her to her own room and giving her
an anodyne. Clinton felt as if his presence must be intrusive, and left
the room--but he divined the cause of Helen's strange emotion. He heard
a quick, passionate tread overhead, and he well knew what the
lion-strength of Mittie's unchained passions must be.
Mrs. Gleason, too, had her suspicions of the truth, having seen Helen's
homeward flight, and heard the voice of Mittie soon afterwards in loud
and angry tones. She besought her husband to leave her to her care,
assuring him that all she needed was perfect quietude. For more than an
hour Mrs. Gleason sat by the side of Helen, holding her hands in one of
hers, while she bathed with the other her throbbing temples. Gradually
the deep, purple flush faded to a pale hue, and her eyes gently closed.
The step-mother thought she slept, and darkened the window--so that the
rays of the young moon could not glimmer through the casement. Mrs.
Gleason looked upon Helen with anguish, seeing before her so much misery
in consequence of her sister's jealous and irascible temper. She sighed
for the departure of Clinton, whose coming had roused Mittie to such
terrible life, and whose fascinations might be deadly to the peace of
Helen. She could see no remedy to the evils which every day might
increase--for she knew by long experience the indomitable nature of
Mittie's temper.
"Mother," said Helen, softly, opening her eyes, "I do not sleep, but I
rest, and it is so sweet--I feel as if I had been out in a terrible
storm--so shattered and so bruised within. Oh! mother, you cannot think
of the shameful accusations she has brought against me. It makes me
shudder to think of them. I shall never, never be happy again. They will
always be ringing in my ears--always blistering and burning me."
"You should not think her words of such consequence," said Mrs. Gleason,
soothingly; "nothing she can say can soil the purity of your nature, or
alienate the affections of your friends. She is a most unhappy girl,
doomed, I fear, to be the curse of this otherwise happy household."
"I cannot live so," cried Helen, clasping her hands entreatingly, "I
would rather die than live in such strife and shame. It makes me wicked
and passionate. I cannot help feeling hatred rising in my bosom, and
then I loathe myself in dust and ashes. Oh! let me go somewhere, where I
may be at peace--anywhere in the world where I shall be in nobody's way.
Ask father to send me back to school--I am young enough, and shall be
years yet; or I should like to go into a nunnery, that must be such a
peaceful place. No stormy passions--no dark, bosom strife."
"No, my dear, we are not going to give up you, the joy and idol of our
hearts. You shall not be the sacrifice; I will shield you henceforth
from the violence of this lawless girl. Tell me all the events of this
evening, Helen, without reserve. Let there be perfect confidence between
us, or we are all lost."
Then Helen, though with many a painful and burning blush, told of her
interview with Clinton, and all of which Mittie had so frantically
accused her.
"When I rushed down stairs, I did not know what I was doing--my brain
seemed on fire, and I thought my reason was gone. If I could find a
place of shelter from her wrath, a spot where her eye could not blaze
upon me! that was my only thought."
"Oh! that this dangerous, and I fear, unprincipled young man had never
entered our household!" cried Mrs. Gleason; "and yet I would not judge
him too harshly. Mittie's admiration, from the first, was only too
manifest, and he must have seen before you arrived, the extraordinary
defects of her temper. That he should prefer you, after having seen and
known you, seems so natural, I cannot help pitying, while I blame him.
If it were possible to accelerate his departure--I must consult with Mr.
Gleason, for something must be done to restore the lost peace of the
family."
"Let me go, dear mother, and all may yet be well."
"If you would indeed like to visit the Parsonage, and remain till this
dark storm subsides, it might perhaps be judicious."
"Not the Parsonage--never, never again shall I be embosomed in its
hallowed shades--I would not go there now, for ten thousand worlds."
"It is wrong, Helen, to allow the words of one, insane with passion, to
have the least influence on the feelings or conduct. Mrs. Hazleton,
Arthur, and Alice, have been your best and truest friends, and you must
not allow yourself to be alienated from them."
Helen closed her eyes to hide the tears that gathered on their surface,
and it was not long before she sunk into a deep sleep. She had indeed
received a terrible shock, and one from which her nerves would long
vibrate.
The first time a young girl listens to the language of love, even if it
steals into her heart gently and soothingly as the sweet south wind,
wakening the sleeping fragrance of a thousand bosom flowers, every
feeling flutters and trembles like the leaves of the mimosa, and recoils
from the slightest contact. But when she is forced suddenly and rudely
to hear the accents of passion, with which she associates the idea of
guilt, and treachery, and shame, she feels as if some robber had broken
into the temple consecrated to the purest, most innocent emotions, and
stolen the golden treasures hidden there. This alone was sufficient to
wound and terrify the young and sensitive Helen, but when her sister
assailed her with such a temper of wrathful accusations, accusations so
shameful and degrading, it is not strange that she was wrought up to the
state of partial frenzy which led her to rush to a father's bosom for
safety and repose.
And where was Mittie, the unhappy victim of her own wild, ungovernable
passion?
She remained in her room with her door locked, seated at the window,
looking out into the darkness, which was illuminated by the rays of a
waxing moon. She could see the white bark of the beech tree, conspicuous
among the other trees, and knowing the spot where the letters were
carved, she imagined she could trace them all, and that they were the
scarlet color of blood.
She had no light in her room, but feeling in her writing desk for the
pen-knife, she stole down stairs the back way and took the path she had
so often walked with Clinton. She was obliged to pass the room where
Helen lay, and glancing in at the window when the curtain fluttered, she
could see her pale, sad-looking face, and she did not like to look
again. She knew she had wronged her, for the moment she had given
utterance to her railing words, conscience told her they were false.
This conviction, however, did not lessen the rancor and bitterness of
her feelings. Hurrying on, she paused in front of the beech tree, and
the cyphers glared Upon her as if seen through a magnifying glass--they
looked so large and fiery. Opening her pen-knife, she smiled as a
moonbeam glared on its keen, blue edge. Had any one seen the expression
of her features, as she gazed at that shining, open blade, they would
have shuddered, and trembled for her purpose.
With a quick, hurried motion, she began to cut the bark from round the
letters, till they seemed to melt away into one large cavity. She knew
that some one was coming behind her, and she knew, too, by a kind of
intuition, that it was Clinton, but she did not pause in her work of
destruction.
"Mittie! what are you doing?" he exclaimed. "Good Heavens!--give me that
knife."
As she threw up her right hand to elude his grasp, she saw the blood
streaming from her fingers. She was not aware that she had cut herself.
She suffered no pain. She gazed with pleasure on the flowing blood.
"Let me bind my handkerchief round the wound," said Clinton, in a
gentle, sympathizing voice. "You are really enough to drive one
frantic."
"_Your_ handkerchief!" she exclaimed, in an accent of ineffable scorn.
"I would put a bandage of fire round it as soon. _Drive one frantic!_ I
suppose your conduct must make one very calm, very cool and reasonable.
But I can tell you, Bryant Clinton, that when you made me the plaything
of your selfish and changing passions, you began a dangerous game. You
thought me, perchance, a love-sick maiden, whose heart would break in
silence and darkness, but you know me not. I will not suffer alone. If I
sink into an abyss of wretchedness, it shall not be alone. I will drag
down with me all who have part or lot in my misery and despair."
Clinton's eye quailed before the dark, passionate glance riveted upon
him. The moon gave only a pale, doubtful lustre, and its reflection on
her face was like the night-light on deep waters--a dark, quivering
brightness, giving one an idea of beauty and splendor and danger. Her
hair was loose and hung around her in black, massy folds, imparting an
air of wild, tragic majesty to her figure. Twisting one of the sable
tresses round her bleeding fingers, she pressed them against her heart.
"Mittie," said Clinton. There was something remarkable in the voice of
Clinton. Its lowest tones, and they were exceedingly low, were as
distinct and clear as the notes of the most exquisitely tuned
instrument. "Mittie! why have you wrought yourself up to this terrible
pitch of passion? Yet why do I ask? I know but too well. I uttered a few
words of gallant seeming to your young sister, which sent her flying
like a startled deer through the woods. Your reproaches completed the
work my folly began. Between us both we have frightened the poor child
almost into spasms. Verily we have been much to blame."
"Deceiver! you told her that you loved me no more. Deny it if you can."
"I will neither assert nor deny any thing. If you have not sufficient
confidence in my honor, and reliance on my truth to trust and believe
me, my only answer to your reproaches shall be silence. Light indeed
must be my hold on your heart, if a breath has power to shake it. The
time has been--but, alas!--how sadly are you changed!"
"I changed!" repeated she. "Would to Heaven I could change!"
"Yes, changed. Be not angry, but hear me. Where is the softness, the
womanly tenderness and grace that first enchanted me, forming as it did
so bewitching a contrast with the dazzling splendor of your beauty? I
did not know then that daggers were sheathed in your brilliant eyes, or
that scorn lurked in those beautiful lips. Nay, interrupt me not. Where,
I say, is the loving, trusting being I loved and adored? You watch me
with the vigilance of hatred, the intensity of revenge. Every word and
look have been misconstrued, every action warped and perverted by
prejudice and passion. You are jealous, frantically jealous of a mere
child, with whom I idly amused myself one passing moment. You have made
your parents look coldly and suspiciously upon me. You have taught me a
bitter lesson."
Every drop of blood forsook the cheeks of Mittie. She felt as if she
were congealing--so cold fell the words of Clinton on her burning heart.
"Then I have forever estranged you. You love me no longer!" said she, in
a faint, husky voice.
"No, Mittie, I love you still. Constancy is one of the elements of my
nature. But love no longer imparts happiness. The chain of gold is
transformed to iron, and the links corrode and lacerate the heart. I
feel that I have cast a cloud over the household, and it is necessary to
depart. I go to-morrow, and may you recover that peace of which I have
momentarily deprived you. I shall pass away from your memory like the
pebble that ruffles a moment the face of the water then sinks, and is
remembered no more."
"What, going--going to-morrow?" she exclaimed, catching hold of his arm
for support, for she felt sick and dizzy at the sudden annunciation.
"Yes!" he replied, drawing her arm through his, and retaining her hand,
which was as cold as ice. "Your brother Louis will accompany me. It is
meet that he should visit my Virginian home, since I have so long
trespassed on the hospitality of his. Whether I ever return depends upon
yourself. If my presence bring only discord and sorrow, it is better,
far better, that I never look upon your face again. If you cannot trust
me, let us part forever."
They were now very near the house, very near a large tree, which had a
rustic bench leaning against it. Its branches swept against the fence
which enclosed Miss Thusa's bleaching ground. The white arch of the
bridge spanned the shadows that hung darkly over it. Mittie drew away
her arm from Clinton and sank down upon the bench. She felt as if the
roots of her heart were all drawing out, so intense was her anguish.
Clinton going away--probably never to return--going, too, cold, altered
and estranged. It was in vain he breathed to her words of love, the
loving spirit, the vitality was wanting. And this was the dissolving of
her wild dreams of love--of her fair visions of felicity. But the
keenest pang was imparted by the conviction that it was her own fault.
He had told her so, dispassionately and deliberately. It was her own
evil temper that had disenchanted him. It was her own dark passions
which had destroyed the spell her beauty had wrapped around him.
What the warnings of a father, the admonitions of friends had failed to
effect, a few words from the lips of Clinton had suddenly wrought. He
had loved. He should love her once more--for she would be soft and
gentle and womanly for his sake. She would be kind to Helen, and
courteous to all. This flashing moment of introspection gave her a
glimpse of her own heart which made her shudder. It was not, however,
the sunlight of truth, growing brighter and brighter, that made the
startling revelation; it was the lightning glare of excitement glancing
into the dark abysses of passion, fiery and transitory, leaving behind a
deeper, heavier gloom. Self-abased by the image on which she had been
gazing, and subdued by the might of her grief, she covered her face with
her hands and wept the bitterest tears that ever fell from the eyes of
woman. They were drops of molten pride, hot and blistering, leaving the
eyes blood-shot and dim. It was a strange thing to see the haughty
Mittie weep. Clinton sat down beside her, and poured the oil of his
smooth, seductive words on the troubled waves he had lashed into foam.
Soft, low, and sad as the whispers of the autumn wind, his voice
murmured in her ear, sad, for it breathed but of parting. She continued
to weep, but her tears no longer flowed from the springs of agony.
"Mittie!" A sterner voice than that of Clinton's breathed her name.
"Mittie, you must come in, the night air is too damp."
It was her father who spoke, of whose approach she was not aware. He
spoke with an air of authority which he seldom assumed, and taking her
hand, led her into the house.
All the father was moved within him, at the sight of his daughter's
tears. It was the first time that he had seen them flow, or at least he
never remembered to have seen her weep. She had not wept when a child,
by the bed of a dying mother--(and the tears of childhood are usually an
ever-welling spring)--she had not wept over her grave--and now her bosom
was laboring with ill-suppressed sobs. What power had blasted the
granite rock that covered the fountain of her sensibilities?
He entreated her to confide in him, to tell him the cause of her
anguish. If Clinton had been trifling with her happiness, he should not
depart without feeling the weight of parental indignation.
"No man dare to trifle with my happiness!" she exclaimed. "Clinton dare
not do it. Reserve your indignation for real wrongs. Wait till I ask
redress. Have I not a right to weep, if I choose? Helen may shed oceans
of tears, without being called to account. All I ask, all I pray for, is
to be left alone."
Thus the proud girl closed the avenues of sympathy and consolation, and
shut herself up with her own corroding thoughts, for the transient
feelings of humility and self-abasement had passed away with the low,
sweet echoes of the voice of Clinton, leaving nothing but the sullen
memory of her grief. And yet the hope that he still loved her was the
vital spark that sustained and warmed her. His last words breathed so
much of his early tenderness and devotion, his manner possessed all its
wonted fascination.
A calm succeeded, if not peace.