The Bower, or Ladies' Apartment.
Thus did Lady Helen commune with her own strangely-affected heart;
sometimes doubting the evidence of her eyes; then, convinced of their
fidelity, striving to allay the tumults in her mind. She seldom
appeared from her own rooms. And such retirement was not questioned,
her father being altogether engaged at the citadel, the countess
absorbed in her own speculations, and Lady Ruthven alone interrupted
the solitude of her niece by frequent visits. Little suspecting the
cause of Helen's prolonged indisposition, she generally selected
Wallace for the subject of conversation. She descanted with enthusiasm
on the rare perfection of his character; told her all that Edwin had
related of his actions from the taking of Dumbarton to the present
moment; and then bade Helen remark the miracle of such wisdom, valor,
and goodness being found in one so young and handsome.
"So, my child," added she, "depend on it; before he was Lady Marion's
husband he must have heard sighs enough from the fairest in our land to
have turned the wits of half the male world. There is something in his
very look, did you meet him on the heath without better barg than a
shepherd's plaid, sufficient to declare him the noblest of men; and,
methinks, would excuse the gentlest lady in the land for leaving hall
and bower to share his sheep-cote. But, alas!" and then the playful
expression of her countenance altered, "he is now for none on earth!"
With these words she turned the subject to the confidential hours he
passed with the young adopted brother of his heart. Every fond emotion
seemed then centered in his wife and child. When Lady Ruthven repeated
his pathetic words to Edwin, she wept; she even sobbed, and paused to
recover; while the deep and silent tears which flowed from the heart to
the eyes of Lady Helen bathed the side of the couch on which she
leaned. "Alas!" cried Lady Ruthven, "that a man, so formed to grace
every relation in life--so noble a creature in all respects--so fond of a
husband--so full of parental tenderness--that he should be deprived of
the wife on whom he doted; that he should be cut off from all hope of
posterity; that when he shall die, nothing will be left of William
Wallace--breaks my heart!"
"Ah, my aunt," cried Helen, raising her head with animation, "will he
not leave behind him the liberty of Scotland? That is an offspring
worthy of his god-like soul."
"True, my dear Helen; but had you ever been a parent, you would know
that no achievements, however great, can heal the wound made in a
father's heart by the loss of a beloved child. And though Sir William
Wallace never saw the infant, ready to bless his arms, yet it perished
in the bosom of its mother; and that circumstance must redouble his
affliction; horribly does it enhance the cruelty of the deed!"
"He has in all things been a direful sacrifice," returned Helen; "and
with God alone dwells the power to wipe the tears from his heart."
"They flow not from his eyes," answered her aunt; "but deep, deep is
the grief that, my Edwin says, is settled there."
While Lady Ruthven was uttering these words, shouts in the street made
her pause; and soon recognizing the name of Wallace sounding from the
lips of the rejoicing multitude, she turned to Helen: "Here comes our
deliverer!" cried she, taking her by the hand; "we have not seen him
since the first day of our liberty. It will do you good, as it will
me, to look on his beneficent face!"
She obeyed the impulse of her aunt's arm, and reached the window just
as he passed into the courtyard. Helen's soul seemed rushing from her
eyes. "Ah! it is indeed he!" thought she; "no dream, no illusion, but
his very self."
He looked up; but not on her side of the building; it was to the window
of Lady Mar; and as he bowed, he smiled. All the charms of that smile
struck upon the soul of Helen; and, hastily retreating, she sunk
breathless into a seat.
"O, no! that man cannot be born for the isolated state I have just
lamented. He is not to be forever cut off from communicating that
happiness to which he would give so much enchantment!" Lady Ruthven
ejaculated this with fervor, her matron cheeks flushing with a sudden
and more forcible admiration of the person and mien of Wallace. "There
was something in that smile, Helen, which tells me all is not chilled
within. And, indeed, how should it be otherwise? That generous
interest in the happiness of all, which seems to flow in a tide of
universal love, cannot spring from a source incapable of dispensing the
softer screams of it again."
Helen, whose well-poised soul was not affected by the agitation of her
body (agitation she was determined to conquer), calmly answered: "Such
a hope little agrees with all you have been telling me of his
conversation with Edwin. Sir William Wallace will never love woman
more; and even to name the idea seems an offense against the sacredness
of his sorrow."
"Blame me not, Helen," returned Lady Ruthven, "that I forgot
probability, in grasping at possibility which might give me such a
nephew as Sir William Wallace, and you a husband worthy of your merits!
I had always, in my own mind, fixed on the unknown knight for your
future lord; and now that I find that he and the deliverer of Scotland
are one, I am not to be looked grave at for wishing to reward him with
the most precious heart that ever beat in a female breast."
"No more of this, if you love me, my dear aunt!" returned Helen; "it
neither can nor ought to be. I revere the memory of Lady Marion too
much not to be agitated by the subject; so, no more!"-she was agitated.
But at that instant Edwin throwing open the door, put an end to the
conversation.
He came to apprise his mother that Sir William Wallace was in the state
apartments, come purposely to pay his respects to her, not having even
been introduced to her when the sudden illness of her niece in the
castle had made them part so abruptly.
"I will not interrupt his introduction now," said Helen, with a faint
smile; "a few days' retirement will strengthen me, and then I shall see
our protector as I ought."
"I will stay with you," cried Edwin, "and I dare say Sir William
Wallace will have no objection to be speedily joined by my mother; for,
as I came along, I met my aunt Mar hastening through the gallery; and,
between ourselves, my sweet coz, I do not think my noble friend quite
likes a private conference with your fair stepmother."
Lady Ruthven had withdrawn before he made this observation.
"Why, Edwin?-surely she would not do anything ungracious to one to whom
she owes so great a weight of obligations?" When Helen asked this, she
remembered the spleen Lady Mar once cherished against Wallace; and she
feared it might now be revived.
"Ungracious! O, no! the reverse of that; but her gratitude is full of
absurdity. I will not repeat the fooleries with which she sought to
detain him at Bute. And that some new fancy respecting him is now
about to menace his patience. I am convinced; for, on my way hither, I
met her hurrying along, and as she passed me she exclaimed, 'Is Lord
Buchan arrived?' I answered. 'Yes.' 'Ah, then he proclaimed him
king?' cried she; and into the great gallery she darted."
"You do not mean to say," demanded Helen, turning her eyes with an
expression which seemed confident of his answer, "that Sir William
Wallace has accepted the crown of Scotland?"
"Certainly not," replied Edwin; "but as certainly it has been offered
to him, and he has refused it."
"I could have sworn it!" returned Helen, rising from her chair; "all is
loyal, all is great and consistent there, Edwin!"
"He is, indeed, the perfect exemplar of all nobleness," rejoined the
youth; "and I believe I shall even love you better, my dear cousin,
because you seem to have so clear an apprehension of his real
character." He then proceeded, with all the animation of the most
zealous affection, to narrate to Helen the particulars of the late
scene on the Carse of Stirling. And while he deepened still more the
profound impression the virtues of Wallace had made on her heart, he
reopened its more tender sympathies by repeating, with even minuter
accuracy than he had done to his mother, details of those hours which
he passed with him in retirement. He spoke of the beacon-hill; of
moonlight walks in the camp, when all but the sentinels and his general
and himself were sunk in sleep.
These were the seasons when the suppressed feelings of Wallace would by
fits break from his lips, and at last pour themselves out,
unrestrainedly, to the ear of sympathy. As the young narrator
described all the endearing qualities of his friend, the cheerful
heroism with which he quelled every tender remembrance to do his duty
in the day-"for it is only in the night," said Edwin, "that my general
remembers Ellerslie"--Helen's tears again stole silently down her
cheeks. Edwin perceived them, and throwing his arms gently around her.
"Weep not, my sweet cousin," said he; "for, with all his sorrow, I
never saw true happiness till I beheld it in the eyes and heard it in
the voice of Sir William Wallace. He has talked to me of the joy he
should experience in giving liberty to Scotland, and establishing her
peace, till his enthusiastic soul, grasping hope, as if it were
possession, he has looked on me with a consciousness of enjoyment which
seemed to say that all bliss was summed up in a patriot's breast.
"And at other times, when, after a conversation on his beloved Marion,
a few natural regrets would pass his lips, and my tears tell how deep
was my sympathy, then he would turn to comfort me; then he would show
me the world beyond this--that world which is the aim of all his deeds,
the end of all his travails--and, lost in the rapturous idea of meeting
his Marion there, a foretaste of all would seem to seize his soul: and
were I then called upon to point out the most enviable felicity on
earth, I should say it is that of Sir William Wallace. It is this
enthusiasm in all he believes and feels that makes him what he is. It
is this eternal spirit of hope, infused into him by Heaven itself, that
makes him rise from sorrow, like the sun from a cloud, brighter, and
with more ardent beams. It is this that bathes his lips in the smiles
of Paradise, that throws a divine luster over his eyes, and makes all
dream of love and happiness that look upon him."
Edwin paused. "Is it not so, my cousin?"
Helen raised her thoughtful face. "He is not a being of this earth,
Edwin. We must learn to imitate him, as well as to-" She hesitated,
then added, "As well as to revere him, I do before the altars of the
saints. But not to worship," said she, interrupting herself; "that
would be a crime. To look on him as a glorious example of patient
suffering--of invincible courage in the behalf of truth and mercy! This
is the end of my reverence for him, and this sentiment, my dear Edwin,
you partake."
"It possesses me wholly," cried the energetic youth; "I have no
thought, no wish, nor ever move or speak, but with the intent to be
like him. He calls me his brother! and I will be so in soul, though I
cannot in blood; and then, my dear Helen, you shall have two Sir
William Wallaces to love!"
"Sweetest, sweetest boy!" cried Helen, putting her quivering lips to
his forehead; "you will then always remember that Helen so dearly loves
Scotland as to be jealous, above all earthly things, for the lord
regent's safety. Be his guardian angel. Beware of treason in man and
woman, friend and kindred. It lurks, my cousin, under the most
specious forms; and, as one, mark Lord Buchan; in short, have a care of
all whom any of the house of Cummin may introduce. Watch over your
general's life in the private hour. It is not the public field I fear
for him; his valiant arm will there be his own guard! But, in the
unreserved day of confidence, envy will point its dagger; and then, be
as eyes to his too trusting soul--as a shield to his too confidently
exposed breast!"
As she spoke she strove to conceal her too eloquent face in the silken
ringlets of her hair.
"I will be all this," cried Edwin, who saw nothing in her tender
solicitude but the ingenuous affection which glowed in his own heart;
"and I will be your eyes, too, my cousin; for when I am absent with Sir
William Wallace I shall consider myself your representative, and so
will send you regular dispatches of all that happens to him."
Thanks would have been a poor means of imparting what she felt at this
assurance; and, rising from her seat, with some of Wallace's own
resigned and enthusiastic expression in her face, she pressed Edwin's
hand to her heart; then bowing her head to him, in token of gratitude,
withdrew into an inner apartment.