PALLIDA MORS.
For a few minutes they all sat in silence, all but Harrington flushed
and throbbing with the excitement of the adventure, and joyous with
their success. The storm had broken with that last thunder-clap, the
clouds were rolling away, and already the moon appeared in the west in
a clear sky, and threw its still lustre upon the drowsy mass of the far
distant city, with its dim multitude of spars, and over the vast and
wild expanse of lifting and falling water which filled all the open
void with its invigorating odor. Low in the east the golden lightnings
flashed fitfully, lighting up fairy grottoes in the sullen clouds, and
overhead the stars bloomed large and lambent through braided shadows,
which were rapidly fleeting away. Far in the distance over the flood, the
red revolving beacon glowed a steady ruby, and failed, and glowed again.
But the wind had almost died from the magic night, and hardly bellied the
sails as it flowed gently from the slumbrous west, and the boat, gliding
with a faint wash and ripple through the swells, went but slowly.
“We shall have a long voyage tacking up to South Boston at this rate,”
murmured Wentworth.
The Captain grunted assent, and for a few minutes they all were silent.
“How white you look, Harrington,” said Wentworth again, looking at the
noble, straight-featured face of his friend, as he sat, bare-headed,
leaning against the stern grasping the tiller, with the moonlight resting
on his pallid countenance.
Harrington did not answer for a minute, but sat looking at them with
still eyes.
“Friends,” said he at length, in a sweet and hollow voice, “come here to
me. I want to tell you something.”
A little startled at his tone and manner, they rose and sat near him.
“Promise me that you will not let Antony know what I am going to tell
you,” he said. “I don’t want to grieve the poor creature, and besides,
it is necessary to the preservation of our secret. I do not know whether
the secret can be preserved now, but it is possible, and we must try. But
promise me that you will not tell Antony.”
“Why, certainly, we will not,” returned Wentworth, vacantly. “What is it?”
“When we get back, Richard,” pursued his friend, “you must take Antony
up at once to Charles’s room; then, in the morning, take him in to his
brother, and tell Roux what has happened to him, and why you concealed it
from him, charging him, at the same time, to say nothing to anybody of
this matter. Then you must take both of them to Worcester in the first
train. But you must tell neither of them of what I am now going to tell
you. Promise me all this.”
“I do,” responded Wentworth, tranced with wonder. “But what is it?”
“Dear Richard,” said Harrington, in the same voice of hollow
sweetness—“dear friends all, I am going to leave you.”
They gazed at him.
“What do you mean?” faltered Wentworth, in a hushed voice.
“Look,” murmured Harrington.
They stared aghast at the hand he held out to them. The tips of the
fingers were red with blood.
A slow horror sank upon them with an icy chill, and the hair of the three
rose as though they were one.
“I am hurt to the life,” said Harrington. “Here.”
He laid the bloody hand upon his left side just over the heart, as he
uttered the last word.
Bagasse fell upon his knees before him with a yell, and flung open the
coat and vest, which were unbuttoned, while Wentworth and the Captain
burst into tears. There was a little blood on the white shirt—very
little. Bagasse stared at it for an instant, with a look of livid horror.
Then, with a fierce and sudden motion, he rent the shirt in two, put in
his hand to the slit of the undershirt, tore it down, and pulling the
clothes asunder with both hands, gazed. A little blot of thin red on the
silver skin—in the centre a short dark line—a little red blood thinly
oozing from it. They all gazed upon the wound.
“He is stab,” said Bagasse, in a low, hoarse voice of heart-breaking
pathos. “He is stab, and he bleed inside him. Ah, my fren’ is stab, and
he die, die, die. Oh my old, old vair seek heart, what will I do wis you?
My fren’, Missr Harrin’ton, so good, so kind, so brave, so tendair as ze
woman, zat nurse me like ze littel babe in my seekness, zat come to me
when evairy ozzer one stay off, zat look at me and I was glad, zat take
my hand and I was glad, zat make my old life glad wis ze lof of him, he
is go away out of zis dam world to die, die, die. Oh, miseree, miseree!”
“Hush, hush, Bagasse!” faltered Harrington, hardly able to speak for
emotion. “Hush, old friend. We must all die sometime. Don’t grieve.
There, there. It will soon be over. Richard, dear Richard, don’t weep so.
Captain, friend, father, do not break my heart. Come, come, bear up, bear
up.”
“Oh, Harrington,” sobbed Wentworth, throwing himself upon his breast,
“what will life be to me if you die! And Muriel—my God, this will kill
her! To lose you in this way, three days after her wedding. She never can
survive it.”
“No, Richard,” said Harrington, calmly. “Muriel will bear her loss with
a brave heart. Both she and I knew that we were not to meet again when I
parted from her to-night. We had spiritual warning of this.”
“You had spiritual warning of this?” said Wentworth, awed from his wild
grief into calm.
“Yes,” murmured Harrington, “in presentments and in dreams. Both of us.
We were both prepared for it. I came here expecting to die, and I was
surprised when the conflict was over to find myself, as I believed,
unharmed. I felt strangely weak, but I thought it the exhaustion of
excitement, and it was not till I entered the boat that I became
conscious of a heavy feeling and a little smarting in my breast, and
discovered that I was stabbed.”
“Haven’t ye no idee when it was done, John?” gasped the Captain, weeping.
“Not the least,” replied Harrington, hollowly. “I was not aware that any
of the men touched me during the whole fray.”
Bagasse rose from his knees, and turning away, stood in a stupor of
despair, with his head bent upon his chest and his arms tightly folded.
“Oh, Harrington, Harrington!” cried Wentworth, “how could you go on this
accursed enterprise! How could you leave Muriel, loving her so much, when
you knew that you were to die! Your love for her should have kept you”—
“No, Richard,” interrupted Harrington, in his sweet, faint tones. “My
love for her sent me. I could not love her so much if I did not love
mankind more. No—I might well doubt the worth and truth of my love for
Muriel if it made me unwilling to lose my life for the rights of the
humblest slave.”
Wentworth rose to his feet.
“Dying, dying before our eyes,” he wailed, in a low voice. “Oh, it cannot
be. Bagasse, is there no hope? The wound does not bleed much.”
Bagasse shook his head.
“I haf see many wound, Missr Wentwort’,” he sombrely replied. “Nevair one
in zat place where ze man will not die. He bleed inside him.”
“Bleeding internally,” gasped Wentworth, wringing his hands. “Oh, if we
could only get home to a physician. No wind—the boat dawdling along—and
he dying! Look here, Captain, down with the sails, and let’s row. We must
go faster than this.”
Captain Fisher rose quickly, and us he did so, Bagasse suddenly caught up
his sabre and faced him.
“See, Capitaine Fisser,” he howled hoarsely, “you turn ze boat to zat dam
island. You let me go zere after zose rascail for my revenge. Zey haf
kill ze man I lof—zey haf kill me—zey have kill ze whole world, when zey
kill ze man zat haf lof in his heart for evairybody. Now I kill zem. See,
Missr Harrin’ton will die. Ze doctair haf not skill to make him well—no
nevair. Good: you let me go for zose murdair devail, and chop zem into
small fragment wis my sabre. You give me zat sweet revenge, zen I go home
and cry wis my old eye into my grave. You do zat now.”
“Bagasse,” said the hollow voice of Harrington, “that must not be. If you
love me, do not think of harming those men. No, let us go on. I want to
get home. I am dying slowly, but I hope to live till I get home.”
Bagasse lifted his knee, snapped the sabre in two across it, and flung
the pieces into the sea.
“I nevair fight nobody no more,” he said hoarsely. “I haf not zat
revenge, and I care for nossing. Zey do to me evairy insult—zey keek me,
zey jump on me, zey roll me in ze mud, I will not fight zem, for I haf
not my revenge.”
“Come, Captain,” cried Wentworth, “let’s settle away the sails, and out
with the oars.”
He flew to the jib halyards, and the Captain to the mainsail. In a
minute, both sails were clewed down, and the mainsail boom lashed one
side to the cleat. Wentworth and the Captain, followed by Bagasse, threw
off coats and waistcoats, and seized the oars. The Captain drew up the
sliding-keel, and took the stroke-oars. Bagasse and Wentworth had the
other two. In a moment the blades fell, and the boat foamed through the
moonlit swells.
Of all this colloquy, conducted for the most part in low voices,
Antony, perched upon the cuddy-deck, and hid from sight by the mainsail,
heard little or nothing, and had no idea that Harrington was in any way
injured. Now that the sail was down, Harrington saw him, and beckoned him
aft. He came instantly, grotesquely sidling between the two front rowers,
and skipping over Captain Fisher’s oars, looking, with the gleam of the
moonlight on his dark, skull-like face, something as he did on the night
when Harrington found him.
“Sit down here by me, Antony,” said the young man, in his sweet, feeble
voice.
Antony squatted beside him, and Harrington put his left arm around his
shoulder, feeling, in his dying hours, a mild and compassionate affection
for the poor creature for whom he had laid down his life.
For a little while there was silence, broken only by the regular roll
of the oars in the rowlocks, the plash and dip of the blades, and the
steady, seething, effervescing sound of the water foaming from the bows
and stern of the boat as she shot through the lifting flood. The clouds
had rolled down the east, and Harrington sat weak and suffering, with
his white and beautiful face upturned to the millioned host of lambent
stars—a solemn and tremendous glory of golden rain that seemed descending
slowly under the frosted nebulæ and vaulted blue.
Soon his face drooped from the midnight sky, and he smiled palely on the
fugitive, who was wistfully looking at him.
“How do you feel, Antony?” said the hollow and gentle voice.
“Fus’ rate, Marster Harrin’ton. Right glad to git away from them
soul-drivers, Marster. Hope you’ll scuse me, Marster Harrin’ton, for
goin’ out that Sunday, an’ givin’ you such a heap o’ trouble, Marster. I
aint wuth much trouble, Marster.”
“Did you think I would find you again, Antony?”
“Yes, Marster.”
“What made you think so?”
“Thought you’d git it out o’ some o’ them books in your house, Marster.”
“You can read, Antony?”
“Ruther p’orly, Marster. Never had much chance at books. Often felt as if
I’d like to git a chance, but couldn’t git none. Had a hard time in this
world, an’ been kep’ down awful, Marster.”
Harrington did not reply, and for a few minutes there was silence.
“Feel tired, Marster Harrin’ton?” asked Antony.
“What makes you think so?” was the reply.
“Voice sounds tired, Marster. Rather curis voice, an’ not zactly like
yours, Marster. ’Spect you fout them soul-drivers oncommon hard to-night.
I’d liked to fout, too, but fight’s most out o’ me, Marster. How do you
feel, Marster Harrin’ton?”
“Are you ever ashamed of yourself, Antony, when you think of all you
don’t know, and can’t do?”
“Yes, Marster.”
“You know you are a very poor man, Antony.”
“Yes, Marster.”
“Very humble, very low, very ignorant, perhaps wicked.”
“Yes, Marster.”
“Well, did you ever, for a little while even, feel that you were greater
and wiser and better than you had thought you were?”
“Yes, Marster. Had that feelin’ come over me once awful. It was ’long
back when I was chokin’ with no air, an’ most gone for somethin’ to eat,
lyin’ on the cotton in the hold of the Solomon, Marster. Tried to make
a noise to be let out, Marster, and couldn’t. Then I guv up for good,
an’ felt as if I was dyin’, an’ all on a sudden like, when I was sort o’
sailin’ away, that feelin’ come over me awful, Marster. Oncommon grand
feelin’, an’ I can’t account for it nohow, but it was oncommon grand,
Marster.”
Harrington slowly lifted his tranced and peaceful face to the sky, and
gazed upon the solemn and awful golden rain of stars.
“That is the way I feel to-night, Antony,” he said in his sweet and
hollow dying voice. “That was your true self, your soul. That was God in
you.”
There was a long silence.
“Do you understand, Antony?” said Harrington.
“No, Marster.”
“It will be made clear to you,” answered Harrington, after a pause. “When
you are dying it will begin to be made clear to you. It will grow clearer
and clearer as you leave the world, and when you are dead you will
understand.”
The voice was thrilling, tender and low. Awed by its hollow music, the
fugitive sat silently revolving the strange words in his simple mind.
Gradually his thoughts went from him, melted in the vast peace of the
brooding night, and soon, lulled by the regular sound of the rowing, he
sank away in a sort of waking doze. Harrington sat motionless, dreaming
upon the stars, his tranquil soul ebbing in suffering from his dying
frame. No word was said—no sound was heard but the regular plash and drip
of the rolling oars, and the steady and continuous seethe of the sea.
A long and weary hour went by, and through the lonely darkness, weirdly
lit by the wan gleam of the low crescent moon, the dark shore and dim
houses began to loom over the weltering flood. The rowers redoubled their
energy, and the boat flew seething through the brine. Half an hour more,
and her keel grated on the sand.
Wentworth and Bagasse sprang up hot and panting, flung down their oars,
and leaped ashore. The Captain waited till they had seized the painter,
then shipped his oars, and left the boat followed by Antony. Dropping the
painter, and hauling all together on the boat, they drew it up high and
dry upon the sands.
“Take Antony on with you, Captain,” whispered Harrington.
The Captain silently put on his clothes, and taking the fugitive by the
arm, led him up the dark lane. Bagasse and Wentworth hurriedly resumed
their garments, and assisted Harrington to rise and leave the leaning
boat. He was very weak, his noble masculine vigor nearly drained away,
but his resolute soul still upbore him, and he could walk feebly, though
with heavy and tottering knees. Upheld by the strong hold around him, and
leaning on their shoulders with clasping arms, he advanced with them up
the lane. They wanted to carry him, but not wishing to let Antony know
his condition, he refused.
The cool air was full of delicious summer fragrance, as they went on
through the glimmering darkness. In a few minutes they heard the snorting
and pawing of horses, and looking up the road, saw the carriage at some
little distance. Leaving Harrington to the charge of Bagasse, Wentworth
ran forward, told John Todd to stay where he was, and mounting the box,
turned the horses and drove the hack down. Antony and the Captain got
in, then Bagasse and Harrington coming up, entered also, and Wentworth
turning the horses again drove up the street, stopped for an instant to
take up John Todd on the box beside him; and away they rolled rapidly
over the smooth road.
It was then between two and three o’clock. Everything had been
successfully managed, and to his dying day John Todd never knew who the
occupants of the carriage were. Wentworth was taciturn, and after a few
remarks, finding he got no answer, John left off talking, and they went
on in silence.
Through the dark, deserted streets of South Boston they rolled rapidly,
and over the long bridge they rapidly rumbled, silent within the carriage
and without. Then over the rattling pavements into Dover, and up Tremont
street to Park, and into Mount Vernon to Temple, where Wentworth reined
in the smoking and pawing horses.
“Get down, John,” said he, “wait here for five minutes, then walk down
Temple street, where you’ll find the carriage, and drive it back to the
stables. I’ll see you to-morrow. Now do exactly as I tell you.”
“Just as you say, Mr. Wentworth,” returned the boy, getting down, and
wondering what all this meant anyway.
Wentworth at once drove the horses down the declivity of Temple street,
drew them up at the door of the lighted house, and with a bursting heart,
leaped from the box, and went up the steps. He laid his hand on the
bell-knob to ring, but shook so in his nerveless agony, that he had to
pause.
Suddenly the door opened, and Muriel appeared standing within the lighted
entry, clad all in white, calm, beautiful and radiant. Wentworth burst
into tears, and staggering forward, fell into her arms.
“Hush, dear Richard,” she said, in a serene and tender voice, “I know it
all. Be calm, as I am. Bring him to me.”
Blind with tears, he tottered down the steps to the carriage, and threw
open the door.
“Richard,” said the faint voice from within, “take Antony up at once.”
Antony got out from the carriage, wondering why his protector spoke in
such a weak voice, and followed Wentworth in.
“Welcome back, Antony,” said Muriel, with a grave smile. “Go up with Mr.
Wentworth.”
She turned her face to the carriage, as the fugitive, cringing low, with
his dark, skull-like face hideous with a reverential smile, passed her,
dragged hastily up-stairs by Wentworth.
In a moment Bagasse sprang from the carriage, and turning, reached in
for Harrington, who crept down presently, supported from behind by the
Captain, and before by the fencing-master. The moment he touched the
pavement, Muriel flew down the steps, clasped him in her arms, and gazed
for an instant, with a pale, bright smile, into his dying face.
The two men gazed at her for a moment, their haggard and weeping faces
stilled with wonder at her seraphic smile of calm, and the soft vision of
her beauty in the darkness. Then starting from their pause, they lifted
Harrington from his feet, bore him up into the library, laid him half
reclining on a couch, and as they did so, she came quickly with water and
wine, and knelt beside him.
Wentworth entered behind them, drenched and draggled with the rain and
spray, with his hair dishevelled, and his face livid and haggard with
grief, and went at once to Emily, who lay on a couch in a dead swoon.
The two men stood forlornly weeping, Bagasse with his face buried in his
hands, the Captain with his head bent on one side, his visage white with
dark circles around the eyes, and the tears streaming on his cheeks. Save
for their low, hoarse sobs, the lighted room was intensely still.
“Beloved Muriel,” murmured Harrington, “I thank the kind fate that
suffers me to see you again, and to die in your arms.”
“And I, my husband,” she replied, in a subdued and tender voice, “I am
happier that it has been ordered so. You return to me, as I knew you
would, living or dead, a victor.”
“Yes,” he replied, “we have triumphed. All is retrieved, and I can pass
away in peace. I was alone; I lost my weapon, and they were seven to one;
but I mastered them all with only one wound. Only one—here—but it is
fatal.”
She quickly undid his neckerchief and collar, laid bare his massive
breast, and gazed upon the stab. Then rising, she went over to Wentworth,
who was bending over Emily, she having just recovered from her swoon.
“Richard,” said she, “I do not think there is any hope for John, but it
is best to call in Dr. Winslow. Will you go for him?”
Wentworth at once left the room.
“Dear Emily, be calm,” said Muriel, gently. “I told you of this
beforehand, that you might be saved the shock. Try to be calm. Try, for
my sake, to meet this sorrow bravely.”
“Oh, Muriel,” replied Emily, with the tears flowing upon her blanched and
agitated face, “is he hurt? Don’t tell me he is killed! Don’t tell me
that! Where is he? Let me see him.”
“Come here, dear Emily,” said Harrington, faintly.
Tremblingly rising, assisted by Muriel, and weeping bitterly, she crossed
the floor, supported by her, and sinking down by Harrington, who had
covered his breast, she laid her head on his shoulder, while he, in low
murmurs, tried to comfort her. Muriel knelt beside them with one arm
around Harrington, and his hand held to her bosom. In a minute or two
Emily had stilled her grief, and nothing was heard but the low, hoarse
sobs of the two men. Watching Harrington’s face, amidst the sobbing,
Muriel saw a faint expression of weary pain flit across it. She instantly
rose, and turned to the two mourners.
“Mr. Bagasse,” said she, sadly smiling, as she laid her hands on his arm.
“I am glad to see you, though I did not think our first meeting would be
at such a time as this.”
He dropped his hands from his uncouth and martial features,
swarthy-white with grief, and bowed low, with the tears running from his
eyes.
“Ah, madame,” he faltered, hoarsely, “ze honor and ze joay I haf to see
ze beautifool ladee wife is all covair ovair wis my sorrow. My old vair
seek heart is cut all up wis my des-pair.”
“Nay, do not grieve so,” she tenderly replied. “We shall all see the man
we love again. Ah, Mr. Bagasse, you could bear to see men die for France.
Can you not bear to see one die for humanity?”
“Yes, I haf see vair many men die,” he answered, slowly moving his
head up and down. “I was conscrip’ wis Nap-oleon. I see men die in big
heap wis cannon an sabre and bayonet at Ligny and Waterloo, an’ I bear
it. I see my two brozzer kill dead at Ligny, an’ I bear it. Not Missr
Harrin’ton. No. I see him kill—I see ze lof of my heart, so kind, so
good, so brave, so tendair wis evairbody, kill by zose murdair devail,
and I nevair bear it. Ah, madame, nevair, nevair!”
She smiled sadly with dim eyes, and held out her beautiful white hands
to him. He caught them quickly in his, pressed them to his lips, and
with a convulsive flush darkly reddening his grotesque and martial
features, drew himself up, and looked for an instant at her solemn festal
loveliness.
“I bear it, madame,” he cried hoarsely, with passionate vehemence. “You
lof him so mush, and you bear it. You learn me zat lesson, and I will
bear it wis you. Ah, madame, you are ze brave, beautifool soldier wife.
You was fit for his great lof. I res-pect, I ad-mire, I wor-ship you.”
He dropped her hands, bowed low, and falling back a pace, tightly folded
his arms, and stood sombre and calm, with his one eye glowing like a coal.
She looked at him for a moment, and then her still eyes wandered slowly
to the weeping Captain, and she glided over to him.
“Mr. Fisher,” she said, in a calm, compassionate voice, “let us endure
this trial with fortitude. I grieve to see you suffer. Try to be calm.”
“I can’t endoor it,” moaned the Captain. “He’s everything to us. What’ll
Hannah and the children say when I tell ’em he’s gone! It’ll be the house
of mournin’ foriver. Here’s the workin’s of slavery. If John H., or Joel
James, was in his coffin this minute, it wouldn’t compare with this
bereavement. I don’t see how you can endoor it. I can’t.”
“He is the light of life to me,” she answered, gently, “but I yield him
up with joy and pride. Can I feel one pulse of grief when I think that he
dies for the inalienable rights of man? Can I remember that he dies to
save a fellow-creature from cruelty and wrong, and mourn? Think! He was
rich, and he dies for the poor; he was strong, and he dies for the weak;
he was a freeman, and he dies for the slave. Is that a death to mourn?
No! My soul is glad in him—my heart covers him with glory.”
The Captain looked at her calm and radiant face with a startled visage,
while a thrill ran through his veins.
“Well, that’s noble,” said he. “Yis, that’s high-minded. Don’t say
another word, Mrs. Harrington. I’m done. Yis, John dies in the Lord. His
father died in the Lord, an’ so he will. It’s hard to bear, but it’s for
libaty.”
He turned from her, sobbing, with his head on one side, and sat down. She
looked at him compassionately, and then glided away to Harrington. He lay
half-reclining, with the mellow lamplight resting on his face, sculptural
now with the pallor of dissolution, the eyes clear and still in their
shadows, the brow lit with the dews of suffering, and a sweet, faint
smile palely irradiating all. Emily, white as marble, sat by him with
her hands clasping one of his, magnetically calmed by his tender words,
and by the peaceful and noble passion of his dying. Motioning to her not
to move, Muriel pushed a footstool near the couch, and kneeling upon it
beside him, put one arm around his neck, and the other across his bosom
over his shoulder, and clasping him so, gazed with adoring tenderness
into his eyes.
Kneeling in silence thus, and holding his soul to hers, a few minutes
passed away, and the sound of the shutting door announced the arrival of
the physician. Muriel and Emily arose, and the former opened the door of
the library. Presently the doctor, a courteous, elderly gentleman, with
a shining bald head, entered bowing, with his hands folded together.
“My dear Mrs. Harrington,” said he, “what is this? Your husband stabbed!
I am shocked to hear it.”
He did not seem at all shocked, however; but was simply kind,
professional and affable, with a little approval and admiration of
Muriel’s beauty visible in his manner as he looked at her.
“Yes, doctor,” she replied, calmly. “Will you look at the wound?”
She turned toward Harrington as she spoke, and the physician at once
passed her, bowing, with his lips pursed up, and laying aside the young
man’s clothes, looked at the stab. Every eye was fixed upon him, and
every heart, save Muriel’s, throbbed painfully in expectancy. In a few
moments, he turned away, and came toward them with a silent look on his
face, which filled them with cold despair.
“How did this happen, Mrs. Harrington?” he asked, with affable gravity.
“Briefly, doctor, thus,” she replied. “Mr. Harrington interfered to-night
in behalf of a poor man, and was wounded by some unknown hand in the
contest.”
The doctor made a clicking sound with his tongue against his teeth.
“What a pity!” he added. “Have you no clue to the perpetrator of this
outrage. The police should be set on the track at once.”
“Doctor,” said she, “I will tell you of this hereafter. Let me only say
now that I wish this matter to remain unknown if possible. The mischief
is done, and it would only be painful to us to have it given to the
public. If you can serve me in this way, I will be deeply grateful to
you.”
“Oh, certainly, Mrs. Harrington,” he replied. “I can appreciate your
feeling under these distressing circumstances. You may depend on me.
There is nothing to be done, I am sorry to say. Probably one of the small
coronary arteries has been severed. The wound will not bleed, externally.
Give him water and a little wine occasionally, and plenty of air. I will
come in again in the morning; but I regret to say that I can do nothing,
and as I unfortunately cannot, I will not intrude further.”
She bent her head in response to his affable bow, and he backed bowing
out of the library, and was gone.
Muriel opened the windows, then glided over to Harrington, and knelt,
murmuring inaudibly beside him, while the rest stood in a common stupor
of cold, blank sorrow. Presently she arose, and gave him wine; then
laying down the glass, she turned to the dejected group:
“Friends,” said she, with calm solemnity, “come here!”
They all approached slowly, and stood with bent heads, gazing with mute
and mournful faces on the white majestic features of Harrington. He
lay, half reclined, his head supported by the cushions, and rising with
something of its old martial carriage from the massive breast, while he
looked upon them, sweet and regnant, with bright, dying eyes.
“Dear friends,” said he, in a voice hollow and low, but firm and clear,
“you will remember to keep all that has happened secret. It is my last
request.”
There was a brief interval of silence.
“Come close to me,” he said, looking at the Captain.
The old man knelt down beside him, weeping, and put his arms around him.
“Kind father,” said the low, sweet voice, “my own father’s friend, the
true friend of my mother, so good and faithful to me, I love you dearly,
and I bless you. Give my fond love to the poor wife and the children, and
tell them we shall all meet hereafter. I wish I could have seen them, but
it has been ordered otherwise. No matter: we shall meet again.”
There was a long silence. Then rising, still weeping bitterly, and unable
to speak a word, the old man grasped for a moment the cold hands of him
he loved like his own children, and turned away sobbing.
“Come, Bagasse,” said Harrington, trying to lift his arms to him.
With a sudden movement, the Frenchman threw himself upon one knee beside
him, clasped him in his arms, and kissed him on each cheek.
“Hah! I lof you,” he cried hoarsely, with a visage of glowing iron, and
an eye of fire. “I lof you wis my heart, my life. See: I die vair soon.
It is sixtee year old wis me. Soon I die and come to you. Ah, brave,
kind, tendair zhentilman, you go off vair young! You lof evairybody so
much zat ze dam world will not haf no place for you. You go to ze good
God. Ask Him zoo par-don ze vair bad life of old Bagasse zat he may come
stay wis you. Zen I am happy, happy.”
“Fear not—soon you will see me,” murmured Harrington, calmly smiling. “It
is but a little while. Bend your face down to me.”
Bagasse did so, and Harrington gently pressed his lips to each cheek.
“There. It is the kiss of France,” he said. “Take it with my love.
Farewell.”
“Farewell, brave zhentilman, farewell,” the Frenchman replied. “Farewell,
till I meet wis you. I lay ze immortelle on you grave.”
He sprang back, erect and martial, and folded his arms. Emily sank down
beside Harrington, calm, though with a face of marble, and Wentworth,
white and stern with despairing grief, knelt on the footstool, with one
arm around his neck and the other grasping his hand.
“Dear lovers,” said Harrington, smiling with pale tenderness, “when the
wedding comes think of me as there. Do not think that you will be lost to
my love, when I am lost to your eyes. I will be happy in your happiness;
and my memory will be part of your joy. In all the good sweet hours, in
all the hours of earthly trial and sorrow, I will be with you. Our happy
days together are not ended—they will be ours again hereafter.”
“Oh, we have lost all in losing you,” wailed Emily, with the tears
flowing from her eyes. “I wish that I had died before this sorrow could
come to me.”
“And I,” gasped Richard; “my heart is broken!”
The fleeting soul rallied in the feeble frame of Harrington, and with a
convulsive effort he raised his arms, and clasped them to his breast.
They clung to him, silently weeping, and for a little while all were
still.
“This is the grief of dying,” he faltered, at length. “Oh, dear ones,
death is bitter to me when I see you grieve.”
“No, no, it shall not be,” cried Wentworth, lifting his streaming eyes
to Harrington’s. “We will not pain you. Emily, dear Emily, let us be
calm—let us not make him suffer whom we love.”
“I will not,” she answered, lifting her beautiful agonized face, and
controlling herself with a strong effort. “I will be calm. For your sake,
John, for I love you as I never dreamed I could love.”
“Thanks, thanks,” faltered Harrington. “Dear Emily, dear Richard, think
of Muriel. She is here, she you love so fondly remains to make life
beautiful to you. Oh, think of that, and be filled with gladness and
gratitude! There. I have much to say to you, but my strength fails me.
Live happy. Love much. Now farewell till we meet in the bright land.”
Emily bent down, folding him in her arms, and pressed her mouth to his
cold lips in a long, fervent kiss, whose memory never left her life.
Rising presently, she swept away to the extremity of the room, and sank
on her knees by a chair. Wentworth remained for a little while, his arms
around his friend, his head resting upon his bosom. Then raising his
sorrowful and haggard face, he kissed him on the forehead, grasped his
hand and held it to his heart, and with one lingering, mournful look upon
the noble and peaceful countenance which smiled upon him, reverently laid
the hand down, and slowly wandering away, knelt beside Emily.
Harrington looked at Muriel, with his white face kindled.
“Come to me now, my beloved,” he said, in a faint and fervid voice. “The
shadows have passed. Come, and share my dying hour of joy.”
Pale, and glorious in her festal beauty, she moved to the folding-doors.
“I will stay with him till he is gone,” she said, calmly. “Wait here till
I come out to you.”
She withdrew, closing the doors behind her, leaving the mourners
together. The Captain and Bagasse seated themselves in silence. Presently
Emily and Wentworth arose from their knees, and sat on a couch, clasped
in each other’s arms. An intense stillness succeeded, and the quiet light
shone lonelily on the four bowed and moveless forms.