You have found out already that you are only looking at a chaplet of
cameos, with just enough of story to string them together. Under these
circumstances, the right thing of course to do is to work out each
character by the rules of metaphysical mathematics, and then to reverse
the process and "prove" the result. But I never tried to extract the
square root out of _any thing_ without failing miserably, and one can
only speak, and act, and write according to one's light. After all, it
seems a more uncertain science than astronomy. Comets _will_ appear, now
and then, at abnormal times, and in places where they have no heavenly
business; and people are still to be found, so very ill-regulated as to
go right or wrong in opposition to all rules and precedents. Where the
variations are so infinite, it is difficult to argue safely from one
singular example to another, and, if you miss one step, your whole
deduction is apt to come to grief. Some one said, that "there were
corners in the nature of the simplest peasant-girl to which the
cleverest man alive could never find a key." Perhaps, too, those who
fancy, rightly or wrongly, that they have mesmerized the heart even of
one fellow-creature so completely that the poor thing could not, if it
would, keep back a single secret, think it hardly fair to give the world
in general the full benefit of their discoveries. Practically, does all
this help one much? It is possible that some who have passed for the
deepest observers of human nature, owed their renown more to an acute
observation of the phenomena of feeling, an intuitive knowledge of what
people like and dislike, a retentive memory, and a happy knack of making
all these available at the right moment, than to any profound reasoning
on abstract principles. Like some untaught arithmeticians, their
calculations came out correct, but they could not have gone through the
steps of the process.
There lives, even now, a sublime theorist, who professes to have made
feminine physiology his peculiar study. Sitting at his desk, or in his
arm-chair, he will trace the motives, impulses, and sensations which a
woman must _necessarily_ have experienced under any given circumstances,
as lucidly as a skillful pathologist, scalpel in hand, may lecture on
the material mysteries of the blood or brain: he will analyze for you
the waters of the _Fons Lacrymarum_, just as Letheby or Taylor might do
those of a new chalybeate spring. A fearful power, is it not, and fatal,
if used tyrannously? Well, I remember hearing a very beautiful and
charming person speak of an evening she had spent in the society of The
Adept, during which she was conscious of being subjected to the action
of his microscope, stethoscope, and other engines of science. She said
"It did not hurt her much," and, on the whole, seemed by no means so
impressed with awe and admiration as could be wished. Indeed, before
they parted, if any one was disquieted, discomfited, or otherwise
damaged, I fancy it was--_not_ the loveliest Margaret. From my slight
acquaintance with that tremendous philosopher, supposing that he were
turned loose among a bevy of perfectly well-educated women, and meant
mischief, I should be disposed to lay longer odds against his chances
than I would against those of many men who have never read one word of
Balzac, Michelet, or Kant.
Still, as was aforesaid, in the days of high art and high farming, high
physiology is clearly the thing to go for. So, for my shortcomings, to
all critics--ethic, dialectic, æsthetic, and ascetic--I cry _mea culpa_,
thus audibly.
Nevertheless, while they are waiting for her at Dorade, we will try to
sketch Cecil Tresilyan.
Her father died when she was too young to remember him, and the first
fourteen years of her life were spent almost entirely in the old Cornish
manor-house from which her family took its name. That great, rambling
pile stood at the head of a glen, terraced at first into gardens, and
then thickly wooded, and stretching down to the shore. There was a small
bay just here, the mouth of which curved inward very abruptly. It seemed
as if the black cliffs had caught the sea in a trap, and stood forward
to keep the outlet fast forever: the waves were free to come and go for
a certain distance, but never to rave or rebel any more: when their
brethren of the open main went out to war, the captives inside might
hear the din, but not break out to join them; they could only leap up
weakly against their prison bars. There was nothing at all remarkable in
the house itself, except its furniture and panelings of black oak, and
two pictures, to which was attached a story bearing on the hereditary
failing which had made the family proverbial. The first was the likeness
of a lovely girl, in the court dress of James the Second's time, with
beautiful hazel eyes, half timid, half trusting, like a pet doe's. The
second represented a woman, perhaps of middle age: in this the hood of a
dark gray dress was drawn far forward, and under it the eyes shone out
of the colorless face with a fixed expression of helpless, agonized
terror, as of one fascinated by some ghostly apparition. You were sorry
when you realized that they were portraits of the same person.
Sir Ewes Tresilyan was a man of strong passions and rather weak
brain--of few words and fewer sympathies; he never made a companion of
Mabel, his daughter, though his love for her was the feeling next his
heart, after his almost insane pride; but he trusted her
implicitly--less because he had faith in her truth and goodness, than
because he held it as impossible for a Tresilyan to disgrace herself or
otherwise derogate, as for the moon to fall from heaven. He was no
classic, you see, and had never read of Endymion.
In her solitary rides Mabel met the son of a neighboring squire, and
they soon began to love each other after the good old fashion. Neither
had one thought that was not honest and pure; but they were so afraid of
her father that they dared not ask his consent to their marriage as yet.
They were prudent, but not prudent or patient enough. So there came
about meetings--first at noon in the woods, then at twilight in the
park, then at midnight in the garden; and at last Sir Ewes Tresilyan
heard of it all; and heard, too, that his daughter's name was abroad in
the country-side, and more than lightly spoken of. That day, as the sun
was setting, two men stood foot to foot, with their doublets off, on the
very spot of smooth turf where the lovers parted last; and Arthur
Bampfylde had to hold his own as best he might with the deadliest rapier
in the western shires. Poor boy! he would scarcely have had the heart to
do his uttermost against Mabel's father; but better will and skill would
have availed little against the thirsty point that came creeping along
his blade and leaping over his guard like a viper's tongue. At the sixth
pass his enemy shook him heavily off his sword, wounded to the death. He
had tried explanation before, utterly in vain; but the true heart would
make one effort more to get justice done, before it ceased to beat. He
gasped out these words through the rush of blood that was choking him,
"Mabel--I swear, she is as pure as the Mother of God; and I--what had I
done?"
Sir Ewes knelt down and lifted Arthur's head upon his knee--not in pity,
but that he might hear the more distinctly--"I will tell you," he said;
"you have wooed a Tresilyan like a yeoman's daughter." The homicide
wrote in his confession of all this that, as he laid the head gently
down, a smile came upon the lips before they set. Was it that the
parting spirit--standing on the threshold of Eternity, and almost within
the light of the grand secret--fathomed the earth-worm's miserable
vanity, and could not refrain its scorn?
Mabel was sitting alone when her father returned. She had no idea that
any thing had been discovered; but the instant she saw his face, she
cast herself on her knees, crying--"I am innocent; indeed I have done no
wrong!"
He griped her arm and raised her up, gazing straight and steadfastly at
her for some moments: then he gave his verdict--"Guilty of having
brought shame on your house; not guilty of sin, I know, or _this_ should
only half atone," and he drew out the blade that had never been wiped
since it drank her lover's blood.
She slid slowly down out of his grasp, never speaking, but bearing in
her eyes the awful look of horror that became frozen there forever. The
second picture might have been taken then, though it was not painted
till long afterward. She never thenceforth, while her father lived, left
the wing of the manor-house in which her rooms lay; neither did he, nor
any one else, except the two servants who attended her, look upon her
face. People pitied her very much at first, and then forgot her
entirely. Once the superior of a Belgian convent, a relation of the
family, offered to admit Mabel, if she chose to take the vows. Perhaps
Sir Ewes Tresilyan was more gratified than he liked to show, for the
best blood in Europe was to be found in that sisterhood; but his reply
was not a gracious one:
"I thank the abbess," he wrote; "but _we_ are used to choose for our
gifts the most precious thing we have--not the most worthless. I will
not lighten my house from a heavy burden, by offering it to God."
He relented, however, when he was dying, and sent for his daughter. Very
reluctantly she came. He had prepared, I believe, a pompous and proper
oration, wherein he was to pardon her and even bestow a sort of
qualified blessing; but the wan face and wild, hollow eyes, not seen for
twelve years, frightened all his grandeur out of his head; and the
obstinate, narrow-minded tyrant collapsed all at once into a foolish,
fond old man. Something too late (that's one comfort) to avail him much.
In Mabel's nature, soft and yielding as it appeared, there was the black
spot that nothing but harshness and cruelty could have brought out--the
utter incapacity of relenting, which had given rise to the rude rhyme
known through three counties--
In Tresilyan's face
Fault finds no grace.
So, when the sick man cried out to her, through his sobs, to kiss him
and forgive him, the dreary, monotonous voice only answered, "I can kiss
you, father;" and when she had laid her icicles of lips on his forehead,
she glided out of the room like a ghost that has accomplished its
mission and hastens away to its own place. Sir Ewes never tried to call
her back; he scarcely spoke at all intelligibly after that; but lay, for
the few remaining hours of life, moaning to himself, his face turned to
the wall.
For a very short time after her father's death, Mabel seemed to take a
pleasure in roaming about the gardens and woods from which she had been
debarred so long; but the walks grew gradually shorter, and she soon
shut herself up in the house entirely, seeing only a few of her near
relatives. It was one of these who, at her own request, painted the
second portrait--a rude performance, but it must have been a likeness.
She seemed to feel an odd sort of satisfaction in looking at the two and
comparing them. Her brain was somewhat clouded and unsteady; but I fancy
she was counting up all the harm and wrong the hard world had done to
her, and calculating what amends would be made in the next. I doubt not
they were kind and pitiful and indulgent enough there; but on earth she
found no source of comfort strong enough to banish from her eyes that
terrible look which haunted them within five minutes of her end.
When spirits assemble from the four corners of heaven, how many thousand
companions, think you, will greet the Gileadite's daughter?
Before you saw Cecil Tresilyan's face, the curve of her neck, and the
way her head was set on it, told you that she was by no means exempt
from the family failing which had laid its hand so heavily on her
ancestors. Yet it was not a hard or habitually haughty, or even a very
decided face. There was nothing alarmingly severe about the slight
aquiline of the nose; the chin did not look as if it were "carved in
marble," or "clasped in steel," or as if it were made of any thing but
soft flesh prettily dimpled; the delicate scarlet lip, when it curled,
rarely went beyond sauciness; though the splendid violet eyes could well
express disdain, this was not their favorite expression--and they had
many. The head would certainly have been too small had it not been for
the glossy masses of dark chestnut hair sweeping down low all round it,
smooth and unbroken as a deep river in its first curl over a cataract.
Candid friends said her complexion was not bright enough; perhaps they
were right; but the color had not forgotten how to come and go there at
fitting seasons; at any rate, the grand clear white could never be
mistaken for an unhealthy pallor. An extraordinarily good constitution
was ever part of a Tresilyan's inheritance; and if you doubted whether
her blood circulated freely you had only to compare her cheek on a
bitter March day with some red-and-white ones, when a sharp east wind
had forced those last to mount _all_ the stripes of the tricolor. By the
way, are not the "roses dipped in milk" going out of fashion just now? A
humble but stanch adherent of the house of York, I like to think--how
many battle-fields, since Towton, our Flower has won!
But if Cecil's face was not faultless, her figure _was_. Had one single
proportion been exaggerated or deficient, she could never have carried
off her height so lithely and gracefully. She might take twenty _poses_
in a morning, and people always thought they would choose the last one
to have her painted in. Here, she was quite inimitable. For instance,
women, I believe, used to practice in their own room for hours to catch
her peculiar way of half-reclining in an arm-chair; but the most
painstaking of them all never achieved any thing beyond a caricature.
Yet no one could accuse her of studying stage-effects. If a trifle of
the _Incedo Regina_ marked her walk and carriage, it was à l'Eugénie,
not à la Statira.
Indeed, she was thoroughly natural all over; cleverer and more
fascinating, certainly, than ninety-nine women out of every hundred; but
not one bit more strong-minded, or heroic, or self-denying. She had been
very well brought up, and had undeniably good principles; but she would
yield to occasional small temptations with perfect grace and facility.
Great ones she had never yet encountered; for Cecil, if not quite
fancy-free, had only read and perhaps dreamed of passions. She had known
one remorse, of which you may hear hereafter (not a heavy allowance,
considering her opportunities), and one grief--the death of her mother.
She entertained a remarkable reverence for all ministers of the
Established Church; yet she was about the last woman alive to have
married a clergyman, and would have considered the charge of the old
women and schools of a country parish as a lingering and unsatisfactory
martyrdom. There never was a more constant attendant at all sorts of
divine service; though perhaps the most casual of worshipers had never
been more bored than she was by some of the discourses to which she
listened so patiently. She would confess this to you at luncheon, and
then start for the same church in the afternoon, with an edifying but
rather comic expression of resignation. I am sure she would not
deliberately have vexed the smallest child; and yet the number of
athletic men who ascribed the loss of their peace of mind to her, was,
as the Yankees have it, "a caution." Some of the "regulars," wary
adventuresses of three seasons' standing, had brought off several pretty
good things by following her, and picking up the victims fluttering
about helpless in their first despair, just as the keepers after a
battue go round the covers with the retrievers.
If there were any more antitheses in her character, they had better
speak for themselves hereafter; nor is there much that need be told
about her companions.
Mrs. Danvers, or "Bessie," as she liked to be called, had been Cecil's
last governess, and was retired on full-pay, which, she flattered
herself, she earned in the capacity of traveling chaperone and censor;
but, inasmuch as when she really held some tutelar authority, her pupil
had never taken the slightest notice of her prohibitions, she could
hardly be expected now to exercise any very salutary influence or
control.
Dick Tresilyan was absurdly proud and fond of his sister, and performed
all her behests with a blind obedience; but when he heard that he was to
attend her during a whole winter's residence abroad, he did think that
it was stretching her prerogative to the verge of tyranny. No wonder. A
dragoon who has lost his horse, a goose on a turnpike-road, or any other
popular type of helplessness, does not present so lamentable a picture
as a Briton in a foreign land, without resources in himself, and with a
rooted aversion to the use of any language except his own. In this
case, the victim actually attempted some feeble remonstrance and
argument on the subject. Cecil was almost as much astonished as the
Prophet was under similar circumstances; but she considered that habits
of discussion in beasts of burden and the lower order of animals
generally were inconvenient, and rather to be discouraged; so she cut it
short, now, somewhat imperiously. Thereupon, Dick Tresilyan slid into a
slough of despond, in which he had been wallowing ever since. A faint
gleam of sunshine broke in when one of his intimates, hearing he was
going to France, suggested "that's where the brandy comes from;" but it
was instantly overclouded by the remark which followed. "I suppose,
though, you won't be able to drink much more of it than you do here:" on
realizing which crushing fact, his melancholy became, if possible, more
profound than ever. Indeed, since he crossed the Channel, he had spent
most of his leisure moments in a sort of chronic blasphemy, which, it is
to be hoped, afforded him some slight relief and consolation, as it was
wholly unintelligible to his audience; for, to do Dick justice, in his
sister's presence the door of his lips was always strictly guarded.
However, to Dorade they came--hours after their time, of course, but
perfectly safe: no accident ever does happen in France to any thing
properly booked, except to luggage sent by _roulage_, to which there
attaches the romantic uncertainty of Vanderdecken's correspondence.
Cecil rather liked traveling; it never tired her; so, by midnight she
had seen Mrs. Danvers, weary and querulous, to bed--gone through a
variety of gymnastics in the way of _accolades_, with Fanny
Molyneux--taken some trouble in inquiring about shooting and other
amusements likely to divert her brother from his sorrows--and yet did
not feel very sleepy.
They ignore shutters in these climes; and her reflection was still
flitting backward and forward across the white window-blinds as Royston
Keene came home from the Cercle. He knew the room, or guessed who the
shadow belonged to; and as he moved away, after pausing a minute or two,
he waved his hand toward it, with a gesture so unwarrantably like a
salute that, were _silhouettes_ sensitive or prudish, it might have
proved an offense not easily forgiven.