Arrived at Zante, placed in a cool and pleasant chamber, attended by a
skilful surgeon, and watched over by the unsleeping vigilance of
Elizabeth, Falkner slowly receded from the shadow of death, whose livid
hue had sat upon his countenance. Still health was far. His wound was
attended by bad symptoms, and the fever eluded every attempt to dislodge
it from his frame. He was but half saved from the grave; emaciated and
feeble, his disorder even tried to vanquish his mind; but that resisted
with more energy than his prostrate body. The death he had gone out to
seek he awaited with courage, yet he no longer expressed an impatience
of existence, but struggled to support with manly fortitude at once the
inroads of disease and the long-nourished sickness of his soul.
It had been a hard trial to Elizabeth to watch over him, while each day
the surgeon's serious face gave no token of hope. But she would not
despond, and in the end his recovery was attributed to her careful
nursing. She never quitted his apartment except for a few hours' sleep;
and, even then, her bed was placed in the chamber adjoining his. If he
moved, she was roused and at his side, divining the cause of his
uneasiness, and alleviating it. There were other nurses about him, and
Vasili, the most faithful of all--but she directed them, and brought
that discernment and tact of which a woman only is capable. Her little
soft hand smoothed his pillow, or, placed upon his brow, cooled and
refreshed him. She scarcely seemed to feel the effects of sleepless
nights and watchful days--every minor sensation was merged in the hope
and resolution to preserve him.
Several months were passed in a state of the utmost solicitude. At last
he grew a little better--the fever intermitted--and the wound gave signs
of healing. On the first day that he was moved to an open alcove, and
felt some enjoyment from the soft air of evening, all that Elizabeth had
gone through was repaid. She sat on a low cushion near; and his thin
fingers, now resting on her head, now playing with the ringlets of her
hair, gave token, by that caress, that though he was silent and his look
abstracted, his thoughts were occupied upon her. At length he
said--"Elizabeth, you have again saved my life."
She looked up with a quick, glad look, and her eyes brightened with
pleasure.
"You have saved my life twice," he continued; "and through you, it
seems, I am destined to live. I will not quarrel again with existence,
since it is your gift; I will hope, prolonged as it has been by you,
that it will prove beneficial to you. I have but one desire now--it is
to be the source of happiness to you."
"Live! dear father, live! and I must be happy!" she exclaimed.
"God grant that it prove so!" he replied, pressing her hand to his lips.
"The prayers of such as I too often turn to curses. But you, my own
dearest, must be blessed; and as my life is preserved, I must hope that
this is done for your sake, and that you will derive some advantage from
it."
"Can you doubt it?" said Elizabeth. "Could I ever be consoled if I lost
you? I have no other tie on earth--no other friend--nor do I wish for
any. Only put aside your cruel thoughts of leaving me for ever, and
every blessing is mine."
"Dear, generous, faithful girl! Yet the time will come when I shall not
be all in all to you; and then, will not my name--my adoption--prove a
stumbling-block to your wishes?"
"How could that happen?" she said. "But do not, dear father, perplex
yourself with looking either forward or backward--repose on the present,
which has nothing in it to annoy you; or rather, your gallantry--your
devotion to the cause of an injured people, must inspire you with
feelings of self-gratulation, and speak peace to your troubles. Let the
rest of your life pass away as a dream; banish quite those thoughts that
have hitherto made you wretched. Your life is saved, despite yourself.
Accept existence as an immediate gift from Heaven; and begin life, from
this moment, with new hopes, new resolves. Whatever your error was,
which you so bitterly repent, it belonged to another state of being.
Your remorse, your resignation, has effaced it; or if any evil results
remain, you will rather exert yourself to repair them--than uselessly to
lament."
"To repair my error--my crime!" cried Falkner, in an altered voice,
while a cloud gathered over his face; "no, no! that is impossible!
never, till we meet in another life, can I offer reparation to the dead.
But I must not think of this now; it is too ungrateful to you to dwell
upon thoughts which would deliver me over to the tomb. Yet one thing I
would say. I left a short detail in England of the miserable event that
must at last destroy me, but it is brief and unsatisfactory. During my
midnight watchings in Greece, I prepared a longer account. You know that
little rosewood box, which, even when dying, I asked for; it is now
close to my bed; the key is here attached to my watch-chain. That box
contains the narrative of my crime; when I die, you will read it and
judge me."
"Never! never!" exclaimed Elizabeth, earnestly. "Dear father, how
cruelly you have tormented yourself by dwelling upon and writing about
the past! and do you think that I would ever read accusations against
you, the guardian angel of my life, even though written by yourself? Let
me bring the box--let me burn the papers--let no word remain to tell of
misery you repent, and have atoned for."
Falkner detained her, as she would have gone to execute her purpose.
"Not alone for you, my child," he said, "did I write, though hereafter,
when you hear me accused, it may be satisfactory to learn the truth from
my own hand. But there are others to satisfy--an injured angel to be
vindicated--a frightful mystery to be unveiled to the world. I have
waited till I should die to fulfil this duty, and still, for your sake,
I will wait; for while you love me and bear my name, I will not cover it
with obloquy. But if I die, this secret must not die with me. I will say
no more now, nor ask any promises: when the time comes, you will
understand and submit to the necessity that urged me to disclosure."
"You shall be obeyed, I promise you," she replied. "I will never set my
reason above yours, except in asking you to live for the sake of the
poor little thing you have preserved."
"Have I preserved you, dearest? I often fear I did wrong in not
restoring you to your natural relations. In making you mine, and linking
you to my blighted fortunes, I may have prepared unnumbered ills for
you. Oh, how sad a riddle is life! we hear of the straight and narrow
path of right in youth, and we disdain the precept; and now would I were
sitting among the nameless crowd on the common road-side, instead of
wandering blindly in this dark desolation; and you--I have brought you
with me into the wilderness of error and suffering; it was wrong--it was
mere selfishness; yet who could foresee?"
"Talk not of foreseeing," said Elizabeth, soothingly, as she pressed his
thin hand to her warm young lips, "think only of the present; you have
made me yours for ever--you cannot cast me off without inflicting real
pangs of misery, instead of those dreamy ills you speak of. I am happy
with you, attending on, being of use to you. What would you more?"
"Perhaps it is so," replied Falkner, "and your good and grateful heart
will repay itself for all its sacrifices. I never can. Henceforth I will
be guided by you, my Elizabeth. I will no longer think of what I have
done, and what yet must be suffered, but wrap up my existence in you;
live in your smiles, your hopes, your affections."
This interchange of heartfelt emotions did good to both. Perplexed, nay,
tormented by conflicting duties, Falkner was led by her entreaties to
dismiss the most painful of his thoughts, and to repose at last on those
more healing. The evil and the good of the day he resolved should
henceforth be sufficient; his duty towards Elizabeth was a primary one,
and he would restrict himself to the performing it.
There is a magic in sympathy, and the heart's overflowing, that we feel
as bliss, though we cannot explain it. This sort of joy Elizabeth felt
after this conversation with her father. Their hearts had united; they
had mingled thought and sensation, and the intimacy of affection that
resulted was an ample reward to her for every suffering. She loved her
benefactor with inexpressible truth and devotedness, and their entire
and full interchange of confidence gave a vivacity to this sentiment,
which of itself was happiness.