There was to Elizabeth a fascinating interest in the story related by
Lady Cecil. Elizabeth had no wild fairy-like imagination. Her talents,
which were remarkable, her serious, thoughtful mind, was warmed by the
vital heat emanating from her affections--whatever regarded these, moved
her deeply.
Here was a tale full of human interest, of love, error, of filial
tenderness, and deep-rooted, uneradicable fidelity. Elizabeth, who knew
little of life, except through such experience as she gathered from the
emotions of her own heart, and the struggling passions of Falkner, could
not regard the story in the same worldly light as Lady Cecil. There was
an unfathomable mystery; but, was there guilt as far as regarded Mrs.
Neville? Elizabeth could not believe it. She believed, that in a nature
as finely formed as hers was described to have been, maternal love, and
love for such a child as Gerard, must have risen paramount to every
other feeling. Philosophers have said that the most exalted natures are
endowed with the strongest and deepest-seated passions. It is by
combating and purifying them that the human being rises into excellence;
and the combat is assisted by setting the good in opposition to the
evil. Perhaps Mrs. Neville had loved--though even that seemed
strange--but her devoted affection to her child must have been more
powerful than a love which, did it exist, appeared unaccompanied by one
sanctifying or extenuating circumstance.
Thus thought Elizabeth. Gerard appeared in a beautiful and heroic light,
bent on his holy mission of redeeming his mother's name from the stigma
accumulated on it. Her heart warmed within her at the thought, that such
a task assimilated to hers. She was endeavouring to reconcile her
benefactor to life, and to remove from his existence the stings of
unavailing remorse. She tried to fancy that some secret tie existed
between their two distinct tasks; and that a united happy end would
spring up for both.
After musing for some time in silence, at length she said, "But you do
not tell me whither Mr. Neville is now gone, and what it is that has so
newly awakened his hopes."
"You remind me," replied Lady Cecil, "of what I had nearly forgotten. It
is a provoking and painful circumstance; the artifice of cupidity to
dupe enthusiasm. You must know that Gerard, in furtherance of his wild
project, has left an intimation among the cottages and villages near
Dromore, and in Lancaster itself, that he will give two hundred pounds
to any one who shall bring any information that will conduce to the
discovery of Mrs. Neville's fate. This is a large bribe to falsehood,
and yet, until now, no one has pretended to have anything to tell. But
the other day he received a letter, and the person who wrote it was so
earnest, that he sent a duplicate to Sir Boyvill. This letter stated
that the writer, Gregory Hoskins, believed himself to be in possession
of some facts connected with Mrs. Neville of Dromore, and on the two
hundred pounds being properly secured to him by a written bond he would
communicate them. This letter was dated Lancaster--thither Gerard is
gone."
"Does it speak of Mrs. Neville as still alive?" asked Elizabeth.
"It says barely the words which I have repeated," Lady Cecil replied.
"Sir Boyvill, knowing his son's impetuosity, hurried down here, to stop,
if he could, his reviving, through such means, the recollection of his
unfortunate lady--with what success you have seen; Gerard is gone, nor
can any one guess what tale will be trumped up to deceive and rob him."
Elizabeth could not feel as secure as her friend, that nothing would
come of the promised information. This was not strange; besides, the
different view taken by a worldly and an experienced person, the tale,
with all its mystery, was an old one to Lady Cecil; while, to her
friend, it bore the freshness of novelty: to the one, it was a story of
the dead and the forgotten; to the other, it was replete with living
interest; the enthusiasm of Gerard communicated itself to her, and she
felt that his present, journey was full of event, the first step in a
discovery of all that hitherto had been inscrutable.
A few days brought a letter from Gerard. Lady Cecil read it, and then
gave it to her young friend to peruse. It was dated Lancaster; it said,
"My journey has hitherto been fruitless; this man Hoskins has gone from
Lancaster, leaving word that I should find him in London, but in so
negligent a way as to lower my hopes considerably. His chief aim must be
to earn the promised reward, and I feel sure that he would take more
pains to obtain it, did he think that it was really within his grasp.
"He arrived but a few weeks since, it seems, from America, whither he
migrated, some twenty years ago, from Ravenglass. How can he bring news
of her I seek from across the Atlantic? The very idea fills me with
disturbance. Has he seen her? Great God! does she yet live? Did she
commission him to make inquiries concerning her abandoned child? No,
Sophia, my life on it, it is not so; she is dead! My heart too truly
reveals the sad truth to me.
"Can I then wish to hear that she is no more? My dear, dear mother! Were
all the accusations true which are brought against you, still would I
seek your retreat, endeavour to assuage your sorrows; wherever, whatever
you are, you are of more worth to me--methinks that you must still be
more worthy of affection than all else that the earth contains! But it
is not so. I feel it--I know it--she is dead. Yet when, where, how? Oh,
my father's vain commands! I would walk barefoot to the summit of the
Andes to have these questions answered. The interval that must elapse
before I reach London, and see this man, is hard to bear. What will he
tell? Nothing! often, in my lucid intervals, as my father would call
them, in my hours of despondency, I fear--nothing!
"You have not played me false, dearest Sophy? In telling your lovely
friend the strange story of my woes, you have taught her to mourn my
mother's fate, not to suspect her goodness? I am half angry with myself
for devolving the task upon you. For, despite your kind endeavours, I
read your heart, my worldly-wise sister, and know its unbelief. I
forgive you, for you never saw my mother's face, nor heard her voice.
Had you ever beheld the purity and integrity that sat upon her brow, and
listened to her sweet tones, she would visit your dreams by day and
night, as she does mine, in the guise of an angel robed in perfect
innocence. I cannot forgive my father for his accusations; his own heart
must be bad, or he could not credit that any evil inhabited hers. For
how many years that guileless heart was laid bare to him! and if it was
not so fond and admiring towards himself as he could have wished, still
there was no concealment, no tortuosity; he saw it all, though now he
discredits the evidence of his senses--shuts his eyes,
'And hooting at the glorious sun in Heaven,
Cries out, "Where is it?"'
For truth was her attribute; the open heart, which made the brow, the
eyes, the cheerful mien, the sweet, loving smile and thrilling voice,
all transcripts of its pure emotions. It was this that rendered her the
adorable being, which all who knew her acknowledge that she was.
"I am solicitous beyond measure that Miss Falkner should receive no
false impression. Her image is before me, when I saw her first, pale in
the agony of fear, bending over her dying father; by day and by night
she forgot herself to attend on him. She who loves a parent so well can
understand me better than any other. She, I am convinced, will form a
true judgment. She will approve my perseverance, and share my doubts and
fears; will she not? ask her--or am I too vain, too credulous? Is there
in the whole world one creature who will join with me in my faith and my
labours? You do not, Sophia; that I have long known, and the feeling of
disappointment is already blunted; but it will revive, it will be barbed
with a new sting, if I am deceived in my belief that Elizabeth Falkner
shares my convictions, and appreciates the utility, the necessity of my
endeavours. I do not desire her pity, that you give me; but at this
moment I am blessed by the hope that she feels with me. I cannot tell
you the good this idea does me. It spurs me to double energy in my
pursuit, and it sustains me during the uncertainty that attends it: it
makes me inexpressibly more anxious to clear my mother's name in her
eyes; since she deigns to partake my griefs. I desire that she should
hereafter share in the triumph of my success.
"My success! the word throws me ten thousand fathoms deep, from the
thoughts of innocence and goodness, to those of wrongs, death, or living
misery. Farewell, dearest Sophia. This letter is written at night;
to-morrow, early, I set out by a fast coach to London. I shall write
again, or you will see me soon. Keep Miss Falkner with you till I
return, and write me a few words of encouragement."
Not a line in this letter but interested and gratified Elizabeth--and
Lady Cecil saw the blush of pleasure mantle over her speaking
countenance; she was half glad, half sorry--she looked on Elizabeth as
she who could cure Gerard of his Quixotic devotion, by inspiring him
with feelings which, while they had all the enthusiasm natural to his
disposition, would detach him from his vain endeavours, and centre his
views and happiness in the living instead of the dead. Lady Cecil knew
that Gerard already loved her friend--he had never loved before--and the
tenderness of his manner, and the admiration that lighted up his eyes
whenever he looked on her, revealed the birth of passion. Elizabeth,
less quick to feel, or at least more tranquil in the display of feeling,
yet sympathized too warmly with him--felt too deeply interested in all
he said and did, not to betray that she was touched by the divine fire
that smooths the ruggedness of life, and fills with peace and smiles a
darkling, stormy world. But instead of weaning Gerard from his madness,
she encouraged him in it--as she well knew; for when she wrote to
Gerard, she asked Elizabeth to add a few lines, and thus she wrote:
"I thank you for the confidence you repose in me, and more than that, I
must express how deeply I feel for you, the more that I think that
justice and truth are on your side. Whether you succeed or not, I
confess that I think you are right in your endeavours--your aim is a
noble and a sacred one--and, like you, I cherish the hope that it will
end in the exculpation of one deeply injured--and your being rewarded
for your fidelity to her memory. God bless you with all the happiness
you deserve."
No subsequent letter arrived from Gerard. Lady Cecil wondered and
conjectured, and expected impatiently. She and her friend could talk of
nothing else. The strange fact that a traveller from America proclaimed
that he had tidings of the lost one, offered a fertile field for
suppositions. Had Mrs. Neville been carried across the Atlantic? How
impossible was this, against her own consent! No pirate's bark was
there, with a crew experienced in crime, ready to acquiesce in a deed of
violence; no fortalice existed, in whose impenetrable walls she could
have been immured; yet so much of strange and fearful must belong to her
fate, which the imagination mourned to think of! Love, though in these
days it carries on its tragedies more covertly--and kills by the slow,
untold pang--by the worm in the bosom--and exerts its influence rather
by teaching deceit than instigating to acts of violence, yet love reigns
in the hearts of men as tyrannically and fiercely--and causes as much
evil, as much ruin, and as many tears, as when, in the younger world,
hecatombs were slain in his honour. In former days mortals wasted rather
life than feeling, and every blow was a physical one; now the heart
dies, though the body lives--and a miserable existence is dragged out,
after hope and joy have ceased to adorn it; yet love is still, despite
the schoolmaster and the legislator, the prime law of human life, and
Alithea Neville was well fitted to inspire an ardent passion. She had a
sensibility which, while it gave strength to her affections, yet
diffused a certain weakness over the mechanism of her being, that made
those around her tremble; she had genius which added lustre to her eye,
and shed around her a fascination of manner, which no man could witness
without desiring to dedicate himself to her service. She seemed the very
object whom Sheridan addressed when he said--
"For friends in every age you'll meet,
And lovers in the young."
That she should be loved to desperation could excite no wonder--but what
had been the effects of this love? a distant home across the ocean--a
home of privation and sorrow--the yearning for her lost children--the
slow breaking of the contrite heart; a life dragged on despite the pangs
of memory--or a nameless grave. Such were the conjectures caused by the
letter of the American.
At length Neville returned. Each turned her eye on his face, to read the
intelligence he had acquired in his speaking countenance. It was sad.
"She lives and is lost," thought Lady Cecil; "He mourns her dead!" was
the supposition of the single-minded Elizabeth. At first he avoided the
subject of his inquiry, and his companions did not question him; till at
last he suddenly exclaimed, "Do you not wish to learn something, Sophia?
Have you forgotten the object of my journey?"
"Dear Gerard," replied Lady Cecil, "these walls and woods, had they a
voice, could tell you that we have thought and spoken of nothing else."
"She is dead!" he answered, abruptly.
A start--an exclamation was the reply. He continued: "If there be any
truth in the tale I have heard, my dear, injured mother is dead; that
is, if what I have heard concern her--mean anything, or is not a mere
fabrication. You shall hear all by-and-by; I will relate all I have been
told. It is a sad story if it be hers, if it be a true story at all."
These disjointed expressions raised the curiosity and interest of his
auditors to their height. It was evening; instead of going on with his
account, he passed into the adjoining room, opened the glass door, and
stepped out into the open air. It was dark, scarcely could you see the
dim outline of the woods--yet, far on the horizon where sky and sea met,
there was a streak of light. Sophia and Elizabeth followed to the room
whence he had gone, and drew their chairs near the open window and
pressed each other's hands.
"What can it all mean?" at length said Lady Cecil.
"Hush!" whispered Elizabeth--"he is here, I saw him cross the streak of
light."
"True," said Gerard's voice--his person they could not distinguish, for
they were in darkness; "I am here, and I will tell you now all I have
heard. I will sit at your feet; give me your hand, Sophy, that I may
feel that you are really present--it is too dark to see anything."
He did not ask for Elizabeth's hand, but he took it, and placing it on
Lady Cecil's, gently clasped both: "I cannot see either of you--but
indulge my wayward humour; so much of coarse and commonplace has been
thrown on the most sacred subject in the world, that I want to bathe my
soul in darkness--a darkness as profound as that which wraps my mother's
fate. Now for my story."