STORM AND CONVULSION.
What did Margaret Cooper dream of? Disappointment, misery, death. There
was a stern presentiment in her waking thoughts, sufficiently keen and
agonizing to inspire such dreadful apprehensions in her dreams. The
temperament which is sanguine, and which, in a lively mood, inspires
hope, is, at the same time, the source of those dark images of thought
and feeling, which appal it with the most terrifying forms of fear; and
when Saturday and Saturday night came and passed, and Alfred Stevens
did not appear, a lurking dread that would not be chidden or kept down,
continued to rise within her soul, which, without assuming any real form
or decisive speech, was yet suggestive of complete overthrow and ruin.
Her dreams were of this complexion. She felt herself abandoned. Nor
merely abandoned. She was a victim. In her desolation she had even lost
her pride. She could no longer meet the sneer with scorn. She could
no longer carry a lofty brow among the little circle, who, once having
envied, were now about to despise her. To the impatient spirit, once so
strong--so insolent in its strength--what a pang--what a humiliation
was here! In her dreams she saw the young maidens of the village stand
aloof, as she had once stood aloof from them:--she heard the
senseless titter of their laugh; and she had no courage to resent
the impertinence. Her courage was buried in her shame. No heart is so
cowardly as that which is conscious of guilt. Picture after picture of
this sort did her fancy present to her that night; and when she awoke
the next morning, the sadness of her soul had taken the color of a deep
and brooding misanthropy. Such had been the effect of her dreams. Her
resolution came only from despair; and resolution from such a source, we
well know, is usually only powerful against itself.
It is one proof of a religious instinct, and of a universal belief in a
controlling and benevolent Deity, that all men however abased, scornful
of divine and human law, invariably, in their moments of desperation,
call upon God. Their first appeal is, involuntarily, to him. The
outlaw, as the fatal bullet pierces his breast--the infidel, sinking
and struggling in the water--the cold stony heart of the murderer, the
miser, the assassin of reputation as of life--all cry out upon God in
the unexpected paroxysms of death. Let us hope that the instinct which
prompts this involuntary appeal for mercy, somewhat helps to secure its
blessings. It is thus also with one who, in the hey-day of the youthful
heart, has lived without thought or prayer--a tumultuous life of uproar
and riot--a long carnival of the passions--the warm blood suppressing
the cool thought, and making the reckless heart impatient of
consideration. Let the sudden emergency arise, with such a heart--let
the blood become stagnant with disease--and the involuntary appeal is
to that God, of whom before there was no thought. We turn to him as to a
father who is equally strong to help and glad to preserve us.
Margaret Cooper, in the ordinary phrase, had lived without God. Her
God was in her own heart, beheld by the lurid fires of an intense,
unmethodized ambition. Her own strength--or rather the persuasion of her
own strength--had been so great, that hitherto she had seen no necessity
for appealing to any other source of power. She might now well begin to
distrust that strength. She did so. Her desperation was not of that sort
utterly to shut out hope; and, while there is hope, there is yet a moral
assurance that the worst is not yet--perhaps not to be. But she was
humbled--not enough, perhaps--but enough to feel the necessity of
calling in her allies. She dropped by her bedside, in prayer, when
she arose that morning. We do not say that she prayed for forgiveness,
without reference to her future earthly desires. Few of us know how to
simplify our demands upon the Deity to this one. We pray that he may
assist us in this or that grand speculation: the planter for a great
crop; the banker for investments that give him fifty per cent.; the
lawyer for more copious fees; the parson for an increase of salary. How
few pray for mercy--forgiveness for the past--strength to sustain the
struggling conscience in the future! Poor Margaret was no wiser, no
better, than the rest of us. She prayed--silly woman!--that Alfred
Stevens might keep his engagement!
He did not! That day she was to be married! She had some reference to
this in making her toilet that morning. The garments which she put on
were all of white. A white rose gleamed palely from amid the raven hair
upon her brow. Beautiful was she, exceedingly. How beautiful! but alas!
the garb she wore--the pale, sweet flower on her forehead--they were
mockeries--the emblems of that purity of soul, that innocence of heart,
which were gone--gone for ever! She shuddered as she beheld the flower,
and meditated this thought. Silently she took the flower from her
forehead, and, as if it were precious as that lost jewel of which it
reminded her, she carefully placed it away in her toilet-case.
Yet her beauty was heightened rather than diminished. Margaret Cooper
was beautiful after no ordinary mould. Tall in stature, with a frame
rounded by the most natural proportions into symmetry, and so formed for
grace; with a power of muscle more than common among women, which, by
inducing activity, made her movements as easy as they were graceful;
with an eye bright like the morning-star, and with a depth of expression
darkly clear, like that of the same golden orb at night; with a face
exquisitely oval; a mouth of great sweetness; cheeks on which the
slightest dash of hue from the red, red rose in June, might be seen to
come and go under the slightest promptings of the active heart within;
a brow of great height and corresponding expansion; with a bust that
impressed you with a sense of the maternal strength which might
be harbored there, even as the swollen bud gives promises of the
full-bosomed luxuriance of the flower when it opens: add to these a
lofty carriage, a look where the quickened spirit seems ever ready for
utterance; a something of eager solemnity in her speech; and a play of
expression on her lips which, if the brow were less lofty and the eye
less keenly bright, might be a smile--and you have some idea of that
noble and lovely temple on which fires of lava had been raised by an
unholy hand; in which a secret worship is carried on which dreads the
light, shrinks from exposure, and trembles to be seen by the very Deity
whose favor it yet seeks in prayer and apprehension.
These beauties of person as we have essayed, though most feebly, to
describe them, were enhanced rather than lessened by that air of anxiety
by which they were now overcast. Her step was no longer free. It was
marked by an unwonted timidity. Her glance was no longer confident; and
when she looked round upon the faces of the young village-maidens, it
was seen that her lip trembled and moved, but no longer with scorn. If
the truth were told, she now envied the meanest of those maidens that
security which her lack of beauty had guarantied. She, the scorner of
all around her, now envied the innocence of the very meanest of her
companions.
Such was the natural effect of her unhappy experience upon her heart.
What would she not have given to be like one of them? She dared not take
her place, in the church, among them. It was a dread that kept her back.
Strange, wondrous power of innocence! The guilty girl felt that she
might be repulsed; that her frailty might make itself known--MUST make
itself known; and she would be driven with shame from that communion
with the pure to which she had no longer any claim! She sunk into one of
the humblest seats in the church, drawing her reluctant mother into the
lowly place beside her.
John Cross did not that day address himself to her case: but sin has
a family similitude among all its members. There is an unmistakeable
likeness, which runs through the connection. If the preacher speaks
fervently to one sin, he is very apt to goad, in some degree, all the
rest: and though Brother Cross had not the most distant idea of singling
out Margaret Cooper for his censure, yet there was a whispering devil at
her elbow that kept up a continual commentary upon what he said, filling
her ears with a direct application of every syllable to her own peculiar
instance.
“See you not,” said the demon, “that every eye is turned upon you? He
sees into your soul; he knows your secret. He declares it, as you hear,
aloud, with a voice of thunder, to all the congregation. Do you not
perceive that you sit alone; that everybody shrinks from your side; that
your miserable old mother alone sits with you; that the eyes of some
watch you with pity, but more with indignation? Look at the young
damsels--late your companions--they are your companions no longer! They
triumph in your shame. Their titter is only suppressed because of the
place in which they are. They ask: 'Is this the maiden who was so wise,
so strong--who scorned us--scorned US, indeed!--and was not able to
baffle the serpent in his very first approaches?' Ha! ha! How they
laugh! Well, indeed, they may. It is very laughable, Margaret--not less
laughable and amusing than strange!--that YOU should have fallen!--so
easily, so blindly--and not even to suspect what every one else was sure
of! O Margaret! Margaret! can it be true? Who will believe in your
wit now, your genius, your beauty? Smutched and smutted! Poor, weak,
degraded! If there is pity for you, Margaret, it is full of mockery too;
it is a pity that is full of bitterness. You should now cast yourself
down, and cover yourself with ashes, and cry, 'Wo is me!' and call upon
the rocks and the hills to cover you!”
Such was the voice in her soul, which to HER senses seemed like that of
some jibing demon at her elbow. Margaret tried to pray--to expel him by
prayer; but the object of his mockery had not been attained. She could
not surrender herself entirely to the chastener. She was scourged,
but not humbled; and the language of the demon provoked defiance, not
humility. Her proud spirit rose once more against the pressure put upon
it. Her bright, dazzling eye flashed in scorn upon the damsels whom she
now fancied to be actually tittering--scarcely able to suppress their
laughter--at her obvious disgrace. On John Cross she fixed her fearless
eye, like that of some fallen angel, still braving the chastener,
whom he can not contend with. A strange strength--for even sin has its
strength for a season--came to her relief in that moment of fiendish
mockery. The strength of an evil spirit was accorded her. Her heart once
more swelled with pride. Her soul once more insisted on its ascendency.
She felt, though she did not say:--
“Even as I am, overthrown, robbed of my treasure, I feel that I am
superior to these. I feel that I have strength against the future. If
they are pure and innocent, it is not because of their greater strength,
but their greater obscurity. If I am overthrown by the tempter, it was
because I was the more worthy object of overthrow. In their littleness
they live: if I am doomed to the shaft, at least it will be as the
eagle is doomed; it will be while soaring aloft--while aiming for the
sun--while grasping at the very bolt by which I am destroyed!”
Such was the consolation offered by the twin-demons of pride and vanity.
The latter finds its aliment in the heart which it too completely
occupies, even from those circumstances which, in other eyes, make its
disgrace and weakness. The sermon which had touched her sin had not
subdued it. Perhaps no sermon, no appeal, however powerful and touching,
could at that moment have had power over her. The paroxysm of her first
consciousness of ruin had not yet passed off. The condition of mind was
not yet reached in which an appeal could be felt.
As in the case of physical disease, so with that of the mind and heart,
there is a period when it is neither useful nor prudent to administer
the medicines which are yet most necessary to safety. The judicious
physician will wait for the moment when the frame is prepared--when the
pulse is somewhat subdued--before he tries the most powerful remedy. The
excitement of the wrong which she had suffered was still great in her
bosom. It was necessary that she should have repose. That excitement
was maintained by the expectation that Stevens would yet make his
appearance. Her eye, at intervals, wandered over the assembly in search
of him. The demon at her elbow understood her quest.
“He will not come,” it said; “you look in vain. The girls follow your
eyes; they behold your disappointment; they laugh at your credulity.
If he leads any to the altar, think you it will be one whom he could
command at pleasure without any such conditions--one who, in her wild
passions and disordered vanity, could so readily yield to his desires,
without demanding any corresponding sacrifices? Margaret, they laugh
now at those weaknesses of a mind which they once feared if not honored.
They wonder, now, that they could have been so deceived. If they do
not laugh aloud, Margaret, it is because they would spare your shame.
Indeed, indeed, they pity you!”
The head of the desperate, but still haughty woman, was now more proudly
uplifted, and her eyes shot forth yet fiercer fires of indignation.
What a conflict was going on in her bosom. Her cheeks glowed with the
strife--her breast heaved; with difficulty she maintained her seat
inflexibly, and continued, without other signs of discomposure, until
the service was concluded. Her step was more stately than ever as she
walked from church; and while her mother lingered behind to talk with
Brother Cross, and to exchange the sweetest speeches with the
widow Thackeray and others, she went on alone--seeing none, heeding
none--dreading to meet any face lest it should wear a smile and look the
language in which the demon at her side still dealt. HE still clung to
her, with the tenacity of a fiendish purpose. He mocked her with her
shame, goading her, with dart upon dart, of every sort of mockery. Truly
did he mutter in her ears:--
“Stevens has abandoned you. Never was child, before yourself, so silly
as to believe such a promise as he made you. Do you doubt?--do you still
hope? It is madness? Why came he not yesterday--last night--to-day? He
is gone. He has abandoned you. You are not only alone--you are lost!
lost for ever!”
The tidings of this unsolicited attendant were confirmed the next day,
by the unsuspecting John Cross. He came to visit Mrs. Cooper and her
daughter among the first of his parishioners. He had gathered from the
villagers already that Stevens had certainly favored Miss Cooper beyond
all the rest of the village damsels. Indeed, it was now generally
bruited that he was engaged to her in marriage. Though the worthy
preacher had very stoutly resisted the suggestions of Mr. Calvert, and
the story of Ned Hinkley, he was yet a little annoyed by them; and he
fancied that, if Stevens were, indeed, engaged to Margaret, she, or
perhaps the old lady, might relieve his anxiety by accounting for the
absence of his protege. The notion of Brother John was, that, having
resolved to marry the maiden, he had naturally gone home to apprize his
parents and to make the necessary preparations.
But this conjecture brought with it a new anxiety. It, now, for the
first time, seemed something strange that Stevens had never declared to
himself, or to anybody else who his parents were--what they were--where
they were--what business they pursued; or anything about them. Of his
friends, they knew as little. The simple old man had never thought of
these things, until the propriety of such inquiries was forced upon him
by the conviction that they would now be made in vain. The inability to
answer them, when it was necessary that an answer should be found, was
a commentary upon his imprudence which startled the good old man not
a little. But, in the confident hope that a solution of the difficulty
could be afforded by the sweetheart or the mother, he proceeded to her
cottage. Of course, Calvert, in his communication to him, had forborne
those darker conjectures which he could not help but entertain; and his
simple auditor, unconscious himself of any thought of evil, had never
himself formed any such suspicions.
Margaret Cooper was in her chamber when Brother Cross arrived. She had
lost that elasticity of temper which would have carried her out at
that period among the hills in long rambles, led by those wild, wooing
companions, which gambol along the paths of poetic contemplation. The
old man opened his stores of scandal to Mrs. Cooper with little or no
hesitation. He told her all that Calvert had said, all that Ned Hinkley
had fancied himself to have heard, and all the village tattle touching
the engagement supposed to exist between Stevens and her daughter.
“Of course, Sister Cooper,” said he, “I believe nothing of this sort
against the youth. I should be sorry to think it of one whom I plucked
as a brand from the burning. I hold Brother Stevens to be a wise young
man and a pious; and truly I fear, as indeed I learn, that there is in
the mind of Ned Hinkley a bitter dislike to the youth, because of some
quarrel which Brother Stevens is said to have had with William Hinkley.
This dislike hath made him conceive evil things of Brother Stevens
and to misunderstand and to pervert some conversation which he hath
overheard which Stevens hath had with his companion. Truly, indeed, I
think that Alfred Stevens is a worthy youth of whom we shall hear a good
account.”
“And I think so too, Brother Cross. Brother Stevens will be yet a
burning and a shining light in the church. There is a malice against
him; and I think I know the cause, Brother Cross.”
“Ah! this will be a light unto our footsteps, Sister Cooper.”
“Thou knowest, Brother Cross,” resumed the old lady in a subdued tone
but with a loftier elevation of eyebrows and head--“thou knowest the
great beauty of my daughter Margaret?”
“The maiden is comely, sister, comely among the maidens; but beauty is
grass. It is a flower which blooms at morning and is cut down in the
evening. It withereth on the stalk where it bloomed, until men turn from
it with sickening and with sorrow, remembering what it hath been. Be not
boastful of thy daughter's beauty, Sister Cooper, it is the beauty of
goodness alone which dieth not.”
“But said I not, Brother Cross, of her wisdom, and her wit, as well
as her beauty?” replied the old lady with some little pique. “I was
forgetful of much, if I spoke only of the beauty of person which
Margaret Cooper surely possesseth, and which the eyes of blindness
itself might see.”
“Dross, dross all, Sister Cooper. The wit of man is a flash which
blindeth and maketh dark; and the wisdom of man is a vain thing. The one
crackleth like thorns beneath the pot--the other stifleth the heart and
keepeth down the soul from her true flight. I count the wit and wisdom
of thy daughter even as I count her beauty. She hath all, I think--as
they are known to and regarded by men. But all is nothing. Beauty hath a
day's life like the butterfly; wit shineth like the sudden flash of the
lightning, leaving only the cloud behind it; and oh! for the vain wisdom
of man which makes him vain and unsteady--likely to falter--liable
to fall--rash in his judgment--erring in his aims--blind to his
duty--wilful in his weakness--insolent to his fellow--presumptuous in
the sight of God. Talk not to me of worldly wisdom. It is the foe to
prayer and meekness. The very fruit of the tree which brought sin and
death into the world. Thy daughter is fair to behold--very fair among
the maidens of our flock--none fairer, none so fair: God hath otherwise
blessed her with a bright mind and a quick intelligence; but I think not
that she is wise to salvation. No, no! she hath not yearned to the holy
places of the tabernacle, unless it be that Brother Stevens hath been
more blessed in his ministry than I!”
“And he hath!” exclaimed the mother. “I tell you, Brother John, the
heart of Margaret Cooper is no longer what it was. It is softened. The
toils of Brother Stevens have not been in vain. Blessed young man,
no wonder they hate and defame him. He hath had a power over Margaret
Cooper such as man never had before; and it is for this reason that Bill
Hinkley and Ned conspired against him, first to take his life, and then
to speak evil of his deeds. They beheld the beauty of my daughter, and
they looked on her with famishing eyes. She sent them a-packing, I tell
you. But this youth, Brother Stevens, found favor in her heart. They
beheld the two as they went forth together. Ah! Brother John, it is
the sweetest sight to behold two young, loving people walk forth in
amity--born, as it would seem, for each other; both so tall, and young,
and handsome; walking together with such smiles, as if there was no
sorrow in the world; as if there was nothing but flowers and sweetness
on the path; as if they could see nothing but one another; and as if
there were no enemies looking on. It did my heart good to see them,
Brother Cross; they always looked so happy with one another.”
“And you think, Sister Cooper, that Brother Stevens hath agreed to take
Margaret to wife?”
“She hath not told me this yet, but in truth, I think it hath very nigh
come to that.”
“Where is she?”
“In her chamber.”
“Call her hither, Sister Cooper; let us ask of her the truth.”
Margaret Cooper was summoned, and descended with slow steps and an
unwilling spirit to meet their visiter.
“Daughter,” said the good old man, taking her hand, and leading her to a
seat, “thou art, even as thy mother sayest, one of exceeding beauty. Few
damsels have ever met mine eyes with a beauty like to thine. No wonder
the young men look on thee with eyes of love; but let not the love of
youth betray thee. The love of God is the only love that is precious to
the heart of wisdom.”
Thus saying, the old man gazed on her with as much admiration as was
consistent with the natural coldness of his temperament, his years, and
his profession. His address, so different from usual, had a soothing
effect upon her. A sigh escaped her, but she said nothing. He then
proceeded to renew the history which had been given to him and which
he had already detailed to her mother. She heard him with patience, in
spite of all his interpolations from Scripture, his ejaculations, his
running commentary upon the narrative, and the numerous suggestive
topics which took him from episode to episode, until the story seemed
interminably mixed up in the digression.
But when he came to that portion which related to the adventure of
Ned Hinkley, to his espionage, the conference of Stevens with his
companion--then she started--then her breathing became suspended, then
quickened--then again suspended--and then, so rapid in its rush, that
her emotion became almost too much for her powers of suppression.
But she did suppress it, with a power, a resolution, not often
paralleled among men--still more seldom among women. After the first
spasmodic acknowledgment given by her surprise, she listened with
comparative calmness. She, alone, had the key to that conversation. She,
alone, knew its terrible signification. She knew that Ned Hinkley was
honest--was to be believed--that he was too simple, and too sincere, for
any such invention; and, sitting with hands clasped upon that chair--the
only attitude which expressed the intense emotion which she felt--she
gazed with unembarrassed eye upon the face of the speaker, while every
word which he spoke went like some keen, death-giving instrument into
her heart.
The whole dreadful history of the villany of Stevens, her irreparable
ruin--was now clearly intelligible. The mocking devil at her elbow had
spoken nothing but the truth. She was indeed the poor victim of a crafty
villain. In the day of her strength and glory she had fallen--fallen,
fallen, fallen!
“Why am I called to hear this?” she demanded with singular composure.
The old man and the mother explained in the same breath--that she might
reveal the degree of intercourse which had taken place between them,
and, if possible, account for the absence of her lover. That, in short,
she might refute the malice of enemies and establish the falsehood of
their suggestions.
“You wish to know if I believe this story of Ned Hinkley?”
“Even so, my daughter.”
“Then, I do!”
“Ha! what is it you say, Margaret?”
“The truth.”
“What?” demanded the preacher, “you can not surely mean that Brother
Stevens hath been a wolf in sheep's clothing--that he hath been a
hypocrite.”
“Alas!” thought Margaret Cooper--“have I not been my own worst
enemy--did I not know him to be this from the first?”
Her secret reflection remained, however, unspoken. She answered the
demand of John Cross without a moment's hesitation.
“I believe that Alfred Stevens is all that he is charged to be--a
hypocrite--a wolf in sheep's clothing!--I see no reason to doubt the
story of Ned Hinkley. He is an honest youth.”
The old lady was in consternation. The preacher aghast and confounded.
“Tell me, Margaret,” said the former, “hath he not engaged himself to
you? Did he not promise--is he not sworn to be your husband?”
“I have already given you my belief. I see no reason to say anything
more. What more do you need? Is he not gone--fled--has he not failed--”
She paused abruptly, while a purple flush went over her face. She rose
to retire.
“Margaret!” exclaimed the mother.
“My daughter!” said John Cross.
“Speak out what you know--tell us all--”
“No! I will say no more. You know enough already. I tell you, I believe
Alfred Stevens to be a hypocrite and a villain. Is not that enough? What
is it to you whether he is so or not? What is it to me, at least? You
do not suppose that it is anything to me? Why should you? What should he
be? I tell you he is nothing to me--nothing--nothing--nothing! Villain
or hypocrite, or what not--he is no more to me than the earth on which
I tread. Let me hear no more about him, I pray you. I would not hear his
name! Are there not villains enough in the world, that you should think
and speak of one only?”
With these vehement words she left the room, and hurried to her chamber.
She stopped suddenly before the mirror.
“And is it thus!” she exclaimed--“and I am--”
The mother by this time had followed her into the room.
“What is the meaning of this, Margaret?--tell me!” cried the old woman
in the wildest agitation.
“What should it be, mother? Look at me!--in my eyes--do they not tell
you? Can you not read?”
“I see nothing--I do not understand you, Margaret.”
“Indeed! but you shall understand me! I thought my face would tell you
without my words. _I_ see it there, legible enough, to myself. Look
again!--spare me if you can--spare your own ears the necessity of
hearing me speak!”
“You terrify me, Margaret--I fear you are out of your mind.
“No! no! that need not be your fear; nor, were it true, would it be a
fear of mine. It might be something to hope--to pray for. It might
bring relief. Hear me, since you will not see. You ask me why I believe
Stevens to be a villain. I KNOW it.”
“Ha! how know it!”
“How! How should I know it? Well, I see that I must speak. Listen then.
You bade me seek and make a conquest of him, did you not? Do not deny
it, mother--you did.”
“Well, if I did?”
“I succeeded! Without trying, I succeeded! He declared to me his
love--he did!--he promised to marry me. He was to have married me
yesterday--to have met me in church and married me. John Cross was
to have performed the ceremony. Well! you saw me there--you saw me in
white--the dress of a bride!--Did he come? Did you see him there? Did
you see the ceremony performed?”
“No, surely not--you know without asking.”
“I know without asking!--surely I do!--but look you, mother--do you
think that conquests are to be made, hearts won, loves confessed,
pledges given, marriage-day fixed--do these things take place, as
matters of pure form? Is there no sensation--no agitation--no beating
and violence about the heart--in the blood--in the brain! I tell you
there is--a blinding violence, a wild, stormy, sensation--fondness,
forgetfulness, madness! I say, madness! madness! madness!”
“Oh, my daughter, what can all this mean? Speak calmly, be deliberate!”
“Calm! deliberate! What a monster if I could be! But I am not mad now.
I will tell you what it means. It means that, in taking captive Alfred
Stevens--in winning a lover--securing that pious young man--there was
some difficulty, some peril. Would you believe it?--there were some
privileges which he claimed. He took me in his arms. Ha! ha! He held me
panting to his breast. His mouth filled mine with kisses--”
“No more, do not say more, my child!”
“Ay, more! more! much more! I tell you--then came blindness and madness,
and I was dishonored--made a woman before I was made a wife! Ruined,
lost, abused, despised, abandoned! Ha! ha! ha! no marriage ceremony.
Though I went to the church. No bridegroom there, though he promised to
come. Preacher, church, bride, all present, yet no wedding. Ha! ha! ha!
How do I know!--Good reason for it, good reason--Ha! ha!--ah!”
The paroxysm, terminated in a convulsion. The unhappy girl fell to the
floor as if stricken in the forehead. The blood gushed from her mouth
and nostrils, and she lay insensible in the presence of the terrified
and miserable mother.