The table was covered with notes, but they were all insignificant, and
Morley glanced over them with an eye which shewed how abstracted the
mind was, and how busy with other topics. He had thrown the last down,
and, with his hand still resting on the table, was gazing forth into
vacancy, when the door of the room opened, and Lieberg entered, with
his usual gentlemanly, but impressive manner.
"Well, Morley," he said, "I have arranged it all for you, as was
proposed; these two men, Stallfed and Neville, had evidently heard all
about you, so far as your being wealthy, young, and unacquainted with
London; and they proposed to make a very pleasant speculation of
Neville's quarrel with you, and share some five hundred pounds between
them, or perhaps more; but the fact of your referring them to me,
instead of some of your college companions, as they expected, has
sadly disappointed them."
"Why, how could they calculate so wildly?" exclaimed Morley. "They
could never imagine that I was to be frightened into paying them money
for the privilege of not fighting?"
"Oh, no, no!" answered Lieberg; "that was not the way, at all. The
way it was to be arranged was this. Stallfed was to treat you in the
most gentlemanly manner, and no one can assume the tone of a high-bred
gentleman better than he can, when he likes it. The slightest apology
on your part was to be accepted; the Captain was to be smitten with
high admiration of your gentlemanly bearing, and bold demeanour. You
were to be invited to dinner, accommodated with champagne, and claret,
perhaps a little laudanum, or some other exhilarating fluid; cards and
dice were to be at your service--and the result was to be, the
enriching of themselves, and the pillaging of you."
"Why, how did you discover all this?" said Morley. "You certainly have
some extraordinary way of getting at people's secrets!"
"Not at all," replied Lieberg--"not at all; it is pure intuition,
Ernstein. I know the whole thing, as well as if it had been done and I
had seen it. This man, Neville, I have long known, to the very
innermost corners of his dark mind. He won two hundred pounds of me at
Ascot, last year, with such barefaced cheatery, that he himself did
not expect me to pay the money--"
"But did you pay it?" exclaimed Ernstein, in some surprise.
"To be sure!" answered Lieberg. "Was it not well worth two hundred
pounds to keep one's name out of the newspaper, in connexion with that
of a blackleg? The very reputation of having overreached Colonel
Lieberg, was as much to him as winning another great battle would be
to the Duke of Wellington. The consequence was, that I pretended to be
looking another way and very busy about other business, paid the money
as fast as ever I could, for fear the whole affair should be exposed
by other people who had bets, and got off the course before the thing
was inquired into, leaving Hartley, of the Third, to horsewhip
Neville, and have his name in the 'Times,' coupled with an action of
battery. However, Ernstein, my simple reply to the worthy Captain,
was, that you were quite prepared to give Mr. Neville satisfaction;
that your place was Chalk Farm, your hour half-past five, and that we
set our watches by the Horse-Guards. If Neville comes to the ground, I
am very much mistaken; though Stallfed has one virtue--namely,
courage, and will bring him if possible. I will call for you at a
quarter after five to-morrow, and roll you up to the place. What do
you intend to do, if the fellow does come? I know you have odd notions
about these sort of things."
"Shoot him!" replied Morley, vehemently. "Shoot him, as I would a mad
dog, and upon the same principle. I am not a man to miss what I fire
at, Lieberg, let it be living or dead; and if he calculates that I am
too humane to kill a viper like him, who is spreading poison and
destroying wherever he goes, he is very much mistaken."
"I think you are quite right, Ernstein," replied Lieberg. "For my own
part, I do not see any use of going out to fight a man, unless one
fires at him; it is very silly work to stand up to be shot at, and
then to waste a certain portion of good powder by firing in the air."
"But there are some circumstances," said Morley, "when a man could not
fire at another--after having done him a great injury, for instance."
"I know none," replied Lieberg, drily. "The man who calls out another
with any reason to believe that his adversary will not fire at him,
must be somewhat of a coward, and deserves to be shot for his pains.
Oh, no; child's play does not become reasonable men! Of course, I
never interfere with what a friend chooses to do in such cases. But I
think you are quite right; and in shooting Neville, you will be doing
a benefit to society; in reward for which, there ought to be a general
subscription, to present you with a very handsome pair of long
barrels. Mind you don't miss him--don't take him too fine!--I am going
to see that great picture of Rubens," he continued, in his usual easy
tone--"will you come? He is a magnificent painter--Rubens; and yet I
hate his pictures--it always seems to me as if he had skinned all his
men, and pinched all his women. Many of them are certainly very
natural, but it is a fat and undignified nature, too. Was there ever
anything like that St. Peter at Cologne? How the saint is roaring in
his unpleasant position! One seems to hear the very cries of agony
coming from his mouth; and yet it does not give us a very elevated
idea of the saint--to see him with his head downwards, bellowing, like
a cross man with the gout. Will you come?"
Morley, however, declined; he had much to think of; and after Lieberg
had left him, he sat for a long time, revolving in his own mind the
situation of Helen Barham, but endeavouring in vain to arrange some
plan to place her in a less dangerous situation, till Mr. Hamilton was
well enough to give him counsel and assistance. He thought of her
much--he thought of her long--of her beauty, of her grace, of a
certain wild, sparkling manner, very different from the demeanour of
the young lady of the fashionable society, but very winning withal,
and very charming. Pity mingled with the train of reflection, and
softened admiration into tenderness; at the same time, there was a
sort of consciousness that she was entirely in his power--that she was
the creature of his will, not by any tie of mere circumstance, but by
the tie of gratitude and admiration. The better spirit, however, as we
have said, had gained the triumph; and though passion might urge, and
vanity prompt, it was all in vain--Morley did not yield for a moment,
but went on in high speculations on the destinies of human beings--of
the strange, and, apparently, wayward turns of fate--and of that far,
but sublime period when the ways of God will be justified, even to the
eyes of his creatures, when those who have suffered, and yet believe,
will rejoice, and those who have doubted and rebelled, will be covered
with confusion, on finding that all is bright, and good, and excellent
in the scheme of Divine wisdom.
The spirit of the soul, as I have called it, exerted her sway during
that hour with calm, but mighty power. He dwelt upon many a curious
question with himself, both general and referring to the chief matter
of the day, and although the idea of marrying Helen Barham, and thus
freeing her from all her difficulties, never entered into his mind as
a thing that could take place, because he could not dream of allying
himself to one so base as her brother was proved to be, yet he asked
himself, had circumstances been different, would he have offered her
his hand? The answer was--"No--she was not the being he would have
chosen." And why was she not so? became the next question. Could any
one be more lovely?--could any style of beauty whatsoever be more fit
to excite ardent passion? Had he a doubt of her virtue? of her
simplicity, or truth? No, no, no! He could not tell why. He did not,
or he would not, investigate why he felt that, although, had he given
way to the temptation of circumstances, and the strong inclination of
his own heart, he might have made Helen Barham his mistress--he would
not choose her for his wife. Let not the reader suppose that it was
any evil in her character, anything that betrayed itself therein, and
which he felt, though he could not define it. No; she was all that she
seemed--pure, bright, generous-hearted, tender, devoted, not without
some faults, but those such as would little affect domestic peace. No!
it was nothing in her character, but it was something in his heart.
Reader! it was a memory!
Great part of the men and women that are cast by the will of God into
the world, go about seeking a mere match of some kind. For most of
them, if not exactly anything, very nearly anything will do. It
matters not what is the first thing that links their affections to
another, whether beauty, or similar thoughts, or similar tastes, or
circumstances, or proprieties, or follies, or accidents; one or two
slight causes combining is sufficient to produce the effect; the words
are spoken, the altar gives its sanction, the ring encircles the
finger, the white ribbons and the orange blossom, the smiles and
gaiety, are worn and pass away, and the union settles down into
tranquil happiness, continual irritation, fierce strife, or speedy
rupture, as the temper, the passions, and the principles of the
parties impel or bind them. But there are others, however, of a finer
clay, and a higher mould, who form, at a very early period, a bright
ideal image of the being that must be their soul's companion, in which
every trait and feature is made harmonious, (to use boldly a mixed
figure,) to the pre-existing tones of their own heart; where each
taste, each feeling, each thought, finds a responsive note in the
spirit of another, and where the corporeal form represents but as a
symbol, that grand quintessence of all that we desire in the heart of
the being that we love. Seldom, very seldom does it happen in life,
that those who have thus, if I may so call it, preconceived their
love, ever find the being they have dreamt of. Seldom, if they do find
her, is it their fate to win her; but if they do, they may well die
the day after, for they have known enough of human joy to fill up a
whole existence. Seldom do they find her; they may find the face and
the form, but the one harmonious whole is rare--oh, how rare! The
mines of Golconda do not furnish fewer diamonds, the river of Ceylon
roll down fewer rubies, than the whole world produces, ay, in a
thousand years, of beings fully worthy to be loved.
Morley Ernstein was one of those who had formed for himself the
picture of her who was to be his; and, as we have shewn the reader, he
had once seen the face of his visions. Whether the mind was there he
knew not, but that face was ever present to his memory, and it was not
that of Helen Barham. Bright, and beautiful, and sunny as she was, he
might feel passion towards her, pity, tenderness, esteem--but no, not
love! There was a something wanting still; I cannot well tell what,
and will not seek to do so, for love is like one of those fine
elixirs, which some skilful and life-restoring hands have formed, and
which we may analyze as we will, separating the parts with every
scientific aid, but still something escapes, which we cannot discover,
something which gives virtue and efficacy to the whole.
The thoughts of Morley Ernstein strayed naturally and by imperceptible
steps from Helen Barham back to that fair young being whom he had seen
once, and only once in life. The idea brought back the thoughts and
feelings of the day when he had met her, so short a time before, and
yet seeming far, far away in the past; so many had been the fresh
incidents which had crowded into that brief period of his career.
There was a sweet and soothing pleasure in the very remembrance. There
always is, in the memory of first love; it is like the memory of our
early home. A first love is surely the early home of the heart. It
came upon him so pleasantly, with such tranquillizing influence, with
such balmy power, that he resolved, as soon as he could disentangle
himself from the affairs which now pressed upon him, he would return
to his own old hall; to his own park, and its shady trees; to the
sweet singing of the summer birds, the smoke of the peasant's cottage,
the village church, the cheerful upland, and all that made the bright
picture to memory of the native place he had left behind.
Suddenly, however, the questions broke upon him--how should he return
to it? and should he ever be able to enjoy, as he had enjoyed it--to
taste the same pleasures with the same zest? Had he not passed by the
moment of such delights? Had he not known, and felt, and lived, beyond
the hour of such calm happiness? Then imagination went on to the work
laid out for the following day; to the act that he was about to
commit; to the bringing of blood upon his hand; to the slaying of a
fellow-creature; to the imprinting on the irrevocable roll of deeds
done, the dark word--"Death!"
He started away from his own thoughts; his mind was made up and fixed;
his determination had been announced, and he resolved that he would
think upon the matter no more. He would amuse his thoughts; he would
mingle with the crowded world; he would go to the party to which he
was invited that night, and do the deed he had purposed to do, as a
mere matter of course; and yet there was one thing which he had to
consider, and which, till late on that day, he did not consider at
all--namely, that he might himself fall in the encounter. He did not
think it likely, but such an event might take place. Neville was a
coward, evidently well known to be so; but the most notorious cowards,
aided by accident, and the cat-in-a-corner courage of despair, have
been known to shoot men of duelling reputation. He might fall, then,
and at all events it was necessary to make some preparation for such a
result. He sat down accordingly, pen in hand, to draw up a little
memorandum of his last wishes; and although, as I have already said,
his property was originally very large, and had been increased greatly
by the care of Mr. Hamilton, his will was soon made, and compressed in
a few lines.
He left his two former guardians his executors; explained very briefly
his knowledge of Helen Barham, her circumstances, and the bad conduct
of her brother. He besought Mr. Hamilton to act entirely as her
guardian, knowing that, with him, that would be only another name for
acting as her father, and he left her so large a portion of the sum
accumulated during his minority, as to place her in a state of
affluence for life, with one or two thoughtful provisions, to ensure
that it should never fall within the grasp of a sharper. His landed
property he suffered to take its legal course, which led it, in case
of his death, to a very distant branch of his family, none of whom he
had seen above two or three times in the course of his life, and whose
representatives had satisfied themselves, during his minority, by
inquiring tenderly, once or twice in the year, after his health, which
had always proved so vigorous as to exclude them from all reasonable
hope of entering into possession themselves.
There was still a larger sum to be disposed of, and Morley thought
for a moment what he should do with it; for it sometimes so happens,
that when thousands are starving, and worse than starving, around, a
rich man, caught by the sudden arrest of death, looks about him
embarrassed for some object on which to bestow his wealth. There were
several things that Morley had proposed to do; institutions he had
dreamt of founding; good deeds of various kinds which he had thought
to perform; but, alas! of all the many things that are killed by
delay, none are so easily slaughtered as those same good deeds. Morley
found now that there was no time to make such arrangements as he had
proposed, with that precision and circumlocution which the law of
England requires, as if for the express purpose of embarrassing a
man's mind at a period when his mind is rarely very clear, and wasting
his time, when time is too seldom very abundant. He therefore
contented himself with leaving the great bulk of his funded property
to Mr. Hamilton, for the purpose of being distributed amongst such
persons as that gentleman should find most necessitous and deserving,
in the course of the next three years. From this, indeed, he reserved
a few small sums for annuities to his servants, and for remembrances
to one or two of his college friends. To Lieberg he left some fine
pictures; and an impulse that he could not resist, made him bequeath
some diamonds which had been his mother's, as a token of gratitude to
Juliet Carr.
"Mr. Hamilton will smile," he thought, "if he have occasion to open
this will, and may well smile, if he should ever know that Helen
Barham I have seen twice, Juliet Carr perhaps once--perhaps not at
all;" and leaning his head on his hand, he began again to think of the
scene which had taken place in the road under his own park wall, and
of the beautiful being he had there beheld, upon whom his imagination
had fixed a name which might very well belong to some one else.
There are strange things told of presentiment; there are a thousand
recorded instances of men firmly and clearly anticipating the death
that awaited them, often when there was no reasonable cause for
expecting it. But we may go further still. Who is there that, without
any distinct motive that he can perceive, has not often found his
thoughts resting strongly upon some particular theme, very loosely
related, if at all, to the circumstances around him, and returning,
whether he would or not, to that one topic, his mind seemingly
impelled to its consideration by an irresistible power out of himself,
and then, ere many hours were over, has found the things connected
with that theme rise up around him as if by magic? Who is there that
has not had occasion to say to himself in life--"My thoughts were
prophetic?" Who is there that has not more than once in life almost
fancied himself endowed with the second sight?
Morley Ernstein dined, dressed himself, and went out to a party, which
had been announced to him, by the lady who gave the invitation, as a
small and an early one. Perhaps of all others this was the kind of
society that he would not have chosen on that occasion. He would
rather have been in the midst of a gay world of sights and sounds,
each appealing strongly to imagination for a moment, and changing
again ere the mind could get weary: But the lady who had asked him had
some claims upon him; she was an old friend of his mother's; had been
kind and affectionate to him in his youth; was of a very amiable
character, though somewhat eccentric in her enthusiasms and her
self-devotion; and thus, as he knew she counted much upon his presence
that night, he would rather have disappointed any person in London
than Lady Malcolm. Be accordingly proceeded to her house not very long
after the hour she had named; but there was already a number of people
in the rooms, almost all of them belonging to the best society in
London, but deviating from their usual late habits to please a person
universally respected and liked.
Lady Malcolm herself, always lady-like, notwithstanding some touches
of eccentricity, was in the small outer room, receiving and talking to
a group of gentlemen who had entered not long before Morley himself.
She greeted her young friend gladly, and then added, with a marked
smile--"If you go on, Sir Morley, you will find an acquaintance in
those other rooms."
As she said this, she turned to speak again with the other party, and
Morley advanced into a larger chamber beyond, where a number of
gentlemen and ladies were collected, talking of everything and nothing
upon the face of the earth. As the room, however, was not very large,
neither of the three being at all upon a grand scale, Morley's
entrance caused some little sensation, for, as we have before said,
his appearance was distinguished, his countenance handsome, the
expression not ordinary, and his whole carriage that of a very
high-bred gentleman. The first persons who saw him, asked others who
stood near, who he was, and it soon spread through the whole, that he
was the rich young Baronet who had lately come of age. Those who were
acquainted with him, approached eagerly to speak with him, and several
others asked to be introduced.
In the demeanour of a man pre-occupied with any grave and powerful
feelings, there is generally a tone of cold firmness, which is
impressive to the indifferent and the light-hearted, and Morley, at
that moment, was too full of the thoughts of to-morrow to be at all
carried away by the light conversation of a party like that. Some
called him haughty; some thought him vain; some pronounced him cold;
some said he was purse-proud. One or two men of high rank judged more
favourably of him, and declared that his bearing was just what it
should be; but after suffering himself to be detained for a few
minutes, the young gentleman moved on, and entered the third chamber,
which concluded the little suite of Lady Malcolm's receiving rooms. He
was making his way towards a table covered with drawings, when a sight
presented itself, which caused him to stop short, and pause, as if
suddenly rooted to the ground. The sight, however, was certainly a
pleasant, one, for it was that of as beautiful a face as was ever
seen, but if it had been that of Venus herself, fresh risen from the
sparkling Mediterranean wave, it could not, independent of
association, have had the effect upon Morley Ernstein which was
produced by that fair countenance.
There--there before him, in the rooms of Lady Malcolm, was the same
soft, yet dazzling face; the same deep blue eyes, with their dark
lashes; the same clear forehead and fair brow; the same short,
chiselled lip, with the rosy mouth half open, in the act of speaking;
the same beautiful form, every line of which was contour and symmetry,
the same bright being, in short, which he had seen once, and as he
believed only once, in life before, when they had stood together for a
moment, by her horse's side, in the mellow light of a spring morning.
She was conversing with a lady who sat on the sofa beside her, but her
eyes were full upon Morley Ernstein; and, on his part, after the first
sudden pause of surprise was over, with a look of bright satisfaction
that could not be mistaken, he crossed the room at once, and took her
hand in his, as if he had known her twenty years, forgetting
altogether, that at that moment he was not even sure of her name.
She smiled upon him kindly, evidently recollecting him well, and not
displeased with the recollection. There was a faint blush, too, came
up in her face, not like the blush of agitation, indeed, but that sort
of sudden transient glow, which comes over a cheek unhackneyed to any
strong sensations, upon even a slight emotion. There are few people in
the world more to be pitied than women who have lost the power of
blushing. With them the bloom has gone off the fruit indeed. She
blushed slightly, as I have said, and Morley inquired after her
health, and spoke of the time when they had last met, and his eyes
sparkled, and his lip became full of expression, and there was
eagerness in his whole tone, so that those who had seen him in the
other room would hardly have known him now. So much can two steps do
to change the whole feelings of the human heart.
Scarcely, however, had he uttered many sentences when the feeling that
he had never been introduced to the fair being to whom he was speaking
in so intimate a tone--that he had, in fact, according to the usages
of society, no right even to know her, first embarrassed, and then
made him smile at his embarrassment, and seeing a vacant seat beside
her on the sofa, he took possession of it at once, resolved to wait
till Lady Malcolm came into the room, in order that no idle form for
the future might stand in the way between them. They spoke of ordinary
subjects for a few minutes--that is to say, subjects which any one
might talk of to another, though in London society in general people
do not do so--of the beauty of the country where they had last met; of
the pleasures of the country in general; of the superiority of that
which, according to the old adage, God himself made, over that which
man made. The lady who sat beside them, either thought their comments
very tiresome, or perceived that one of the party might feel it as
pleasant if he were left alone with his neighbour, and, contrary to
the usual course of human benevolence, she rose, and went away to
speak to a dear friend in the doorway.
If she supposed that the conversation of Morley Ernstein and his fair
companion would be more free after she was gone, she was very much
mistaken. For the first few minutes, they had both very nearly fallen
into absolute silence, though their thoughts were busy. As often
happens on such occasions, it was the lady who first spoke.
"I am happy," she said, "to see that you are so completely recovered."
"Then you are Juliet Carr," said Morley, abruptly; "I was sure it was
so, from the description of my good old servant Adam Gray."
"Indeed!" said the young lady, with the warm blood now rushing quick
into her glowing cheek--"indeed! The truth is," she added, a moment
after, "that in passing by the place where you were lying ill, I heard
of the accident that had occurred, and in going near your house, in
one of my walks round Yelverley, I thought it best to inform your
servants that such was the case, suspecting that they might not know
it, as, indeed, they did not."
"And most grateful am I, dear Miss Carr," replied Morley, "for your
taking the trouble of letting them know. However much interest you
might create in me on our first meeting, I could hardly hope that I
had excited any such kind feelings in you, when my rash folly, in
leaping my horse over the park palings, might have killed you, and
certainly did alarm you very much."
"Your kindness after it was done," replied Juliet Carr, in a calm
tone, "made ample compensation; but," she added, in a lower voice, and
with her eyes cast down upon the ground, "that was not the first time
that we ever met."
"Indeed!" exclaimed Morley, in his turn surprised, and under the first
impulse speaking out the plain truth, without any of the softenings of
conventional life--"I did not think it possible, that if I had once
seen you on the whole earth before, even for a single moment, I could
ever have forgotten you."
His fair companion answered not for a moment, and he added
"Where--where was it, Miss Carr? I do not recollect any one even of
your name in our neighbourhood. Where was it?"
"In this very house--in this very room," replied Juliet Carr. "We have
played together many a time upon the carpet, and you used to tease me
sadly," she added, with a playful look, "when you were eight years
old, and I was seven."
"God give me the opportunity of teasing you again!" exclaimed Morley,
with a bright laugh--her words illuminating, in a moment, the whole
dark void of the past, like a flash of lightning in a murky night;
"and is it possible that you were my little July, my little
summer-month, as I used to call you? It is the only name by which I
ever knew you; for, indeed, dear Juliet, I was not aware that your
name was Carr. Do you recollect"--he added--but ere he could conclude
his sentence, the memory of the light, boyish feelings of the past,
became mingled so strangely with the intense manly feelings of the
present, as to make him almost regret he had begun the question, and
caused his voice to tremble as he went on, feeling that he must
conclude--"Do you recollect how you promised to be my wife?"
Juliet Carr turned deadly pale, and Morley could scarcely hear her
voice, as she replied, "Oh yes, oh yes! I remember something of it."
His heart sunk, for he was inexperienced in matters of love, and
thought that, in that paleness, and that low tone, he perceived a
thousand things which they did not imply in the least. Such feelings
as his, however, are seldom without hope, and he soon rallied again;
but he resolved, ere he said more upon subjects of so deep an
interest, to watch and see, to mark every word and every tone, to
gather by some means, in short, the certainty that there was no such
bar as another attachment between her heart and his. So far he
resolved wisely; but he went on to determine that he would guard his
own affections carefully, that he would take care not to fall in love
with Juliet Carr till he was certain there was no obstacle to her
loving him again. In this he resolved very foolishly, as every man
does who takes resolutions in regard to things that are past. Morley
Ernstein had no longer any power not to love Juliet Carr. He might
guard the posterns of the citadel as he would,--the garrison had
already surrendered, and the enemy had entered by the great gates.
Morley might have been somewhat puzzled to renew the conversation,
after the momentary pause for thought which succeeded the last word
spoken. It is a great art in that sort of communion which he was
holding with Juliet Carr, never to let any subject drop entirely
without leaving some sort of link in the chain open to hook it on to
another. Morley was relieved from his difficulty, however, though not
in the manner which he might have liked the best. The lady who had
been talking with his fair companion when he first saw her that
evening, returned, and spoke with her again for a few minutes. What
she said Morley did not hear, for he went on thinking upon the subject
which, for the time, was predominant in his own mind. After a moment
or two, however, he saw Miss Carr's eyes directed towards the man with
whom the other lady had been speaking in the doorway, and at the same
time a sort of shudder seemed to come over her, while she said, "Can
you really admire such conduct?"
The lady made some reply, which Morley did not hear, laughed, with a
gay toss of her head, and went away again.
Morley Ernstein was now better prepared to carry on the conversation,
for his mind had turned to the past, and to the childish days which he
had spent in that house with Juliet Carr. "Am I mistaken in thinking,
Miss Carr," he asked, "that you are a niece of Lady Malcolm's? It
seems to me, that I recollect having heard such was the case, long
ago."
"Oh no," replied Juliet Carr; "our relationship is not so near. My
mother was Lady Malcolm's cousin; but you know how generous and
high-spirited she is; and since my mother's death she has always acted
towards me more as a mother than anything else--at least, when she has
been permitted to do so."
"I really do not see, Miss Carr," replied Morley Ernstein, "the exact
connexion between Lady Malcolm's generosity and high spirit, and her
affection for you; I should think it very possible to love you dearly,
without any great liberality of feeling."
He spoke with a smile, and evidently in a tone of assumed playfulness;
but Juliet Carr replied, eagerly--"Oh, indeed! in this case you are
mistaken; it needed great kindness and generosity for Lady Malcolm to
feel any affection for me at all, as my birth kept her from a
considerable property, which, at that time, I have heard, she was much
in need of."
"Then, I trust, you are with her now for a long time," said Morley
Ernstein.
"I have only leave of absence for three weeks," she answered; and the
moment after added, in a low tone, "Thank Heaven, he is gone!"
Morley had remarked that, during the last five minutes, her eyes had
turned frequently towards the gentleman who stood in the doorway, and
who had now just moved away with a slight degree of lameness in his
walk. There was quite sufficient love in Morley's breast to make him
feel an eager--I might almost call it an apprehensive, interest in all
Juliet Carr's thoughts, and, with his usual impetuosity, he said at
once, "May I know who the gentleman is, Miss Carr, whose departure
seems to afford you so much relief?"
"I really do not know," replied Juliet, with a smile, which might,
perhaps, be at Morley's impetuous questioning, or perhaps, at her own
ignorance of the man's name, for whose absence she had thanked
Heaven--"I really do not know," she answered, and then stopped, gazing
in his face, with that smile, as if to puzzle him still further.
Morley looked down upon the ground, but would ask no further
questions; and seeing a sort of determination in his countenance not
to do so, Juliet Carr added, in a lower tone, and with a graver look,
"I can tell you what he his, though I cannot tell you who."
"What, what?" asked Morley, eagerly.
"He is a duellist!" replied Juliet Carr. "Lady Emily Greenfield came
up, just now, to tell me a good deal about him; she says that he
killed another man in a duel, a fortnight ago."
There was a look of abhorrence and pain in her beautiful face as she
spoke, which brought some strange sensations into Morley's heart, when
he thought of the part he was about to play the next morning; and he
replied, "Perhaps he could not help it."
"Could not help it!" exclaimed Juliet Carr, with a look of surprise,
and forgetting, in her eagerness, the lapse of thirteen or fourteen
years she added--"Could not help it! Oh, Morley!"
Morley felt as if he could have cast himself at her feet, in gratitude
for that one word; but he governed his impetuous nature, and followed
out the subject on which they were speaking. "Perhaps," he said, in
explanation, "he was grossly insulted by this man whom he shot.
Perhaps his adversary called him out, and made him fight."
"But, do you mean to say," asked Juliet Carr, "that there are any
circumstances in which a man cannot help deliberately killing another?
I myself think, that no man ought to fight a duel at all; but even if
he be weak enough to risk his own life for a vain prejudice, he has no
right to take that of another. God will ask the blood of his brother
at his hand," she added, lifting her beautiful eyes as if towards the
heavens; "and though he may smother the voice of conscience, in this
world, he must not hope that he will escape punishment in another. Oh!
think what a horrible thing it is to take away that existence which we
can never restore; to cut off, in a moment, a fellow-being, from all
the warm and sweet relationships of life; to change the living being,
instinct with a bright spirit, into a dull mass of inanimate clay,
and, worse than all, to put the seal of fate upon the sins, and
follies, and crimes, of a fellow-being; to cut him off for ever from
repentance, and bring the day of judgment upon his head, without time
for thought, or preparation, or hope, or atonement! Oh, no, no! if
such a thing had happened to me, I would hide myself from all eyes in
the darkest corners of the earth. I would spend my whole life in
bitterness and tears. I should never know a moment's peace--I should
think I heard the voice of him whom I had murdered, crying for ever in
my ears, 'You have not only destroyed the body, but condemned the
soul!'"
Morley had been gazing thoughtfully on the ground, but he now replied,
"There may be some cases, Miss Carr, where we should be doing a
benefit to society, in firing at a man opposed to us in a duel.
Suppose that he were one of those criminals who are daily committing
crimes that the laws will not reach?"
"Leave him to God!" replied Juliet, eagerly. "Leave him to God! His
law will sooner or later reach all, and it is a law of mercy as well
as justice."
They both paused; Juliet with a warm glow upon her cheek, from a
feeling that she had been speaking with some vehemence, and Morley
doing what so few people ever do in conversation, really weighing the
arguments that were addressed to him, and applying them to his own
heart.
"But suppose," he said--"suppose a man so placed that his own life is
at stake. There are circumstances in which there is every probability
that a man must either take life or lose it. For instance, when your
adversary is known as an infallible shot, where you have but one
chance for your own existence, and where, judging yourself in the
right, you have every reason to defend your own life, even at the
sacrifice of that of an enemy whom you know to be in the wrong?"
"It is a hard case," replied Juliet Carr, with her eyes cast down upon
the ground; "but I am really not fit to be a judge upon such matters,
and perhaps have said more than I ought upon the subject already."
"Nay," said Morley; "I really wish to hear your opinion. Believe me,
it is valuable to me, for I think a woman often judges these sort of
things more sanely than a man."
"Well, you shall have it!" replied Juliet Carr, "though it is little
worth having. You must recollect that I think no man has any right to
fight at all, if he be a Christian. He ought, therefore, never to be
there, and if he will go there, I cannot see why, to save his own
life, he should add a great crime to a great fault, and make murder
terminate strife. Perhaps this is speaking too harshly; but what I
mean to say is, that I should love, and respect, and admire the man
most who, if he have not resolution enough to refuse to fight, would
shew that his courage went to the high pitch of risking all, rather
than do that which he knew to be the highest pitch of evil. Were I a
man I would rather lose life than keep it under a continual sense of
remorse--nay, even as a weak woman, I say the same; and I am sure in
the choice my courage would not fail."
Morley gazed at her for a moment with tenderness and admiration; but
he then replied, as he saw Lady Malcolm approaching them, "Well, then,
I promise you, that if ever I should be called upon to fight, I will
recollect your lesson of to-night, and not fire at my adversary."
Juliet looked as if she would fain reply, but Lady Malcolm came up,
with a smile, saying, "So you have found each other out! She is
scarcely at all changed--is she, Morley?"
"So little, at least in manner," replied Morley, "that every instant I
feel myself inclined to forget the years that have past, and to call
her Juliet."
If ever lover made an artful speech in this world, it was that which
had just proceeded from the lips of Morley Ernstein; for it brought
about quietly, as he well knew it would, that which he did not dare to
ask openly.
"Why should you call her anything else?" asked Lady Malcolm. "You were
like brother and sister in your childhood. Call her Juliet, to be
sure. I am certain she has no objection. Have you, my dear girl?"
Morley felt very strongly that they were not brother and sister now,
and perhaps Juliet Carr did the same, for she blushed while she
replied, "None, assuredly."
"And will you call me Morley again?" demanded her lover--for so we may
now well name him.
"Yes," answered Juliet Carr, looking up with that candour of heart
which is far, far more attractive than the finest art that ever
coquette devised; "I shall find no difficulty in it, for old habits
come back with such force that I can scarcely call you anything else."
Morley felt that in the new game he was playing, he had won a point;
and, casting from him all thoughts of the following morning, he
lingered on at Lady Malcolm's house till he was the last guest
present. He then took leave, and quitted the house where he had spent
a night of joy, such as he had never known till then; but as he turned
from the door, and the memory of the dark business before him rushed
upon his mind, it seemed as if a cold wind blew upon him.