THE INVALID.
When Mr. Mandeville entered the house, as related at the close of the first
chapter, he found Eveline lying on the floor of her room, in a state of
insensibility. All his efforts to arouse her were unavailing, and leaving
her in the care of the distracted housemaid, he hastened off for the
doctor. When the stunning influence was removed, Eveline was still
unconscious. A burning fever was in her veins, and delirium in her brain.
All night long the doctor remained by her bedside, and when morning at
length compelled him to visit other patients, he left with an expression on
his countenance, which caused anything but a hopeful sensation in the
father's breast.
Days of anxiety and nights of sleepless watching passed away, and yet the
father, with pale cheeks and heavy heart, sat by the bedside of the
afflicted. No mother had she, that kind parent having several years before
been laid in the cold grave; and the father strove to make up for the loss
as far as he could understand the necessities of a sick-room; and, indeed,
he became wonderfully gentle in his attentions. His touch was trained to be
light and soft as a woman's, his step quiet, and his manner subdued. He
would leave the room only for a few minutes at a time, and then return with
an air of impatience, but it often happened that for hours together he
would allow no one to share the duties of nurse with him, though the best
of aid was always at hand. And he had a reason for this singular course of
conduct. Eveline frequently raved in her delirium, and words would then
fall from her lips which he would not have others to hear for the wealth of
India. Why? Listen for a few moments:
"Oh, how dark! all dark! Nothing but clouds! No sun, no moon, no stars!
When _will_ morning come? Who made it dark? Oh, God! that my father, my own
father, should do this!"
Thus would the unconscious child talk into the very ear of her parent,
often wringing her hands and manifesting the utmost distress. Then her
thoughts would take another direction, on this wise:
"What a load is on my heart; oh, so heavy! It weighs me down to the earth.
Who will take it away? Alas, there is no one to pity me! No one will come
to me and lift this great burden from my bosom; and it is crushing the
life-blood from my heart! Hark! don't you hear the drops fall as they are
pressed out? Patter, patter, patter! Well, it will soon be over; they will
see the blood; yes, and _he_, my once good, dear, kind father; oh, may he
never know that _his_ hand wrung it out and wrenched my heart in twain!
Poor father! he knew not that he was killing me--me his only daughter. May
he never be wiser! Ah, I am going."
She would sink down exhausted, and lay sometimes for hours in a stupor,
after these paroxysms of excitement, and the heavy-hearted father often
feared she would never rouse again. But a higher stage of fever would
awaken her from the state of lethargy, and then the ears of the agonized
parent would be greeted and his heart pierced by words like these:
"Oh, hear him, father, hear him! I know he can explain it to your
satisfaction. How can Charles bear such charges? I wonder at his patience
and self-command. Father, father! How unjust! How cruel! Do let him speak!
Convinced! Yes, on what grounds? Whose word is entitled to more credit than
that of Charles? That's it! The name--the name of the base slanderer. I
know it is some villain. Father! how _can_ you deny him the only means of
defense? 'Unpleasant rencounter!' yes, to the vile miscreants, no doubt.
'Confidence!' My life! isn't Charles worthy of confidence, too? His word
alone is worth a thousand oaths of such heartless slanderers as those that
stab in the dark! Don't get angry, Charles, he's my father. Nobly done!
How respectfully he acts when so abused and insulted! All will yet be
right. Ah! I'll tell him how I spurn the accusation! How my soul burns with
indignation that his fair name should be assailed! I am so glad he is
coming; I know he feels deeply the wrong--What!"
At this point the startled look of the poor girl alarmed the father. She
bent her head, in a listening attitude, as if eager to catch every word
that was spoken by some one in the distance. Ah, too well the wretched
parent knew on what her thoughts were running. Too well he knew where and
when the blow had fallen that smote his child to the dust--perhaps had
opened to her the gate of death. A deep, stifled, half sigh, half groan
escaped from her lips, and she murmured in a hoarse whisper:
"Father, father! you will kill your child. Oh, God! this is too much!
Turned from our door! without a word of comfort! How deadly pale he is! My
own parent to call him 'unworthy!' and then forbid him to speak!"
At this point a shriek from her lips would lift the father to his feet, the
cold drops of agony on his brow. That soul-rending cry he had heard before,
but it lost none of its horrors by being repeated. Alas, it told but too
plainly of the wreck his cruel words had made, and he trembled lest only
the beginning of sorrows was upon him. How he blamed himself for being so
rash and precipitate; and, as Eveline sunk back in exhaustion, the awful
thought kept forcing itself into his mind:
"If she dies, I am her murderer!" What a reflection for a parent over an
almost dying child! Who can measure the anguish it created in his breast?
There lay his precious child before him, prostrated by his own act,
hovering on the very brink of the grave, life trembling on a breath--and
he, oh, he might never whisper a word of comfort in her ear! Poor man! For
all this there was no repentance in his soul; it was only regret and
remorse--but oh, remorse how bitter! Not that his belief was changed as to
the guilt and innocence of the parties, for he still had confidence in
Duffel, and was fully persuaded of Hadley's evil intentions. He was glad
that the designs of the latter had been frustrated, but blamed himself for
the manner in which it had been done.
But the reflections of the unhappy man, whether of reproach, sorrow, or
regret, were ended for the time by another phase in the ever-changing
condition of the invalid. In tones expressive of the deepest wretchedness,
the daughter, once more arousing from the stupor of exhaustion, would
piteously exclaim, in low, sad accents, whose inexpressible woe pierced the
afflicted watcher's heart as with scorpion daggers:
"Gone! gone!--gone without a parting word or look! Gone, and my aching eyes
shall behold him no more! Gone, and the darkness comes over me! Oh, this
horrid gloom!--this load on my heart! Father! Charles! why do you both
leave me in this dreadful place?"
"Eveline, Eveline, my dear; your father is here; he has not left you; see,
I am by you; give me your hand."
"Did somebody call me? Who is there?"
"It is I, my child, your father. Come with me; let me lead you from this
place."
"Ah, it's a strange voice! I hoped it was dear father or Charles; but, no,
no, Charles was driven away; he is gone forever! Oh, my poor heart!--and
father, he has left me too: they are gone, and I shall die here. Oh, what
will father say when he finds me dead? Well, it is best that he is away,
for now he will not know that he has killed me. Poor, dear, kind father! I
would so much like to say farewell before I go. It might be some
consolation for him to know when I am gone that I love him still!"
Every word of these last sentences went to the father's heart. How strong
must be that affection which could still cling to him so tenderly, though
he had committed such an outrage upon her feelings with regard to another!
The distressed sire bowed his head and smote his breast. Then he knelt down
by the bedside and prayed. It was the first prayer he had offered up for
years; but, oh! how earnestly he suplicated that his child might be spared
to him. In his agonized pleading, so great was the commotion in his spirit
and the emotions of his heart, that tears, the first that had bedewed his
eyes since the death of his wife, streamed down his face. May we not hope
that his prayer was heard? But the horrors of the sick room were not yet
over. Eveline kept sleeping and waking, or rather, she lay in a state of
stupor or raved in a delirium of fever, with occasional intervals of quiet,
which sometimes lasted for hours, and excited delusive hopes in the heart
of the father, that she was better, only to plunge him again into doubt and
fear when the fever fit returned. He arose from his knees, and bending over
his child, imprinted kiss after kiss, "with all a mother's tenderness,"
upon her brow and lips. O, how rejoiced would he have been could those
kisses have conveyed to her an understanding of his feelings at that
moment! How a knowledge of his affection would have gladdened her heart!
But, no; for all the return manifested, he might as well have pressed his
lips to cold marble. After a time, the fever returned in violence, and she
resumed her distempered and broken discourse:
"Never! never! I will stay with you, if you wish me to; but marry Duffel, I
never will! Force me to? No, father, you cannot! You may drive me from your
house; you may turn me off and disown me, but you cannot make me perjure
myself before God at the altar. No, father, I will obey you in all else; in
this I cannot, and will not. If I were to go and forswear my soul in the
solemn rites of marriage, my adored mother would weep over me in sorrow, if
angels _can_ weep in heaven. No, never, never!"
"My child, my dear Eveline," said the father, tenderly endeavoring to quiet
her, "you need not fear that your father will be so cruel"--and he laid his
hand gently upon her, to assure her of his presence; but it had a contrary
effect from that he intended; she seemed to apprehend violence, and cried
out:
"Help! help! They are dragging me away to marry a villain! Will no one help
me? Where is Charles? Leave me! help!" She began to scream very loudly, and
Mr. Mandeville knew not what to do. The doctor, however, opportunely came
at this moment, and administered a soothing potion, and she became quiet.
This was the recurring succession of events in the sick chamber for the
first ten days of Eveline's illness; then there was a change; the violent
symptoms of disease were reduced, and a state of dreamy languor succeeded,
with rare intervals of excitement, and those of the mildest type; but
consciousness did not return, and the father had the satisfaction of
knowing that the secrets of the place were his own. He had now but little
fear that others would learn them, but this gleam of comfort was
overshadowed by the increased apprehensions that his child's sickness must
prove fatal. Indeed, hope had almost fled from his bosom, but he clung with
a death-grasp to the desire for her recovery, if for nothing else, that a
good understanding might exist between them. He could not endure the
thought of her leaving the world under a wrong impression of the _motives_
by which he had been actuated in the course he had pursued. As his long and
continued watching had worn him down, he now left the bedside frequently to
snatch a little rest, and recuperate his exhausted powers.
And where was Hadley all this time? No fond mother ever hovered about the
cradle of her sick darling with deeper solicitude, than did he about the
residence of his beloved. He made friends of the nurse and maid, and from
them and the doctor kept himself advised of her condition. Oh, how his
heart ached to be by the bedside of the sufferer! How, at times, his spirit
rebelled at the injustice of the father! But when he was told of his
devoted attention, tireless care, and deep distress, he forgave him in his
heart and blessed him for his devoted kindness to the invalid.
But where was Duffel? Let the sequel tell.