Marion had frequently sketched in her own mind a faint outline of what
she should say to Agnes on the subject of her unaccountable intimacy
with Lord Doncaster, who seemed to delight in making a parade of her
preference for his society, especially in the presence of his nephew;
but when Marion found herself at length alone one day with her sister,
she felt her heart sink with apprehension, yet, being resolved to
conquer nature, and do her duty, if possible, she approached the table
where Agnes was seated. A large, foreign-looking book, with gold
clasps, lay conspicuously before her, which Marion discovered at once
to be a missal, bound in antique boards of beautifully inlaid wood,
with massy gilt ornaments, and illuminated by designs in the style of
Albert Durer.
To hide her confusion, and begin the subject with advantage, Marion
placed her hand on the shoulder of Agnes for some moments, and leaned
forward, examining those splendid paintings, the singular beauty of
which she admired, while expressing considerable amazement at the
strange, distorted designs on the border, where animals with five heads
and their faces all nose, were varied with fish mounted on legs, and
birds exhibiting human countenances.
"These eccentric creatures resemble the figures in some horrible
dream!" observed Marion; "but they are not a greater distortion from
the truth of nature, than the Popish superstitions which they
illustrate are from the truth of revelation. Nothing seems left in
either, of the perfect symmetry with which all things come from a
Divine Creator."
"I am no controversialist," said Agnes, indifferently. "I take matters
as I find them."
"That is not the safest of all plans, unless you are very careful from
whom your ideas are received. I have heard that there are writers in
the Roman Catholic Church, such as Massillon, Pascal, and Fenelon, who
were nearly as pure in Christian doctrine as ourselves, resting their
hope on no merits except those of our Divine Saviour; but I should
think, for instance, that no Protestant could gain anything from
associating with such a man as the Abbe Mordaunt, who would disgrace
any church. Dear Agnes, allow me for this once the privilege of a
sister; not merely to love you with my whole heart, as I always do, but
also to prove my affection by saying for your sake what is most painful
to me, and may probably be annoying to you. It is with the greatest
anxiety and surprise that I have lately been watching you----"
"Watching me!" exclaimed Agnes, starting round with angry asperity, and
fixing her flashing eyes on Marion. "What right have you--or what right
has any living being to watch me?"
"The right of affection and kindness," replied Marion, with emotion,
while a large tear glittered in her deep blue eyes. "We are motherless
girls, Agnes, and therefore we owe each other the greater solicitude.
There are many eyes upon you, less friendly, I fear, than those of a
sister. If others were not placing a sinister construction on all they
see, I might not perhaps have ventured to begin the subject; but as it
is, I have no choice except to discuss it with either Patrick or
yourself. Our kind uncle must not be agitated, on any consideration;
otherwise I have sometimes thought of asking him to take us at once
away from this place."
"And pray, what has your mean 'watching' of my conduct,--your police
investigation, discovered, which might render so desperate a measure
necessary?" asked Agnes, with a flickering color in her cheek, and in a
bitter tone of suppressed anger. "Wisdom will die with you, Marion! I
ought to be duly sensible of my good fortune, in having such a sister!
Perhaps you intend obligingly to favor me with a few hints for the
regulation of my conduct,--to honor me with a little of that valuable
advice which I have not been sufficiently alert in asking."
"Agnes! I know myself to be in a most unsuitable position, when
criticising anything in your conduct; but if I had died, and returned
from another world with permission to speak, I could not be more
entirely free from any personal motive. If I give pain to you, I give
greater pain to myself; but every one combines in saying, that this old
Roman Catholic peer, and his Abbe, are most profligate men; that they
scarcely deserve to be well received by ladies of character; that the
very glance of their eye is contamination, and that you alone, of all
the ladies in this house, are singled out to be, not distinguished, but
insulted by their attentions. Surely, Agnes, it is time for me to
speak. Our reputation is all we have on earth--more precious to any
woman than the wealth of the world, and more precious, if possible, to
us, than to others, because we have no other dependence. Patrick is
every day on the brink of ruin, and must leave us before long. Our
uncle--but I cannot speak of that--when he is gone, we shall be alone
indeed."
"When that day comes, I shall be as sorry as yourself; but there is
nothing to fear at present. Captain De Crespigny says, all old uncles
or aunts who wish to be lamented by their young nieces, should die in
the midst of a gay season, to interrupt the parties and balls; but
good, worthy Sir Arthur is more considerate than to incommode any one.
When we do lose the Admiral, however, be under no apprehension of my
remaining alone! I have made up my great mind upon that subject, and
you will see that circumstances do not always continue the same."
"Nor people either, Agnes! I have long feared that you trust too
implicitly in the constancy of Captain De Crespigny."
"Trust! Do you suppose that I any longer trust him!" exclaimed
Agnes--her color rising, and her large eyes glittering with a strange
expression of indignant contempt. "No, Marion! He has been represented
to me now, as he is, a heartless, vain, unfeeling coquette. All men are
monsters, but he is the worst! I can be revenged, however! Even he,
cold and indifferent as he is, shall repent! I shall blight his hopes,
as he has blighted mine. I shall cross his views, humble and disappoint
him. To inflict on him all that he has so wantonly and cruelly
inflicted on me; to destroy his insolent triumph, and bring down the
pride of his success, I would--yes, Marion, I would, and I shall
sacrifice the happiness of my whole life!"
"Dear Agnes! do not say so! Do not even think so for a moment! What can
you mean! Revenge would be a wretched satisfaction, at best! If he has
treated you ill----"
"If he has!" interrupted Agnes, with startling vehemence. "Marion! the
Abbe thinks he could never have married me, even had he wished it. That
Captain De Crespigny became entangled, from the time he was a boy, in
one of those horrid Scotch affairs, half a marriage, or a whole one,
just as he pleases, and Lord Doncaster told me one day in
confidence----"
"In confidence, Agnes! What confidence should ever exist between you
and such a man as Lord Doncaster? an old _roue_! You ought to despise
and avoid him!"
"I am apt to think you are quite mistaken," replied Agnes, with a
sudden assumption of haughtiness, while she shot an angry glance at
Marion. "The last Lord Doncaster but ten, may have been a _roue_, or
what you please, but I know nothing, and will hear nothing against the
present."
"That is the very point on which I must speak!" answered Marion,
hurriedly, her features working with agitation, while the blood rushed
back to her heart. "In a case like this, where love or marriage are
completely out of the question, our friends are all astonished that
you, Agnes, who make no secret of liking admiration, should waste so
much time in deep conversation with that really disreputable old Peer.
Believe me, it gives rise to much animadversion, and even calumny,
especially when connected with that new ornament you wear; and I begin
seriously to fear you may be persuaded into taking the veil."
"Only a bridal veil," replied Agnes, arranging her ringlets. "I am not
quite so mad as you think. I certainly have adopted this badge! At Rome
I shall do as Rome does. Now, Marion, as young Rapid says in the
comedy, 'I shall take it a personal favor if you will not faint;' but
the Romish faith suits me best, and I consider it religion in full
dress, instead of religion in deshabille. I admire the almost
theatrical magnificence of its ritual; the splendid processions, the
consecrated dresses, the superb music, the dazzling lights, the clouds
of burning incense, the romantic convents, and the magnificent
cathedrals."
Marion looked aghast with consternation and sorrow, while she listened
in silence; but at length, in a tone of subdued and mournful
indignation, she replied, "Is this, then, possible! that without one
serious thought, you would forsake our holy faith, for a mere external
mockery of religion! a solemn pantomime? Attracted by rosaries,
crucifixes, tinkling bells, and empty symbols, you would forget the
lessons of our childhood, the church in which we worshipped with our
father, the Bible which he taught us to revere. Surely, Agnes, you will
consult a clergyman of our own persuasion, before taking rashly the
most important step which a mortal can possibly contemplate,--which our
parents would rather you had never been born, than that you took."
"Excuse me, for interrupting your sermon. It is against all rule, but
it may save you a great deal of trouble," said Agnes, arranging her
rings, and re-tying her bouquet; "my sole intention is to be of a
similar religion to the man I marry."
"Do _you_ still expect," said Marion, with a look of surprise, "to be
Mrs. De Crespigny?"
"Or Marchioness of Doncaster!"
"Yes, in due course of time, when Captain De Crespigny succeeds!"
"He never shall succeed," replied Agnes, setting her teeth, and
speaking with stern determination, while her face became rigid as
stone. "Captain De Crespigny has deceived me, cheated me of my youth,
hopes, and happiness. I have been fooled, trifled with, basely
ill-treated. My heart is seared against any real attachment to another;
but I shall be amply revenged on him. I shall destroy his happiness, as
he has destroyed mine. Without his long-expected wealth and title, he
will find that the butterfly is but a grub.--I mean to marry his
uncle!----"
A dead silence followed these words. Marion made no exclamation, and
did not even look at Agnes, but buried her face in her hands, with a
feeling of unutterable shame and consternation. The very idea had never
before occurred to her imagination, that her young and blooming sister
could contemplate so degrading a sacrifice; but when, at length, she
looked up, there was something in the proud, stern expression of that
beautiful countenance, which forced upon her the unwelcome and
extraordinary conviction that all had been said in earnest.
"Agnes!" cried she, gasping with astonishment; "that dissipated,
horrid, dreadful man! Impossible! The miserable wreck of an ill-spent
life! A superannuated _roue_. Are you in jest? or are you mad?"
"Mad! or at least delirious! Marion, we have lived long together, and
yet you do not know me! I am not one to sit tamely down, as you would
do, and wash my heart away with tears! My sorrows are not to be
closeted in silent desolation, but I must act. If hope and happiness
are crushed for ever, he who turned my feelings to stone shall suffer
for it! He shall no longer wind me on, and wind me off, according to
his own caprice! It is like death itself to love in secret, but worse
than death when it is known, and he does know all! He knows, believes,
and rejoices to believe, that I have waited, suffered, hoped, and
feared for him, and for him only; but I am not one to die of scorned
love. Now every spark of my regard for him is crushed out. His vanity
shall not have another moment's triumph over me," said Agnes, her eyes
becoming frightfully brilliant. "My heart feels as if it were buried in
a snow-drift, and nothing warms it but the hope of vengeance."
"Agnes! who in her senses would think of being consigned to misery and
contempt both here and hereafter, merely to punish one who ought to be
despised! If Captain De Crespigny be vain, foolish, and unprincipled,
is that a sufficient reason for you to become degraded, and, I must
say, infamous!" said Marion, in a tone of undisguised disgust, though
her voice made no more impression than the gentle wave on the hard and
unbending cliff. "Such a step as this would separate you for ever from
those you have most reason to love."
"I am one of the Positive Club, Marion, who never change their minds
about anything! and my resolution is unalterable. ''Tis best repenting
in a coach and six.'"
"Think, Agnes, not of the short triumph over Captain De Crespigny, but
of the long years that must follow,--of the living death you must
endure, linked to vice, decrepitude, and immorality, lowered in your
own eyes, and contemptible in those of others."
"Mistaken as usual, Marion! a life of mediocrity would be a life of
misery to me, and few people think the worse of any young lady for
becoming a Marchioness. Lord Doncaster can give me every thing except
happiness, and I must find the best substitute for that in my power. A
blight is on my heart! my pride has been mortally wounded; but I cannot
undertake a cold, insipid, colorless existence, devoid of motive and of
hope. It would be ennui drowned in wretchedness, if I return jilted,
mortified, and disappointed, to our uncle's dog-hole of a villa at
Portobello?"
A red spot burned on Marion's cheek, and indignant tears, occupying the
place of words, glittered on her eye-lashes, while her thoughts
reverted to their generous, kind-hearted, and high-spirited uncle,
whose affection was so undervalued by Agnes, and whose better feelings
were about to be so outraged by the announcement of a preposterous and
really disgraceful project.
Agnes now assumed the dignity of a peeress in expectancy, looking cold,
resolute, and haughty, till at length Marion, overcome with emotion,
threw her arms round the neck of her sister, and burst into tears,
saying, in accents of incoherent affection,--
"Agnes,--dear Agnes! take pity upon yourself. Lay open your heart to a
kind Providence,--pray for peace, but do not barter yourself for
revenge. Do not become utterly lost, as well as unhappy! For my sake,
for everybody's sake, let us go home as we came! Life is only precious
for the eternal hopes and the domestic affections it bestows. Would you
rashly throw away both, bringing on a lifetime of unpitied remorse?"
Marion looked up with anxious solicitude, but scarcely had she ceased
to speak before Agnes glided out of the room, leaving behind her the
splendid missal adorned with Lord Doncaster's arms in gold upon the
white parchment binding. Beside it lay the envelope of a letter, with a
marquis' coronet on the seal, and underneath was engraved, to her
astonishment, the exact date of Agnes' birthday. Marion started when
she saw this absurd piece of gallantry, and covered her face with her
hands, as if she never could show it again.
She did not know how hate could burn,
In hearts once changed from soft to stern;
Nor all the false and fatal zeal,
The convert of revenge can feel.