Perhaps in the course of a long and, till its very latter years, a most
prosperous life, the Knight of Gwynne had never known more real unbroken
happiness than now that he had laid his head beneath the lowly thatch of
a fisherman's cottage, and found a home beside the humble hearth where
daily toil had used to repose. It was not that he either felt, or
assumed to feel, indifferent to the great reverse of his fortune, and to
the loss of that station to which all his habits of life and thought
had been conformed. Nor had he the innate sense that his misfortunes had
been incurred without the culpability of, at least, neglect on his
own part. No; he neither deceived nor exonerated himself. His present
happiness sprang from discovering in those far dearer to him
than himself powers of patient submission, traits of affectionate
forbearance, signs of a hopeful, trusting spirit, that their trials
were not sent without an aim and object,--all gifts of heart and mind,
higher, nobler, and better than the palmiest days of prosperity had
brought forth.
It was that short and fleeting season, the late autumn, a time in which
the climate of Northern Ireland makes a brief but brilliant amende for
the long dreary months of the year. The sea, at last calm and tranquil,
rolled its long waves upon the shore in measured sweep, waking the
echoes in a thousand caves, and resounding with hollow voice beneath the
very cliffs. The wild and fanciful outlines of the Skerry Islands were
marked, sharp and distinct, against the dark blue sky, and reflected not
less so in the unruffled water at their base. The White Rocks, as they
are called, shone with a lustre like dulled silver; and above them the
ruined towers of old Dunluce hung balanced over the sea, and even in
decay seemed to defy dissolution.
The most striking feature of the picture was, however, the myriad of
small boats, amounting in some instances to several hundreds, which
filled the little bay at sunset. These were the fishermen from
Innisshowen, coming to gather the seaweed on the western shore their
eastern aspect denied them,--a hardy and a daring race, who braved the
terrible storms of that fearful coast without a thought of fear. Here
were they now, their little skiffs crowded with every sail they could
carry,--for it was a trial of speed who should be first up after the
turn of the ebb-tide,--their taper masts bending and springing like
whips, the white water curling at the bows and rustling over the
gunwales; while the fishermen themselves, with long harpoon spears,
contested for the prizes,--large masses of floating weed, which not
unfrequently were seized upon by three or four rival parties at the same
moment.
A more animated scene cannot be conceived than the bay thus presented:
the boats tacking and beating in every direction, crossing each other
so closely as to threaten collision,--sometimes, indeed, carrying off a
bowsprit or a rudder; while, from the restless motion of those on
board, the frail skiffs were at each instant endangered,--accidents that
occurred continually, but whose peril may be judged by the hearty cheers
and roars of laughter they excited. Here might be seen a wide-spreading
surface of tangled seaweed, vigorously towed in two different directions
by contending crews, whose exertions to secure it were accompanied by
the wildest shouts and cries. There a party were hauling in the prey,
while their comrades, with spars and spears, kept the enemy aloof; and
here, on the upturned keel of a capsized boat, were a dripping group,
whose heaviest penalty was the ridicule of their fellows.
Seated in front of the little cottage, the Darcys and Forester watched
this strange scene with all the interest its moving, stirring life could
excite; and while the ladies could enjoy the varying picture only for
itself, to the Knight and the youth it brought back the memory of a more
brilliant and a grander display, one to which heroism and danger had
lent the most exciting of all interests.
“I see,” said Darcy, as he watched his companion's countenance,--“I see
whither your thoughts are wandering. They are off to the old castle of
Aboukir, and the tall cliffs at Marmorica.” Forester slightly nodded an
assent, but never spoke, while the Knight resumed: “I told you it would
never do to give up the service. The very glance of your eye at yonder
picture tells me how the great original is before your miud. Come, a few
weeks more of rest and quiet, you will be yourself again. Then must you
present yourself before the gallant Duke, and ask for a restitution to
your old grade. There will be sharp work erelong. Buonaparte is not the
man to forgive Alexandria and Cairo. If I read you aright, you prefer
such a career to all the ambition of a political life.”
Forester was still silent; but his changing color told that the Knight's
words had affected him deeply, but whether as they were intended, it
was not so plain to see. The Knight went on: “I am not disposed to vain
regrets; but if I were to give way to such, it would be that I am not
young enough to enter upon the career I now see opening to our arms. Our
insular position seems to have moulded our destiny in great part; but,
rely on it, we are as much a nation of soldiers as of sailors.” Warming
with this theme, Darcy continued, while sketching out the possible turn
of events, to depict the noble path open to a young man who to natural
talents and acquirements added the high advantages of fortune, rank, and
family influence.
“I told you,” said he, smiling, “that I blamed you once unjustly, as
it happened, because, as a Guardsman, you did not seize the occasion to
exchange guard-mounting for the field; but now I shall be sorely grieved
if you suffer yourself to be withdrawn from a path that has already
opened so brightly, by any of the seductions of your station, or the
fascinations of mere fashion.”
“Are you certain,” said Lady Eleanor, speaking in a voice shaken by
agitation,--“are you certain, my dear, that these same counsels of yours
would be in strict accordance with the wishes of Lord Wallincourt's
friends, or is it not possible that _their_ ambitions may point very
differently for his future?”
“I can but give the advice I would offer to Lionel,” said Darcy, “if my
son were placed in similarly fortunate circumstances. A year or two, at
least, of such training will be no bad discipline to a young man's mind,
and help to fit him to discuss those terms which, if I see aright, will
be rife in our assemblies for some years to come--” Darcy was about
to continue, when Tate advanced with a letter, whose address bespoke
Bicknell's hand. It was a long-expected communication, and, anxious
to peruse it carefully, the Knight arose, and making his excuses,
re-entered the cottage.
The party sat for some time in silence. Lady Eleanor's mind was in a
state of unusual conflict, since, for the first time in her life, had
she practised any concealment with her husband, having forborne to tell
him of Forester's former addresses to Helen. To this course she had
been impelled by various reasons, the most pressing among which were
the evident change in the young man's demeanor since he last appeared
amongst them, and, consequently, the possibility that he had outlived
the passion he then professed; and secondly, by observing that nothing
in Helen betrayed the slightest desire to encourage any renewal of those
professions, or any chagrin at the change in his conduct. As a mother
and as a woman, she hesitated to avow what should seem to represent
her daughter as being deserted, while she argued that if Helen were as
indifferent as she really seemed, there was no occasion whatever for
the disclosure. Now, however, that the Knight had spoken his counsels so
strongly, the thought occurred to her, that Forester might receive the
advice in the light of a rejection of his former proposal, and suppose
that these suggestions were only another mode of refusing his suit.
Hence a struggle of doubt and uncertainty arose within her, whether she
should at once make everything known to Darcy, or still keep silence,
and leave events to their own development. The former course seemed the
most fitting; and entirely forgetful of all else, she hastily arose, and
followed her husband into the cabin.
Forester was now alone with Helen, and for the first time since that
well-remembered night when he had offered his heart and been rejected.
The game of dissimulating feelings is almost easiest before a numerous
audience; it is rarely possible in a _tête-à-tête_. So Forester soon
felt; and although he made several efforts to induce a conversation,
they were all abrupt and disjointed, as were Helen's own replies to
them. At length came a pause; and what a thing is a pause at such a
moment! The long lingering seconds in which a duellist watches his
adversary's pistol, wavering over the region of his heart or brain, is
less torturing than such suspense. Forester arose twice, and again sat
down, his face pale and flushed alternately. At length, with a thick and
rapid utterance, he said,--
“I have been thinking over the Knight's counsels,--dare I ask if they
have Miss Darcy's concurrence?”
“It would be a great, a very great presumption in me,” said Helen,
tremulously, “to offer an opinion on such a theme. I have neither the
knowledge to distinguish between the opposite careers, nor have I any
feeling for those sentiments which men alone understand in warfare.”
“Nor, perhaps,” added Forester, with a sudden irony, “sufficient
interest in the subject to give it a thought.”
Helen was silent; her slightly compressed lips and heightened color
showed that she was offended at the speech, but she made no reply.
“I crave your pardon, Miss Darcy,” said he, in a low, submissive accent,
that told how heartfelt it was. “I most humbly ask you to forgive my
rudeness. The very fact that I had no claim to that interest should
have protected you from such a speech. But see what comes of kindness
to those who are little used to it; they get soon spoiled, and forget
themselves.”
“Lord Wall incourt will have to guard himself well against flattery, if
such humble attentions as ours disturb his judgment.”
“I will get out of the region of it,” said he, resolutely; “I will take
the Knight's advice. It is but a plunge, and all is over.”
“If I dare to say so, my Lord,” said Helen, archly, “this is scarcely
the spirit in which my father hoped his counsels would be accepted. His
chivalry on the score of a military life may be overstrained, but it has
no touch of that recklessness your Lordship seems to lend it.”
“And why should not this be the spirit in which I join the army?” said
he, passionately; “the career has not for me those fascinations which
others feel. Danger I like, for its stimulus, as other men like it; but
I would rather confront it when and where and how I please, than at the
dictate of a colonel and by the ritual of a despatch.”
“Rather be a letter of marque, in fact, than a ship-of-the-line,--more
credit to your Lordship's love of danger than discipline.”
Forester smiled, but not without anger, at the quiet persiflage of her
manner. It took him some seconds ere he could resume.
“I perceive,” said he, in a tone of deeper feeling, “that whatever my
resolves, to discuss them must be an impertinence, when they excite no
other emotion than ridicule--”
“Nay, my Lord,” interposed Helen, eagerly; “I beg you to forgive my
levity. Nothing was further from my thoughts than to hurt one to whom
we owe our deepest debt of gratitude. I can never forget you saved
my father's life; pray do not let me seem so base, to my heart, as to
undervalue this.”
“Oh, Miss Darcy,” said he, passionately, “it is I who need
forgiveness,--I, whose temper, rendered irritable by illness, suspect
reproach and sarcasm in every word of those who are kindest to me.”
“You are unjust to yourself,” said Helen, gently,--“unjust, because you
expect the same powers of mind and judgment that you enjoyed in health.
Think how much better you are than when you came here. Think what a few
days more may do. How changed--”
“Has Miss Darcy changed since last I met her?” asked he, in a tone that
sank into the very depth of her heart.
Helen tried to smile; but emotions of a sadder shade spread over her
pale features, as she said,--
“I hope so, my Lord; I trust that altered fortunes have not lost their
teaching. I fervently hope that sorrow and suffering have left something
behind them better than unavailing regrets and heart-repinings.”
“Oh, believe me,” cried Forester, passionately, “it is not of this
change I would speak. I dared to ask with reference to another feeling.”
“Be it so,” said Helen, trembling, as if nerving herself for a strong
and long-looked-for effort,-“be it so, my Lord, and is not my answer
wide enough for both? Would not any change, short of a dishonorable one,
make the decision I once came to a thousand times more necessary now?”
“Oh, Helen, these are cold and cruel words. Will you tell me that my
rank and station are to be like a curse upon my happiness?”
“I spoke of _our_ altered condition, my Lord. I spoke of the
impossibility of your Lordship recurring to a theme which the sight of
that thatched roof should have stifled. Nay, hear me out. It is not of
_you_ or _your_ motives that is here the question; it is of _me_ and
_my_ duties. They are there, my Lord,--they are with those whose hearts
have been twined round mine from infancy,--mine when the world went
well and proudly with us; doubly, trebly mine when affection can replace
fortune, and the sympathies' of the humblest home make up for all the
flatteries of the world. I have no reason to dwell longer on this to one
who knows those of whom I speak, and can value them too.”
“But is there no place in your heart, Helen, for other affections than
these; or is that place already occupied?”
“My Lord, you have borne my frankness so well, I must even submit to
yours with a good grace. Still, this is a question you have no right to
ask, or I to answer. I have told you that whatever doubt there might
be as to _your_ road in life, _mine_ offered no alternative. That ought
surely to be enough.”
“It shall be,” said Forester, with a low sigh, as, trembling in every
limb, he arose from the seat. “And yet, Helen,” said he, in a voice
barely above a whisper, “there might come a time when these duties, to
which you cling with such attachment, should be rendered less needful by
altered fortunes. I have heard that your father's prospects present more
of hope than heretofore, have I not? Think that if the Knight should be
restored to his own again, that then--”
“Nay,--it is scarcely worthy of your Lordship to exact a pledge which is
to hang upon a decision like this. A verdict may give back my father's
estate; it surely should not dispose of his daughter's hand?”
“I would exact nothing, Miss Darcy,” said Forester, stung by the tone of
this reply. “But I see you cannot feel for the difficulties which
beset him who has staked his all upon a cast. I asked, what might your
feelings be, were the circumstances which now surround you altered?”
Helen was silent for a second or two; and then, as if having collected
all her energy, she said: “I would that you had spared me--had spared
yourself--the pain I now must give us both; but to be silent longer
would be to encourage deception.” It was not till after another brief
interval that she could continue: “Soon after you left this, my Lord,
you wrote a letter to Miss Daly. This letter-I stop not now to ask with
what propriety towards either of us--she left in my hands. I read it
carefully; and if many of the sentiments it contained served to elevate
your character in my esteem, I saw enough to show me that your resolves
were scarcely less instigated by outraged pride than what you fancied
to be a tender feeling. This perhaps might have wounded me, had I felt
differently towards you. As it was, I thought it for the best; I deemed
it happier that your motives should be divided ones, even though you
knew it not. But as I read on, my Lord,--as I perused the account of
your interview with Lady Wallincourt,--then a new light broke suddenly
upon me; I found what, had I known more of life, should not have
surprised, but what in my ignorance did indeed astonish me, that my
father's station was regarded as one which could be alleged as a reason
against your feeling towards his daughter. Now, my Lord, _we_ have our
pride too; and had your influence over me been all that ever you wished
it, I tell you freely that I never would permit my affection to be
gratified at the price of an insult to my father's house. If I were to
say that your sentiments towards me should not have suffered it, would
it be too much?”
“But, dearest Helen, remember that I am no longer dependent on my
mother's will,--remember that I stand in a position and a rank which
only needs you to share with me to make it all that my loftiest ambition
ever coveted.”
“These are, forgive me if I tell you, very selfish reasonings, my
Lord. They may apply to _you_; they hardly address themselves to _my_
position. The pride which could not stoop to ally itself with our house
in our days of prosperity, should not assuredly be wounded by suing us
in our humbler fortunes.”
“Your thoughts dwell on Lady Netherby, Miss Darcy,” said Forester,
irritably; “she is scarcely the person most to be considered here.”
“Enough for me, if I think so,” said Helen, haughtily. “The lady your
Lordship's condescension would place in the position of a mother
should at least be able to regard me with other feelings than those of
compassionate endurance. In a word, sir, it cannot be. To discuss the
topic longer is but to distress us both. Leave me to my gratitude to
you, which is unbounded. Let me dwell upon the many traits of noble
heroism I can think of in your character with enthusiasm, ay, and with
pride,--pride that one so high and so gifted should have ever thought
of one so little worthy of him. But do not weaken my principle by hoping
that my affection can be won at the cost of my self-esteem.”
Forester bowed with a deep, respectful reverence; and when he lifted
up his head, the sad expression of his features was that of one who had
heard an irrevocable doom pronounced upon his dearest, most cherished
hopes. Lady Eleanor at the same moment came forward from the door of the
cottage, so that he had barely time to utter a hasty good-bye ere she
joined her daughter.
“Your father wishes to see Lord Wallincourt, Helen. Has he gone?” But
before Helen could reply the Knight came up.
“I hope you have not forgotten to ask him to dinner, Eleanor?” said he.
“We did so yesterday, and he never made his appearance the whole
evening.”
“Helen, did you?” But Helen was gone while they were speaking; so that
Darcy, to repair the omission, hastened after his young friend with all
the speed he could command.
“Have I found you?” cried Darcy, as, turning an angle of the rocky
shore, he came behind Forester, who, with folded arms and bent-down
head, stood like one sorrow-struck. “I just discovered that neither my
wife nor my daughter had asked you to stop to dinner; and as you are
punctilious, fully as much as they are forgetful, there was nothing for
it but to run after you.”
“You are too kind, my dear Knight,--but not to-day; I'm poorly,--a
headache.”
“Nay; a headache always means a mere excuse. Come back with me: you
shall be as stupid a _convive_ as you wish, only be a good listener, for
I have got a great budget from my man of law, Mr. Bicknell, and am dying
for somebody to inflict it upon.”
“With the best grace he could muster,--which was still very far from
a good one,--Forester suffered himself to be led back to the
cottage, endeavoring, as he went, to feel or feign an interest in the
intelligence the Knight was full of. It seemed that Bicknell was very
anxious not only for the Knight's counsel on many points, but for his
actual presence at the trial. He appeared to think that Darcy being
there, would be a great check upon the line of conduct he was apprised
O'Halloran would adopt. There was already a very strong reaction in the
West in favor of the old gentry of the land, and it would be at least
an evidence of willingness to confront the enemy, were the Knight to be
present.
“He tells me,” continued the Knight, “that Daly regretted deeply not
having attended the former trial,--why, he does not exactly explain, but
he uses the argument to press me now to do so.”
Forester might, perhaps, have enlightened him on this score, had he so
pleased, but he said nothing.
“Of course, I need not say, nothing like intimidation is meant by this
advice. The days for such are, thank God, gone by in Ireland; and it
was, besides, a game I never could have played at; but yet it might be
what many would expect of me, and at all events it can scarcely do harm.
What is your opinion?”
“I quite agree with Mr. Bicknell,” said Forester, hastily; “there is
a certain license these gentlemen of wig and gown enjoy, that is more
protected by the bench than either good morals or good manners warrant.”
“Nay, you are now making the very error I would guard against,” said
Darcy, laughing. “This legal sparring is rather good fun, even though
they do not always keep the gloves on. Now, will you come with me?”
“Of course; I should have asked your leave to do so, had you not invited
me.”
“You 'll hear the great O'Halloran, and I suspect that is as much as I
shall gain myself by this action. We have merely some points of law to
go upon; but, as I understand, nothing new or material in evidence to
adduce. You ask, then, why persist? I 'll own to you I cannot say; but
there seems the same punctilio in legal matters as in military; and it
is a point of honor to sustain the siege until the garrison have eaten
their boots. I am not so far from that contingency now, that I should be
impatient; but meanwhile I perceive the savor of something better, and
here comes Tate to say it is on the table.”