THE STORY OF FANNY RAYMOND.
“Have you seen but the bright lily grow
Before rude hands have touched it?
Have you marked but the fall o’ the snow
Before the soil hath smutched it?”
BEN JONSON.
The disease of Mr. Withers daily advanced—his health so rapidly declined
that he became exceedingly anxious for the arrival of Raymond, who was
now hourly expected.
“Well, Sophie, my gentle nurse,” said he one day, as she sat by his
bedside, “your probation is drawing to a close. You have devoted
yourself to me for eight long years, my guardian angel—to what purpose?”
“To what purpose?—you have done more good in this parish than any
minister who has preceded you for many years; for even Mr. May, with all
his excellences, lacked that eloquence—that power of persuasion—that
profound knowledge of and potent sway over the human heart, that nothing
but sorrow can lend to intellect. Hearts have been moved and elevated,
minds aroused and inspired by your wisdom. A spirit has been invoked in
this dull neighborhood that may never be still again. I have often
thought how infinitely productive is _one_ good word, or thought, or
act, its influence extending down generations, still augmenting for
ever.”
“Ah! Sophie, but while all the light was shed abroad, the shadow was
cast black and thick at home; and how it has darkened our home and your
young life, Sophie!”
“Some _must_ suffer for others,” said Sophie, abstractedly.
“And _have_ you suffered so much, Sophie?” he inquired, sadly.
“No!—oh, no!—I was thinking of _your_ suffering, not of my own, and I
thought aloud.”
While she spoke, Hagar entered from a ride, and brought a letter from
Rosalia. When it had been read, and Hagar had left the room to change
her riding habit, he said,—
“How much that girl—I mean Rosalia, writes like one I know—her very
spirit speaks through Rosalia’s pen, as her form is again before me in
Rosalia’s person.”
“You mean Fanny?”
“Yes, I mean Fanny. You have never, until this moment, mentioned her
name to me since the night of Rosalia’s arrival, when I angrily forbade
your doing so. Often since that I have wished that you might, thus
affording me the opportunity of telling you our sad story. I will tell
you now, but first, will Hagar be occupied for the next hour?”
“Yes, she has gone to her chamber to answer Rosalia’s letter.”
“Give me a cordial, Sophie?” She did so, and revived by the stimulant,
Withers commenced his story.
“I was the only son of my mother, and she a widow, Sophie. She supported
and schooled me by her own exertions until I was eighteen years old,
when I fell under the notice of the Rev. Lenox May, who received me into
his house to read theology with him. Subsequently I entered college, and
soon after taking orders, I had the misfortune to lose my mother. She
had lived to see the desire of her heart, however—her beloved son in
holy orders. She had seen the ceremony of his ordination, heard him
preach his first sermon, heard it universally praised as a miracle of
eloquence, thoroughly believed it herself, and was ready to exclaim—‘Now
let thy servant depart in peace.’ Sophie, I never was intended for a
minister of the Gospel. If I have made a tolerable one it is because the
hard blows of circumstances have hammered me into shape. Accident and my
mother’s wishes made me one. However, soon after my ordination, I was
called to the charge of a parish in a village on the Hudson, and the
adulation I there received reconciled me to the profession. I was called
handsome and eloquent. The church certainly flourished under my
ministry. I was flattered by the circumstance _then_; _now_ I know such
is ever the case when a young clergyman of tolerable ability is
installed in a parish. But, Sophie, I was foster-nursed by the old
ladies of the parish, and out of that grew all my sorrows. South of the
village, on an eminence overlooking the river, stood the white granite
villa of my wealthiest and most important parishioner, General Raymond.
He was a widower, with one child—the child of his old age—Fanny, the
sole heiress of his property. Religion, or rather, evangelical theology,
was his passion. How sonorous rang his full-toned responses through the
church, as standing, his stout form erect, his broad shoulders thrown
back _à-la-militaire_, his chest expanding with self-importance, he
called himself a ‘miserable sinner.’ On the first Sunday of my
installation he invited me home to dinner with him, and with stately,
old-fashioned courtesy conducted me to his carriage that stood waiting
at the church-door, and there, as I stepped in, I first saw Fanny
Raymond, then a child of twelve years of age, a lovely, little,
shrinking creature, who squeezed herself quite into the corner as I took
the seat by her side, as you have often seen a playful white kitten draw
herself up between fear and defiance, and I instantly felt the same
impulse to catch the lovely, shy thing to my bosom that you would have
felt to play with the said kitten. So strong was this impulse that it
must have spoken through look and gesture, and might have been obeyed
but that the pompous old general followed me immediately into the
carriage, and announced, “My daughter, Miss Raymond,” with as much
ceremony as though the sweet child had been a woman of five-and-twenty.
She sat there, watching me furtively, her sweet eyes flashing their soft
shy light under the shadowy lashes, and quickly averted when met by
mine, while rose clouds would roll up over her snowy cheeks. That sweet,
shy spirit, whether in the violet, in the fawn, or in the timid girl,
always attracted me, Sophie. It was your eyes, that meeting my glance,
would startle and dilate in beautiful haze that provoked _your_ fate,
Sophie. I would have given anything—my parish—the world, then and there
to have caught the shrinking child to my bosom, and hugged, and kissed,
and romped with her to my heart’s content. From that day I was a
frequent, and always a welcome and an honored guest at the villa. Time
passed, and I rose in popularity, winning golden opinions from all sorts
of people, and especially from women. As long as a young minister
remains unmarried, unappropriated, unmonopolized, he is sure to be
popular; so _my_ popularity continued to increase for three years. While
watching the development of the child, Fanny Raymond, I had sought the
society of no woman. When Fanny was about fifteen years of age, I was
sent for one day to the villa. It was to be put in possession of an
attested copy of General Raymond’s will, by a clause of which I was
appointed sole trustee of the estate, until Fanny should come of age. It
was during this visit, and in the presence of one of the old ladies of
the parish, that General Raymond remarked, ‘I am now upwards of eighty
years old—I am failing fast; I should like to see Fanny married before
my departure, but, alas! that is a comfort for which I dare scarcely
pray.’ Up to that time I had not thought of aspiring to the hand of
General Raymond’s heiress. It was my lot that evening to drive the old
lady, my fellow-visitor, back to the village in the General’s carriage.
It was during our ride home that the old lady, one of my foster-mothers,
suggested to me the plan, the propriety of my paying my addresses to
Miss Raymond, ‘For,’ said she, ‘it is the duty of a young pastor to
consider in his marriage the welfare of his parish.’
“I took her advice. I wooed Fanny Raymond—did I love her? No; but her
extreme youth, her beauty and graceful shyness strongly attracted
me—through that idiosyncrasy that lured me to the pursuit of such. I
wooed her, but she avoided, fled from me. That added zest to the chase.
I had her father’s interest, and I married her. I married her, despite
of her reluctance, or rather _because_ of her reluctance, and despite of
tears, prayers, and resistance. (Here notwithstanding the chastening of
illness and sorrow, his eye and lip glowed as with the recollection of
piquant joy.) I married her. The wild shy creature, full of emotion as a
harp is of music, was in my power—in my grasp. Oh! the wild beating of
my heart, when I had caught and held the fluttering bird! Did I love her
now? Yes! as the fire loves the fuel it consumes. And _then_ she loved
_me_, Sophie! or rather _no_, I will not profane the word that expresses
_your_ pure affection for me, Sophie. But she grew passionately,
insanely fond of me—she loved me as the drunkard loves the bowl he feels
is his destruction—as the moth loves the flame that must consume it. And
then, Sophie! _then_, she lost all attractions for me! From indifference
I grew almost to loathe her. I struggled against this growing disgust,
but it overmastered me. Poor Fanny! if she had not been the simplest
child on earth, if she had possessed the slightest speck of coquetry,
this aversion might have been delayed. Poor Fanny!” (Here, overcome by
his feelings, he covered his brow with his hand. How quickly varying
emotions chased each other through his heart; but this belonged to the
high action of his disease.) “We lived with her father. Fanny became a
mother at sixteen. General Raymond lived to bless his grandson, and then
was gathered to his fathers. We continued to reside at the villa. I
utterly neglected her. At the slightest display of fondness on her part,
I grew freezingly cold. This was _real_, this was a feeling it was
useless to struggle against, as I had found, and as at last she
understood. Fanny grieved, suffered, and sought solace in her child. As
years passed, she became calm, grew accustomed and reconciled to her
lot; and how beautiful she grew as her day advanced from its morning
freshness towards the noonday glory it was destined never to reach. How
beautiful! At least all the parish said so. _I_ could not feel her
beauty. Years slid serenely, imperceptibly, over us. We were prosperous.
I had the largest property, the most elegant house, and the most
beautiful wife in the parish. Besides which I had a growing celebrity. I
was vain-glorious, Sophie, _not proud_. There is this difference between
pride and vainglory: pride does _not_ depend upon the external
circumstances of rank, wealth, fame; vainglory _does_. We sometimes
speak of _mortifying_ pride; _pride_ is _never_ mortified; it is
impossible—it holds itself grandly above all such influences; vanity,
self-love, is _often_ humbled. I was vain-glorious, not only of my
wealth, of my celebrity, of my admired wife—but most of all, of the
_intact propriety_ of all things appertaining to me. Years slid smoothly
over us. I never saw so beautiful a woman as Fanny was at thirty. Few of
our women bloom into the full flower—most of them are withered in the
bud. Fanny at thirty was the perfect rose of beauty. Why, Sophie, when I
took her to New York city, or into any strange company, there was always
a half-suppressed murmur of irrepressible admiration. Though I was no
longer _proud_ of her, yet now that for long years she had ceased to
worry me with her unwelcome caresses, there had grown up a calm
friendship and confidence between us—she understood me, and _I thought_
that I understood her. I never guessed the latent force of passion,
augmenting while it slumbered in her heart (sleep is the time for
growth), or suspected the burning lava, burning more fiercely for
suppression under the snowy exterior of that volcanic bosom! As little
dreamed I of impending ruin as the city under the shadow of Vesuvius!
About this time the whole country rang with the name of one man. A man
distinguished alike for the splendor of his genius, the audacious flight
of his ambition, the godlike beauty of his person, and the satanic power
of fascination that neither the honor of man nor the purity of woman
ever withstood. You cannot fail to identify the man—but _one_ such is
born in a cycle of centuries. One day I received an invitation to preach
an ordination sermon upon the next Sabbath, in the city. I had, during
the years of my ministry, received several calls to take charge of large
city parishes; but always declined them, because our large property and
our home lay near our village. Frequently I was invited to preach in the
cities, and then wherever I went crowds gathered. I always took Fanny
with me, for the beauty of the woman attracted quite as much attention
as the genius of the man. Upon receiving this invitation to preach the
ordination sermon, therefore, I procured a substitute to fill my pulpit,
and taking Fanny, stepped aboard a steamboat on Saturday morning, and
the afternoon of the same day reached the city.
“It had been advertised that I was to preach at that church, and at an
early hour it was crowded, packed. As I entered the church and led Fanny
up the aisle, I do not know whether I was most vain of her or of myself.
I know that my heart was swelling with vainglory as I opened the door of
one of the front central pews under the pulpit, handed her in, and
passed within the altar to my place. I saw from my high post that Fanny
divided attention with me from the few who, packed into the end pews,
could obtain a view of her. In the end pew nearest the pulpit, on my
right hand, I was surprised and flattered to recognise the celebrated B.
I had never had him for an auditor before. I observed that he did not
seem to see Fanny, who sat immediately in the angle of his vision,
notwithstanding _her_ eyes were ever furtively raking him. I was not
surprised at this, for to say nothing of his celebrity, he was by far
the most distinguished looking man present, both for the striking beauty
of his person and the grace and dignity of his attitude and demeanor;
but I _was_ slightly surprised that he had not seemed to have seen the
vision of loveliness and light that was dazzling all other eyes. These
were not proper thoughts for a minister of the gospel in the pulpit, but
they were mine; and they produced their bitter fruits, brought about
their own punishment.
“At the close of the sermon, a few minutes after I had left the pulpit,
B. came from his pew, and a mutual friend introduced him to me. My wife
was hanging on my arm at the time of this introduction. B. spoke of our
village, of General Raymond as having been a valued friend, &c., and of
his own intention soon to visit the village. I, like every one else he
ever set his eyes upon, was fascinated by his looks and manners. I
pressed him to come—and _soon_—and entreated him to come at once to the
villa, instead of stopping at a hotel, and to make our house his home,
while he should find it convenient or agreeable to honor us with his
presence.
“Well, Sophie, I returned home on Monday. In the course of the week, B.
visited us. He remained with us an honored guest for two weeks, and in
those two weeks, Sophie!——His manner rather than his words seemed to
reveal a warm admiration for me and everything about me. Our elegant
house, well-chosen library, our busts and pictures, our tastefully
planned grounds, everything seemed to give him a quiet and graceful
delight. His manner to me seemed (for all was _seeming_) to reveal a
charming mixture of reverence and affection. I was fascinated—drawn in.
His manner seemed distant to my wife, _so_ distant that I never inclined
to _jealousy_, but often to _vanity_; felt piqued that he did not appear
to appreciate the merits of _her_, my most brilliant appendage. He
visited little while he remained at our house; the charms of our house
seemed to rivet him to the place. Parochial duty called me frequently
from home; he was left to the hospitable care of my wife. They were much
together.
“The last day of his stay approached. And up to that day I was utterly
unsuspicious of the cloud lowering black and heavy over my house!
utterly unprepared for the descent of the thunderbolt that blasted my
hearth! The day of his departure dawned. It had been arranged between us
that I should drive him down to the village, in the carriage, to meet
the steamboat that would pass in the evening. But early in the afternoon
I was summoned to attend the bedside of a dying parishioner, at an
opposite point of the village. I was constrained, therefore, to leave
him, promising, however, to meet him at the steamboat hotel, before his
departure.
“I left him with Fanny—Oh! let me recall her image, as the last time I
saw her in purity and peace: She sat in a chair by the open window,
arrayed in a beautiful robe of light blue silk; her air and attitude I
noticed _then_ was pensive; her elbow rested on the window-sill, and her
arm, her beautiful arm, encircled by a diamond bracelet, emerged from
its sleeve of silk and lace; her hand supported her drooping head, from
which her ringlets hung like spiral curls of glittering gold. The other
gemmed and snow-like hand hung listless by her side. Strange! I was then
inspired with a warmth of affection towards her I had not felt for
years. I stepped back as I was about leaving the room, and lifted the
snow-flake hand to my lips, and then left the room and the house, for
the first time for years, with the wish that I might be able to dispatch
my business quickly and return soon. This caprice pursued me,
strengthening every inch of the way, as I journeyed from her, until at
the solemn bed of death, it was interrupted by the sight of my dying
parishioner and his weeping family. I administered the last consolations
of religion to the dying man, or at least I read the service for the
sick by his bedside, and gave him the sacrament. I soon after took
leave, and rode towards the village, where I expected to find B.,
awaiting the steamboat. I found him in the parlor of the hotel. As the
hour of the boat’s passing had not quite arrived, I ordered supper, and
we supped together. Yes! we sat down once more and broke bread together!
Oh! the power of duplicity in that bad man! Had I been the most jealous,
as I was then the most unsuspicious of human beings, by no sign in his
countenance or manner could I have detected a consciousness in him of
the blasting ruin he had wrought in my home! His conversation was as
brilliant, his manner as entertaining as ever; and his eyes sought mine
with the same earnest sweetness that had ever lived in their expression.
At the end of half an hour, the boat stopped at the landing, and I took
leave of him with more regret than I had ever felt at parting with
mortal man before or since. I pressed him to repeat his visit soon, and
make it longer—and he promised! and bade me bear his best wishes and his
adieux to Mrs. Withers! I mounted my horse and rode towards home, my
thoughts strangely haunted with Fanny—how lovely she seemed in my
thoughts! I hastened onwards. I drew near the house.
“That ride home! How distinctly, how indelibly is every circumstance
attending it imprinted on my memory! That ride home through the dark,
cool woods, with the moonlight shimmering down through the leaves, with
the merry chirp of insects in the trees, with the fresh dew on the
grass; with my heart warmer, lighter, gladder, than it had been for
years; nothing, nothing to warn me of the ruin before me! I was, except
the stirring of a new and glad emotion, as calm as Pompeii under the
shadow of Vesuvius. I passed through the iron gate in front of our
house—it swung to with a loud clang behind me. To this day the clang of
a gate sends a pang to my heart. I passed up the gravel walk between
rows of violets whose fragrance filled the air. I recollect it so
distinctly. To this hour the smell of violets makes me ill. I jumped
from my horse, and throwing the bridle to a servant who came to take it,
I hastened up the marble stairs, and into the house. The lamps were not
lighted. ‘She is enjoying the moonlight of this cool hour,’ I said, and
I passed into the parlor. The moon was shining through the two large
front windows shaded with foliage, and shining in two bright square
patches, variegated with the black shadows of the leaves on the carpet;
and the leaves in the window and their shadows on the floor trembled in
the rising breeze. At first I thought the room was vacant, but looking
around, I presently discerned the form of Fanny on a sofa in the back of
the room. She lay partly on the floor, partly on the sofa. Her dress
disordered, her hair dishevelled, her face down, her arms thrown over
her head in an attitude of the uttermost despair—of the last
abandonment. Surprised, I approached her, thinking her sick, or perhaps
sleeping. I spoke to her—she did not reply. I stooped, raised, and
kissed her. _Then_ she bounded like a shot from under my embrace, and
sank cowering in a distant part of the room. Wondering, I followed her,
but she raised, turned away her head, grinding her face into the corner,
while she threw up both arms towards me in a frantic, abjuring gesture!
I now really fancied that in the dubious light, I had mistaken some one
_else_ for Fanny; that this could not be she, but was probably some poor
mad stroller. I hastened into the hall and called for lights. They were
brought, set upon the mantel-piece, and the servant retired. I turned
towards her. God! what a thing met my view! Ashy pale, with a wild blaze
in her blue eyes, haggard and shuddering, she cowered in the corner, her
hands clasping her head, her gaze riveted in phrensied despair upon me!
I spoke to her, but she changed not her attitude. I caressed her, and
she broke forth in raving madness. God! oh God! Sophie, how can I
describe to you the grief, horror, _distraction_, with which I gathered
from her raving, the shameful story of _her_ fall and of my dishonor!
Though earth and hell swam together in my reeling reason, every fact of
the loathsome story betrayed in her phrensied remorse struck distinctly
on my ear. How the snake had glided nearer to her every day, fascinating
her imagination by his brilliancy, stealing into her bosom by his sweet
tenderness, lulling her fears and disarming her resistance by his gentle
mesmerism, winding coil after coil of his serpent fold around her, and
delaying until the last hour—the tender parting hour, the safe hour of
sorrowful, tearful adieux, and non-resistance—the _unguarded_ hour, to
strike his venomed fangs deep in her heart! How sudden was her fall—how
quick her recovery! How terrible her remorse! And I, Sophie! _I!_—I said
that earth and hell swam together in my reason! I felt a rushing and
roaring in my head and ears like the coming of many waters; the earth
rocked under my feet, and I thought the end of all things was at hand. I
suppose I fell. **** The next link in memory was a slow, feeble
returning to consciousness—more like a weak babe’s first coming into
existence than like a man’s revival. The first glimmering of sensibility
found me extended prostrated on my bed, unable to lift or turn; aye,
even to _move_ a limb. The only fluttering life seeming to linger in my
languid eyes, and in the weak breath hovering in my bosom and on my lips
like a soul ready for flight. A dreary, dreary weight that I could then
neither understand, nor throw off, lay heavy on my soul. A sorrowful,
shadowy face, like a dream of Fanny, floated past my vision. It was the
face of Raymond, my son, my constant attendant. Too slowly dawned reason
and memory on the night of my intellect to endanger a shock and a
relapse. Day by day, and hour by hour, I picked up and restrung the
broken and scattered links in the chain of circumstances; and in a few
days, before my physical powers were recovered sufficiently to allow me
to speak a consecutive sentence, or utter a word above my breath, I
understood the height and depth—the full extent of my ruin. But _she_!
where was _she_? I saw nothing of her—heard nothing of her. For many
days I dared not inquire. At last one day when Raymond was sitting by me
with his shame-bowed head leaned upon his hands, my anxiety, by intense
thought of her, had become insupportable.
“‘Raymond!’ said I.
He looked up sorrowfully.
“‘Where is your mother, my boy?’
“‘Gone!’
“‘How!’
“‘Fled!’
“‘When?’
“‘Upon the night of your attack.’
“‘Where? with whom?’
“‘We do not know.’
“‘Has any one pursued her?’
“‘No, sir.’
“‘Why did not you follow her—seek, save her?’
“‘My duty was by your bedside, my father?’
“‘Raymond! tell me! how far is this dreadful tragedy known—how far has
her frantic remorse, _my_ phrensied despair exposed us?’
“He was silent, and when I repeated and pressed the question he bowed
his young face upon his hands and wept. The tears trickled between his
fingers. I understood by his silent grief that our shame was not hidden.
After a while, ‘Raymond!’ said I. He raised his tearful face. ‘You loved
your mother?’ He sobbed aloud.
“‘Go and seek her.’
“‘My place is by your side, my father.’
“‘Go and seek your mother.’
“‘I cannot leave you yet, sir.’
“‘Go and seek and save your mother, lodge her in a place of safety, and
then return to me.’
“‘Alas! sir, you need me every moment—do not command me to leave you.’
“‘Raymond! _now_ I cannot rest until I know she is found and safe, or
_dead_, and so it is with you, boy. Raymond, do you sleep at night?’
“He shook his head mournfully—_so_ mournfully. Ah! if our betrayer could
have seen our sorrow, his heart—even _his_ heart, would have been melted
in repentance for all the wreck he had made.
“‘Raymond,’ said I, ‘she has severed the tie that bound her to _me_, but
she is your mother still—_that_ tie nor life nor death can sever. _I_
may not—_must_ not see her again; _you_ must go and seek her, find her,
and find a distant, secluded asylum for her. _You_ must tend and care
for her, and make her life as tolerable as, with her keen sensibilities,
the memory of her awful sin will permit it to be. I give her up to you.
To-morrow morning you must set out on your search.’
“He no longer opposed my wish, perhaps it was _his_ wish too, in fact.
Utterly exhausted by the conversation, I sank into silence.
“The next morning I renewed my charge to him, and, with some difficulty,
got him off. Now you will be surprised that I charged one so young, for
he was but fourteen, with such a mission, but before any other would I
have chosen that lad. Raymond was ever an earnest, thoughtful, and now a
sorrow-stricken boy. He left me the second day.
“Upon my first return to consciousness, when I was so weak, I would
sometimes recognise a neighbor, or a parishioner, by my bedside, but,
unwilling to meet his or her eye, I would close mine, and lie still; and
after that I gave orders that no one should be admitted to my chamber.
Many days passed. At last Raymond returned, with news of my poor
fugitive. Wandering towards the south, she had been arrested. Her rare
beauty, her insanity (for she had lost her reason), the mystery that
enveloped her, excited interest. She had been lodged in the —— Asylum
for the insane, and there she had been left.
“Was it strange that I felt no resentment towards her? Perhaps had I
_loved_ her more this would have been otherwise; perhaps all feeling
of anger was drowned in _humiliation_. At length I got down stairs.
It was impossible then to refuse myself to my visitors. They were my
oldest and gravest parishioners. They were a long time in breaking
the ice of the subject congealing around my heart, but when at
length it _was_ broken, the waters of sympathy flowed freely. ‘Cut
off this abomination from your house!’ ‘Amputate this polluted—this
putrid limb, though it were your right hand!’ This was their advice,
and I followed it. The necessary steps occupied me some time. The
necessity of settling my chaotic household and arranging my future
plan of living kept me busy for some weeks. Still even then, between
the pauses of practical duty, my mind would suddenly fall into
stagnation, when neither memory nor reason could be aroused, when
only _instinct_ kept me silent or sententious, lest I should expose
myself; into that terrible state when the mind hovers on the shadowy
boundary of madness—the twilight hour between the day of reason and
the night of insanity—upon the awful line dividing _conscious_ from
_un_conscious madness! But madness affects the whole system. The
blood was sent in rushing force and choking volume to my heart, and
forth again with lightning speed, in lava streams, down my veins,
impelling me to leaping phrensy! Oh! how I dreaded when this chained
demon would burst the weak fetters of my will! This dread!—this
dread! I dared not confide it to any one—dared not consult a
physician. I furtively read all the books I could upon the subject,
and took all the means I could to avert the impending—the hourly—the
momentarily impending horror! Oh, Sophie! on God’s earth there is
not a grief or terror like this; bearing a fiend in your bosom,
bound by the feeblest threads of consciousness and will—threads that
you fear and feel may be burst asunder at any moment. I walked with
reeling brain upon the slippery edge of a dizzy precipice!—I walked,
as it were, upon a mine that threatened every instant to explode!
Everywhere—at home, abroad, walking, riding, in the full glory of
noonday, in the dark watches of the night, I bore this grenade of
the bosom! In the pulpit, Sophie—in the midst of the most closely
reasoned argument, suddenly the blood would rush through my veins,
and into my head, impelling me to leap, shouting, over the
pulpit-top, and throttle some of the people before me. This
impending horror—the constant _dread_ of it, accelerated the hour of
its fall upon me. One day, late in the evening, I was riding home
with Raymond. We were, as usual, _silent_, for oh, Sophie! we sat
together long hours at home in silence—we rode together long miles
without exchanging a word. The forest-path through which we rode was
the same one I had passed in going home upon the evening of my
household wreck. The shadows were as dark in the woods, the dew was
as fresh on the grass, the chirps of the insects as blithe in the
trees, and the silvery beams of the moonlight shimmered as brightly
through the overhanging leaves. It was the same scene—the same!
Every instant the excitement was rising higher in my bosom, growing
irrepressible—uncontrollable; until, as we emerged from the
forest-path, and passed into our yard—as the iron gate swung to with
a clang—as the perfume of violets met me—as the dark front of the
house loomed up in the moonlight,—everything reproducing the scene
of that fatal evening, insanity broke forth in phrensy, and I became
a raving maniac!
“I recovered my reason to learn the value of poor Fanny’s son. I awoke
one day from a deep sleep—I awoke refreshed, with cooler blood, calmer
nerves, and clearer brain, than I had known for weeks, and with a full
consciousness of all that had passed up to the hour of my loss of
self-control. Raymond was sitting by me.
“‘Raymond, what has happened?’ inquired I.
“‘You have been very ill, my father.’
“‘I have been MAD!—I know that right well, my boy—but tell me, how long
did it last? what did I do? and who was with me?’ This last was the most
important question—my heart stopped its pulsations until he answered:
“‘Your attack spent its _fury in half an hour_, father—you hurt no one
but yourself—and—no one witnessed your—your _illness_ but myself and the
waiter who assisted me in getting you up to bed.’
“‘And what did you then do? what did you give me?’
“‘Nothing, father; nature did everything, and did it well—art nothing.
Your fury spent itself as a storm spends itself—-by raging—and then it
subsided, as a storm subsides, into perfect calmness; you fell into a
deep sleep of exhaustion, which lasted all last night and all to-day,
from which you have but just awaked; and you feel better _for_ the
attack, do you not, father? It has expended the gathering vapors and
gloom of many weeks, and you feel better?’
“‘Yes, yes, quite well, calm and clear-headed; but, Raymond, with this
interregnum in my memory, and this great change in my feelings, it seems
to me that a long, long time, has intervened since my attack; _how_ long
has the time really been?’
“‘Not quite twenty-four hours.’
“‘Has any one called to-day?’
“‘No one.’
“‘Then none know of this except yourself?’
“‘No, sir, none know of this except myself and the waiter, who does not
more than half comprehend it, and who, besides, is no gossip.’
“‘You understand that I _wish_ no one to know of it?’
“‘I understand that perfectly, my father; and it shall be my care to
guard your secret.’
“It was some time after this that I found how much I had hurt Raymond by
a furious blow on the chest dealt in my phrensy.
“From that time, Sophie, my disease became periodical; Raymond was my
constant attendant. These repeated attacks of lunacy impaired my temper;
I became gloomy, irascible, misanthropic. My attacks of phrensy became
less frequent and violent, but my gloom deepened as a natural
consequence; for unless I could have been _cured_ it was even _better_
that these regular storms should disperse the unwholesome vapors of my
mind. There is a wonderful analogy between the soul and the
atmosphere—storms clear both—though in storms, both mental and
atmospheric, there is sometimes much damage done. Well! the storms had
well nigh ceased, but the gloom gathered thicker and thicker in my mind,
and working up through it was one irrational wish—a desire to re-marry;
and with this returned in all its former force my idiosyncrasy—of
seeking the reluctant—pursuing the flying—catching the resisting—and in
the darkening of my gloom this deepened into the desire of _torturing
the victim_! You shudder, Sophie! but this was insanity. Every passion
in its excess is moral insanity—-every exaggerated idiosyncrasy is
mental insanity; and in madness, brought about by any other external
cause, the master passion, or the distinguishing idiosyncrasy, if not
entirely _reversed_, is exaggerated to phrensy. _My_ idiosyncrasy was
exaggerated—because morbid. I had left my pulpit fearing that if I did
not my pulpit would eject _me_. I had shut myself up in the villa, and
brooded over my wish, and the readiest way of accomplishing it. At this
time I received a letter from Mr. May, inquiring the reason of my
resignation of my pulpit—a notice of which he had seen in the ‘Church
Organ.’ I replied ‘domestic affliction,’—‘the _loss_ of my wife,’—she
_was_ lost—but need I blazon my dishonor by revealing the _manner_ of
her loss? _He_ understood, simple old man! that she was _dead_, and
there he left it. The correspondence ceased. A few months from that time
I received at the same moment the news of his death and a call to fill
his pulpit. I accepted it, glad to escape from my neighborhood. I sent
Raymond off to college—shut up the villa, leaving it in charge of old
Jupiter, who lived at a porter’s lodge at the gate, and I came down
here, full of my purpose of finding another wife. You, Sophie, at first
sight, struck my fancy; as usual with my peculiar mood of love, your
shrinking from me but lured me to the chase—but added zest to the idea
of catching you; your avowed dislike and shuddering antipathy but served
to intensify the desire to seize and torture you—forgive me, Sophie!
this was insanity. Though constantly threatened with an attack of
phrensy, I had not one single one after leaving the scene of my sorrows.
I married you, Sophie, as I had married Fanny—in spite of your tears and
prayers—in defiance of your antipathy and against your will. When I had
thought it was safe to let him know it, when he could no longer
interfere, or at least when I thought that there was no _time_ left for
him to reach here in season,—I wrote and told Raymond—paying him the
compliment of the _form_ of an invitation—and telling him in the same
letter of the escape, flight, and suicide of his mother. He did not come
in season, as you know—though he grazed the edge of ‘the nick of time.’
“Now, Sophie, for another revulsion of feeling. From the time I first
saw you, as I said, the idea of marrying you interested and amused
me—your aversion stimulated my stagnant blood agreeably. I _lived_ in
the thought of getting you into my power—life _came_ and waned with this
thought. As the day of our marriage approached your antipathy thoroughly
aroused me—I gloated over the idea of tormenting and torturing you. But
when our marriage day drew _very_ near, you fell into apathy! That
disappointed me. I thought you were going to die on my hands. My
interest in you waned with your non-resistance. The wedding-day, the
evening came, and I married you. You were then so still in your
despair—so cold—so dead!—I felt swindled out of my enjoyment, and half
regretted my bargain. I felt as the tyrant must feel when his victim on
the rack expires before half the exquisite torments or the crowning
torture is tried and suffered. Don’t shudder now, Sophie! I _was
insane_!
“Well, Sophie, I left your side to have a conversation with Dr.
Otterback. I left you almost expiring. When I saw you again, life and
light had returned to you. When you came up to me and laid your fair
hand on my arm, so softly, and spoke to me so kindly, I gazed in wonder
on your face; and, Sophie, the angel looking through your eyes subdued
me. Your after kindness melted me into penitence. Still there were
adverse influences at work. A mind shaken to its foundation, as mine had
been, was not to be calmed soon, or stay calm long. The sudden sight of
Raymond, the image of his mother, in her perfect beauty, connecting the
present with the past so painfully, affected me more than the sight of
Fanny herself had done. Alas! poor Fanny had been scarcely recognisable.
I could scarcely realize the identity of that haggard wanderer of the
heath with the resplendent beauty of the Villa. But her image lived
again in Raymond. Never had the extraordinary resemblance struck me so
forcibly, as when, after a long absence from _both_, I again saw
Raymond. The associations conjured up, brought on that violent attack of
phrensy that seized me at the Hall. Well, Sophie! my guardian angel, you
have known all my moods since then. You know how your love has subdued
my hate—your heaven redeemed my hell—your angel converted my demon.
Enough, Sophie! your probation is almost over. My earthly life is
drawing near its close. When I am gone, Raymond will be as a brother to
you. Raymond is wealthy. Never since her separation from me have I
appropriated a dollar of the fortune that came with his mother. I could
not bear to do it. Now, dear Sophie! I am very tired; close the
shutters, draw the curtains and leave the room, that I may sleep while
you take some relaxation and refreshment.”