Griffith's friends laughed heartily with him while he was getting drunk;
and when he had got drunk, they laughed still louder, only at him.
They "knocked him down" for a song; and he sang a rather Anacreontic one
very melodiously, and so loud that certain of the servants, listening
outside, derived great delectation from it; and Neville applauded
ironically.
Soon after, they "knocked him down" for a story; and as it requires more
brains to tell a story than to sing a song, the poor butt made an ass of
himself. He maundered and wandered, and stopped, and went on, and lost
one thread and took up another, and got into a perfect maze. And while
he was thus entangled, a servant came in and brought him a note, and put
it in his hand. The unhappy narrator received it with a sapient nod, but
was too polite, or else too stupid, to open it, so closed his fingers on
it, and went maundering on till his story trickled into the sand of the
desert, and somehow ceased; for it could not be said to end, being a
thing without head or tail.
He sat down amidst derisive cheers. About five minutes afterwards, in
some intermittent flash of reason, he found he had got hold of
something. He opened his hand, and lo, a note! On this he chuckled
unreasonably, and distributed sage, cunning winks around, as if he, by
special ingenuity, had caught a nightingale, or the like; then, with
sudden hauteur and gravity, proceeded to examine his prize.
But he knew the handwriting at once; and it gave him a galvanic shock
that half sobered him for the moment.
He opened the note, and spelled it with great difficulty. It was
beautifully written, in long, clear letters; but then those letters kept
dancing so!
"I much desire to speak to you before 'tis too late, but can
think of no way save one. I lie in the turreted room: come
under my window at nine of the clock; and prithee come sober,
if you respect yourself, or
"KATE."
Griffith put the note in his pocket, and tried to think; but he could
not think to much purpose. Then this made him suspect he was drunk. Then
he tried to be sober; but he found he could not. He sat in a sort of
stupid agony, with Love and Drink battling for his brain. It was piteous
to see the poor fool's struggles to regain the reason he had so madly
parted with. He could not do it; and when he found that, he took up a
finger-glass, and gravely poured the contents upon his head.
At this there was a burst of laughter.
This irritated Mr. Gaunt; and, with that rapid change of sentiments
which marks the sober savage and the drunken European, he offered to
fight a gentleman he had been hitherto holding up to the company as his
best friend. But his best friend (a very distant acquaintance) was by
this time as tipsy as himself, and offered a piteous disclaimer, mingled
with tears; and these maudlin drops so affected Griffith that he flung
his one available arm round his best friend's head, and wept in turn;
and down went both their lachrymose, empty noddles on the table.
Griffith's remained there; but his best friend extricated himself, and,
shaking his skull, said, dolefully, "He is very drunk." This notable
discovery, coming from such a quarter, caused considerable merriment.
"Let him alone," said an old toper; and Griffith remained a good hour
with his head on the table. Meantime the other gentlemen soon put it out
of their power to ridicule him on the score of intoxication.
Griffith, keeping quiet, got a little better, and suddenly started up
with a notion he was to go to Kate this very moment. He muttered an
excuse, and staggered to a glass door that led to the lawn. He opened
this door, and rushed out into the open air. He thought it would set him
all right; but, instead of that, it made him so much worse that
presently his legs came to a misunderstanding, and he measured his
length on the ground, and could not get up again, but kept slipping
down.
Upon this he groaned and lay quiet.
Now there was a foot of snow on the ground; and it melted about
Griffith's hot temples and flushed face, and mightily refreshed and
revived him.
He sat up and kissed Kate's letter, and Love began to get the upper hand
of Liquor a little.
Finally he got up and half strutted, half staggered, to the turret, and
stood under Kate's window.
The turret was covered with luxuriant ivy, and that ivy with snow. So
the glass of the window was set in a massive frame of winter; but a
bright fire burned inside the room, and this set the panes all aflame.
It was cheery and glorious to see the window glow like a sheet of
transparent fire in its deep frame of snow; but Griffith could not
appreciate all that. He stood there a sorrowful man. The wine he had
taken to drown his despair had lost its stimulating effect, and had
given him a heavy head, but left him his sick heart.
He stood and puzzled his drowsy faculties why Kate had sent for him.
Was it to bid him good by forever, or to lessen his misery by telling
him she would not marry another? He soon gave up cudgelling his
enfeebled brains. Kate was a superior being to him, and often said
things, and did things, that surprised him. She had sent for him, and
that was enough. He should see her and speak to her once more, at all
events. He stood, alternately nodding and looking up at her glowing
room, and longing for its owner to appear. But as Bacchus had inspired
him to mistake eight o'clock for nine, and as she was not a votary of
Bacchus, she did not appear; and he stood there till he began to shiver.
The shadow of a female passed along the wall; and Griffith gave a great
start. Then he heard the fire poked. Soon after he saw the shadow again;
but it had a large servant's cap on: so his heart had beaten high for
Mary or Susan. He hung his head disappointed; and, holding on by the
ivy, fell a nodding again.
By and by one of the little casements was opened softly. He looked up,
and there was the right face peering out.
O, what a picture she was in the moonlight and the firelight! They both
fought for that fair head, and each got a share of it: the full moon's
silvery beams shone on her rose-like cheeks and lilified them a shade,
and lit her great gray eyes and made them gleam astoundingly; but the
ruby firelight rushed at her from behind, and flowed over her golden
hair, and reddened and glorified it till it seemed more than mortal. And
all this in a very picture-frame of snow.
Imagine, then, how sweet and glorious she glowed on him who loved her,
and who looked at her perhaps for the last time.
The sight did wonders to clear his head; he stood open-mouthed, with his
heart beating. She looked him all over a moment. "Ah!" said she. Then,
quietly, "I am so glad you are come." Then, kindly and regretfully, "How
pale you look! you are unhappy."
This greeting, so gentle and kind, overpowered Griffith. His heart was
too full to speak.
Kate waited a moment; and then, as he did not reply to her, she began to
plead to him. "I hope you are not angry with _me_," she said. "_I_ did
not want him to leave me your estates. I would not rob you of them for
the world, if I had my way."
"Angry with you!" said Griffith. "I'm not such a villain. Mr. Charlton
did the right thing, and--" He could say no more.
"I do not think so," said Kate. "But don't you fret: all shall be
settled to your satisfaction. I cannot quite love you, but I have a
sincere affection for you; and so I ought. Cheer up, dear Griffith;
don't you be down-hearted about what has happened to-day."
Griffith smiled. "I don't feel unhappy," he said; "I did feel as if my
heart was broken. But then you seemed parted from me. Now we are
together, I feel as happy as ever. Mistress, don't you ever shut that
window and leave me in the dark again. Let me stand and look at your
sweet face all night, and I shall be the happiest man in Cumberland."
"Ay," said Kate, blushing at his ardor; "happy for a single night; but
when I go away you will be in the dumps again, and perhaps get tipsy; as
if that could mend matters! Nay, I must set your happiness on stronger
legs than that. Do you know I have got permission to undo this cruel
will, and let you have Bolton Hall and Hernshaw again?"
Griffith looked pleased, but rather puzzled.
Kate went on, but not so glibly now. "However," said she, a little
nervously, "there is one condition to it that will cost us both some
pain. If you consent to accept these two estates from me, who don't
value them one straw, why then--"
"Well, what?" he gasped.
"Why, then, my poor Griffith, we shall be bound in honor--you and I--not
to meet for some months, perhaps for a whole year: in one word,--do not
hate me,--not till you can bear to see me--another--man's--wife."
The murder being out, she hid her face in her hands directly, and in
that attitude awaited his reply.
Griffith stood petrified a moment; and I don't think his intellects were
even yet quite clear enough to take it all in at once. But at last he
did comprehend it, and when he did, he just uttered a loud cry of agony,
and then turned his back on her without a word.
* * * * *
Man does not speak by words alone. A mute glance of reproach has ere now
pierced the heart a tirade would have left untouched; and even an
inarticulate cry may utter volumes.
Such an eloquent cry was that with which Griffith Gaunt turned his back
upon the angelical face he adored, and the soft, persuasive tongue.
There was agony, there was shame, there was wrath, all in that one
ejaculation.
It frightened Kate. She called him back. "Don't leave me so," she said.
"I know I have affronted you; but I meant all for the best. Do not let
us part in anger."
At this Griffith returned in violent agitation. "It is your fault for
making me speak," he cried. "I was going away without a word, as a man
should, that is insulted by a woman. You heartless girl! What! you bid
me sell you to that man for two dirty farms! O, well you know Bolton and
Hernshaw were but the steps by which I hoped to climb to you: and now
you tell me to part with you, and take those miserable acres instead of
my darling. Ah, mistress, you have never loved, or you would hate
yourself and despise yourself for what you have done. Love! if you had
known what that word means, you couldn't look in my face and stab me to
the heart like this. God forgive you! And sure I hope he will; for,
after all, it is not _your_ fault that you were born without a heart.
WHY, KATE, YOU ARE CRYING."