CONSTANCE MAKES A DISCOVERY THAT TOUCHES AND ENLIGHTENS HER AS TO
GODOLPHIN’S NATURE.--AN EVENT, ALTHOUGH IN PRIVATE LIFE, NOT WITHOUT ITS
INTEREST.
If Constance most bitterly reproached herself, or rather her slackened
nerves, her breaking health, that she had before another--that other
too, not of her own sex--betrayed her dependence upon even her husband’s
heart for happiness; if her conscience instantly took alarm at the
error (and it was indeed a grave one) which had revealed to any man her
domestic griefs; yet, on the other hand, she could not control the
wild thrill of delight with which she recalled those words that had so
solemnly assured her she was still beloved by Godolphin. She had a firm
respect in Radclyffe’s penetration and his sincerity, and knew that he
was one neither to deceive her nor be deceived himself. His advice, too,
came home to her. Had she, indeed, with sufficient address, sufficient
softness, insinuated herself into Godolphin’s nature? Neglected herself,
had she not neglected in return? She asked herself this question, and
was never weary of examining her past conduct. That Radclyffe, the
austere and chilling Radclyffe, entertained for her any feeling warmer
than friendship, she never for an instant suspected; that suspicion
alone would have driven him from her presence for ever. And although
there had been a time, in his bright and exulting youth, when Radclyffe
had not been without those arts which win, in the opposite sex,
affection from aversion itself, those arts doubled, ay, a hundredfold,
in their fascination, would not have availed him with the pure but
disappointed Constance, even had a sense of right and wrong very
different from the standard he now acknowledged permitted him to exert
them. So that his was rather the sacrifice of impulse, than of any
triumph that impulse could afterwards have gained him.
Many, and soft and sweet were now the recollections of Constance. Her
heart flew back to her early love among the shades of Wendover; to the
first confession of the fair enthusiastic boy, when he offered at her
shrine a mind, a genius, a heart capable of fruits which the indolence
of after-life, and the lethargy of disappointed hope, had blighted
before their time.
If he was now so deaf to what she considered the nobler, because more
stirring, excitements of life, was she not in some measure answerable
for the supineness? Had there not been a day in which he had vowed to
toil, to labour, to sacrifice the very character of his mind, for a
union with her? Was she, after all, was she right to adhere so rigidly
to her father’s dying words, and to that vow afterwards confirmed by her
own pride and bitterness of soul? She looked to her father’s portrait
for an answer; and that daring and eloquent face seemed, for the first
time, cold and unanswering to her appeal.
In such meditations the hours passed, and midnight came on without
Constance having quitted her apartment. She now summoned her woman, and
inquired if Godolphin was at home. He had come in about an hour since,
and, complaining of fatigue, had retired to rest. Constance again
dismissed her maid, and stole to his apartment. He was already asleep,
his cheek rested on his arm, and his hair fell wildly over a brow that
now worked under the influence of his dreams. Constance put the light
softly down, and seating herself beside him, watched over a sleep which,
if it had come suddenly on him, was not the less unquiet and disturbed.
At length he muttered, “Yes, Lucilla, yes; I tell you, you are avenged.
I have not forgotten you! I have not forgotten that I betrayed, deserted
you! but was it my fault? No, no! Yet I have not the less sought to
forget it. These poor excesses,--these chilling gaieties,--were they not
incurred for you?--and now you come--you--ah, no--spare me!”
Shocked and startled, Constance drew back. Here was a new key to
Godolphin’s present life, his dissipation, his thirst for pleasure. Had
he indeed sought to lull the stings of conscience? And she, instead
of soothing, of reconciling him to the past, had she left him alone
to struggle with bitter and unresting thoughts, and to contrast the
devotion of the one lost with the indifference of the one gained? She
crept back to her own chamber, to commune with her heart and be still.
“My dear Percy,” said she, the next day, when he carelessly sauntered
into her boudoir before he rode out, “I have a favour to ask of you.”
“Who ever denied a favour to Lady Erpingham?”
“Not you, certainly; but my favour is a great one.”
“It is granted.”
“Let us pass the summer in ----shire.”
Godolphin’s brow clouded.
“At Wendover Castle?” said he, after a pause.
“We have never been there since our marriage,” said Constance evasively.
“Humph!--as you will.”
“It was the place,” said Constance, “where you, Percy, first told me you
loved!”
The tone of his wife’s voice struck on the right chord in Godolphin’s
breast; he looked up, and saw her eyes full of tears and fixed upon him.
“Why, Constance,” said he, much affected, “who would have thought that
you still cherished that remembrance?”
“Ah! when shall I forget it?” said Constance; “then you loved me!”
“And was rejected.”
“Hush! but I believe now that I was wrong.”
“No, Constance; you were wrong, for your own happiness, that the
rejection was not renewed.”
“Percy!”
“Constance!” and in the accent of that last word there was something
that encouraged Constance, and she threw herself into Godolphin’s arms,
and murmured:--
“If I have offended, forgive me; let us be to each other what we once
were.”
Words like these from the lips of one in whom such tender supplications,
such feminine yearnings, were not common, subdued Godolphin at once.
He folded her in his arms, and kissing her passionately, whispered, “Be
always thus, Constance, and you will be more to me than ever.”