NATURE'S MELODRAMA.
What, then, had become of Elsley? And whence had he written the fatal
letter? He had hurried up the high road for half an hour and more, till
the valley on the left sloped upward more rapidly, in dark dreary bogs,
the moonlight shining on their runnels; while the mountain on his right
sloped downwards more rapidly in dark dreary down, strewn with rocks
which stood out black against the sky. He was nearing the head of the
watershed; soon he saw slate roofs glittering in the moonlight, and
found himself at the little inn of Pen-y-gwryd, at the meeting of the
three great valleys, the central heart of the mountains.
And a genial, jovial little heart it is, and an honest, kindly little
heart too, with warm life-blood within. So it looked that night, with
every window red with comfortable light, and a long stream of glare
pouring across the road from the open door, gilding the fir-tree tops in
front: but its geniality only made him shudder. He had been there more
than once, and knew the place and the people; and knew, too, that of all
people in the world, they were the least like him. He hurried past the
doorway, and caught one glimpse of the bright kitchen. A sudden thought
struck him. He would go in and write his letter there. But not yet--he
could not go in yet; for through the open door came some sweet Welsh
air, so sweet, that even he paused to listen. Men were singing in three
parts, in that rich metallic temper of voice, and that perfect time and
tune, which is the one gift still left to that strange Cymry race, worn
out with the long burden of so many thousand years. He knew the air; it
was "The Rising of the Lark." Heavens! what a bitter contrast to his own
thoughts! But he stood rooted, as if spell-bound, to hear it to the end.
The lark's upward flight was over; and Elsley heard him come quivering
down from heaven's gate, fluttering, sinking, trilling self-complacently,
springing aloft in one bar, only to sink lower in the next, and call
more softly to his brooding mate below; till, worn out with his ecstasy,
he murmured one last sigh of joy, and sank into the nest. The picture
flashed through Elsley's brain as swiftly as the notes did through his
ears. He breathed more freely when it vanished with the sounds. He
strode hastily in, and down the little passage to the kitchen.
It was a low room, ceiled with dark beams, from which hung bacon and
fishing-rods, harness and drying stockings, and all the miscellanea of a
fishing inn kept by a farmer, and beneath it the usual happy, hearty,
honest group. There was Harry Owen, bland and stalwart, his baby in his
arms, smiling upon the world in general; old Mrs. Pritchard, bending
over the fire, putting the last touch to one of those miraculous
soufflets, compact of clouds and nectar, which transport alike palate
and fancy, at the first mouthful, from Snowdon to Belgrave Square. A
sturdy fair-haired Saxon Gourbannelig sat with his back to the door, and
two of the beautiful children on his knee, their long locks flowing over
the elbows of his shooting jacket, as, with both arms round them, he
made Punch for them with his handkerchief and his fingers, and chattered
to them in English, while they chattered in Welsh. By him sat another
Englishman, to whom the three tuneful Snowdon guides, their music-score
upon their knees, sat listening approvingly, as he rolled out, with
voice as of a jolly blackbird, or jollier monk of old, the good old
Wessex song:--
"My dog he has his master's nose,
To smell a knave through silken hose;
If friends or honest men go by,
Welcome, quoth my dog and I!
"Of foreign tongues let scholars brag,
With fifteen names for a pudding-bag:
Two tongues I know ne'er told a lie;
And their wearers be, my dog and I!"
"That ought to be Harry's song, and the colly's too, eh?" said he,
pointing to the dear old dog, who sat with his head on Owen's knee--"eh,
my men? Here's a health to the honest man and his dog!"
And all laughed and drank; while Elsley's dark face looked in at the
doorway, and half turned to escape. Handsome lady-like Mrs. Owen,
bustling out of the kitchen with a supper-tray, ran full against him,
and uttered a Welsh scream.
"Show me a room, and bring me a pen and paper," said he; and then
started in his turn, as all had started at him; for the two Englishmen
looked round, and, behold, to his disgust, the singer was none other
than Naylor; the actor of Punch was Wynd.
To have found his _bêtes noires_ even here, and at such a moment! And
what was worse, to hear Mrs. Owen say,--"We have no room, sir, unless
these gentlemen--"
"Of course," said Wynd, jumping up, a child under each arm. "Mr.
Vavasour! we shall be most happy to have your company,--for a week if
you will!"
"Ten minutes' solitude is all I ask, sir, if I am not intruding too
far."
"Two hours, if you like. We'll stay here. Mrs. Owen,--the thicker the
merrier." But Elsley had vanished into a chamber bestrewn with plaids,
pipes, hob-nail boots, fishing-tackle, mathematical books, scraps of
ore, and the wild confusion of a gownsman's den.
"The party is taken ill with a poem," said Wynd.
Naylor stuck out his heavy under-lip and glanced sidelong at his friend.
"With something worse, Ned. That man's eye and voice had something
uncanny in them. Mellot said he would go crazed some day; and be hanged
if I don't think he is so now."
Another five minutes, and Elsley rang the bell violently for hot
brandy-and-water.
Mrs. Owen came back looking a little startled, a letter in her hand.
"The gentleman had drunk the liquor off at one draught, and ran out of
the house like a wild man. Harry Owen must go down to Beddgelert
instantly with the letter; and there was five shillings to pay for all."
Harry Owen rises, like a strong and patient beast of burden, ready for
any amount of walking, at any hour in the twenty-four. He has been up
Snowdon once to-day already. He is going up again at twelve to-night,
with a German who wants to see the sun rise; he deputes that office to
John Roberts and strides out.
"Which way did the gentleman go, Mrs. Owen?" asks Naylor.
"Capel Curig road."
Naylor whispers to Wynd, who sets the two little girls on the table, and
hurries out with him. They look up the road, and see no one; run a
couple of hundred yards, where they catch a sight of the next turn,
clear in the moonlight. There is no one on the road.
"Run to the bridge, Wynd," whispers Naylor. "He may have thrown himself
over."
"Tally ho!" whispers Wynd in return, laying his hand on Naylor's arm,
and pointing to the left of the road.
A hundred yards from them, over the boggy upland, among scattered
boulders, a dark figure is moving. Now he stops short, gesticulating;
turns right and left irresolutely. At last he hurries on and upward; he
is running, springing from stone to stone.
"There is but one thing, Wynd. After him, or he'll drown himself in Llyn
Cwn Fynnon."
"No, he's striking to the right. Can he be going up the Glyder?"
"We'll see that in five minutes. All in the day's work, my boy. I could
go up Mont Blanc with such a dinner in me."
The two gallant men run in, struggle into their wet boots again, and
provisioned with meat and bread, whiskey, tobacco, and plaids, are away
upon Elsley's tracks, having left Mrs. Owen disconsolate by their
announcement, that a sudden fancy to sleep on the Glyder has seized
them. Nothing more will they tell her, or any one; being gentlemen,
however much slang they may talk in private.
Elsley left the door of Pen-y-gwryd, careless whither he went, if he
went only far enough.
In front of him rose the Glyder Vawr, its head shrouded in soft mist,
through which the moonlight gleamed upon the chequered quarries of that
enormous desolation, the dead bones of the eldest-born of time. A wild
longing seized him; he would escape up thither; up into those clouds, up
anywhere to be alone--alone with his miserable self. That was dreadful
enough: but less dreadful than having a companion,--ay, even a stone by
him--which could remind him of the scene which he had left; even remind
him that there was another human being on earth beside himself. Yes,--to
put that cliff between him and all the world! Away he plunged from the
high road, splashing over boggy uplands, scrambling among scattered
boulders, across a stony torrent bed, and then across another and
another:--when would he reach that dark marbled wall, which rose into
the infinite blank,--looking within a stone-throw of him, and yet no
nearer after he had walked a mile?
He reached it at last, and rushed up the talus of boulders, springing
from stone to stone; till his breath failed him, and he was forced to
settle into a less frantic pace. But upward he would go, and upward he
went, with a strength which he never had felt before. Strong? How should
he not be strong, while every vein felt filled with molten lead; while
some unseen power seemed not so much to attract him upwards, as to drive
him by magical repulsion from all that he had left below?
So upward and upward ever, driven on by the terrible gad-fly, like Io of
old he went; stumbling upwards along torrent beds of slippery slate,
writhing himself upward through crannies where the waterfall splashed
cold upon his chest and face, yet could not cool the inward fire;
climbing, hand and knee, up cliffs of sharp-edged rock; striding over
downs where huge rocks lay crouched in the grass, like fossil monsters
of some ancient world, and seemed to stare at him with still and angry
brows. Upward still, to black terraces of lava, standing out hard and
black against the grey cloud, gleaming like iron in the moonlight, stair
above stair, like those over which Vathek and the Princess climbed up to
the halls of Eblis. Over their crumbling steps, up through their cracks
and crannies, out upon a dreary slope of broken stones, and then,--
before he dives upward into the cloud ten yards above his head,--one
breathless look back upon the world.
The horizontal curtain of mist; gauzy below, fringed with white tufts
and streamers, deepening above into the blackness of utter night. Below
it a long gulf of soft yellow haze in which, as in a bath of gold, lie
delicate bars of far-off western cloud; and the faint glimmer of the
western sea, above long knotted spurs of hill, in deepest shades, like a
bunch of purple grapes flecked here and there from behind with gleams of
golden light; and beneath them again, the dark woods sleeping over
Gwynnant, and their dark double sleeping in the bright lake below.
On the right hand Snowdon rises. Vast sheets of utter blackness--vast
sheets of shining light. He can see every crag which juts from the green
walls of Galt-y-Wennalt; and far past it into the Great Valley of Cwn
Dyli; and then the red peak, now as black as night, shuts out the world
with its huge mist-topped cone. But on the left hand all is deepest
shade. From the highest saw-edges, where Moel Meirch cuts the golden
sky, down to the very depth of the abyss, all is lustrous darkness,
sooty, and yet golden still. Let the darkness lie upon it for ever!
Hidden be those woods where she stood an hour ago! Hidden that road down
which, even now, they may be pacing home together!--Curse the thought!
He covers his face in his hands, and shudders in every limb.
He lifts his hands from his eyes at last:--what has befallen?
Before the golden haze a white veil is falling fast. Sea, mountain,
lake, are vanishing, fading as in a dream. Soon he can see nothing, but
the twinkle of a light in Pen-y-gwryd, a thousand feet below; happy
children are nestling there in innocent sleep. Jovial voices are
chatting round the fire. What has he to do with youth, and health, and
joy? Lower, lower, ye clouds!--Shut out that insolent and intruding
spark, till nothing be seen but the silver sheet of Cwm Fynnon, and the
silver zig-zag lines which wander into it among black morass, while down
the mountain side go, softly sliding, troops of white mist-angels.
Softly they slide, swift and yet motionless, as if by some inner will,
which needs no force of limbs; gliding gently round the crags, diving
gently off into the abyss, their long white robes trailing about their
feet in upward-floating folds. "Let us go hence," they seem to whisper
to the God-forsaken, as legends say they whispered, when they left their
doomed shrine in old Jerusalem. Let the white fringe fall between him
and the last of that fair troop; let the grey curtain follow, the black
pall above descend; till he is alone in darkness that may be felt, and
in the shadow of death.
Now he is safe at last; hidden from all living things--hidden it may be,
from God; for at least God is hidden from him. He has desired to be
alone: and he is alone; the centre of the universe, if universe there
be. All created things, suns and planets, seem to revolve round him, and
he a point of darkness, not of light. He seems to float self-poised in
the centre of the boundless nothing, upon an ell-broad slab of stone--
and yet not even on that: for the very ground on which he stands he does
not feel. He does not feel the mist which wets his cheek, the blood
which throbs within his veins. He only is; and there is none beside.
Horrible thought! Permitted but to few, and to them--thank God!--but
rarely. For two minutes of that absolute self-isolation would bring
madness; if, indeed, it be not the very essence of madness itself.
There he stood; he knew not how long; without motion, without thought,
without even rage or hate, now--in one blank paralysis of his whole
nature; conscious only of self, and of a dull, inward fire, as if his
soul were a dark vault, lighted with lurid smoke.
* * * * *
What was that? He started: shuddered--as well he might. Had he seen
heaven opened? or another place? So momentary was the vision, that he
scarce knew what he saw. There it was again! Lasting but for a moment: but
long enough to let him see the whole western heaven transfigured into
one sheet of pale blue gauze, and before it Snowdon towering black as
ink, with every saw and crest cut out, hard and terrible, against the
lightning-glare:--and then the blank of darkness.
Again! The awful black giant, towering high in air, before the gates of
that blue abyss of flame: but a black crown of cloud has settled upon
his head; and out of it the lightning sparks leap to and fro, ringing
his brows with a coronet of fire.
Another moment, and the roar of that great battle between earth and
heaven crashed full on Elsley's ears.
He heard it leap from Snowdon, sharp and rattling, across the gulf
toward him, till it crashed full upon the Glyder overhead, and rolled
and flapped from crag to crag, and died away along the dreary downs. No!
There it boomed out again, thundering full against Siabod on the left;
and Siabod tossed it on to Moel Meirch, who answered from all her clefts
and peaks with a long confused battle-growl, and then tossed it across
to Aran; and Aran, with one dull, bluff report from her flat cliff, to
nearer Lliwedd; till, worn out with the long bufferings of that giant
ring, it sank and died on Gwynnant far below--but ere it died, another
and another thunder-crash burst, sharper and nearer every time, to hurry
round the hills after the one which roared before it.
Another minute, and the blue glare filled the sky once more: but no
black Titan towered before it now. The storm had leapt Llanberris pass,
and all around Elsley was one howling chaos of cloud, and rain, and
blinding flame. He turned and fled again.
By the sensation of his feet, he knew that he was going up hill; and if
he but went upward, he cared not whither he went. The rain gushed
through, where the lightning pierced the cloud, in drops like musket
balls. He was drenched to the skin in a moment; dazzled and giddy from
the flashes; stunned by the everlasting roar, peal over-rushing peal,
echo out-shooting echo, till rocks and air quivered alike beneath the
continuous battle-cannonade.--"What matter? What fitter guide for such a
path as mine than the blue lightning flashes?"
Poor wretch! He had gone out of his way for many a year, to give himself
up, a willing captive, to the melodramatic view of Nature, and had let
sights and sounds, not principles and duties, mould his feelings for
him: and now, in his utter need and utter weakness, he had met her in a
mood which was too awful for such as he was to resist. The Nemesis had
come; and swept away helplessly, without faith and hope, by those
outward impressions of things on which he had feasted his soul so long,
he was the puppet of his own eyes and ears; the slave of glare and
noise.
Breathless, but still untired, he toiled up a steep incline, where he
could feel beneath him neither moss nor herb. Now and then his feet
brushed through a soft tuft of parsley fern: but soon even that sign of
vegetation ceased; his feet only rasped over rough bare rock, and he was
alone in a desert of stone.
What was that sudden apparition above him, seen for a moment dim and
gigantic through the mist, hid the next in darkness? The next flash
showed him a line of obelisks, like giants crouching side by side,
staring down on him from the clouds. Another five minutes, he was at
their feet, and past them; to see above them again another line of awful
watchers through the storms and rains of many a thousand years, waiting,
grim and silent, like those doomed senators in the Capitol of Rome, till
their own turn should come, and the last lightning stroke hurl them too
down, to lie for ever by their fallen brothers, whose mighty bones
bestrewed the screes below.
He groped his way between them; saw some fifty yards beyond a higher
peak; gained it by fierce struggles and many falls; saw another beyond
that; and, rushing down and up two slopes of moss, reached a region
where the upright lava-ledges had been split asunder into chasms,
crushed together again into caves, toppled over each other, hurled up
into spires, in such chaotic confusion, that progress seemed impossible.
A flash of lightning revealed a lofty cairn above his head. There was
yet, then, a higher point! He would reach it, if he broke every limb in
the attempt! and madly he hurried on, feeling his way from ledge to
ledge, squeezing himself through crannies, crawling on hands and knees
along the sharp chines of the rocks, till he reached the foot of the
cairn; climbed it, and threw himself at full length on the summit of the
Glyder Vawr.
An awful place it always is; and Elsley saw it at an awful time, as the
glare unveiled below him a sea of rock-waves, all sharp on edge,
pointing toward him on every side: or rather one wave-crest of a sea;
for twenty yards beyond, all sloped away into the abysmal dark.
Terrible were those rocks below; and ten times more terrible as seen
through the lurid glow of his distempered brain. All the weird peaks and
slabs seemed pointing up at him: sharp-toothed jaws gaped upward--
tongues hissed upward--arms pointed upward--hounds leaped upward--
monstrous snake-heads peered upward out of cracks and caves. Did he not
see them move, writhe? or was it the ever-shifting light of the flashes?
Did he not hear them howl, yell at him? or was it but the wind, tortured
in their labyrinthine caverns?
The next moment, and all was dark again; but the images which had been
called up remained, and fastened on his brain, and grew there; and when,
in the light of the next flash, the scene returned, he could see the red
lips of the phantom hounds, the bright eyes of the phantom snakes; the
tongues wagged in mockery; the hands brandished great stones to hurl at
him; the mountain-top was instinct with fiendish life,--a very
Blocksberg of all hideous shapes and sins.
And yet he did not shrink. Horrible it was; he was going mad before it.
And yet he took a strange and fierce delight in making it more horrible;
in maddening himself yet more and more; in clothing those fantastic
stones with every fancy which could inspire another man with dread. But
he had no dread. Perfect rage, like perfect love, casts out fear. He
rejoiced in his own misery, in his own danger. His life hung on a
thread; any instant might hurl him from that cairn, a blackened corpse.
What better end? Let it come! He was Prometheus on the peak of Caucasus,
hurling defiance at the unjust Jove! His hopes, his love, his very
honour--curse it!--ruined! Let the lightning stroke come! He were a
coward to shrink from it. Let him face the worst, unprotected,
bare-headed, naked, and do battle, himself, and nothing but himself,
against the universe! And, as men at such moments will do, in the mad
desire to free the self-tortured spirit from some unseen and choking
bond, he began wildly tearing off his clothes.
But merciful nature brought relief, and stopped him in his mad efforts,
or he had been a frozen corpse long ere the dawn. His hands, stiff with
cold, refused to obey him; as he delayed he was saved. After the
paroxysm came the collapse; he sank upon the top of the cairn half
senseless. He felt himself falling over its edge; and the animal
instinct of self-preservation, unconsciously to him, made him slide down
gently, till he sank into a crack between two rocks, sheltered somewhat,
as it befell happily, from the lashing of the rain.
Another minute, and he slept a dreamless sleep.
But there are two men upon that mountain, whom neither rock nor rain,
storm nor thunder have conquered, because they are simply brave honest
men; and who are, perhaps, far more "poetic" characters at this moment
than Elsley Vavasour, or any dozen of mere verse-writers, because they
are hazarding their lives, on an errand of mercy, and all the while have
so little notion that they are hazarding their lives, or doing anything
dangerous or heroic, that, instead of being touched for a moment by
Nature's melodrama, they are jesting at each other's troubles, greeting
each interval of darkness with mock shouts of misery and despair,
likening the crags to various fogies of their acquaintance, male and
female, and only pulling the cutty pipes out of their mouths to chant
snatches of jovial songs. They are Wynd and Naylor, the two Cambridge
boating-men, in bedrabbled flannel trousers, and shooting-jackets
pocketful of water; who are both fully agreed, that hunting a mad poet
over the mountains in a thunder-storm is, on the whole, "the jolliest
lark they ever had in their lives."
"He must have gone up here somewhere. I saw the poor beggar against the
sky as plain as I see you,--which I don't--" for darkness cut the speech
short.
"Where be you, William? says the keeper."
"Here I be, sir, says the beater, with my 'eels above my 'ed."
"Wery well, William; when you get your 'ed above your 'eels, gae on."
"But I'm stuck fast between two stones! Hang the stones!" And Naylor
bursts into an old seventeenth century ditty of the days of "three-man
glees."
"They stoans, they stoans, they stoans, they stoans--
They stoans that built George Riddler's oven,
O they was fetched from Blakeney quarr';
And George he was a jolly old man,
And his head did grow above his har'.
"One thing in George Riddler I must commend,
And I hold it for a valiant thing;
With any three brothers in Gloucestershire
He swore that his three sons should sing.
"There was Dick the tribble, and Tom the mane,
Let every man sing in his own place;
And William he was the eldest brother,
And therefore he should sing the base.--
I'm down again! This is my thirteenth fall."
"So am I! I shall just lie and light a pipe."
"Come on, now, and look round the lee side of this crag. We shall find
him bundled up under the lee of one of them."
"He don't know lee from windward, I dare say." "He'll soon find out the
difference by his skin;--if it's half as wet, at least, as mine is."
"I'll tell you what, Naylor, if the poor fellow has crossed the ridge,
and tried to go down on the Twll du, he's a dead man by this time."
"He'll have funked it, when he comes to the edge, and sees nothing but
mist below. But if he has wandered on to the cliffs above Trifaen, he's
a dead man, then, at all events. Get out of the way of that flash! A
close shave, that! I believe my whiskers are singed."
"'Pon my honour, Wynd, we ought to be saying our prayers rather than
joking in this way."
"We may do both, and be none the worse. As for coming to grief, old boy,
we're on a good errand, I suppose, and the devil himself can't harm us.
Still, shame to him who's ashamed of saying his prayers, as Arnold used
to say."
And all the while, these two brave lads have been thrusting their
lanthorn into every crack and cranny, and beating round every crag
carefully and cunningly, till long past two in the morning.
"Here's the ordnance cairn, at last; and--here am I astride of a
carving-knife, I think! Come and help me off, or I shall be split to the
chin!"
"I'm coming! What's this soft under my feet? Who-o-o-oop! Run him to
earth at last!"
And diving down into a crack, Wynd drags out by the collar the
unconscious Elsley.
"What a swab! Like a piece of wet blotting-paper. Lucky he's not made of
salt."
"He's dead!" says Naylor.
"Not a bit. I can feel his heart. There's life in the old dog yet."
And they begin, under the lee of a rock, chafing him, wrapping him in
their plaids, and pouring whiskey down his throat.
It was some time before Vavasour recovered his consciousness. The first
use which he made of it was to bid his preservers leave him; querulously
at first; and then fiercely, when he found out who they were.
"Leave me, I say! Cannot I be alone if I choose? What right have you to
dog me in this way?"
"My dear sir, we have as much right here as any one else; and if we find
a man dying here of cold and fatigue--"
"What business of yours, if I choose to die?"
"There is no harm in your dying, sir," says Naylor. "The harm is in our
letting you die; I assure you it is entirely to satisfy our own
consciences we are troubling you thus;" and he begins pressing him to
take food.
"No, sir; nothing from you! You have shown me impertinence enough in the
last few weeks, without pressing on me benefits for which I do not wish.
Let me go! If you will not leave me, I shall leave you!"
And he tried to rise: but, stiffened with cold, sank back again upon the
rock.
In vain they tried to reason with him; begged his pardon for all past
jests: he made effort after effort to get up; and at last, his limbs,
regaining strength by the fierceness of his passion, supported him; and
he struggled onward toward the northern slope of the mountain.
"You must not go down till it is light; it is as much as your life is
worth."
"I am going to Bangor, sir; and go I will!"
"I tell you, there is fifteen hundred feet of slippery screes below
you."
"As steep as a house-roof, and with every tile on it loose. You will
roll from top to bottom before you have gone a hundred yards."
"What care I? Let me go, I say! Curse you, sir! Do you mean to use
force?"
"I do," said Wynd quietly, as he took him round arms and body, and set
him down on the rock like a child.
"You have assaulted me, sir! The law shall avenge this insult, if there
be law in England!"
"I know nothing about law: but I suppose it will justify me in saving
any man's life who is rushing to certain death."
"Look here, sir!" said Naylor. "Go down, if you will, when it grows
light: but from this place you do not stir yet. Whatever you may think
of our conduct to-night, you will thank us for it to-morrow morning,
when you see where you are."
The unhappy man stamped with rage. The red glare of the lanthorn showed
him his two powerful warders, standing right and left. He felt that
there was no escape from them, but in darkness; and suddenly he dashed
at the lanthorn, and tried to tear it out of Wynd's hands.
"Steady, sir!" said Wynd, springing back, and parrying his outstretched
hand. "If you wish us to consider you in your senses, you will be
quiet."
"And if you don't choose to appear sane," said Naylor, "you must not be
surprised if we treat you as men are treated who--you understand me."
Elsley was silent awhile; his rage, finding itself impotent, subsided
into dark cunning. "Really, gentlemen," he said at length, "I believe
you are right; I have been very foolish, and you very kind; but you
would excuse my absurdities if you knew their provocation."
"My dear sir," said Naylor, "we are bound to believe that you have good
cause enough for what you are doing. We have no wish to interfere
impertinently. Only wait till daylight, and wrap yourself in one of our
plaids, as the only possible method of carrying out your own intentions;
for dead men can't go to Bangor, whithersoever else they may go."
"You really are too kind; but I believe I must accept your offer, under
penalty of being called mad;" and Elsley laughed a hollow laugh; for he
was by no means sure that he was not mad. He took the proffered wrapper;
lay down; and seemed to sleep.
Wynd and Naylor, congratulating themselves on his better mind, lay down
also beneath the other plaid, intending to watch him. But worn out with
fatigue, they were both fast asleep ere ten minutes had passed.
Elsley had determined to keep himself awake at all risks; and he paid a
bitter penalty for so doing; for now that the fury had passed away, his
brain began to work freely again, and inflicted torture so exquisite,
that he looked back with regret on the unreasoning madness of last
night, as a less fearful hell than that of thought; of deliberate, acute
recollections, suspicions, trains of argument, which he tried to thrust
from him, and yet could not. Who has not known in the still, sleepless
hours of night, how dark thoughts will possess the mind with terrors,
which seem logical, irrefragable, inevitable?
So it was then with the wretched Elsley; within his mind a whole train
of devil's advocates seemed arguing, with triumphant subtlety, the
certainty of Lucia's treason; and justifying to him his rage, his
hatred, his flight, his desertion of his own children,--if indeed (so
far had the devil led him astray) they were his own. At last he could
bear it no longer. He would escape to Bangor, and then to London, cross
to France, to Italy, and there bury himself amid the forests of the
Apennines, or the sunny glens of Calabria. And for a moment the vision
of a poet's life in that glorious land brightened his dark imagination.
Yes! He would escape thither, and be at peace; and if the world heard of
him again, it should be in such a thunder-voice, as those with which
Shelley and Byron, from their southern seclusion, had shaken the
ungrateful motherland which cast them out. He would escape; and now was
the time to do it! For the rain had long since ceased; the dawn was
approaching fast; the cloud was thinning from black to pearly grey. Now
was his time--were it not for those two men! To be kept, guarded,
stopped by them, or by any man! Shameful! intolerable! He had fled
hither to be free, and even here he found himself a prisoner. True, they
had promised to let him go if he waited till daylight; but perhaps they
were deceiving him, as he was deceiving them--why not? They thought him
mad. It was a ruse, a stratagem, to keep him quiet awhile, and then
bring him back,--"restore him to his afflicted friends." His friends,
truly! He would be too cunning for them yet. And even if they meant to
let him go, would he accept liberty from them, or any man? No; he was
free! He had a right to go; and go he would, that moment!
He raised himself cautiously. The lanthorn had burned to the socket: and
he could not see the men, though they were not four yards off; but by
their regular and heavy breathing he could tell that they both slept
soundly. He slipped from under the plaid; drew off his shoes, for fear
of noise among the rocks, and rose. What if he did make a noise? What if
they woke, chased him, brought him back by force? Curse the thought!--
And gliding close to them, he listened again to their heavy breathing.
How could he prevent their following him?
A horrible, nameless temptation came over him. Every vein in his body
throbbed fire; his brain seemed to swell to bursting; and ere he was
aware, he found himself feeling about in the darkness for a loose stone.
He could not find one. Thank God that he could not find one! But after
that dreadful thought had once crossed his mind, he must flee from that
place ere the brand of Cain be on his brow.
With a cunning and activity utterly new to him, he glided away, like a
snake; downward over crags and boulders, he knew not how long or how
far; all he knew was, that he was going down, down, down, into a dim
abyss. There was just light enough to discern the upper surface of a
rock within arm's length; beyond that all was blank. He seemed to be
hours descending; to be going down miles after miles: and still he
reached no level spot. The mountain-side was too steep for him to stand
upright, except at moments. It seemed one uniform quarry of smooth
broken slate, slipping down for ever beneath his feet.--Whither? He grew
giddy, and more giddy; and a horrible fantastic notion seized him, that
he had lost his way; that somehow, the precipice had no bottom, no end
at all; that he was going down some infinite abyss, into the very depths
of the earth, and the molten roots of the mountains, never to reascend.
He stopped, trembling, only to slide down again; terrified, he tried to
struggle upward: but the shale gave way beneath his feet, and go he
must.
What was that noise above his head? A falling stone? Were his enemies in
pursuit? Down to the depth of hell rather than that they should take
him! He drove his heels into the slippery shale, and rushed forward
blindly, springing, slipping, falling, rolling, till he stopped
breathless on a jutting slab. And lo! below him, through the thin pearly
veil of cloud, a dim world of dark cliffs, blue lakes, grey mountains
with their dark heads wrapped in cloud, and the straight vale of Nant
Francon, magnified in mist, till it seemed to stretch for hundreds of
leagues towards the rosy north-east dawning and the shining sea.
With a wild shout he hurried onward. In five minutes he was clear of the
cloud. He reached the foot of that enormous slope, and hurried over
rocky ways, till he stopped at the top of a precipice, full six hundred
feet above the lonely tarn of Idwal.
Never mind. He knew where he was now; he knew that there was a passage
somewhere, for he had once seen one from below. He found it, and almost
ran along the boggy shore of Idwal, looking back every now and then at
the black wall of the Twll du, in dread lest he should see two moving
specks in hot pursuit.
And now he had gained the shore of Ogwen, and the broad coach-road; and
down it he strode, running at times, past the roaring cataract, past the
enormous cliffs of the Carnedds, past Tin-y-maes, where nothing was
stirring but a barking dog; on through the sleeping streets of Bethesda,
past the black stairs of the Penrhyn quarry. The huge clicking ant-heap
was silent now, save for the roar of Ogwen, as he swirled and bubbled
down, rich coffee-brown from last night's rain.
On, past rich woods, past trim cottages, gardens gay with flowers; past
rhododendron shrubberies, broad fields of golden stubble, sweet clover,
and grey swedes, with Ogwen making music far below. The sun is up at
last, and Colonel Pennant's grim slate castle, towering above black
woods, glitters metallic in its rays, like Chaucer's house of fame. He
stops, to look back once. Far up the vale, eight miles away, beneath a
roof of cloud, the pass of Nant Francon gapes high in air between the
great jaws of the Carnedd and the Glyder, its cliffs marked with the
upright white line of the waterfall. He is clear of the mountains; clear
of that cursed place, and all its cursed thoughts! On, past Llandegai
and all its rose-clad cottages; past yellow quarrymen walking out to
their work, who stare as they pass at his haggard face, drenched
clothes, and streaming hair. He does not see them. One fixed thought is
in his mind, and that is, the railway station at Bangor.
He is striding through Bangor streets now, beside the summer sea, from
which fresh scents of shore-weed greet him. He had rather smell the
smoke and gas of the Strand.
The station is shut. He looks at the bill outside. There is no train for
full two hours; and he throws himself, worn out with fatigue, upon the
doorstep.
Now a new terror seizes him. Has he money enough to reach London? Has he
his purse at all? Too dreadful to find himself stopped short, on the
very brink of deliverance! A cold perspiration breaks from his forehead,
as he feels in every pocket. Yes, his purse is there: but he turns sick
as he opens it, and dare hardly look. Hurrah! Five pounds, six--eight!
That will take him as far as Paris. He can walk; beg the rest of the
way, if need be.
What will he do now? Wander over the town, and gaze vacantly at one
little object and another about the house fronts. One thing he will not
look at; and that is the bright summer sea, all golden in the sun rays,
flecked with gay white sails. From all which is bright and calm, and
cheerful, his soul shrinks as from an impertinence; he longs for the
lurid gas-light of London, and the roar of the Strand, and the
everlasting stream of faces among whom he may wander free, sure that no
one will recognise him, the disgraced, the desperate.
The weary hours roll on. Too tired to stand longer, he sits down on the
shafts of a cart, and tries not to think. It is not difficult. Body and
mind are alike worn out, and his brain seems filled with uniform dull
mist.
A shop-door opens in front of him; a boy comes out. He sees bottles
inside, and shelves, the look of which he knows too well.
The bottle-boy, whistling, begins to take the shutters down. How often,
in Whitbury of old, had Elsley done the same! Half amused, he watched
the lad, and wondered how he spent his evenings, and what works he read,
and whether he ever thought of writing poetry.
And as he watched, all his past life rose up before him, ever since he
served out medicines fifteen years ago;--his wild aspirations, heavy
labours, struggles, plans, brief triumphs, long disappointments: and
here was what it had all come to,--a failure,--a miserable, shameful
failure! Not that he thought of it with repentance, with a single wish
that he had done otherwise: but only with disappointed rage. "Yes!" he
said bitterly to himself--
"'We poets in our youth begin in gladness,
But after come despondency and madness.'
This is the way of the world with all who have nobler feelings in them
than will fit into its cold rules. Curse the world! what on earth had I
to do with mixing myself up in it, and marrying a fine lady? Fool that I
was! I might have known from the first that she could not understand me;
that she would go back to her own! Let her go! I will forget her, and
the world, and everything--and I know how!"
And springing up, he walked across to the druggist's shop.
Years before, Elsley had tried opium, and found, unhappily for him, that
it fed his fancy without inflicting those tortures of indigestion which
keep many, happily for them, from its magic snare. He had tried it more
than once of late: but Lucia had had a hint of the fact from Thurnall;
and in just terror had exacted from him a solemn promise never to touch
opium again. Elsley was a man of honour, and the promise had been kept.
But now--"I promised her, and therefore I will break my promise! She has
broken hers, and I am free!"
And he went in and bought his opium. He took a little on the spot to
allay the cravings of hunger. He reserved a full dose for the
railway-carriage. It would bridge over the weary gulf of time which lay
between him and town.
He took his second-class place at last; not without stares and whispers
from those round at the wild figure which was starting for London,
without bag or baggage. But as the clerks agreed, "If he was running
away from his creditors, it was a shame to stop him. If he was running
from the police, they would have the more sport the longer the run. At
least it was no business of theirs."
There was one thing more to do, and he did it. He wrote to Campbell a
short note.
"If, as I suppose, you expect from me 'the satisfaction of a gentleman,'
you will find me at ... Adelphi. I am not escaping from you but from the
whole world. If, by shooting me you can quicken my escape, you will do
me the first and last favour which I am likely to ask from you."
He posted his letter, settled himself in a corner of the carriage, and
took his second dose of opium. From that moment he recollected little
more. A confused whirl of hedges and woods, rattling stations, screaming
and flashing trains, great red towns, white chalk cuttings; while the
everlasting roar and rattle of the carriages shaped themselves in his
brain into a hundred snatches of old tunes, all full of a strange
merriment, as if mocking at his misery, striving to keep him awake and
conscious of who and what he was. He closed his eyes and shut out the
hateful garish world: but that sound he could not shut out. Too tired to
sleep, too tired even to think, he could do nothing but submit to the
ridiculous torment; watching in spite of himself every note, as one
jig-tune after another was fiddled by all the imps close to his ear,
mile after mile, and county after county, for all that weary day, which
seemed full seven years long.
At Euston Square the porter called him several times ere he could rouse
him. He could hear nothing for awhile but that same imps' melody, even
though it had stopped. At last he got out, staring round him, shook
himself awake by one strong effort, and hurried away, not knowing
whither he went.
Wrapt up in self, he wandered on till dark, slept on a doorstep, and
awoke, not knowing at first where he was. Gradually all the horror came
back to him, and with the horror the craving for opium wherewith to
forget it.
He looked round to see his whereabouts. Surely this must be Golden
Square? A sudden thought struck him. He went to a chemist's shop, bought
a fresh supply of his poison, and, taking only enough to allay the
cravings of his stomach, hurried tottering in the direction of Drury
Lane.