Your father’s image is so hit in you,
His very air, that I should call you
As I did him.
Surely I saw a form, a proud, bright form,
Standing beside my couch.
When Lord Castleton had made his arrangement for watching the
progress of the trial, and the conduct of the Darnell family in it,
one of the last enquiries he had made previously to going to court,
was the exact situation of the lodgings they had taken in town; and
thither he directed his steps upon leaving the court by a different
door from that which Lucy had been carried out.
Alice Darnell had remained in a most painful state of agitating
suspense, pacing the little parlour in which she had been left by
her brother and his daughter. It was so long since she had heard the
busy hum of men; the little lodging where she had now been left to
her solitary fancies and thickening recollections, was so like one to
which she had been used in happier days, then long gone by; the Babel
sound of many voices in the peculiarly thronged streets, were such as
had not met her ear since on that dreadful night she had forced her
way through the crowds of the theatre, to learn her husband’s fate:
all these combined, had worked her into a dreadful state of nervous
excitement, when a knock was heard at the street door, and she opened
that of the apartment at the head of the stairs, thinking that it was
probably some one from the courts, bringing her intelligence.
A stranger ascended the obscured staircase, and Alice, upon his
raising his head slowly, receded from the door without uttering a
word, but keeping her eyes intently fixed upon him as he entered the
room. She pressed her hands against her brain, muttering, “Somers!
Churchill! Who is it? Oh merciful powers, deprive me not of my
senses! The grave might, for some special purpose, have been made
to render up or one or other of these departed spirits; but this
confused vision which recalls them both at once, can only be the
creature of my disordered imagination.”
“Miss Alice Darnell,” said Castleton, “excuse this intrusion, I
entreat you. It was your niece I sought, for the purpose of offering
her an explanation of my conduct. I regret that my sudden appearance
should have so discomposed you, who, as well as the rest of your
family, will have much to forgive in my past conduct; but I trust,
that the future will not give you any thing of which to complain.”
“Who is it then? Churchill indeed restored to life; but not as I saw
you last! The resemblance is much stronger! the hair so like! But I
must not pursue that train, or indeed think of myself at all, if I
mean to keep my spirits and my senses to support others. But if you
are here, what is the trial then about? Where is my niece--my poor
misguided nephew?”
“I will explain all to you, Miss Darnell. The manner in which I have
always heard Lucy speak of you, forbids any mystery where you are
the person concerned. Your nephew either now is, or soon will be,
safe. And for your beloved niece--allow me, before I explain myself
farther, to ask--I am sure my Lucy could never conceal any thing from
you--Do you think--you know not how much hangs on your answer--do you
think she could be really, truly happy, in sharing somewhat a more
exalted lot in life with him whom she only knew as the poor painter
Churchill? Perhaps it has been providentially ordained that I should
have this opportunity of asking a candid reply to that question
from you. If your answer must dash my hopes at once, it may be in
mercy ordained that I should hear it from you, that I may no longer
unwarrantably trespass on the tranquillity of one whose interest
I may have failed in exciting. But I implore you, if you can give
me any encouragement to think otherwise, to do so now. A young and
artless girl may perhaps succeed in concealing the nature of her
sentiments from him who seeks to awaken partiality; but--forgive me
if I address you thus the first time of our meeting;--but it seems
to me, that through Lucy, I already know you thoroughly; and all
my hopes depend upon the impression of her feelings towards myself
formed by you,--her ever watchful guardian genius, from whom she
never could have attempted concealment.”
“It was even thus that Somers looked--it was even thus that Somers
pleaded; and it is not by my lips that such pleadings can be
pronounced vain,” said Alice Darnell, half to herself. “Strange
similarity!” she continued, “yes, even to the inexplicable mystery
of the transaction from which all the mischief in my own case
arose.” Then more decidedly addressing herself to her anxiously
expectant listener, she said: “Forgive me if, till you have
completely cleared away all the mystery in which your proceedings
have been involved, I must decline at present giving any answer
to your enquiries--enquiries which even then you would be hardly
authorised in making of me, and which, perhaps, I should be as little
justified in answering for another; for imprudent as is that woman
who herself opens her heart to him who conceals his intentions, most
unpardonable would she be who, under similar circumstances, betrayed
the confidence of another. Not only should my niece’s sentiments, if
favourable, not through me be known, but, if necessary, they should
themselves be checked, and controlled, till your explanation is
complete.”
“Excuse me, if, in my anxiety to have my doubts removed, I have
myself omitted to be as explicit as I had intended. I commenced by
stating that from you I would have no concealment. But from a name
which I have heard you several times appear to connect with me, I
thought you had some clue to the knowledge I came to impart. Your
niece has only known me as Churchill, but Somers is my name, though
Castleton is the title by which I am called. But you are ill--are
agitated--” interrupting himself, in sudden alarm. For as Castleton
had proceeded in this apparently natural explanation, the gaze of
Alice had become more intensely fixed on his countenance, and at the
abrupt mention of that fatal name, so long enshrined in the secret
recesses of her heart, the sorrows of years passed from her mind,
and for one short fleeting moment she believed she saw before her
the lover of her youth, the husband of her heart--the adored, the
departed Somers. All the blood in her exhausted frame seemed to rush
to her face, as starting from her chair, she staggered one step
towards him, wildly exclaiming: “Somers! my own, my lost--my God!
no--Forgive me, you shall know all.”
And then, bursting into an agonizing flood of tears, she gradually
resumed her composure enough to answer the kind enquiries of her
astonished visitor; who, greatly touched and alarmed at the extent of
her emotion, almost forgot his own urgent anxieties, and asked with
great interest how he had unintentionally distressed her.
“No, go on, my Lord, I entreat you; one moment’s bewildering
astonishment at the disclosure you have just made, if you knew all,
you could not but expect from me; but my object is not to revive past
griefs of my own; but to guard the future of another from similar
danger. I own that while exacting candour from you, concealment on my
part comes with an ill grace; but my demand is founded upon a desire
to secure a happy future to her whom you profess to love, and for
whom alone I now live. My own silence arises from an anxious wish
to spare a recital, which you might think injurious to the memory of
one whom we are equally bound to guard from reproach. Yes, my Lord,
strange as it may appear to you, there was another person in whom we
were mutually deeply interested. At a future time, perhaps, if you
require it, I shall be bound to be explicit; but now I conjure you
by your professed attachment, by your desire to have your own doubts
removed, proceed with your own explanation.”
Castleton, when so adjured, proceeded at once to recount his early
admiration of Lucy; and he detailed with so much unaffected candour
the motives which had induced him a second time to visit Bankside
Farm; and he dwelt with so much fervour upon the still increasing
force of his passion, as he became better acquainted with its object;
and the whole was urged in that soft winning manner, so like one
which his auditress had formerly known to be resistless; that any
previous unfavourable impression was soon removed from Alice’s mind;
most willing, as she was, to be convinced of his sincerity.
By this means he soon acquired a most powerful advocate, had it
been necessary, in his favour with Lucy; but before they had
completely arranged the manner in which he should proceed towards
the accomplishment of his object, a bustle in the passage below
announced, as they rightly imagined, the return of Lucy herself.
As Castleton had already recounted to Alice Darnell the shock that
his unexpected apparition in court had caused to her niece, she
prudently recommended that he should not again present himself to
her till she had herself ascertained whether the poor girl’s nerves
had yet recovered from the agitation they had experienced. With
this view, beseeching him to await her return where he then was,
she went out to meet her niece, with the intention of communicating
with her first in her own room, before she informed her who was
there awaiting her: and it was fortunate that she so decided, for
she found Lucy in a much worse state than she had anticipated. Her
delicate frame, and soft and sensitive nature, were not calculated
to sustain any great nervous excitement. Her mental faculties, clear
and just as they generally were, and adequately sustained, under
ordinary circumstances, by the constant desire to be right herself
and to do wrong to no one, wanted nevertheless that practical energy
which might support them in any extraordinary trial. She had for
many hours fought against the weakness of her nature, in striving to
go successfully through the effort of her examination; and the last
shock,--the apparition, as she thought, of Churchill, had completely
upset her.
The delay in her return from the court had been caused by a
succession of fainting-fits, in the intervals of which her intellects
had been far from settled. She had been attended, in a waiting-room,
by the best medical adviser of the place, who happened to be in
court; and after a conveyance had been procured to remove her home,
he had recommended that, upon returning there, all agitating subjects
should be avoided, and the most perfect quiet rigidly enforced during
the rest of the day.
These transactions were explained to Alice in a few words by her
brother, before he returned into court to hear George’s fate,
the uncertainty about which, he could not help thinking, was the
main cause of his daughter’s indisposition. The aunt, therefore,
accompanied her charge to her own back-room, and darkening it as
much as possible, persuaded her to stretch herself on the bed. Lucy
knew her aunt perfectly, and tacitly complied with her desire; but,
as far as could be gathered from the low mutterings that continued
at intervals, her faculties seemed still confused. All this time,
Castleton remained in the place where he had been left by Alice,
fixed like a statue, afraid to stir, lest the least motion on
his part should disturb the invalid; bitterly regretting his own
inconsiderate appearance in court, and venting reproaches on his own
head, which, but that the same fear which kept him stationary checked
his utterance, would have been as loud as they were heartfelt.
At length Alice slowly opened the intermediate door, and putting her
finger on her lip, whispered--
“I think she sleeps now. She is still far far from composed, and it
would be quite impossible that she should be fit to see you to-day;
nor, indeed, do I think it ought to be risked at all, till I have
had an opportunity of first explaining much to her, if such occasion
should recur on her partial recovery. How much have I authority from
you to say?”
“Say all--every thing--you cannot possibly say enough; for words were
never coined that could express all I feel.”
“Hush,” interrupted Alice; “I hear her voice again, and I think
repeating your name. Step softly this way; and if she repeats it
again, as she did but now, no explanation I could give to the
question you asked me could be one half so satisfactory;” and she
placed him just within the doorway of the obscure apartment.
“Aunt Alice,” called Lucy from the bed. “Aunt Alice; quick, dear
aunt. Hast seen him? where is he? and why is the morning so dark--so
dismal dark? when he’s come back, so gay too, on purpose to marry me.
I knew he couldn’t have it in his heart to die, when he loved me so;
and I’m sure I’d rather have died a thousand deaths myself, than that
he should so have perished.”
There was more even in the tone with which these words were uttered,
than in the disjointed and incoherent sentences themselves, which
confirmed Castleton in his conviction that he was beloved. And so
Alice Darnell construed what she heard; for, as she again motioned
him to retire, she said,
“You cannot surely, my dear Lord, have any more questions to ask of
me now. If you have, trust to my ready-getting answers for you before
to-morrow. She must have rest and quiet now; but with these all will
soon be well again. The ills that spring from a surfeit of happiness,
may in this world be left to their own cure; while there are scars
that misfortune has graven, which any casual coincidence may re-open,
and no time can completely heal. Good b’ye, my dear Lord; and in the
midst of your own happiness, think again of what you proposed to do
for my poor nephew George.”
Lord Castleton having, in the course of his explanation to Alice,
in which he had candidly confessed his dislike that his connexion
with the smuggling transactions should be published to the world,
intimated his intention of providing for George in a manner that
should be satisfactory to all his family.