Early in the summer of 1850 I and my surviving companions left the
wilds and forests of Central America for home. Arrived at the coast,
we took ship there for England. The vessel was wrecked in the Gulf of
Mexico—I was among the few saved from the sea. It was my third escape
from peril of death. Death by disease, death by the Indians, death by
drowning—all three had approached me; all three had passed me by.
The survivors of the wreck were rescued by an American vessel bound for
Liverpool. The ship reached her port on the thirteenth day of October
1850. We landed late in the afternoon, and I arrived in London the same
night.
These pages are not the record of my wanderings and my dangers away
from home. The motives which led me from my country and my friends to
a new world of adventure and peril are known. From that self-imposed
exile I came back, as I had hoped, prayed, believed I should come
back—a changed man. In the waters of a new life I had tempered my
nature afresh. In the stern school of extremity and danger my will
had learnt to be strong, my heart to be resolute, my mind to rely on
itself. I had gone out to fly from my own future. I came back to face
it, as a man should.
To face it with that inevitable suppression of myself which I knew
it would demand from me. I had parted with the worst bitterness of
the past, but not with my heart’s remembrance of the sorrow and the
tenderness of that memorable time. I had not ceased to feel the one
irreparable disappointment of my life—I had only learnt to bear it.
Laura Fairlie was in all my thoughts when the ship bore me away, and I
looked my last at England. Laura Fairlie was in all my thoughts when
the ship brought me back, and the morning light showed the friendly
shore in view.
My pen traces the old letters as my heart goes back to the old love. I
write of her as Laura Fairlie still. It is hard to think of her, it is
hard to speak of her, by her husband’s name.
There are no more words of explanation to add on my appearance for the
second time in these pages. This narrative, if I have the strength and
the courage to write it, may now go on.
My first anxieties and first hopes when the morning came centred in my
mother and my sister. I felt the necessity of preparing them for the
joy and surprise of my return, after an absence during which it had
been impossible for them to receive any tidings of me for months past.
Early in the morning I sent a letter to the Hampstead Cottage, and
followed it myself in an hour’s time.
When the first meeting was over, when our quiet and composure of other
days began gradually to return to us, I saw something in my mother’s
face which told me that a secret oppression lay heavy on her heart.
There was more than love—there was sorrow in the anxious eyes that
looked on me so tenderly—there was pity in the kind hand that slowly
and fondly strengthened its hold on mine. We had no concealments from
each other. She knew how the hope of my life had been wrecked—she knew
why I had left her. It was on my lips to ask as composedly as I could
if any letter had come for me from Miss Halcombe, if there was any news
of her sister that I might hear. But when I looked in my mother’s face
I lost courage to put the question even in that guarded form. I could
only say, doubtingly and restrainedly—
“You have something to tell me.”
My sister, who had been sitting opposite to us, rose suddenly without a
word of explanation—rose and left the room.
My mother moved closer to me on the sofa and put her arms round my
neck. Those fond arms trembled—the tears flowed fast over the faithful
loving face.
“Walter!” she whispered, “my own darling! my heart is heavy for you.
Oh, my son! my son! try to remember that I am still left!”
My head sank on her bosom. She had said all in saying those words.
* * * * * * * * * *
It was the morning of the third day since my return—the morning of the
sixteenth of October.
I had remained with them at the cottage—I had tried hard not to
embitter the happiness of my return to THEM as it was embittered to ME.
I had done all man could to rise after the shock, and accept my life
resignedly—to let my great sorrow come in tenderness to my heart, and
not in despair. It was useless and hopeless. No tears soothed my aching
eyes, no relief came to me from my sister’s sympathy or my mother’s
love.
On that third morning I opened my heart to them. At last the words
passed my lips which I had longed to speak on the day when my mother
told me of her death.
“Let me go away alone for a little while,” I said. “I shall bear it
better when I have looked once more at the place where I first saw
her—when I have knelt and prayed by the grave where they have laid her
to rest.”