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THE MONCTONS:
A NOVEL.
BY
SUSANNA MOODIE.
AUTHOR OF
"ROUGHING IT IN THE BUSH," "FLORA LINDSAY,"
"MATRIMONIAL SPECULATIONS," &c.
What--dost thou think I'll bend to thee?
The free in soul are ever free:
Nor force, nor poverty can bind
The subtle will--the thinking mind.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL II.
LONDON:
RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET.
1856.
LONDON:
Printed by Schulze and Co., 13, Poland Street.
Transcriber's Note: The Table of Contents is not contained in the book
but has been created for the convenience of the reader of this etext.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I.
II. ALICE.
III. MY VISIT TO MONCTON PARK.
IV. A SAD EVENT.
V. A DISCOVERY.
VI. MY SECOND INTERVIEW WITH DINAH NORTH.
VII. AN EXPLANATION--DEPARTURE--DISAPPOINTMENT.
VIII. ELM GROVE.
IX. MY NURSE, AND WHO SHE WAS.
X. MY LETTERS.
XI. A WELCOME AND AN UNWELCOME VISITOR.
XII. DINAH'S CONFESSION.
XIII. RETRIBUTIVE JUSTICE.
XIV. THE DOUBLE BRIDAL.
THE MONCTONS.
CHAPTER I.
"The next day, my friend bade us adieu. Had he expressed the least
wish to that effect, I would have accompanied him to the South--but he
did not, and we parted, never to meet again. He died abroad, and
Charlotte became the inheritor of his large fortune. Her grief for the
loss of her brother affected her health and spirits to such an
alarming degree, that instant change of air and scene was recommended
by her physician, and she left London to spend some months with her
aunt on the Continent. I would have gladly made one in their party,
but this she forbade me to do in the most positive terms.
"I fancied that her manner to me had grown cold and distant during the
separation which had intervened between her brother's death and the
severe illness that followed the announcement of that melancholy
event. These fears were confirmed by a long and very prudential letter
from her aunt, entreating me, as a mutual friend, not to follow them
to Italy, as it might be attended by unpleasant results to Miss
Laurie, who was still very young--too young, in her estimation, to
acknowledge publicly an accepted lover; that as no actual engagement
existed between us, she thought it most advisable for both parties
only to regard each other in the light of friends, until the
expiration of the time which would make Miss Laurie the mistress of
her hand and fortune. It was impossible to mistake the purport of this
letter, which I felt certain must have been sanctioned by her niece.
Then, and not until then was I fully aware of all that I had lost by
the death of my poor friend.
"Charlotte had repented of her affection for the low-born Philip
Mornington. She was a great heiress now, and a match for the first
nobleman in the kingdom. I crushed the letter beneath my feet, and
felt within my breast the extinction of hope.
"I suspected that Robert Moncton and his son were at the bottom of
this unexpected movement; nor was I mistaken. It was strange, that
among the whole range of my acquaintance, I had never been introduced
to this rascal and his son, or met him accidentally at any place of
public resort. They effectually worked my ruin, but it was in the
dark.
"The loss of Charlotte made me reckless of the future. I plunged
headlong into all sorts of dissipation: wine, women, the turf, the
gaming-table, by turns intoxicated my brain, and engrossed my time and
thoughts, until repeated losses to an alarming amount, made me
restless and miserable, without in the least checking the growing
evil. I had forfeited self-respect, and with it the moral courage to
resist temptation.
"I was goaded on in my career of guilt by a young man of fascinating
person and manners, but of depraved habits and broken fortunes. From
the first night that I was introduced to William Howard, he expressed
for me the deepest respect and friendship, and haunted me subsequently
like my shadow. He flattered my vanity by the most sedulous
attentions, echoed my sentiments, hung upon my words, copied my style
of dress, and imitated my manners.
"These arts might have failed in producing the desired effect, had he
not wound himself into my confidence, by appearing to sympathize in my
mental sufferings. He talked of Charlotte, and endeavoured to soothe
my irritated feelings, by expressing the most sanguine hopes of my
ultimate success; and, to dissipate the melancholy that preyed upon my
health and spirits, he led me by degrees to mix with the reckless and
profligate, and to find pleasure in the society of individuals whom I
could not respect, and from whose proximity a few months before I
should have shrunk with disgust and aversion.
"A young fellow just beyond his minority is easily led astray,
particularly, when he has wealth at his command, and no settled
employment or profession to engage his time and thoughts, and worse
still, with no religious principles to guide him in his perilous
voyage across the treacherous ocean of life.
"Alas! Geoffrey; I chose for my pilot one who had not only ruined
himself, but caused the shipwreck of others, superior in prudence and
intelligence; to the man who now trusted to his advice and believed
him a friend.
"When I look back to that disastrous period of my life, my soul
shrinks within itself, and I lament my madness with unceasing
bitterness. All that I have since suffered, appears but a just
retribution for those three years of vice and folly. Little did I then
suspect, that my quondam friend was an infamous sharper, bribed by the
still more infamous Robert Moncton to lure me to destruction.
"In spite of her aunt's prohibition, I had continued to write to Miss
Laurie; at first, frequently, seldom many days elapsing between letter
and letter, but to my surprise and indignation, not one of my
communications had been answered, although breathing the most ardent
attachment, and dictated by a passion as sincere as ever animated a
human breast. What could be the cause of this cruel neglect? I called
repeatedly at Mrs. ----'s house in town, but was constantly told by
the old housekeeper, who received me very coldly, that Miss Laurie and
her aunt were still on the continent.
"As long as this miserable state of uncertainty continued, I clung to
hope, and maintained the character of a man of honour and a gentleman.
But the insidious tempter was ever at hand, to exaggerate my distress,
and to weaken my good resolutions. Howard laughed at my constancy to a
false mistress, and by degrees, led me to consider myself as a very
ill-used man, and Miss Laurie as a heartless coquette.
"Two years had elapsed since the death of Cornelius; and I was just
ready to accompany a party of gay young fellows to Newmarket, when I
was told accidentally, that Miss Laurie, the great heiress, had
arrived in town, and the young men were laughing and speculating upon
the chance of winning her and her fortune.
"'They say she's a beauty!' cried one.
"'Beauty won't pay debts,' said another. 'I can't afford to marry for
love.'
"'A plain girl with her property is sure to be handsome. Beauty and
gold are too much to fall to the share of one person. I dare say,
she's only passable.'
"'Sour grapes, Hunter,' said Howard. 'You know that you are such a
---- ugly fellow, that no woman, with or without a fortune would take
you for better or worse.'
"'_Better_ is out of the question, Howard, and he can't be well
worse,' said the first speaker. 'But I should like to know if Miss
Laurie is really the beauty they say she is. Money is a thing to
possess--to enjoy--to get rid of. But beauty is a divinity. I may
covet the one--I adore the other.'
"'You may do both then, at a humble distance, George. But here's
Philip Mornington, can satisfy all your queries--he knows, and used to
feel an interest in the young lady.'
"To hear her name in such company, was to me profanation. I made some
ungracious reply to what I considered an impertinent observation of
Howard's, and feigning some improbable excuse for absenting myself
from the party, I turned my horse's head and rode back to my lodgings,
in spite of several large bets that I had pending upon a favorite
horse.
"Charlotte was in London, and I could not rest until I had learned my
fate from her own lips. I hastened to her aunt's residence; and,
contrary to my expectations, on sending up my card, I was instantly
admitted to her presence.
"She was alone in the drawing-room. The slight girl of seventeen was
now a beautiful and graceful woman; intelligence beaming from her
eyes, and the bloom of health upon her cheek. As I approached the
table at which she was seated, she rose to meet me, and the colour
receded so fast from her face that I feared she would faint, and
instead of addressing me with her usual frankness, she turned away her
head and burst into tears.
"You may imagine my distress: I endeavoured to take her hand, but she
drew proudly back.
"'Is this Charlotte?'
"'Rather let me ask--is this Philip Mornington, my brother's friend?'
she spoke with a degree of severity which astonished me--'the man for
whom I once entertained the deepest respect and affection.'
"'Which implies that you do so no longer?'
"'You have rightly guessed.'
"'And may I ask Miss Laurie why she has seen fit to change the opinion
she once entertained?'
"'Mr. Mornington,' said she, firmly, repressing the emotion which
convulsed her lips and glistened in her eyes, 'I have long wished to
see you, to hear from your own lips an explanation of your
extraordinary conduct, and though this meeting must be our last, I
could not part with you for ever, until I had convinced you that the
separation was effected by yourself.'
"'It will be difficult to prove that,' said I, 'if you really
sanctioned your aunt's letter, and were privy to its contents.'
"'It was written at my request,' she replied, with provoking coldness.
'Mr. Moncton's suspicions were aroused, and your following us to the
continent would have confirmed them, and rendered us both miserable.
But my motives for requesting a temporary separation, were fully
discussed in my letter which accompanied the one written by my aunt.
To this reasonable request you returned no answer, nor, in fact, to
several subsequent letters which were written during our absence
abroad.'
"I trembled with agitation while she was speaking, and I fear that she
misinterpreted my emotion.
"'Good Heavens!' I exclaimed at last, 'how grossly have I deceived
myself into the belief that you never wrote to me--that you cast me
from you without one word of pity or remorse. I never got a line from
you, Charlotte. Your aunt's cruel letter came only too soon, and was
answered too promptly; and to the many I have written to you since,
you did not deign a reply.'
"'They never reached us, Mr. Mornington; and it is strange that these
letters (which to me were, at least, matters of no small importance)
should be the only ones among the numbers addressed to us by other
friends, which miscarried.'
"I was stung by the incredulous air with which she spoke: it was so
unlike my own simple, frank-hearted Charlotte.
"'Miss Laurie, you doubt my word?'
"'A career of vice and folly, Mr. Mornington, has made me doubt your
_character_. While I could place confidence in the _one_, I never
suspected deceit in the other.'
"'Your silence, Charlotte, drove me to desperation, and involved me in
the dissipation to which you allude.'
"'A man of integrity could not so easily be warped from the path of
duty:' she said this proudly. 'I can no longer love one whom I have
ceased to respect, whose conduct, for the last two years, has made me
regret that we ever met.'
"'You are too severe, Miss Laurie,' and I felt the blood rush to my
face. 'You should take into account all I have suffered for your
sake.'
"'You found a strange method of alleviating those sufferings, Philip.'
This was said sadly, but with extreme bitterness. 'Had you loved or
cherished me in your memory, you never could have pursued a course of
conduct so diametrically opposite to my wishes.'
"This was a home-thrust. I felt like a guilty and condemned creature,
debased in my own eyes, and humbled before the woman I adored.
"I felt that it was useless to endeavour to defend myself against her
just accusations; yet, I could not part with her, without one struggle
more for forgiveness, and while I acknowledged and bitterly lamented
my past errors, I pleaded for mercy with the most passionate
eloquence. I promised to abjure all my idle companions and vicious
habits, and devote the rest of my life entirely to her.
"She listened to me with tearful earnestness, but remained firm to her
purpose, that we were to part there for ever, and only remember each
other as strangers.
"Her obstinacy rendered me desperate. I forgot the provocation I had
given her by my wicked and reckless course. I reproached her as the
cause of all my crimes. Accused her of fickleness and cruelty, and
called Heaven to witness, how little I merited her displeasure.
"Her gentle feminine brow was overcast; her countenance was dark and
stern.
"'These are awful charges, Mr. Mornington. Permit me to ask you a few
questions, in my turn, and answer them briefly and without evasion.'
"I gazed in silent astonishment upon her kindling face.
"'Are you in the habit of frequenting the gaming-table? Yes, or no.'
"My eyes involuntarily shrunk from hers.
"'The race-course?'
"'I must confess to both these charges,' I stammered out. 'But'----
"'For such conduct there can be no excuse. It is not amid such scenes
that I would look for the man I love.'
"'Cease, Charlotte, in mercy cease, if you do not mean to drive me
mad. Some enemy has poisoned your mind against me. Left to yourself,
you could not condemn me in this cold, pitiless manner.'
"'Your own lips have condemned you, Philip.' She stopped, passed her
hand across her brow, as if in sudden pain, and sighed deeply.
"'When will these reproaches end, Charlotte? Of what else do you
accuse me?'
"'Is what I have said, false or true?' she cried, turning suddenly
towards me, and grasping my arm. 'If false, clear yourself. If true,
what more can I have to do with you?'
"'Alas!' I cried, 'it is but too true!'
"'And can you expect, Mr. Mornington, that any virtuous, well-educated
woman could place her happiness in the keeping of one who has shown
such little self-government; who chooses for his associates men of
loose morals and bad character. Your constant companion and bosom
friend is a notorious gambler, a man whose society is scouted by all
honourable men. I pity you, Philip; weep for you; pray for you; and
God only knows the agony which this hour has cost me; but we must meet
as lovers and friends no more.'
"She glided from the room, and I stood for some minutes stupidly
staring after her, with the horrible consciousness of having exchanged
a pearl of great price, for the base coin in which pleasure pays her
deluded followers, and only felt the inestimable value of the treasure
I had lost, when it was no longer in my power to recover it.
"I returned to the company I had quitted. I betted and lost; plunged
madly on; staked my whole property on a desperate chance, and returned
from the races, forsaken by my gay companions, a heart-broken and
ruined man!
"It was night when I reached London. Not wishing to encounter any of
my late associates, I entered a coffee-house seldom frequented by men
of their class, and called for a bottle of wine.
"The place was ill-lighted and solitary. I threw myself into a far
corner of my box, and, for the first time (for I never was a drinker)
tried to drown care in the intoxicating bowl.
"The wine, instead of soothing, only increased the fever of my spirit,
and I began to review with bitterness the insanity of my conduct for
the last few months. With a brain on fire with the wine, I continued
eagerly to swallow, and a heart as dull and cold as ice from recent
mortification and disappointment, I sank with my head upon the table
into a sort of waking trance, conscious of surrounding objects, but
unable to rouse myself from the stupor which held every faculty in its
leaden grasp.
"Two men entered the box. I heard one say to the other, in a voice
which seemed familiar.
"'This place is occupied, we had better go to another.'
"'The fellow's drunk,' returned his companion, and may be considered
as _non compos_. He has lost all knowledge of himself, and therefore
can take no notice of us.'
"Feeling little interest in anything beyond my own misery, I gave no
signs of life or motion, beyond pressing my burning brow more tightly
against my folded hands, which rested on the table.
"'So, Mornington's career is ended at last, and he is a ruined man,'
said the elder of the twain.
"'Yes, I have settled his business for you; and as my success has been
great, I expect my reward should be proportionately so.'
"'I am ready to fulfil my promise, but expect nothing more. You have
been well paid by your dupe. He has realized the old proverb--Light
come, light go. I thought he would have given you more trouble. Yours,
Howard, has been an easy victory.'
"'Hang the foolish fellow!' cried my quondam friend; 'I feel some
qualms of conscience about him; he was so warm-hearted and
generous--so unsuspicious, that I feel as if I had been guilty of a
moral murder. And what, Mr. Moncton, must be your feelings: your
hatred to the poor young man is almost gratuitous, when it appears
that you are personally unknown to each other.'
"'He is the son of my worst enemy, and I will pursue him to death.'
"'He will spare you the trouble, if I read my man rightly. He will not
submit to this sudden change of fortune with stoical indifference, but
will finish a career of folly with an act of madness.'
"'Commit suicide?'
"'Ay, put a pistol to his head. He is an infidel, and will not be
scared from his purpose by any fear of an hereafter.'
"'Bring me that piece of news to-morrow, Howard, and it will be
something to stake at hazard before night.'
"He left the box; I rose to prevent him, but the opportunity of
revenge was lost. The younger scoundrel remained behind to settle with
the waiter; as he turned round I confronted and stared him full in the
face. He pretended not to know I who was.
"'Fellow, let me pass!'
"'Never! until you have received the just reward of your treachery.
You are a mean, contemptible wretch: the base hireling of a baser
villain. I will prosecute you both for entering into a conspiracy
against me.'
"'You had better let it alone,' said he, in a hoarse whisper. 'You are
a disappointed and desperate man. No sensible person will listen to
complaints made by a drunken, broken-down spendthrift and gambler.'
"'Liar!' I cried, losing all self-control, 'when did you ever see me
drunk, or knew me guilty of one dishonourable act?'
"'You were always too great a fool, Mornington, to take care of
yourself, and you are not able, at this moment, to stand steady. Be
that, however, as it may, I never retract my words; if you require
satisfaction, you know where to find me.'
"'I will neither meet nor treat you as a gentleman. You are beneath
contempt.'
"'The son of a drunken huntsman has a greater claim to gentility,'
sneered the sharper, bursting into an insulting laugh. 'Your mother
may, perhaps, have given you an indirect claim to a higher descent.'
"This taunt stung me to madness, and sobered me in a moment. I flung
myself headlong upon him. I was young and strong--the attack
unexpected, he fell heavily to the ground. In my fury I spat upon him,
and trampled him beneath my feet. Death, I felt was too honourable a
punishment for such a contemptible villain. I would not have killed
him though certain that no punishment would follow the act.
"The people of the house interfered. I was taken into custody and kept
in durance vile until the following morning; but as no one appeared to
make any charge against me, I was released, with a severe reprimand
from the police magistrate, and suffered to return home.
"Home! I had now no home: about one hundred pounds was all that
remained to me of my fine property when my debts, falsely termed debts
of honour, were paid, my lodgings settled for, and my servant
discharged.
"My disgrace had not yet reached the home of my childhood. A state of
mental suffering brought on a low fever. I was seized with an
indescribable longing, an aching of the heart to end my days in my
native village.
"Pride in vain combated this feeling. It resisted all the arguments of
reason and common sense. Nature triumphed--and a few days saw me once
more under the shadow of the great oak which canopied our lowly
dwelling."