A DISCOVERY AND A DEPARTURE.
I HASTENED home after my eventful interview with Isora, and gave myself
up to tumultuous and wild conjecture. Aubrey sought me the next morning:
I narrated to him all that had occurred: he said little, but that little
enraged me, for it was contrary to the dictates of my own wishes. The
character of Morose in the “Silent Woman” is by no means an uncommon
one. Many men--certainly many lovers--would say with equal truth, always
provided they had equal candour, “All discourses but my own afflict
me; they seem harsh, impertinent, and irksome.” Certainly I felt that
amiable sentiment most sincerely with regard to Aubrey. I left him
abruptly: a resolution possessed me. “I will see,” said I, “this
Barnard; I will lie in wait for him; I will demand and obtain, though
it be by force, the secret which evidently subsists between him and this
exiled family.”
Full of this idea, I drew my cloak round me, and repaired on foot to the
neighbourhood of the Spaniard’s cottage. There was no place near it very
commodious for accommodation both of vigil and concealment. However, I
made a little hill, in a field opposite the house, my warder’s station,
and, lying at full length on the ground, wrapt in my cloak, I trusted to
escape notice. The day passed: no visitor appeared. The next morning I
went from my own rooms, through the subterranean passage into the castle
cave, as the excavation I have before described was generally termed.
On the shore I saw Gerald by one of the small fishing-boats usually kept
there. I passed him with a sneer at his amusements, which were always
those of conflicts against fish or fowl. He answered me in the same
strain, as he threw his nets into the boat, and pushed out to sea. “How
is it that you go alone?” said I; “is there so much glory in the capture
of mackerel and dogfish that you will allow no one to share it?”
“There are other sports besides those for men,” answered Gerald,
colouring indignantly: “my taste is confined to amusements in which he
is but a fool who seeks companionship; and if you could read character
better, my wise brother, you would know that the bold rover is ever less
idle and more fortunate than the speculative dreamer.”
As Gerald said this, which he did with a significant emphasis, he rowed
vigorously across the water, and the little boat was soon half way to
the opposite islet. My eyes followed it musingly as it glided over the
waves, and my thoughts painfully revolved the words which Gerald had
uttered. “What can he mean?” said I, half aloud; “yet what matters it?
Perhaps some low amour, some village conquest, inspires him with that
becoming fulness of pride and vain-glory; joy be with so bold a rover!”
and I strode away along the beach towards my place of watch; once only I
turned to look at Gerald; he had then just touched the islet, which
was celebrated as much for the fishing it afforded as the smuggling it
protected.
I arrived at last at the hillock, and resumed my station. Time passed
on, till, at the dusk of evening, the Spaniard came out. He walked
slowly towards the town; I followed him at a distance. Just before he
reached the town, he turned off by a path which led to the beach. As the
evening was unusually fresh and chill, I felt convinced that some cause,
not wholly trivial, drew the Spaniard forth to brave it. My pride a
little revolted at the idea of following him; but I persuaded myself
that Isora’s happiness, and perhaps her father’s safety, depended on my
obtaining some knowledge of the character and designs of this Barnard,
who appeared to possess so dangerous an influence over both daughter and
sire; nor did I doubt but that the old man was now gone forth to meet
him. The times were those of mystery and of intrigue: the emissaries of
the House of Stuart were restlessly at work among all classes; many of
them, obscure and mean individuals, made their way the more dangerously
from their apparent insignificance. My uncle, a moderate Tory, was
opposed, though quietly and without vehemence, to the claims of the
banished House. Like Sedley, who became so stanch a revolutionist,
he had seen the Court of Charles II. and the character of that King’s
brother too closely to feel much respect for either; but he thought it
indecorous to express opposition loudly against a party among whom were
many of his early friends; and the good old knight was too much attached
to private ties to be very much alive to public feeling. However, at
his well-filled board, conversation, generally, though displeasingly to
himself, turned upon politics, and I had there often listened, of
late, to dark hints of the danger to which we were exposed, and of the
restless machinations of the Jacobites. I did not, therefore, scruple to
suspect this Barnard of some plot against the existing state, and I did
it the more from observing that the Spaniard often spoke bitterly of the
English Court, which had rejected some claims he had imagined himself
entitled to make upon it; and that he was naturally of a temper
vehemently opposed to quiet and alive to enterprise. With this
impression, I deemed it fair to seize any opportunity of seeing, at
least, even if I could not question, the man whom the Spaniard himself
confessed to have state reasons for concealment; and my anxiety to
behold one whose very name could agitate Isora, and whose presence could
occasion the state in which I had found her, sharpened this desire into
the keenness of a passion.
While Alvarez descended to the beach, I kept the upper path, which wound
along the cliff. There was a spot where the rocks were rude and broken
into crags, and afforded me a place where, unseen, I could behold what
passed below. The first thing I beheld was a boat approaching rapidly
towards the shore; one man was seated in it; he reached the shore, and I
recognized Gerald. That was a dreadful moment. Alvarez now slowly joined
him; they remained together for nearly an hour. I saw Gerald give the
Spaniard a letter, which appeared to make the chief subject of their
conversation. At length they parted, with the signs rather of respect
than familiarity. Don Diego returned homeward, and Gerald re-entered the
boat. I watched its progress over the waves with feelings of a dark and
almost unutterable nature. “My enemy! my rival! ruiner of my hopes!--_my
brother_!--_my twin brother_!” I muttered bitterly between my ground
teeth.
The boat did not make to the open sea: it skulked along the shore, till
distance and shadow scarcely allowed me to trace the outline of Gerald’s
figure. It then touched the beach, and I could just descry the dim shape
of another man enter; and Gerald, instead of returning homewards, pushed
out towards the islet. I spent the greater part of the night in the open
air. Wearied and exhausted by the furious indulgence of my passions,
I gained my room at length. There, however, as elsewhere, thought
succeeded to thought, and scheme to scheme. Should I speak to Gerald?
Should I confide in Alvarez? Should I renew my suit to Isora? If the
first, what could I hope to learn from my enemy? If the second, what
could I gain from the father, while the daughter remained averse to me?
If the third,--there my heart pointed, and the third scheme I resolved
to adopt.
But was I sure that Gerald was this Barnard? Might there not be some
hope that he was not? No, I could perceive none. Alvarez had never
spoken to me of acquaintance with any other Englishman than Barnard;
I had no reason to believe that he ever held converse with any other.
Would it not have been natural too, unless some powerful cause, such
as love to Isora, induced silence,--would it not have been natural that
Gerald should have mentioned his acquaintance with the Spaniard? Unless
some dark scheme, such as that which Barnard appeared to have in common
with Don Diego, commanded obscurity, would it have been likely that
Gerald should have met Alvarez alone,--at night,--on an unfrequented
spot? What that scheme _was_, I guessed not,--I cared not. All my
interest in the identity of Barnard with Gerald Devereux was that
derived from the power he seemed to possess over Isora. Here, too, at
once, was explained the pretended Barnard’s desire of concealment, and
the vigilance with which it had been effected. It was so certain that
Gerald, if my rival, would seek to avoid me; it was so easy for him,
who could watch all my motions, to secure the power of doing so. Then
I remembered Gerald’s character through the country as a gallant and a
general lover; and I closed my eyes as if to shut out the vision when
I recalled the beauty of his form contrasted with the comparative
plainness of my own.
“There is no hope,” I repeated; and an insensibility, rather than sleep,
crept over me. Dreadful and fierce dreams peopled my slumbers; and, when
I started from them at a late hour the next day, I was unable to rise
from my bed: my agitation and my wanderings had terminated in a burning
fever. In four days, however, I recovered sufficiently to mount my
horse: I rode to the Spaniard’s house; I found there only the woman who
had been Don Diego’s solitary domestic. The morning before, Alvarez and
his daughter had departed, none knew for certain whither; but it was
supposed their destination was London. The woman gave me a note: it was
from Isora; it contained only these lines:
Forget me: we are now parted forever. As you value my peace of mind--of
happiness I do not speak--seek not to discover our next retreat. I
implore you to think no more of what has been; you are young, very
young. Life has a thousand paths for you; any one of them will lead you
from remembrance of me. Farewell, again and again!
ISORA D’ALVAREZ.
With this note was another, in French, from Don Diego: it was colder and
more formal than I could have expected; it thanked me for my attentions
towards him; it regretted that he could not take leave of me in person,
and it enclosed the sum by the loan of which our acquaintance had
commenced.
“It is well!” said I, calmly, to myself, “it is well; I will forget
her:” and I rode instantly home. “But,” I resumed in my soliloquy, “I
will yet strive to obtain confirmation to what perhaps needs it not.
I will yet strive to see if Gerald can deny the depth of his injuries
towards me; there will be at least some comfort in witnessing either his
defiance or his confusion.”
Agreeably to this thought, I hastened to seek Gerald. I found him in
his apartment; I shut the door, and seating myself, with a smile thus
addressed him,--
“Dear Gerald, I have a favour to ask of you.”
“What is it?”
“How long have you known a certain Mr. Barnard?” Gerald changed colour;
his voice faltered as he repeated the name “Barnard!”
“Yes,” said I, with affected composure, “Barnard! a great friend of Don
Diego D’Alvarez.”
“I perceive,” said Gerald, collecting himself, “that you are in some
measure acquainted with my secret: how far it is known to you I cannot
guess; but I tell you, very fairly, that from me you will not increase
the sum of your knowledge.”
When one is in a good sound rage, it is astonishing how calm one can be!
I was certainly somewhat amazed by Gerald’s hardihood and assurance, but
I continued, with a smile,
“And Donna Isora, how long, if not very intrusive on your confidence,
have you known her?”
“I tell you,” answered Gerald, doggedly, “that I will answer no
questions.”
“You remember the old story,” returned I, “of the two brothers, Eteocles
and Polynices, whose very ashes refused to mingle; faith, Gerald, our
love seems much of the same sort. I know not if our ashes will exhibit
so laudible an antipathy: but I think our hearts and hands will do so
while a spark of life animates them; yes, though our blood” (I added,
in a voice quivering with furious emotion) “prevents our contest by the
sword, it prevents not the hatred and the curses of the heart.”
Gerald turned pale. “I do not understand you,” he faltered out,--“I know
you abhor me; but why, why this excess of malice?”
I cast on him a look of bitter scorn, and turned from the room.
It is not pleasing to place before the reader these dark passages of
fraternal hatred: but in the record of all passions there is a moral;
and it is wise to see to how vast a sum the units of childish animosity
swell, when they are once brought into a heap, by some violent event,
and told over by the nice accuracy of Revenge.
But I long to pass from these scenes, and my history is about to glide
along others of more glittering and smiling aspect. Thank Heaven, I
write a tale, not only of love, but of a life; and that which I cannot
avoid I can at least condense.