What it was that woke me, I know not. It certainly was not the lark,
for there is no such heavenly benison of dawn on this side of the
Atlantic. It might, indeed, be a crowd of those large birds of the
swallow tribe which they call here the bee-martins, who had
congregated round the windows, daring each other to wanton,
purposeless flights. But I think it was something within, rather than
without--some of those strange, silent operations, amidst which the
mind still lives and acts when apparently dead in sleep--some of the
heart's sentinels calling the watches of the night.
I was to rise to meet Bessy in the early morning, and I did not lie
awake to count the hours; I was too weary for that. I slept, and slept
soundly, the allotted time; and then I woke, as if a voice had said,
"Arise!"
The day was yet unconfirmed; the hues of the east were still russet,
rather than red; but, as I dressed myself, the rose and the gold must
have grown stronger in the sky, for many a magic hue poured varying
through the pathways amongst the trunks of the old trees, and,
streaming across the turf that covered the little rise on which the
house stood, seemed to spread a many-coloured carpet before the
windows.
I took some pains in my toilet, but I was in the parlour and at the
window some time before five o'clock struck.
I amused myself with gazing forth, and the quiet, pleasant scene, with
the sun at length, "_perfundens omnia luce_," sank into, and refreshed
the spirit.
But that spirit was all the time busy with other things. It was like
thinking in the midst of music--one of the sweetest things I know in
life when the heart is at ease--when we feel that harmony, are
harmonized by it, and yet lose not one thread of the golden web we are
weaving. There was a certain degree of waywardness in my mood, which,
perhaps, that morning-scene encouraged, though I know not whence it
originally sprung--a feeling of power, which I was inclined to sport
with. May I own it? I experienced, I fancy, some of the sensations of
the despot, when he remembers how much happiness or misery hung upon
his will. Could it be that the treacherous heart was too conscious of
the power Bessy had given me to decide her fate and mine for both? No,
no, I will not believe it; and, at all events, if I was inclined, as I
have said, to sport with the power, I was not inclined to abuse it.
But, somehow, during the calm, refreshing sleep of the preceding
night, confidence had returned; and I felt as if something was ever
whispering in my ear that there could be no possible circumstance in
the past or the present which could place a barrier between me and her
I loved.
Bessy did not keep me long waiting; for she was by my side before the
clock had finished striking; and, oh, she looked very lovely, though
her cheek was paler than usual, and her eyes somewhat languid. The
eyelashes looked longer and darker than ever, the iris more full,
though more shaded by the drooping lid. The beautiful, dark, silky
hair was perhaps not arranged with all the trim care of former days;
but the wavy lines were more plainly seen, making, as some old poet
called it, "traps for sunbeams."
I could see that she had made up her mind to her fate during the
night--that she had prejudged my decision--or else felt that, after
all that had passed, we could not be separated; for when she gave me
her hand, she held up her lips to me also for the morning kiss, as if
she would have said,--"I know how it must be."
Bessy had got the packet of letters in her hand; and I was leading her
to the sofa, but she stopped me, saying,--
"Let us go out amongst the trees, dear Richard. You know what a wild,
fanciful girl I am; and when I have to encounter anything that is
likely to agitate me, I would rather have breathing-room in the free
air, and trees, and flowers, and birds around me, in preference to
tables and chairs."
"And do you think anything will agitate you this morning, love?" I
asked, somewhat maliciously, I am afraid.
"Oh, yes," she answered. "How can it be otherwise? although I know
quite well, Richard, how you will decide, and what you will say, and I
will abide by my promise; yet the very talking of such things must
agitate me much."
"I do not think you know what I will say, dearest," I replied, walking
by her side towards the door. "I may have much more to say than you
can even guess; but let us go out; I prefer the free air, too, my
beloved. Under the clear sky, one feels in the presence of a purer
power; and with the great trust you have placed in me, I should wish
to deal as if the eye of God were visibly fixed on me the whole time."
We went forth together, passed across the little open space, and
wandered on a short distance into the wood to a spot where we could
see the cleared part of the plantation without being quite hidden from
the house. We there seated ourselves in the shade, though a ray of the
early sun stole through between the trunks of the old giants, and
crossed with a gleam of golden light Bessy's tiny foot and delicate
ankle.
She laid the bundle of old letters upon my knee, and was apparently
about to speak of them; but I forestalled her, taking her dear hand in
mine, and holding it there.
"Bessy," I said, "these have been four eventful days--ay, and four
eventful months to both you and me."
"They have, indeed!" she answered with a sigh.
"Have you remarked," I continued, "how fortune has seemed to take a
pleasure in binding our fates together link after link in a chain that
cannot be broken? How, from the first, event after event drew us
nearer and nearer to each other, as if to sport with all your cold
resolves, and with my unreasonable expectation?"
"It would seem so, truly," she answered, gazing down on the grass in
thought.
"Let us recapitulate, my beloved," I said, "before we go farther.
Here, to begin with myself, in man's true egotistical spirit, as you
would have said not long ago,--I came to this country, without ever
dreaming that I should find any one to excite anything in my heart
beyond a passing feeling of admiration. I had made no resolves; but I
had gone through many years and scenes, without ever seeing a woman I
could wish to make my wife--without seeing any one to love, in short."
"And to fall in love, at length, with a wild Virginian girl, quite
unworthy of you!" said Bessy, looking up with one of her old bright
smiles.
"Nay," I answered, "to find a treasure where I least expected it. But
let us go on----"
"Ay, but you have not added, dear Richard," she said, still smiling,
"that you did not think it at all a treasure when you found it first."
"Perhaps I did not recognize its full value," I replied; "but I soon
found it out when I came to see it nearer."
"I do not wonder that you saw nothing worth caring for in me at
first," rejoined Bessy. "If you had hated me, and despised me, I could
not blame you; for when I think of my sauciness and folly that night
and the next morning, I feel even now quite ashamed of myself. But
there is some excuse to be made for a wild, somewhat spoiled girl,
Richard, who has never known love, or what it means, or what it is
like. She says and does a thousand things that she would never think
of if she had a grain more experience. But now tell me, when was it
you began first to judge a little more favourably of me? for all this
has grown upon us so imperceptibly, that I do not really know where it
began."
"It began on my part," I answered, "that morning when we first rode
over to Beavors--when you and I went to look at the pictures in the
dining-room together. Then Bessy let me get a little peep at her
heart, and that was quite enough, dear girl. I was more than half in
love with you, Bessy, when we mounted our horses to return after the
storm. It was high time that I should be so, Bessy; for I do not think
if there had not been something more buoyant in my breast than mere
humanity, we should ever have got out of that river."
"I am afraid, Richard," said Bessy, "that by that time there was
something more buoyant, as you call it, in my bosom, too. I don't mind
telling you now, but all that afternoon, at Beavors, I had been
feeling very strangely about you, and could not be half so saucy as I
wished. I do not think I should have cared much about being drowned
before I knew you; but then I did not like the thought of it at all."
"Well, love," I answered, "that adventure was the first of those links
between us, which I am now recapitulating--danger of the most
desperate kind shared together."
"Ay," cried Bessy, eagerly, "and benefits conferred--life saved--bold
and noble daring to save it--O Richard, how could I ever think of
making you unhappy after that?"
"Assuredly, it bound us very closely together," I answered "No two
people, after having experienced such sensations of interest and
anxiety for each other, could ever feel towards each other as they did
before."
"It was very soon 'Richard and Bessy' after that," she answered,
thoughtfully. Then, raising her eyes to mine, with one of her sunny
smiles, she added--"And I fancy in our own hearts it was 'dear
Richard' and 'dear Bessy.'"
"It certainly was in mine, dear girl," I replied; "but there were
other ties to be added, Bessy: the interest you showed in me--your
anxiety about me, before the duel with Robert Thornton, and your
gentle care and tendance afterwards; but, more than all, your frank
kindness, and the courage of your tenderness, were never to be
forgotten by me. Bessy, I do not think, if nothing else had happened
to link us still more closely together, we could ever have made up our
minds to part. But more, much more, has happened since then--how much
within the last three days! Our flight together from a terrible
fate----"
"Your saving me from death a second time," she added.
"The strange, close intimacy into which we were thrown during our long
wanderings--intimacy such as, perhaps, never before existed between
two unmarried persons."
"And which you used so nobly," she added. "Oh, Richard, if there were
nothing else but your generous, delicate kindness during that night
and day--kindness which, while I loved you as a wife, made me trust
and rely upon you as a brother--were there nothing but that, I should,
I believe, feel myself justified in overleaping barriers which would
be insurmountable in other circumstances, and casting away all
consideration but of what is due to you."
"But my happiness must not be alone consulted," I replied. "Whatever
we do must be for your happiness also. Dear Bessy, you have lain and
slept in these arms; your head has been pillowed on this bosom; your
heart has beat fondly against mine. Now tell me, would you withdraw
yourself from that resting-place?"
"Oh, no, no, no!" she cried; "never, never! I can never have any other
upon earth."
And, leaning her head upon my bosom again, she wept.
"And will you be perfectly happy here?" I said, putting my arm around
her.
"There," she said, raising her head with a start, but without
answering my question--"there, you need not read those papers,
Richard. It needs no further consideration. I am yours, willingly,
readily--without a doubt. Give me the letters. I will throw them away;
and, with them, I will try to cast off all memory of what they
contain. But you must promise me one thing, Richard. If, in after
times, when I am your wife, you should see some shade of sadness come
upon me, a slight and temporary gloom, as if a cloud were passing
across a summer's sky, you must not for a moment think that Bessy
regrets what she has done--that there is even a shade of repentance,
or, as I once called it, remorse, for you have opened my eyes. I see
what is right to be done, and I will do it, both for your happiness
and for my own. A memory, however, of what these pages contain may,
perhaps, from time to time, come back and sadden me, whether I will or
not. But it is well that it should be so--that there should be some
little thing to take away from the very sweetness of the cup. Were it
not for that, I should be too, too happy. Life would be too bright,
and I should hardly know how to bear it. Give me the papers, Richard.
We will think of them no more."
"May I not read them?" I asked.
"Yes, if you will," she answered; "though I see no use in it. They may
make _you_ sad too; and my course is now completely decided, If you
still wish it, this hand is yours, and nothing but death shall take it
from you. It can serve no good purpose to read those sad words."
I drew her very close to me, and kissed her cheek, saying,--
"It may serve a very good purpose, Bessy. If I am not mistaken, it
will enable me, I do believe, to remove from your mind an error,
which, as you have said, might grow into a sad memory, might
overshadow our mutual happiness as we stood together at the altar, and
often come like a dark cloud over the brightness of our future fate."
"Indeed!" she exclaimed, with a doubting and bewildered look; "I do
not see how that can be, Richard."
"May I read, Bessy?" I again asked.
"Assuredly," she answered; "do, if you wish it. But there is only one
which it is needful for you to read, and that is not very long. It is
here."
And turning the papers over rapidly, she pointed to one, which had the
post-mark, I think, 'Yorktown.' She then put her hand over her eyes,
as if resolved not to see the letters any more; and, still leaning her
head on my shoulder, remained silent while I read.
The letter ran as follows; for having it by me as I write, I may as
well copy it as it stands:
"MY DEAR MADAM,--Mr. Winthorp brought me your letter of inquiry
yesterday, and also one from Mr. Hubbard. But it was late at night
before I received them; and though I notified the sheriff and the
magistrates immediately, it was considered too late to do anything
that night. Alas, that I should say it! it was too late altogether.
"Early this morning--one of the saddest mornings I have ever seen--I
went out to the village; and, upon inquiry, found that the constable
and a _posse_ had gone out in one direction, while there was reason to
believe that Colonel Davenport had gone in another; that is to say,
down towards the bank of the river, so as to have the means at hand
for either party to escape out of the State. I rode whither these
hints directed me as fast as I could, though, God help me! I had no
power or right to interfere. Had I possessed either, I was too late,
however; for the matter was all finished and over, and the deed was
done before I arrived in the meadow.
"It is very sad to have to tell you that, of two dear friends, I found
one dead, and the other almost in a state of distraction. Davenport
had been killed at the first fire, and _Sir_ Richard Conway was nearly
insane at the act which he had committed. Tearing his hair and
wringing his hands, he sometimes walked up and down the field, and
sometimes stopped to gaze upon the dead body, crying out that he had
killed his best friend, his brother, the man he most esteemed on
earth. In fact, he spoke very hard words of himself, but still harder
of another, who shall be nameless, but whom he accused of having
nursed up a jest into a quarrel, and a quarrel into a murder; and who,
he said, had suppressed a letter offering every explanation on his
part which an honourable man could give.
"The man he spoke of was there upon the field present; but he kept out
of his way, and being a near connection of yours, though I believe you
are 'scarce cater-cousins,' I think it better not to allude to him
more particularly, although all the people present, who were in
numbers quite unbefitting the occasion, laid much blame to his charge,
and I had some fear that violence would be shown to him.
"Davenport was dead, and there was no help for it; but Conway's grief
seemed to touch them much, and when a report spread that the justices
were coming, they hurried your brother down as fast as possible to a
boat which was in readiness, whether he would or no, and one of them
got in with two sailors to steer him over to the eastern shore of
Maryland.
"I trust, my dear madam, that you will communicate these sad facts as
gently as possible to her who has the deepest and the saddest interest
in them, unless, indeed, Rumour, who has a thousand wings as well as a
thousand tongues, has carried to her the tidings before this reaches
you.
"I may add, and I do it reluctantly, although I tell you fairly I give
no credit whatever to the report--for whenever anything sad and
disastrous occurs it is sure to give rise to a thousand vague whispers
of other calamities--that a rumour has reached this place, since the
fatal event of the morning, that a boat has been capsized in the bay,
having four persons on board, all of whom were lost; and credulous
people will have it that this was the boat which was carrying your
brother. However, you may make your mind quite easy on this score;
such a thing occurs very rarely in the Chesapeake, and I dare say the
whole tale is a fabrication. Yet I cannot but condole with you very
sincerely upon the terrible disaster which has actually occurred. That
is sufficient, without anything more, to strike you with profound
grief; for to see such near connection falling by each other's hand,
to the disruption of all family ties and kindred associations, is,
indeed, very terrible, although I am inclined to think that neither
Davenport nor Conway were so much to blame as those who pretended to
act as their friends.
"Believe me to be, my dear madam, with sincere sympathy and respect,
your faithful friend and servant,
"AGAR HARCOURT."
"_Postscriptum_--I am truly grieved to inform you that the rumour of a
boat having been lost proves to be too true. Do not alarm yourself
yet. We have no particulars; but simply that about ten o'clock this
morning a small boat was seen crowding sail across the bay, when by
some sudden accident, no one knows what, she was seen to capsize at a
great distance from shore. No assistance could be rendered; for all
the vessels which saw her were far distant, and a gale was blowing at
the time. Let us hope for the best, however, and put our trust in
God."
I read the letter attentively. I scrutinized--I examined every word.
There was no doubt it was a genuine letter, from some gentleman I had
never heard of, to good aunt Bab. Yet there was something wrong. There
must be some mistake. The post-mark was there--the address was written
in the same hand as the letter itself; but there was some mistake or
some fraud about it.
At length I turned to the docket, written in a neat, round, legal-like
hand, and in very fresh ink; and it gave me the clue. This Mr. Agar
Harcourt, who had written the letter, was evidently intimately
acquainted with all the parties, and could not have made a mistake.
The letter expressed what he believed to be true, and there was no
probability of his believing anything that was not true. Yet there was
a falsehood somewhere. The docket, however, read thus,--
"Letter, from the Rev. Agar Harcourt to Mrs. Barbara Thornton in
regard to the death of Colonel Edward Davenport by the hands of Sir
Richard Conway, baronet, father of the present Sir Richard Conway, now
serving in the ---- regiment of dragoons in the Presidency of Bombay."
I could easily conceive how such a letter, so designated, must have
affected my dear Bessy when first she saw it. What feelings of terror
and anguish, and hesitation, must have been produced in her mind when
she learned to believe that she was about to give herself, heart and
mind, and soul and body, to the son of one who had slain her own
father. My mind, though not light, was relieved; for I knew that, by
other proofs, I could show her the error easily; yet I wished to prove
it to her from the letter itself, to show her the villany which had
been perpetrated, and which I knew that letter, if thoroughly and
properly analyzed and scanned, must display in some part.
I accordingly turned to the very beginning again, and read it once
more, examining every word.
In the meantime, Bessy removed her hand from her eyes, weary of
waiting for my long examination. She fixed them on my face, however,
and not upon the letter, and at length she said, in a low and timid
tone,--
"Well, Richard, was not that enough to shake and terrify, and almost
drive me mad?"
"It was, my love," I answered, pressing her closely to me, "and I
grieve that a scoundrel should have had the power to inflict upon you
such pain. You shall suffer no more on this account, Bessy; but let me
go on and examine this paper more closely."
"Oh, it is certainly Mr. Harcourt's handwriting," replied Bessy.
"There are several more of his letters there, and I have got two or
three others. I know his writing quite well."
"I doubt it not," I answered; "yet there is a falsehood somewhere. Let
me examine farther, dear girl."
I read the first page, and part of the second, and then something
struck my eye which made me pause.
"Look here," dearest, I said. "This docket on the back tells you that
this is a letter describing the death of Colonel Davenport--your
father, I presume--by the hands of Sir Richard Conway, whom it points
out as _my_ father. The docket purports to have been written when I
was serving with a regiment in the presidency of Bombay. That is eight
years ago, Bessy; for I exchanged almost immediately after that
period, when I was merely a cornet, into a regiment in Bengal. Yet the
ink seems to me exceedingly fresh. I suspect that it has not been upon
the paper more than ten days. But now mark another thing. Look here at
this line; you see it stands thus: 'Davenport had been killed at the
first fire, and----' The line is almost full if you end with that word
'_and;_' but crowded in at the end of the line is the small word
'Sir,' and then, in the next line, come the words, 'Richard Conway.'
If you will remark closely the handwriting and the ink of that small
word, 'Sir,' you will perceive that the one is different and the other
bluer than those employed in the letter."
"I see, I see!" cried Bessy, eagerly. "It _is_ different; but what
object could be attained by adding that word?"
"To bear out the docket that was written by Robert Thornton," I
answered, "and to snap the love and the engagement between us like a
withered twig, by making you believe that my father had killed your
father, and the parricidal drops would stain the hand which you
clasped in mine at the altar. Then you did believe it, Bessy?"
"I did, indeed," she answered. "But where you have twice saved my
life, Richard, where you have risked your own to do it--where you have
been so kind, so noble, so generous, surely, surely, the barrier is
broken down, the stain wiped out, and my father himself may look down
and bless us. Oh, do not gaze at me so! Tell me--tell me what you
mean! What do your looks mean? Is it not so? Is not this letter true?"
"No, no, no! Bessy," I answered. "With the interpretation put upon it,
and that small word, 'Sir,' added, it is not true! My father, Sir
_Henry_ Conway, was never in America in his life; though my uncle,
Major Richard Conway, was. My father died only thirteen years ago. My
uncle, Richard Conway, was drowned in Chesapeake Buy, some nineteen or
twenty years ago. Richard Conway was the youngest son, and never
inherited the baronetcy. That word '_Sir_' was introduced solely to
make you believe he was my father. Cast all feelings of doubt and
hesitation from your mind, my beloved. My uncle, it is true, may have
killed your father for aught I know; for I never heard of the fact
till now: but, believe me, my father was as innocent of your father's
blood as I am; and I have every reason to believe, from what I have
heard this day, that my uncle would have been as innocent also, if it
had not been for the base and treacherous conduct of old William
Thornton, who was your father's second, and who would not suffer an
honourable explanation to take place.
"And now, my beloved Bessy, have I not kept my word with you? Have I
not extracted from this letter--which was meant to poison your peace,
to divide you from a man who truly loved you, or to render your union
with him a wretched one--the antidote to its own venomous
insinuations?"
Bessy did not answer. Some minutes before, while I was clearing away
cloud after cloud from her mind, and she had hidden her face upon my
bosom, I thought that I felt her heart beating violently; but now she
was quite silent and still--so still that, for a moment, I thought she
had fainted. I raised her head gently, and saw that the tears were
flowing fast from her eyes. She wiped them away hastily; and through
the drops beamed a bright smile, telling me they were not drops of
sorrow. She hid her face again; but I heard her murmur,--
"They have come at last, Richard--they have come at last, and will
bring relief--do not wish me to check them: they are full of joy and
comfort."
"Then weep on, dearest," I said; "and may you never shed any but such
tears as these."
Gradually she grew more composed, and looked up, saying,--
"Oh, this is a happy hour! It is like the clearing away of dark mist;
not alone giving back sunshine to the spot where we stand, but opening
out bright prospects all around us."
"Then I may tell your uncle that you are mine without doubt or
hesitation?" I asked.
"Yours, joyfully, gladly," she answered. "Richard, if ever you thought
me a coquette, you shall not think me so now; for you shall find me as
ready to own my love as I was formerly to declare I never could love.
How you ever came to love me, I cannot tell; but I know right well how
I came to love you, and I should hate and despise myself if I did
not."
"I came to love you very easily, dear Bessy," I answered. "It was
simply, as I told you one day, I found you out."
"And I did not believe you," she replied; "but no wonder, for then I
had not found myself out. But there is one thing that puzzles me
still, which is, why--for what cause, or on what motive, Mr. William
Thornton has so persecuted me and mine. I can easily believe that
Robert was moved only by the desire for money, and the habit of fraud;
for all the country knows what he was; but as for his father, I have
heard people say, who knew him in his youth, that he was a gay,
thoughtless, open-hearted man, who spent all he had, and more, with
profusion, rather than liberality; yet even at the time of my poor
father's death, it would seem he had the same bad feelings towards us,
though he concealed them."
"It is indeed strange," I replied, remembering the extraordinary
vehemence of hatred the old man had displayed towards Bessy herself.
"There may be some mystery in the business; but it were as well not to
inquire into it too far, dear Bessy. Let us be content that we have
frustrated all their schemes against us, without prying into their
motives. There is, they say, a skeleton in every house; and we may as
well not open the closet door. Something puzzles me also," I added;
"but that is of no very fearful nature. It is this: that your uncle
Henry did not know all the circumstances of this sad affair between
your father and my uncle; for only yesterday he seemed to think you
had good grounds for refusing to unite your fate with mine."
"I do not think he knows anything but what I wrote to him," replied
Bessy. "At the time the duel was fought, he must have been in Europe;
for about that time he travelled with my aunt for three years; and the
subject has been carefully avoided ever since. Even dear aunt Bab
never gave us any particulars. One day, indeed, when warning me not to
fall in love with a duellist, she told me my poor father had been
killed in a duel. But that was the only allusion to the facts I ever
heard till I received these letters. Even Mr. William Thornton, when
he used to come to see me often, 'on business,' as he said, never even
approached the subject."
"It must have been a painful--a dreadful one to him," I answered. "I
do not wonder he abstained."
"Bessy, Bessy!" cried the voice of our good old maiden hostess. "Sir
Richard, if you have had your chat out, will you come in to breakfast?
We have a guest here who knows you."
Bessy and I would both have dispensed, I believe, with the breakfast
and the guest; for that morning, as a Persian poet says, in speaking
of the conversation of happy lovers, we had certainly "fed on roses,"
and we desired no company but our own.
However, we were forced to go; and, after Bessy had made me assure her
that her eyes did not look very red, we returned to the house.