_Hel._ O, that my prayers could such affection move!
_Her._ The more I hate, the more he follows me.
_Hel._ The more I love, the more he hateth me.
_Her._ His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine.
_Midsummer Night’s Dream_.
While Dunscomb and Timms were thus employed, the younger members of the
party very naturally sought modes of entertainment that were more in
conformity with their tastes and years. John Wilmeter had been invited
to be present at the consultation; but his old feelings were revived,
and he found a pleasure in being with Anna that induced him to disregard
the request. His sister and his friend were now betrothed, and they had
glided off along one of the pretty paths of the Rattletrap woods, in a
way that is so very common to persons in their situation. This left Jack
alone with Anna. The latter was timid, shy even; while the former was
thoughtful. Still, it was not easy to separate; and they, too, almost
unconsciously to themselves, were soon walking in that pleasant wood,
following one of its broadest and most frequented paths, however.
John, naturally enough, imputed the thoughtfulness of his companion to
the event of the morning; and he spoke kindly to her, and with a gentle
delicacy on the subject, that more than once compelled the warm-hearted
girl to struggle against her tears. After he had said enough on this
topic, the young man followed the current of his own thoughts, and spoke
of her he had left in the gaol of Biberry.
“Her case is most extraordinary,” continued John, “and it has excited
our liveliest sympathy. By ours, I mean the disinterested and
intelligent; for the vulgar prejudice is strong against her. Sarah, or
even yourself, Anna”—his companion looked more like herself, at this
implied compliment, than she had done before that day—“could not seem
less likely to be guilty of anything wrong, than this Miss Monson; yet
she stands indicted, and is to be tried for murder and arson! To me, it
seems monstrous to suspect such a person of crimes so heinous.”
Anna remained silent half a minute; for she had sufficient good sense to
know that appearances, unless connected with facts, ought to have no
great weight in forming an opinion of guilt or innocence. As Jack
evidently expected an answer, however, his companion made an effort to
speak.
“Does she say nothing of her friends, nor express a wish to have them
informed of her situation?” Anna succeeded in asking.
“Not a syllable. I could not speak to her on the subject, you know——”
“Why not?” demanded Anna, quickly.
“Why not?—You’ve no notion, Anna, of the kind of person this Miss Monson
is. You cannot talk to _her_ as you would to an every-day sort of young
lady; and, now she is in such distress, one is naturally more cautious
about saying anything to add to her sorrow.”
“Yes, I can understand _that_,” returned the generous-minded girl; “and
I think you are very right to remember all this, on every occasion.
Still, it is so natural for a female to lean on her friends, in every
great emergency, I cannot but wonder that your client——”
“Don’t call her my _client_, Anna, I beg of you. I hate the word as
applied to this lady. If I serve her in any degree, it is solely as a
friend. The same feeling prevails with Uncle Tom; for I understand he
has not received a cent of Miss Monson’s money, though she is liberal of
it to profuseness. Timms is actually getting rich on it.”
“Is it usual for you gentlemen of the bar to give their services
gratuitously to those who can pay for them?”
“As far from it as possible,” returned Jack, laughing. “We look to the
main chance like so many merchants or brokers, and seldom open our
mouths without shutting our hearts. But this is a case altogether out of
the common rule; and Mr. Dunscomb works for love, and not for money.”
Had Anna cared less for John Wilmeter, she might have said something
clever about the nephew’s being in the same category as the uncle; but
her feelings were too deeply interested to suffer her even to think what
would seem to her profane. After a moment’s pause, therefore, she
quietly said—
“I believe you have intimated that Mr. Timms is not quite so
disinterested?”
“Not he—Miss Monson has given him fees amounting to a thousand dollars,
by his own admission; and the fellow has had the conscience to take the
money. I have remonstrated about his fleecing a friendless woman in this
extravagant manner; but he laughs in my face for my pains. Timms has
good points, but honesty is not one of them. He says no woman can be
friendless who has a pretty face, and a pocket full of money.”
“You can hardly call a person unfriended who has so much money at
command, John,” Anna answered with timidity; but not without manifest
interest in the subject. “A thousand dollars sounds like a large sum to
me!”
“It is a good deal of money for a fee; though much more is sometimes
given. I dare say Miss Monson would have gladly given the same to uncle
Tom, if he would have taken it. Timms told me that she proposed offering
as much to him; but be persuaded her to wait until the trial was over.”
“And where does all this money come from, John?”
“I’m sure I do not know—I am not at all in Miss Monson’s confidence; on
her pecuniary affairs, at least. She _does_ honour me so much as to
consult me about her trial occasionally, it is true; but to me she has
never alluded to money, except to ask me to obtain change for large
notes. I do not see anything so very wonderful in a lady’s having money.
You, who are a sort of heiress yourself, ought to know that.”
“I do not get money in thousands, I can assure you, Jack; nor do I think
that I have it to get. I believe my whole income would not much more
than meet the expenditure of this strange woman——”
“Do not call her _woman_, Anna; it pains me to hear you speak of her in
such terms.”
“I beg her pardon and yours, Jack; but I meant no disrespect. We are all
women.”
“I know it is foolish to feel nervous on such a subject; but I cannot
help it. One connects so many ideas of vulgarity and crime, with
prisons, and indictments, and trials, that we are apt to suppose all who
are accused to belong to the commoner classes. Such is not the fact with
Miss Monson, I can assure you. Not even Sarah—nay, not even _yourself_,
my dear Anna, can pretend to more decided marks of refinement and
education. I do not know a more distinguished young woman——”
“There, Jack; now _you_ call her a woman yourself,” interrupted Anna, a
little archly; secretly delighted at the compliment she had just heard.
“_Young_ woman—anybody can say _that_, you know, without implying
anything common or vulgar; and _woman_ too, sometimes. I do not know how
it was; but I did not exactly like the word as you happened to use it. I
believe close and long watching is making me nervous; and I am not quite
as much myself as usual.”
Anna gave a very soft sigh, and that seemed to afford her relief, though
it was scarcely audible; then she continued the subject.
“How old is this extraordinary young lady?” she demanded, scarce
speaking loud enough to be heard.
“Old! How can I tell? She is very youthful in appearance; but, from the
circumstance of her having so much money at command, I take it for
granted she is of age. The law now gives to every woman the full command
of all her property, even though married, after she become of age.”
“Which I trust you find a very proper attention to the rights of our
sex!”
“I care very little about it; though Uncle Tom says it is of a piece
with all our late New York legislation.”
“Mr. Dunscomb, like most elderly persons, has little taste for change.”
“It is not that. He thinks that minds of an ordinary stamp are running
away with the conceit that they are on the road of progress; and that
most of our recent improvements, as they are called, are marked by
empiricism. This ‘tea-cup law,’ as he terms it, will set the women above
their husbands, and create two sets of interests where there ought to be
but one.”
“Yes; I am aware such is his opinion. He remarked, the day he brought
home my mother’s settlement for the signatures, that it was the most
ticklish part of his profession to prepare such papers. I remember one
of his observations, which struck me as being very just.”
“Which you mean to repeat to me, Anna?”
“Certainly, John, if you wish to hear it,” returned a gentle voice,
coming from one unaccustomed to refuse any of the reasonable requests of
this particular applicant. “The remark of Mr. Dunscomb was this:—He said
that most family misunderstandings grew out of money; and he thought it
unwise to set it up as a bone of contention between man and wife. Where
there was so close a union in all other matters, he thought there might
safely be a community of interests in this respect. He saw no sufficient
reason for altering the old law, which had the great merit of having
been tried.”
“He could hardly persuade rich fathers, and vigilant guardians, who have
the interests of heiresses to look after, to subscribe to all his
notions. They say that it is better to make a provision against
imprudence and misfortune, by settling a woman’s fortune on herself, in
a country where speculation tempts so many to their ruin.”
“I do not object to anything that may have an eye to an evil day,
provided it be done openly and honestly. But the income should be common
property, and like all that belongs to a family, should pass under the
control of its head.”
“It is very liberal in you to say and think this, Anna!”
“It is what every woman, who has a true woman’s heart, could wish, and
would do. For myself, I would marry no man whom I did not respect and
look up to in most things; and surely, if I gave him my heart and my
hand, I could wish to give him as much control over my means as
circumstances would at all allow. It might be prudent to provide against
misfortune by means of settlements; but this much done, I feel certain
it would afford me the greatest delight to commit all that I could to a
husband’s keeping.”
“Suppose that husband were a spendthrift, and wasted your estate?”
“He could waste but the income, were there a settlement; and I would
rather share the consequences of his imprudence with him, than sit aloof
in selfish enjoyment of that in which he did not partake.”
All this sounded very well in John’s ears; and he knew Anna Updyke too
well to suppose she did not fully mean all that she said. He wondered
what might be Mary Monson’s views on this subject.
“It is possible for the husband to partake of the wife’s wealth, even
when he does not command it,” the young man resumed, anxious to hear
what more Anna might have to say.
“What! as a dependant on her bounty? No woman who respects herself could
wish to see her husband so degraded; nay, no female, who has a true
woman’s heart, would ever consent to place the man to whom she has given
her hand, in so false a position. It is for the woman to be dependent on
the man, and not the man on the woman. I agree fully with Mr. Dunscomb,
when he says that ‘silken knots are too delicate to be rudely undone by
dollars.’ The family in which the head has to ask the wife for the money
that is to support it, must soon go wrong; as it is placing the weaker
vessel uppermost.”
“You would make a capital wife, Anna, if these are really your
opinions!”
Anna blushed, and almost repented of her generous warmth, but, being
perfectly sincere, she would not deny her sentiments.
“They ought to be the opinion of every wife,” she answered. “I could not
endure to see the man to whom I could wish on all occasions to look up,
soliciting the means on which we both subsisted. It would be my delight,
if I had money and he had none, to pour all into his lap, and then come
and ask of him as much as was necessary to my comfort.”
“If he had the soul of a man he would not wait to be asked, but would
endeavour to anticipate your smallest wants. I believe you are right,
and that happiness is best secured by confidence.”
“And in not reversing the laws of nature. Why do women vow to obey and
honour their husbands, if they are to retain them as dependants? I
declare, John Wilmeter, I should almost despise the man who could
consent to live with me on any terms but those in which nature, the
church, and reason, unite in telling us he ought to be the superior.”
“Well, Anna, this is good, old-fashioned, womanly sentiment; and I will
confess it delights me to hear it from _you_. I am the better pleased,
because, as Uncle Tom is always complaining, the weakness of the hour is
to place your sex above ours, and to reverse all the ancient rules in
this respect. Let a woman, now-a-days, run away from her husband, and
carry off the children; it is ten to one but some crotchety judge, who
thinks more of a character built up on gossip than of deferring properly
to that which the laws of God and the wisdom of man have decreed, refuse
to issue a writ of _habeas corpus_ to restore the issue to the parent.”
“I do not know, John,”—Anna hesitatingly rejoined, with a true woman’s
instinct—“it _would_ be so hard to rob a mother of her children!”
“It might be _hard_, but in such a case it would be _just_. I like that
word ‘rob,’ for it suits both parties. To me, it seems that the father
is the party robbed, when the wife not only steals away from her duty to
her husband, but deprives him of his children too.”
“It is wrong, and I have heard Mr. Dunscomb express great indignation at
what he called the ‘soft-soapiness’ of certain judges in cases of this
nature. Still, John, the world is apt to think a woman would not abandon
the most sacred of her duties without a cause. That feeling must be at
the bottom of what you call the decision, I believe, of these judges.”
“If there be such a cause as would justify a woman in deserting her
husband, and in stealing his children—for it is robbery after all, and
robbery of the worst sort, since it involves breaches of faith of the
most heinous nature—let that cause be shown, that justice may pronounce
between the parties. Besides, it is not true that women will not
sometimes forget their duties without sufficient cause. There are
capricious, and uncertain, and egotistical women, who follow their own
wayward inclinations, as well as selfish men. Some women love power
intensely, and are never satisfied with simply filling the place that
was intended for them by nature. It is hard for such to submit to their
husbands, or, indeed, to submit to any one.”
“It must be a strange female,” answered Anna, gently, “who cannot suffer
the control of the man of her choice, after quitting father and mother
for his sake.”
“Different women have different sources of pride, that make their
husbands very uncomfortable, even when they remain with them, and affect
to discharge their duties. One will pride herself on family, and take
every occasion to let her beloved partner know how much better she is
connected than he may happen to be; another is conceited, and fancies
herself cleverer than her lord and master, and would fain have him take
_her_ advice on all occasions; while a third may have the most money,
and delight in letting it be known that it is _her_ pocket that sustains
the household.”
“I did not know, John, that you thought so much of these things,” said
Anna, laughing; “though I think you are very right in your opinions.
Pray, which of the three evils that you have mentioned would you
conceive the greatest?”
“The second. I might stand family pride; though it is disgusting when it
is not ridiculous. Then the money might be got along with for its own
sake, provided the purse were in my hand; but I really do not think I
could live with a woman who fancied she knew the most.”
“But, in many things, women ought to, and _do_ know the most.”
“Oh! as to accomplishments, and small talk, and making preserves, and
dancing, and even poetry and religion—yes, I will throw in religion—I
could wish my wife to be clever—very clever—as clever as you are
yourself, Anna”—The fair listener coloured, though her eyes brightened
at this unintended but very direct compliment—“Yes, yes; all that would
do well enough. But when it came to the affairs of men, out-of-door
concerns, or politics, or law, or anything, indeed, that called for a
masculine education and understanding, I could not endure a woman who
fancied she knew the most.”
“I should think few wives would dream of troubling their husbands with
their opinions touching the law!”
“I don’t know that. You’ve no notion, Anna, to what a pass conceit can
carry a person;—you, who are so diffident and shy, and always so ready
to yield to those who ought to know best. I’ve met with women who, not
content with arraying their own charms in their own way, must fancy they
can teach us how to put on our clothes, tell us how to turn over a
wristband, or settle a shirt-collar!”
“This is not conceit, John, but good taste,” cried Anna, now laughing
outright, and appearing herself again. “It is merely female tact
teaching male awkwardness how to adorn itself. But, surely, no woman,
John, would bother herself about law, let her love of domination be as
strong as it might.”
“I’m not so sure of that. The only really complaisant thing I ever saw
about this Mary Monson”—a cloud again passed athwart the bright
countenance of Anna—“was a sort of strange predilection for law. Even
Timms has remarked it, and commented on it too.”
“The poor woman——”
“Do not use that word in speaking of her, if you please, Anna.”
“Well, lady—if you like that better——”
“No—say young lady—or Miss Monson—or Mary, which has the most agreeable
sound of all.”
“Yet, I think I have been told that none of you believe she has been
indicted by her real name.”
“Very true; but it makes no difference. Call her by that she has
assumed; but do not call her by an alias as wretched as that of ‘poor
woman.’”
“I meant no slight, I do assure you, John; for I feel almost as much
interest in Miss Monson as you do yourself. It is not surprising,
however, that one in her situation should feel an interest in the law.”
“It is not this sort of interest that I mean. It has seemed to me, once
or twice, that she dealt with the difficulties of her own case as if she
took a pleasure in meeting them—had a species of professional pleasure
in conquering them. Timms will not let me into his secrets, and I am
glad of it, for I fancy all of them would not bear the light; but he
tells me, honestly, that some of Miss Monson’s suggestions have been
quite admirable!”
“Perhaps she has been”—Anna checked herself with the consciousness that
what she was about to utter might appear to be, and what was of still
greater importance in her own eyes, might really be, ungenerous.
“Perhaps what? Finish the sentence, I beg of you.”
Anna shook her head.
“You intended to say that perhaps Miss Monson had some _experience_ in
the law, and that it gave her a certain satisfaction to contend with its
difficulties, in consequence of previous training. Am I not right?”
Anna would not answer in terms; but she gave a little nod in assent,
colouring scarlet.
“I knew it; and I will be frank enough to own that Timms thinks the same
thing. He has hinted as much as that; but the thing is impossible. You
have only to look at her, to see that such a thing is impossible.”
Anna Updyke thought that almost anything of the sort might be possible
to a female who was in the circumstances of the accused; this, however,
she would not say, lest it might wound John’s feelings, for which she
had all the tenderness of warm affection, and a woman’s self-denial. Had
the case been reversed, it is by no means probable that her impulsive
companion would have manifested the same forbearance on her account.
John would have contended for victory, and pressed his adversary with
all the arguments, facts and reasons he could muster, on such an
occasion. Not so with the gentler and more thoughtful young woman who
was now walking quietly, and a little sadly, at his side, instinct with
all the gentleness, self-denial, and warm-hearted affection of her sex.
“No, it is worse than an absurdity”—resumed John—“it is cruel, to
imagine anything of the sort of Miss ——By the way, Anna, do you know
that a very singular thing occurred last evening, before I drove over to
town, to be present at the wedding. You know Marie Mill?”
“Certainly—Marie Moulin, you should say.”
“Well, in answering one of her mistress’s questions, she said ‘oui,
_Madame_.’”
“What would you have had her say?—‘_non_, Madame?’”
“But why Madame at all?—Why not Mademoiselle?”
“It would be very vulgar to say ‘Yes, Miss,’ in English.”
“To be sure it would; but it is very different in French. One _can_
say—_must_ say Mademoiselle to a young unmarried female in that
language; though it be vulgar to say Miss, without the name, in English.
French, you know, Anna, is a much more precise language than our own;
and those who speak it, do not take the liberties with it that we take
with the English. _Madame_ always infers a married woman; unless,
indeed, it be with a woman a hundred years old.”
“No French woman is ever _that_, John—but it _is_ odd that Marie Moulin,
who so well understands the usages of her own little world, should have
said _Madame_ to a _démoiselle_. Have I not heard, nevertheless, that
Marie’s first salutation, when she was admitted to the gaol, was a
simple exclamation of ‘Mademoiselle?’”
“That is very true; for I heard it myself. What is more, that
exclamation was almost as remarkable as this; French servants always
adding the name under such circumstances, unless they are addressing
their own particular mistresses. Madame, and Mademoiselle, are
appropriated to those they serve; while it is Mademoiselle this, or
Madame that, to every one else.”
“And now she calls her _Mademoiselle_ or _Madame_! It only proves that
too much importance is not to be attached to Marie Moulin’s sayings and
doings.”
“I’m not so sure of that. Marie has been three years in this country, as
we all know. Now the young person that she left a _Mademoiselle_ might
very well have become a _Madame_ in that interval of time. When they
met, the domestic may have used the old and familiar term in her
surprise; or she may not have known of the lady’s marriage. Afterwards,
when there had been leisure for explanations between them, she gave her
mistress her proper appellation.”
“Does she habitually say Madame now, in speaking to this singular
being?”
“Habitually she is silent. Usually she remains in the cell, when any one
is with Miss—or Mrs. Monson, perhaps I ought to say”—John used this last
term with a strong expression of spite, which gave his companion a
suppressed but infinite delight—“but when any one is with the mistress,
call her what you will, the maid commonly remains in the dungeon or
cell. Owing to this, I have never been in the way of hearing the last
address the first, except on the two occasions named. I confess I begin
to think——”
“What, John?”
“Why, that our _Miss_ Monson may turn out to be a married woman, after
all.”
“She is very young, is she not? Almost too young to be a wife?”
“Not at all! What do you call too young? She is between twenty and
twenty-two or three. She may even be twenty-five or six.”
Anna sighed, though almost imperceptibly to herself; for these were ages
that well suited her companion, though the youngest exceeded her own by
a twelvemonth. Little more, however, was said on the subject at that
interview.
It is one of the singular effects of the passion of love, more
especially with the generous-minded and just of the female sex, that a
lively interest is often awakened in behalf of a successful or favoured
rival. Such was now the fact as regards the feeling that Anna Updyke
began to entertain towards Mary Monson. The critical condition of the
lady would of itself excite interest where it failed to produce
distrust; but, the circumstance that John Wilmeter saw so much to admire
in this unknown female, if he did not actually love her, gave her an
importance in the eyes of Anna that at once elevated her into an object
of the highest interest. She was seized with the liveliest desire to see
the accused, and began seriously to reflect on the possibility of
effecting such an end. No vulgar curiosity was mingled with this
new-born purpose; but, in addition to the motives that were connected
with John’s state of mind, there was a benevolent and truly feminine
wish, on the part of Anna, to be of service to one of her own sex, so
cruelly placed, and cut off, as it would seem, from all communication
with those who should be her natural protectors and advisers.
Anna Updyke gathered, through that which had fallen from Wilmeter and
his sister, that the intercourse between the former and his interesting
client had been of the most reserved character; therein showing a
discretion and self-respect on the part of the prisoner, that spoke well
for her education and delicacy. How such a woman came to be in the
extraordinary position in which she was placed, was of course as much a
mystery to her as to all others; though, like every one else who knew
aught of the case, she indulged in conjectures of her own on the
subject. Being of a particularly natural and frank disposition, without
a particle of any ungenerous or detracting quality, and filled with
woman’s kindness in her very soul, this noble-minded young woman began
now to feel far more than an idle curiosity in behalf of her who had so
lately caused herself so much pain, not to say bitterness of anguish.
All was forgotten in pity for the miserable condition of the unconscious
offender; unconscious, for Anna was sufficiently clear-sighted and just
to see and to admit that, if John had been led astray by the charms and
sufferings of this stranger, the fact could not rightfully be imputed to
the last, as a fault. Every statement of John’s went to confirm this act
of justice to the stranger.
Then, the unaccountable silence of Marie Moulin doubled the mystery and
greatly increased the interest of the whole affair. This woman had gone
to Biberry pledged to communicate to Sarah all she knew or might learn,
touching the accused; and well did Anna know that her friend would make
her the repository of her own information, on this as well as on other
subjects; but a most unaccountable silence governed the course of the
domestic, as well as that of her strange mistress. It really seemed
that, in passing the principal door of the gaol, Marie Moulin had buried
herself in a convent, where all communication with the outer world was
forbidden. Three several letters from Sarah had John handed in at the
grate, certain that they must have reached the hands of the Swiss; but
no answer had been received. All attempts to speak to Marie were
quietly, but most ingeniously evaded, by the tact and readiness of the
prisoner; and the hope of obtaining information from that source was
abandoned by Sarah, who was too proud to solicit a servant for that
which the last was reluctant to communicate. With Anna the feeling was
different. She had no curiosity on the subject, separated from a most
generous and womanly concern in the prisoner’s forlorn state; and she
thought far less of Marie Moulin’s disrespect and forgetfulness of her
word, than of Mary Monson’s desolation and approaching trial.
[Illustration]