“Oh! her smile—it seems half holy,
As if drawn from thoughts more far
Than our common jestings are;
And if any painter drew her,
He would paint her unaware,
With a halo round her hair.”
Elizabeth Barrett.
Never was the Lady Mabel’s beauty more transcendent than on that
evening; and as she entered the splendid apartments where King James
held his levee, a low murmur of admiration arose on every side.
“What exquisite creature is she, who moves like a queen by right of her
own loveliness!” exclaimed a young French nobleman of the highest rank,
who was visiting at the court. “Tell me, Ormond?” he said, turning to an
older person who stood beside him, “do your cold English eyes behold
unmoved such a vision of beauty; for my own part, I confess that, never
upon my sight rose so peerless a creature.” And, in truth, Mabel’s
beauty was of no ordinary kind; tall, and rather slender, yet with all
the roundness of _contour_, and the gracefulness of childhood, every
movement had a charm. Her complexion was exquisitely fair, and so
transparently delicate that it glowed with every passing emotion; her
eyes, large and full, were of that dark violet hue that varies every
moment—sometimes so soft and liquid that you would have thought her a
creature all gentleness, then flashing with the light of thought,
brilliant and sparkling, as though a tear had never dimmed their lustre.
At times, the mirth—so natural to her once—would play over her lovely
features, glancing in dimples round her rosy mouth, and bringing to view
the pearly teeth, so small and regular.
On this evening she was robed in a thin, exquisite dress of the richest
lace, over a satin of such lustre as to resemble woven silver, whilst on
her raven hair rested a tiara of brilliants, such as a nobleman’s
revenue could not purchase, the gift of the Queen to Lady Arlington on
her marriage. Her snowy neck and arms were circled with the same
sparkling gems, and one shone like a star on the girdle that confined
her slender waist. Who would have recognized in the queenly bearing and
rather haughty countenance of the Lady Mabel, the sweet, simple and
loving maiden, who used to dance over the fields at Riverdale? And yet
could she have met in all that crowd of flatterers one true friend, one
pure, guileless nature, Mabel’s whole face would have changed, and her
free spirit have flowed out in all its wonted fullness and
confidingness. The young Duke D’Alençon, the French nobleman to whom we
have before alluded, was of the blood-royal, and an especial favorite of
Louis Fourteenth, the reigning monarch of France. He had been educated
at a convent, and was early imbued with the strongest reverence for the
Romish church: so deeply was his mind filled with its superstitions,
that it was only the most-earnest solicitations of relations that
prevented his becoming a monk. A residence at the Court of Louis, the
most dissipated and reckless of any in Europe, had moderated, in some
measure, his severe notions of conduct, but his attachment to the forms
and ceremonies of his own church remained as firm and bigoted as before.
It was the sympathy between himself and the English monarch, that had
induced him to visit the Court of St. James.
To Lord Arlington, the king had often spoken of his dear friend
D’Alençon; and, ever striving to add new links to the ties that bound
the nation to France, he expressed his wish that a union between Mabel
and the young duke might be formed, adding, at the same time, that the
latter would wed none but a member of his own communion. To this
proposal, Lord Arlington with much delight had acceded, and declared
that _his_ daughter could be no other than a zealous Catholic. It was
with this plan at heart, he had so earnestly desired Mabel to be present
on the evening before-mentioned, and all transpired to the satisfaction
of the ambitious parent. The king himself introduced D’Alençon to the
lovely Mabel, and after whispering in her ear some words of flattery,
that called a blush to her fair cheek, he left them to converse
undisturbed. The young duke’s nature was more earnest, sincere, and
enthusiastic than any our heroine had yet encountered, and she
accordingly listened with unusual interest to his words, and replied
with more of her accustomed spirit and vivacity than she had ever before
displayed.
Little dreamed the artless girl that her father was watching every
glance of her eye, and that already, in his ambitious mind, a resolution
was formed as inflexible as iron, a plan for her aggrandizement, which
no prayers, or tears, or entreaties of hers could alter in the minutest
particulars.
Not many weeks had passed since that evening, and the young duke had
sought Mabel’s side at every festive occasion, yet still to her he had
never breathed his love. Something there was in her simple purity that
almost awed him; her calm dignity prevented all courtly gallantries,
while her apparent indifference kept back an impassioned declaration. To
her father, therefore, he resolved to speak first, and it was with
difficulty Lord Arlington concealed his delight, when the prospect of
his daughter’s alliance with the blood-royal of France was first
presented to him as a _certain_ thing; for, to his mind, the possibility
of Mabel’s opposition would have seemed absurd. The proposal was at once
accepted, and the day fixed upon for the nuptials, which were to be
celebrated according to the Romish form; and, previous to the ceremony,
the young pair were to confess and receive mass, after the custom of
that church.
The next day, the happy father called his daughter to the library, and
there proceeded to lay before the astonished girl her brilliant
prospects; not to ask her consent, not even to inquire whether she loved
D’Alençon, but with the iron tone of one who expects no opposition, and
to whom denial would be of no avail. Mabel heard at first as one in a
dream, her eyes dilated, her bosom heaved, but when he went on, and
named the day that had been fixed upon, she seemed to feel as one who
has heard his doom, but whose lips will cry for mercy, though there is
no hope.
“My father!” she passionately exclaimed, “it must not be. I cannot,
cannot wed him—oh, God! teach me in this hour what I shall say. The
time has come—I can no longer keep silent! Father—I have striven to be
dutiful, I have tried to please you; nay, sometimes I have grieved my
conscience rather than disobey you—but it cannot be so any longer. No!”
she wildly said, and her eyes glowed, her whole frame trembled with the
violence of her emotion, “I am your child, and, as such, I am bound as
far as I can to obey you, but I have another father, even _God_, and to
him, before you, before all the world, I owe allegiance. I have solemnly
pledged myself to obey his will as I have been taught it; I am a member
of His church—yes, my father, I am a Protestant, a Puritan, if so in
derision you call those who acknowledge no supreme head but _Christ, no
infallible guide_ but the Bible; and can you ask me, in obedience to
your will, to renounce my faith, to abjure my church, to forsake that
which is dearer to me than all the world beside? No, you will not, you
cannot be so cruel, so unjust, so harsh!”
“Cease, cease this idle ranting, Lady Mabel. As your father, it is my
duty to bring you into the true church, from which, but for my
carelessness, you should never have wandered. Is not the opinion of your
father, and your sovereign, of more value than your own unenlightened
prejudices? Is it not your duty to obey your only parent, at the expense
only of the sacrifice of a mere form of worship?
“Nay, _speak_ not; I will hear no complaints, no refusals: you shall
marry D’Alençon on the day I have fixed, or I will deprive your old
Puritan teacher of his living, and send him forth a _beggar_.”
With a faint shriek Mabel sprung forward, and fell at her father’s feet,
clasping his knees with her cold hands, and lifting her despairing eyes
to his face.
“Spare, oh! spare me this trial, my father; I will do aught else to
please you, but, oh! do not ask me solemnly to confess a faith I have
not, or to promise a love that I can never, never give: let me be your
own Mabel—let me live with you, and cheer your declining years? I ask
no high station, I covet no wealth—only let me be at peace with God,
and my own soul! In pity hear me, O father; for her sake, whose name I
bear, do not revenge my denial of your wishes on the head of that
innocent old man—do not send his gray hairs in sorrow to the grave?”
For a moment, one moment only, the proud heart of the aspiring man was
softened, as he called to mind one who had also knelt before him, and
implored him to let her once more see her childhood’s friends; but the
next, the vision of a coronet over that pale brow, round which the long
dark curls were falling, and he coldly said—
“You have but to _choose_. I ask no dreadful sacrifice at your hands:
methinks it were to many rather a pleasant prospect to be Duchess
D’Alençon, and you will remember your own impressions of him were
decidedly agreeable. However, he will be satisfied when you are his, I
doubt not; I will leave you to meditate, and remember, in a life of
_forty_ years, your father was never known to give up any thing on which
his will was fixed.”
Mabel said no more; on that sweet face had fallen the deadness of
despair, no sound escaped from her lips, her eyes wandered vacantly
round as if her mind had failed under the pressure of some great
calamity—but she was not forsaken in that dark hour by Him to whom she
had solemnly given her service. Although the terrible thought that she
should send forth her beloved and venerable father to destitution and
want was ever in her mind, and—added to it—the remembrance that
Walter, too, would be left desolate, even were he suffered to retain the
curacy, which, in itself, was very improbable; yet the words of Mr.
Dacre were with her—“My child, never give up your faith, let no threats
induce you; and then, above even this, the words of Christ, ‘whoso
loveth father or mother more than me, is not worthy of me.’”
Strengthened by these reflections, Mabel resolved, before God, never to
abjure her faith, and never to wed one whom she could not love or
revere.
The weeks passed slowly on, and nothing more was said to Mabel on the
subject of her marriage, but she saw the preparations going on with
languid indifference, which her father attributed to her perfect
resignation to his will. One thing she had requested of Lord Arlington,
and he had granted it, and this was—that the duke should visit her
only, occasionally, as a common acquaintance.
The wedding-day approached: it was the night before—the magnificent
dress, with the gorgeous jewels and bridal gifts, were all prepared.
Mabel asked leave to retire early, and as she knelt, according to the
custom, to receive her father’s good-night embrace, she gently kissed
his hand and a tear fell upon it. With more than his usual tenderness,
he said—“God bless and keep you, my darling daughter!”
* * * * *
That morning, Mabel did not appear. It was late, and becoming alarmed,
her father entered her room. The curtained bed had not been touched. She
had fled—and with her, a young girl, her waiting-maid, who loved her
fair mistress with almost a passionate fondness. No clue could be
obtained of her course; search was unavailing; and, heart-broken and
disconsolate, the father—after a year or two of utter silence as to her
fate—relapsed into a sad and stern misanthropy. None but himself knew
how sharp were the pangs of remorse, or how his solitude was haunted by
a pale, sad face, and the moans of a broken heart.