Parents have flinty hearts! No tears can move them.
--OTWAY.
When Alice Bridgenorth at length entered the parlour where her anxious
lover had so long expected her, it was with a slow step, and a composed
manner. Her dress was arranged with an accurate attention to form, which
at once enhanced the appearance of its puritanic simplicity, and struck
Julian as a bad omen; for although the time bestowed upon the toilet
may, in many cases, intimate the wish to appear advantageously at such
an interview, yet a ceremonious arrangement of attire is very much
allied with formality, and a preconceived determination to treat a lover
with cold politeness.
The sad-coloured gown--the pinched and plaited cap, which carefully
obscured the profusion of long dark-brown hair--the small ruff, and the
long sleeves, would have appeared to great disadvantage on a shape less
graceful than Alice Bridgenorth’s; but an exquisite form, though not, as
yet, sufficiently rounded in the outlines to produce the perfection
of female beauty, was able to sustain and give grace even to this
unbecoming dress. Her countenance, fair and delicate, with eyes of
hazel, and a brow of alabaster, had, notwithstanding, less regular
beauty than her form, and might have been justly subjected to criticism.
There was, however, a life and spirit in her gaiety, and a depth of
sentiment in her gravity, which made Alice, in conversation with the
very few persons with whom she associated, so fascinating in her manners
and expression, whether of language or countenance--so touching, also,
in her simplicity and purity of thought, that brighter beauties might
have been overlooked in her company. It was no wonder, therefore, that
an ardent character like Julian, influenced by these charms, as well as
by the secrecy and mystery attending his intercourse with Alice, should
prefer the recluse of the Black Fort to all others with whom he had
become acquainted in general society.
His heart beat high as she came into the apartment, and it was almost
without an attempt to speak that his profound obeisance acknowledged her
entrance.
“This is a mockery, Master Peveril,” said Alice, with an effort to speak
firmly, which yet was disconcerted by a slightly tremulous inflection
of voice--“a mockery, and a cruel one. You come to this lone place,
inhabited only by two women, too simple to command your absence--too
weak to enforce it--you come, in spite of my earnest request--to
the neglect of your own time--to the prejudice, I may fear, of my
character--you abuse the influence you possess over the simple person
to whom I am entrusted--All this you do, and think to make up by low
reverences and constrained courtesy! Is this honourable, or is it
fair?--Is it,” she added, after a moment’s hesitation--“is it kind?”
The tremulous accent fell especially on the last word she uttered, and
it was spoken in a low tone of gentle reproach, which went to Julian’s
heart.
“If,” said he, “there was a mode by which, at the peril of my life,
Alice, I could show my regard--my respect--my devoted tenderness--the
danger would be dearer to me than ever was pleasure.”
“You have said such things often,” said Alice, “and they are such as I
ought not to hear, and do not desire to hear. I have no tasks to impose
on you--no enemies to be destroyed--no need or desire of protection--no
wish, Heaven knows, to expose you to danger--It is your visits here
alone to which danger attaches. You have but to rule your own wilful
temper--to turn your thoughts and your cares elsewhere, and I can have
nothing to ask--nothing to wish for. Use your own reason--consider the
injury you do yourself--the injustice you do us--and let me, once
more, in fair terms, entreat you to absent yourself from this
place--till--till----”
She paused, and Julian eagerly interrupted her.--“Till when,
Alice?--till when?--impose on me any length of absence which your
severity can inflict, short of a final separation--Say, Begone for
years, but return when these years are over; and, slow and wearily as
they must pass away, still the thought that they must at length have
their period, will enable me to live through them. Let me, then, conjure
thee, Alice, to name a date--to fix a term--to say till _when!_”
“Till you can bear to think of me only as a friend and sister.”
“That is a sentence of eternal banishment indeed!” said Julian; “it
is seeming, no doubt, to fix a term of exile, but attaching to it an
impossible condition.”
“And why impossible, Julian?” said Alice, in a tone of persuasion; “were
we not happier ere you threw the mask from your own countenance, and
tore the veil from my foolish eyes? Did we not meet with joy, spend our
time happily, and part cheerily, because we transgressed no duty, and
incurred no self-reproach? Bring back that state of happy ignorance, and
you shall have no reason to call me unkind. But while you form schemes
which I know to be visionary, and use language of such violence and
passion, you shall excuse me if I now, and once for all, declare, that
since Deborah shows herself unfit for the trust reposed in her, and
must needs expose me to persecutions of this nature, I will write to
my father, that he may fix me another place of residence; and in the
meanwhile I will take shelter with my aunt at Kirk-Truagh.”
“Hear me, unpitying girl,” said Peveril, “hear me, and you shall see how
devoted I am to obedience, in all that I can do to oblige you! You say
you were happy when we spoke not on such topics--well--at all expense of
my own suppressed feelings, that happy period shall return. I will meet
you--walk with you--read with you--but only as a brother would with his
sister, or a friend with his friend; the thoughts I may nourish, be they
of hope or of despair, my tongue shall not give birth to, and therefore
I cannot offend; Deborah shall be ever by your side, and her presence
shall prevent my even hinting at what might displease you--only do not
make a crime to me of those thoughts which are the dearest part of
my existence; for believe me it were better and kinder to rob me of
existence itself.”
“This is the mere ecstasy of passion, Julian,” answered Alice
Bridgenorth; “that which is unpleasant, our selfish and stubborn
will represents as impossible. I have no confidence in the plan you
propose--no confidence in your resolution, and less than none in the
protection of Deborah. Till you can renounce, honestly and explicitly,
the wishes you have lately expressed, we must be strangers;--and could
you renounce them even at this moment, it were better that we should
part for a long time; and, for Heaven’s sake, let it be as soon as
possible--perhaps it is even now too late to prevent some unpleasant
accident--I thought I heard a noise.”
“It was Deborah,” answered Julian. “Be not afraid, Alice; we are secure
against surprise.”
“I know not,” said Alice, “what you mean by such security--I have
nothing to hide. I sought not this interview; on the contrary, averted
it as long as I could--and am now most desirous to break it off.”
“And wherefore, Alice, since you say it must be our last? Why should you
shake the sand which is passing so fast? the very executioner hurries
not the prayers of the wretches upon the scaffold.--And see you not--I
will argue as coldly as you can desire--see you not that you are
breaking your own word, and recalling the hope which yourself held out
to me?”
“What hope have I suggested? What word have I given, Julian?” answered
Alice. “You yourself build wild hopes in the air, and accuse me of
destroying what had never any earthly foundation. Spare yourself,
Julian--spare me--and in mercy to us both depart, and return not again
till you can be more reasonable.”
“Reasonable?” replied Julian; “it is you, Alice, who will deprive me
altogether of reason. Did you not say, that if our parents could be
brought to consent to our union, you would no longer oppose my suit?”
“No--no--no,” said Alice eagerly, and blushing deeply,--“I did not say
so, Julian--it was your own wild imagination which put construction on
my silence and my confusion.”
“You do _not_ say so, then?” answered Julian; “and if all other
obstacles were removed, I should find one in the cold flinty bosom of
her who repays the most devoted and sincere affection with contempt and
dislike?--Is that,” he added, in a deep tone of feeling--“is that what
Alice Bridgenorth says to Julian Peveril?”
“Indeed--indeed, Julian,” said the almost weeping girl, “I do not say
so--I say nothing, and I ought not to say anything concerning what
I might do, in a state of things which can never take place. Indeed,
Julian, you ought not thus to press me. Unprotected as I am--wishing you
well--very well--why should you urge me to say or do what would lessen
me in my own eyes? to own affection for one from whom fate has separated
me for ever? It is ungenerous--it is cruel--it is seeking a momentary
and selfish gratification to yourself, at the expense of every feeling
which I ought to entertain.”
“You have said enough, Alice,” said Julian, with sparkling eyes; “you
have said enough in deprecating my urgency, and I will press you no
farther. But you overrate the impediments which lie betwixt us--they
must and shall give way.”
“So you said before,” answered Alice, “and with what probability, your
own account may show. You dared not to mention the subject to your own
father--how should you venture to mention it to mine?”
“That I will soon enable you to decide upon. Major Bridgenorth, by my
mother’s account, is a worthy and an estimable man. I will remind him,
that to my mother’s care he owes the dearest treasure and comfort of his
life; and I will ask him if it is a just retribution to make that mother
childless. Let me but know where to find him, Alice, and you shall soon
hear if I have feared to plead my cause with him.”
“Alas!” answered Alice, “you well know my uncertainty as to my dear
father’s residence. How often has it been my earnest request to him that
he would let me share his solitary abode, or his obscure wanderings!
But the short and infrequent visits which he makes to this house are all
that he permits me of his society. Something I might surely do, however
little, to alleviate the melancholy by which he is oppressed.”
“Something we might both do,” said Peveril. “How willingly would I aid
you in so pleasing a task! All old griefs should be forgotten--all
old friendships revived. My father’s prejudices are those of an
Englishman--strong, indeed, but not insurmountable by reason. Tell me,
then, where Major Bridgenorth is, and leave the rest to me; or let me
but know by what address your letters reach him, and I will forthwith
essay to discover his dwelling.”
“Do not attempt it, I charge you,” said Alice. “He is already a man of
sorrows; and what would he think were I capable of entertaining a suit
so likely to add to them? Besides, I could not tell you, if I would,
where he is now to be found. My letters reach him from time to time, by
means of my aunt Christian; but of his address I am entirely ignorant.”
“Then, by Heaven,” answered Julian, “I will watch his arrival in this
island, and in this house; and ere he has locked thee in his arms, he
shall answer to me on the subject of my suit.”
“Then demand that answer now,” said a voice from without the door, which
was at the same time slowly opened--“Demand that answer now, for here
stands Ralph Bridgenorth.”
As he spoke, he entered the apartment with his usual slow and sedate
step--raised his flapp’d and steeple-crowned hat from his brows, and,
standing in the midst of the room, eyed alternately his daughter and
Julian Peveril with a fixed and penetrating glance.
“Father!” said Alice, utterly astonished, and terrified besides, by his
sudden appearance at such a conjuncture,--“Father, I am not to blame.”
“Of that anon, Alice,” said Bridgenorth; “meantime retire to your
apartment--I have that to say to this youth which will not endure your
presence.”
“Indeed--indeed, father,” said Alice, alarmed at what she supposed these
words indicated, “Julian is as little to be blamed as I! It was chance,
it was fortune, which caused our meeting together.” Then suddenly
rushing forward, she threw her arms around her father, saying, “Oh, do
him no injury--he meant no wrong! Father, you were wont to be a man of
reason and religious peace.”
“And wherefore should I not be so now, Alice?” said Bridgenorth, raising
his daughter from the ground, on which she had almost sunk in the
earnestness of her supplication. “Dost thou know aught, maiden, which
should inflame my anger against this young man, more than reason
or religion may bridle? Go--go to thy chamber. Compose thine own
passions--learn to rule these--and leave it to me to deal with this
stubborn young man.”
Alice arose, and, with her eyes fixed on the ground, retired slowly from
the apartment. Julian followed her steps with his eyes till the last
wave of her garment was visible at the closing door; then turned his
looks to Major Bridgenorth, and then sunk them on the ground. The Major
continued to regard him in profound silence; his looks were melancholy
and even austere; but there was nothing which indicated either agitation
or keen resentment. He motioned to Julian to take a seat, and assumed
one himself. After which he opened the conversation in the following
manner:--
“You seemed but now, young gentleman, anxious to learn where I was to
be found. Such I at least conjectured, from the few expressions which I
chanced to overhear; for I made bold, though it may be contrary to the
code of modern courtesy, to listen a moment or two, in order to gather
upon what subject so young a man as you entertained so young a woman as
Alice, in a private interview.”
“I trust, sir,” said Julian, rallying spirits in what he felt to be a
case of extremity, “you have heard nothing on my part which has given
offence to a gentleman, whom, though unknown, I am bound to respect so
highly.”
“On the contrary,” said Bridgenorth, with the same formal gravity, “I am
pleased to find that your business is, or appears to be, with me,
rather than with my daughter. I only think you had done better to have
entrusted it to me in the first instance, as my sole concern.”
The utmost sharpness of attention which Julian applied, could not
discover if Bridgenorth spoke seriously or ironically to the above
purpose. He was, however, quick-witted beyond his experience, and
was internally determined to endeavour to discover something of the
character and the temper of him with whom he spoke. For that purpose,
regulating his reply in the same tone with Bridgenorth’s observation, he
said, that not having the advantage to know his place of residence, he
had applied for information to his daughter.
“Who is now known to you for the first time?” said Bridgenorth. “Am I so
to understand you?”
“By no means,” answered Julian, looking down; “I have been known to your
daughter for many years; and what I wished to say, respects both her
happiness and my own.”
“I must understand you,” said Bridgenorth, “even as carnal men
understand each other on the matters of this world. You are attached to
my daughter by the cords of love; I have long known this.”
“You, Master Bridgenorth?” exclaimed Peveril--“_You_ have long known
it?”
“Yes, young man. Think you, that as the father of an only child, I could
have suffered Alice Bridgenorth--the only living pledge of her who is
now an angel in heaven--to have remained in this seclusion without the
surest knowledge of all her material actions? I have, in person, seen
more, both of her and of you, than you could be aware of; and
when absent in the body, I had the means of maintaining the same
superintendence. Young man, they say that such love as you entertain for
my daughter teaches much subtilty; but believe not that it can overreach
the affection which a widowed father bears to an only child.”
“If,” said Julian, his heart beating thick and joyfully, “if you have
known this intercourse so long, may I not hope that it has not met your
disapprobation?”
The Major paused for an instant, and then answered, “In some respects,
certainly not. Had it done so--had there seemed aught on your side, or
on my daughter’s, to have rendered your visits here dangerous to her,
or displeasing to me, she had not been long the inhabitant of this
solitude, or of this island. But be not so hasty as to presume, that
all which you may desire in this matter can be either easily or speedily
accomplished.”
“I foresee, indeed, difficulties,” answered Julian; “but with your
kind acquiescence, they are such as I trust to remove. My father is
generous--my mother is candid and liberal. They loved you once; I trust
they will love you again. I will be the mediator betwixt you--peace and
harmony shall once more inhabit our neighbourhood, and----”
Bridgenorth interrupted him with a grim smile; for such it seemed, as it
passed over a face of deep melancholy. “My daughter well said, but short
while past, that you were a dreamer of dreams--an architect of plans and
hopes fantastic as the visions of the night. It is a great thing you
ask of me;--the hand of my only child--the sum of my worldly substance,
though that is but dross in comparison. You ask the key of the only
fountain from which I may yet hope to drink one pleasant draught; you
ask to be the sole and absolute keeper of my earthly happiness--and what
have you offered, or what have you to offer in return, for the surrender
you require of me?”
“I am but too sensible,” said Peveril, abashed at his own hasty
conclusions, “how difficult it may be.”
“Nay, but interrupt me not,” replied Bridgenorth, “till I show you the
amount of what you offer me in exchange for a boon, which, whatever may
be its intrinsic value, is earnestly desired by you, and comprehends all
that is valuable on earth which I have it in my power to bestow. You may
have heard that in the late times I was the antagonist of your father’s
principles and his profane faction, but not the enemy of his person.”
“I have ever heard,” replied Julian, “much the contrary; and it was but
now that I reminded you that you had been his friend.”
“Ay. When he was in affliction and I in prosperity, I was neither
unwilling, nor altogether unable, to show myself such. Well, the tables
are turned--the times are changed. A peaceful and unoffending man
might have expected from a neighbour, now powerful in his turn, such
protection, when walking in the paths of the law, as all men, subjects
of the same realm, have a right to expect even from perfect strangers.
What chances? I pursue, with the warrant of the King and law, a
murderess, bearing on her hand the blood of my near connection, and I
had, in such a case, a right to call on every liege subject to render
assistance to the execution. My late friendly neighbour, bound, as a man
and a magistrate, to give ready assistance to a legal action--bound,
as a grateful and obliged friend, to respect my rights and my
person--thrusts himself betwixt me--me, the avenger of blood--and my
lawful captive; beats me to the earth, at once endangering my life, and,
in mere human eyes, sullying mine honour; and under his protection, the
Midianitish woman reaches, like a sea-eagle, the nest which she hath
made in the wave-surrounded rocks, and remains there till gold, duly
administered at Court, wipes out all memory of her crime, and baffles
the vengeance due to the memory of the best and bravest of men.--But,”
he added, apostrophising the portrait of Christian, “thou art not
yet forgotten, my fair-haired William! The vengeance which dogs thy
murderess is slow,--but it is sure!”
There was a pause of some moments, which Julian Peveril, willing to hear
to what conclusion Major Bridgenorth was finally to arrive, did not
care to interrupt. Accordingly, in a few minutes, the latter
proceeded.--“These things,” he said, “I recall not in bitterness, so far
as they are personal to me--I recall them not in spite of heart, though
they have been the means of banishing me from my place of residence,
where my fathers dwelt, and where my earthly comforts lie interred. But
the public cause sets further strife betwixt your father and me. Who so
active as he to execute the fatal edict of black St. Bartholomew’s day,
when so many hundreds of gospel-preachers were expelled from house and
home--from hearth and altar--from church and parish, to make room for
belly-gods and thieves? Who, when a devoted few of the Lord’s people
were united to lift the fallen standard, and once more advance the
good cause, was the readiest to break their purpose--to search for,
persecute, and apprehend them? Whose breath did I feel warm on my
neck--whose naked sword was thrust within a foot of my body, whilst
I lurked darkling, like a thief in concealment, in the house of my
fathers?--It was Geoffrey Peveril’s--it was your father’s!--What can
you answer to all this, or how can you reconcile it with your present
wishes?
“These things I point out to you, Julian, that I may show you how
impossible, in the eyes of a merely worldly man, would be the union
which you are desirous of. But Heaven hath at times opened a door, where
man beholds no means of issue. Julian, your mother, for one to whom the
truth is unknown, is, after the fashion of the world, one of the best,
and one of the wisest of women; and Providence, which gave her so fair a
form, and tenanted that form with a mind as pure as the original frailty
of our vile nature will permit, means not, I trust, that she shall
continue to the end to be a vessel of wrath and perdition. Of your
father I say nothing--he is what the times and example of others, and
the counsels of his lordly priest, have made him; and of him, once more,
I say nothing, save that I have power over him, which ere now he might
have felt, but that there is one within his chambers, who might have
suffered in his suffering. Nor do I wish to root up your ancient family.
If I prize not your boast of family honours and pedigree, I would not
willingly destroy them; more than I would pull down a moss-grown tower,
or hew to the ground an ancient oak, save for the straightening of
the common path, and advantage of the public. I have, therefore, no
resentment against the humbled House of Peveril--nay, I have regard to
it in its depression.”
He here made a second pause, as if he expected Julian to say something.
But notwithstanding the ardour with which the young man had pressed his
suit, he was too much trained in ideas of the importance of his family,
and in the better habit of respect for his parents, to hear, without
displeasure, some part of Bridgenorth’s discourse.
“The House of Peveril,” he replied, “was never humbled.”
“Had you said the sons of that House had never been _humble_,” answered
Bridgenorth, “you would have come nearer the truth.--Are _you_
not humbled? Live you not here, the lackey of a haughty woman, the
play-companion of an empty youth? If you leave this Isle, and go to the
Court of England, see what regard will there be paid to the old pedigree
that deduces your descent from kings and conquerors. A scurril or
obscene jest, an impudent carriage, a laced cloak, a handful of gold,
and the readiness to wager it on a card, or a die, will better advance
you at the Court of Charles, than your father’s ancient name, and
slavish devotion of blood and fortune to the cause of _his_ father.”
“That is, indeed, but too probable,” said Peveril; “but the Court shall
be no element of mine. I will live like my fathers, among my people,
care for their comforts, decide their differences----”
“Build Maypoles, and dance around them,” said Bridgenorth, with another
of those grim smiles which passed over his features like the light of
a sexton’s torch, as it glares and is reflected by the window of the
church, when he comes from locking a funeral vault. “No, Julian,
these are not times in which, by the dreaming drudgery of a country
magistrate, and the petty cares of a country proprietor, a man can serve
his unhappy country. There are mighty designs afloat, and men are called
to make their choice betwixt God and Baal. The ancient superstition--the
abomination of our fathers--is raising its head, and flinging abroad its
snares, under the protection of the princes of the earth; but she raises
not her head unmarked or unwatched; the true English hearts are as
thousands, which wait but a signal to arise as one man, and show the
kings of the earth that they have combined in vain! We will cast their
cords from us--the cup of their abominations we will not taste.”
“You speak in darkness, Master Bridgenorth,” said Peveril. “Knowing so
much of me, you may, perhaps, also be aware, that I at least have
seen too much of the delusions of Rome, to desire that they should be
propagated at home.”
“Else, wherefore do I speak to thee friendly and so free?” said
Bridgenorth. “Do I not know, with what readiness of early wit you
baffled the wily attempts of the woman’s priest, to seduce thee from the
Protestant faith? Do I not know, how thou wast beset when abroad, and
that thou didst both hold thine own faith, and secure the wavering
belief of thy friend? Said I not, this was done like the son of Margaret
Peveril? Said I not, he holdeth, as yet, but the dead letter--but the
seed which is sown shall one day sprout and quicken?--Enough, however,
of this. For to-day this is thy habitation. I will see in thee neither
the servant of the daughter of Eshbaal, nor the son of him who pursued
my life, and blemished my honours; but thou shalt be to me, for this
day, as the child of her, without whom my house had been extinct.”
So saying, he stretched out his thin, bony hand, and grasped that of
Julian Peveril; but there was such a look of mourning in his welcome,
that whatever delight the youth anticipated, spending so long a time
in the neighbourhood of Alice Bridgenorth, perhaps in her society,
or however strongly he felt the prudence of conciliating her father’s
good-will, he could not help feeling as if his heart was chilled in his
company.