The following morning was indeed eventful to the family at Laughton; and
as if conscious of what it brought forth, it rose dreary and sunless.
One heavy mist covered all the landscape, and a raw, drizzling rain fell
pattering through the yellow leaves.
Madame Dalibard, pleading her infirmities, rarely left her room before
noon, and Varney professed himself very irregular in his hours of
rising; the breakfast, therefore, afforded no social assembly to the
family, but each took that meal in the solitude of his or her own
chamber. Percival, in whom all habits partook of the healthfulness and
simplicity of his character, rose habitually early, and that day, in
spite of the weather, walked forth betimes to meet the person charged
with the letters from the post. He had done so for the last three or
four days, impatient to hear from his mother, and calculating that it
was full time to receive the expected answer to his confession and his
prayer. He met the messenger at the bottom of the park, not far from
Guy’s Oak. This day he was not disappointed. The letter-bag contained
three letters for himself,--two with the foreign postmark, the third in
Ardworth’s hand. It contained also a letter for Madame Dalibard, and two
for Varney.
Leaving the messenger to take these last to the Hall, Percival, with his
own prizes, plunged into the hollow of the glen before him, and, seating
himself at the foot of Guy’s Oak, through the vast branches of which the
rain scarcely came, and only in single, mournful drops, he opened first
the letter in his mother’s hand, and read as follows:--
MY DEAR, DEAR SON,--How can I express to you the alarm your letter has
given to me! So these, then, are the new relations you have discovered!
I fondly imagined that you were alluding to some of my own family, and
conjecturing who, amongst my many cousins, could have so captivated
your attention. These the new relations,--Lucretia Dalibard, Helen
Mainwaring! Percival, do you not know ---- No, you cannot know that
Helen Mainwaring is the daughter of a disgraced man, of one who (more
than suspected of fraud in the bank in which he was a partner) left his
country, condemned even by his own father. If you doubt this, you have
but to inquire at ----, not ten miles from Laughton, where the elder
Mainwaring resided. Ask there what became of William Mainwaring. And
Lucretia, you do not know that the dying prayer of her uncle, Sir Miles
St. John, was that she might never enter the house he bequeathed to
your father. Not till after my poor Charles’s death did I know the exact
cause for Sir Miles’s displeasure, though confident it was just; but
then amongst his papers I found the ungrateful letter which betrayed
thoughts so dark and passions so unwomanly that I blushed for my sex
to read it. Could it be possible that that poor old man’s prayers were
unheeded, that that treacherous step could ever cross your threshold,
that that cruel eye, which read with such barbarous joy the ravages of
death on a benefactor’s face, could rest on the hearth by which your
frank, truthful countenance has so often smiled away my tears, I should
feel indeed as if a thunder-cloud hung over the roof. No, if you marry
the niece, the aunt must be banished from your house. Good heavens! and
it is the daughter of William Mainwaring, the niece and ward of Lucretia
Dalibard, to whom you have given your faithful affection, whom you
single from the world as your wife! Oh, my son,--my beloved, my sole
surviving child,--do not think that I blame you, that my heart does
not bleed while I write thus; but I implore you on my knees to pause at
least, to suspend this intercourse till I myself can reach England. And
what then? Why, then, Percival, I promise, on my part, that I will see
your Helen with unprejudiced eyes, that I will put away from me, as
far as possible, all visions of disappointed pride,--the remembrance of
faults not her own,--and if she be as you say and think, I will take her
to my heart and call her ‘Daughter.’ Are you satisfied? If so, come to
me,--come at once, and take comfort from your mother’s lip. How I long
to be with you while you read this; how I tremble at the pain I so
rudely give you! But my poor sister still chains me here, I dare not
leave her, lest I should lose her last sigh. Come then, come; we will
console each other.
Your fond (how fond!) and sorrowing mother,
MARY ST. JOHN. SORRENTO, October 3, 1831.
P.S.--You see by this address that we have left Pisa for this place,
recommended by our physician; hence an unhappy delay of some days in my
reply. Ah, Percival, how sleepless will be my pillow till I hear from
you!
Long, very long, was it before St. John, mute and overwhelmed with the
sudden shock of his anguish, opened his other letters. The first was
from Captain Greville.
What trap have you fallen into, foolish boy? That you would get into
some silly scrape or another, was natural enough. But a scrape for life,
sir,--that is serious! But--God bless you for your candour, my Percival;
you have written to us in time--you are old-fashioned enough to think
that a mother’s consent is necessary to a young man’s union; and you
have left it in our power to save you yet. It is not every boyish fancy
that proves to be true love. But enough of this preaching; I shall
do better than write scolding letters,--I shall come and scold you in
person. My servant is at this very moment packing my portmanteau, the
laquais-de-place is gone to Naples for my passport. Almost as soon as
you receive this I shall be with you; and if I am a day or two later
than the mail, be patient: do not commit yourself further. Break your
heart if you please, but don’t implicate your honour. I shall come at
once to Curzon Street. Adieu! H. GREVILLE.
Ardworth’s letter was shorter than the others,--fortunately so, for
otherwise it had been unread:--
If I do not come to you myself the day after you receive this, dear
Percival,--which, indeed, is most probable,--I shall send you my proxy,
in one whom, for my sake, I know that you will kindly welcome. He will
undertake my task, and clear up all the mysteries with which, I trust,
my correspondence has thoroughly bewildered your lively imagination.
Yours ever, JOHN ARDWORTH. GRAY’S INN.
Little indeed did Percival’s imagination busy itself with the mysteries
of Ardworth’s correspondence. His mind scarcely took in the sense of the
words over which his eye mechanically wandered.
And the letter which narrated the visit of Madame Dalibard to the
house thus solemnly interdicted to her step was on its way to his
mother,--nay, by this time would almost have reached her! Greville was
on the road,--nay, as his tutor’s letter had been forwarded from London,
might perhaps be in Curzon Street that day. How desirable to see him
before he could reach Laughton, to prepare him for Madame Dalibard’s
visit, for Helen’s illness, explain the position in which he was
involved, and conciliate the old soldier’s rough, kind heart to his love
and his distress.
He did not dread the meeting with Greville,--he yearned for it. He
needed an adviser, a confidant, a friend. To dismiss abruptly his guests
from his house,--impossible; to abandon Helen because of her father’s
crime or her aunt’s fault (whatever that last might be, and no clear
detail of it was given),--that never entered his thoughts! Pure and
unsullied, the starry face of Helen shone the holier for the cloud
around it. An inexpressible and chivalrous compassion mingled with his
love and confirmed his faith. She, poor child, to suffer for the deeds
of others,--no. What availed his power as man, and dignity as gentleman,
if they could not wrap in their own shelter the one by whom such shelter
was now doubly needed? Thus, amidst all his emotions, firm and resolved
at least on one point, and beginning already to recover the hope of his
sanguine nature, from his reliance on his mother’s love, on the promises
that softened her disclosures and warnings, and on his conviction
that Helen had only to be seen for every scruple to give way, Percival
wandered back towards the house, and coming abruptly on the terrace, he
encountered Varney, who was leaning motionless against the balustrades,
with an open letter in his hand. Varney was deadly pale, and there was
the trace of some recent and gloomy agitation in the relaxed muscles
of his cheeks, usually so firmly rounded. But Percival did not heed his
appearance as he took him gravely by the arm, and leading him into the
garden, said, after a painful pause,--
“Varney, I am about to ask you two questions, which your close
connection with Madame Dalibard may enable you to answer, but in which,
from obvious motives, I must demand the strictest confidence. You will
not hint to her or to Helen what I am about to say?”
Varney stared uneasily on Percival’s serious countenance, and gave the
promise required.
“First, then, for what offence was Madame Dalibard expelled her uncle’s
house,--this house of Laughton?
“Secondly, what is the crime with which Mr. Mainwaring, Helen’s father,
is charged?”
“With regard to the first,” said Varney, recovering his composure, “I
thought I had already told you that Sir Miles was a proud man, and that
in consequence of discovering a girlish flirtation between his niece
Lucretia (now Madame Dalibard) and Mainwaring, who afterwards jilted her
for Helen’s mother, he altered his will; ‘expelled her his house’ is too
harsh a phrase. This is all I know. With regard to the second question,
no crime was ever brought home to William Mainwaring; he was suspected
of dealing improperly with the funds of the bank, and he repaid the
alleged deficit by the sacrifice of all he possessed.”
“This is the truth?” exclaimed Percival, joyfully.
“The plain truth, I believe; but why these questions at this moment? Ah,
you too, I see, have had letters,--I understand. Lady Mary gives these
reasons for withholding her consent.”
“Her consent is not withheld,” answered Percival; “but shall I own it?
Remember, I have your promise not to wound and offend Madame Dalibard by
the disclosure: my mother does refer to the subjects I have alluded to,
and Captain Greville, my old friend and tutor, is on his way to England;
perhaps to-morrow he may arrive at Laughton.”
“Ha!” said Varney, startled, “to-morrow! And what sort of a man is this
Captain Greville?”
“The best man possible for such a case as mine,--kind-hearted, yet
cool, sagacious; the finest observer, the quickest judge of
character,--nothing escapes him. Oh, one interview will suffice to show
him all Helen’s innocent and matchless excellence.”
“To-morrow! this man comes to-morrow!”
“All that I fear is,--for he is rather rough and blunt in his
manner,--all that I fear is his first surprise, and, dare I say
displeasure, at seeing this poor Madame Dalibard, whose faults, I fear,
were graver than you suppose, at the house from which her uncle--to
whom, indeed, I owe this inheritance--”
“I see, I see!” interrupted Varney, quickly. “And Madame Dalibard is the
most susceptible of women,--so well-born and so poor, so gifted and so
helpless; it is natural. Can you not write, and put off this Captain
Greville for a few days,--until, indeed, I can find some excuse for
terminating our visit?”
“But my letter may be hardly in time to reach him; he may be in town
to-day.”
“Go then to town at once; you can be back late at night, or at least
to-morrow. Anything better than wounding the pride of a woman on whom,
after all, you must depend for free and open intercourse with Helen.”
“That is exactly what I thought of; but what excuse--”
“Excuse,--a thousand! Every man coming of age into such a property has
business with his lawyers. Or why not say simply that you want to meet
a friend of yours who has just left your mother in Italy? In short, any
excuse suffices, and none can be offensive.”
“I will order my carriage instantly.”
“Right!” exclaimed Varney; and his eye followed the receding form of
Percival with a mixture of fierce exultation and anxious fear. Then,
turning towards the window of the turret-chamber in which Madame
Dalibard reposed, and seeing it still closed, he muttered an impatient
oath; but even while he did so, the shutters were slowly opened, and a
footman, stepping from the porch, approached Varney with a message that
Madame Dalibard would see him in five minutes, if he would then have the
goodness to ascend to her room.
Before that time was well expired, Varney was in the chamber. Madame
Dalibard was up and in her chair; and the unwonted joy which her
countenance evinced was in strong contrast with the sombre shade upon
her son-in-law’s brow, and the nervous quiver of his lip.
“Gabriel,” she said, as he drew near to her, “my son is found!”
“I know it,” he answered petulantly. “You! From whom?”
“From Grabman.”
“And I from a still better authority,--from Walter Ardworth himself. He
lives; he will restore my child!” She extended a letter while she spoke.
He, in return, gave her, not that still crumpled in his hand, but one
which he drew from his breast. These letters severally occupied both,
begun and finished almost in the same moment.
That from Grabman ran thus:--
DEAR JASON,--Toss up your hat and cry ‘hip, hip!’ At last, from person
to person, I have tracked the lost Vincent Braddell. He lives still! We
can maintain his identity in any court of law. Scarce in time for the
post, I have not a moment for further particulars. I shall employ the
next two days in reducing all the evidence to a regular digest, which I
will despatch to you. Meanwhile, prepare, as soon as may be, to put
me in possession of my fee,--5000 pounds; and my expedition merits
something more. Yours, NICHOLAS GRABMAN.
The letter from Ardworth was no less positive:--
MADAM,--In obedience to the commands of a dying friend, I took charge
of his infant and concealed its existence from his mother,--yourself.
On returning to England, I need not say that I was not unmindful of my
trust. Your son lives; and after mature reflection I have resolved to
restore him to your arms. In this I have been decided by what I have
heard, from one whom I can trust, of your altered habits, your decorous
life, your melancholy infirmities, and the generous protection you have
given to the orphan of my poor cousin Susan, my old friend Mainwaring.
Alfred Braddell himself, if it be permitted to him to look down and read
my motives, will pardon me, I venture to feel assured, this departure
from his injunctions. Whatever the faults which displeased him, they
have been amply chastised. And your son, grown to man, can no longer be
endangered by example, in tending the couch, or soothing the repentance
of his mother.
These words are severe; but you will pardon them in him who gives you
back your child. I shall venture to wait on you in person, with such
proofs as may satisfy you as to the identity of your son. I count on
arriving at Laughton to-morrow. Meanwhile, I simply sign myself by
a name in which you will recognize the kinsman to one branch of your
family, and the friend of your dead husband. J. WALTER ARDWORTH.
CRAVEN HOTEL, October, 1831.
“Well, and are you not rejoiced?” said Lucretia, gazing surprised on
Varney’s sullen and unsympathizing face.
“No! because time presses; because, even while discovering your son,
you may fail in securing his heritage; because, in the midst of your
triumph, I see Newgate opening to myself. Look you, I too have had my
news,--less pleasing than yours. This Stubmore (curse him!) writes me
word that he shall certainly be in town next month at farthest, and that
he meditates, immediately on his arrival, transferring the legacy from
the Bank of England to an excellent mortgage of which he has heard. Were
it not for this scheme of ours, nothing would be left for me but flight
and exile.”
“A month,--that is a long time. Do you think, now that my son is found,
and that son like John Ardworth (for there can be no doubt that my
surmise was right), with genius to make station the pedestal to
the power I dreamed of in my youth, but which my sex forbade me to
attain,--do you think I will keep him a month from his inheritance?
Before the month is out, you shall replace what you have taken, and
buy your trustee’s silence, if need be, either from the sums you have
insured, or from the rents of Laughton.”
“Lucretia,” said Varney, whose fresh colours had grown livid, “what is
to be done must be done at once. Percival St. John has heard from his
mother. Attend.” And Varney rapidly related the questions St. John had
put to him, the dreaded arrival of Captain Greville, the danger of
so keen an observer, the necessity, at all events, of abridging their
visit, the urgency of hastening the catastrophe to its close.
Lucretia listened in ominous and steadfast silence.
“But,” she said at last, “you have persuaded St. John to give this man
the meeting in London,--to put off his visit for the time. St. John will
return to us to-morrow. Well, and if he finds his Helen is no more! Two
nights ago I, for the first time, mingled in the morning draught that
which has no antidote and no cure. This night two drops more, and St.
John will return to find that Death is in the house before him. And
then for himself,--the sole remaining barrier between my son and this
inheritance,--for himself, why, grief sometimes kills suddenly; and
there be drugs whose effect simulates the death-stroke of grief.”
“Yet, yet, this rapidity, if necessary, is perilous. Nothing in Helen’s
state forbodes sudden death by natural means. The strangeness of two
deaths, both so young; Greville in England, if not here,--hastening down
to examine, to inquire. With such prepossessions against you, there must
be an inquest.”
“Well, and what can be discovered? It was I who shrank before,--it is
I who now urge despatch. I feel as in my proper home in these halls. I
would not leave them again but to my grave. I stand on the hearth of my
youth; I fight for my rights and my son’s! Perish those who oppose me!”
A fell energy and power were in the aspect of the murderess as she thus
spoke; and while her determination awed the inferior villany of Varney,
it served somewhat to mitigate his fears.
As in more detail they began to arrange their execrable plans, Percival,
while the horses were being harnessed to take him to the nearest
post-town, sought Helen, and found her in the little chamber which
he had described and appropriated as her own, when his fond fancy had
sketched the fair outline of the future.
This room had been originally fitted up for the private devotions of the
Roman Catholic wife of an ancestor in the reign of Charles II; and in
a recess, half veiled by a curtain, there still stood that holy symbol
which, whether Protestant or Roman Catholic, no one sincerely penetrated
with the solemn pathos of sacred history can behold unmoved,--the Cross
of the Divine Agony. Before this holy symbol Helen stood in earnest
reverence. She did not kneel (for the forms of the religion in which
she had been reared were opposed to that posture of worship before the
graven image), but you could see in that countenance, eloquent at once
with the enthusiasm and the meekness of piety, that the soul was filled
with the memories and the hopes which, age after age, have consoled the
sufferer and inspired the martyr. The soul knelt to the idea, if the
knee bowed not to the image, embracing the tender grandeur of the
sacrifice and the vast inheritance opened to faith in the redemption.
The young man held his breath while he gazed. He was moved, and he was
awed. Slowly Helen turned towards him, and, smiling sweetly, held out
to him her hand. They seated themselves in silence in the depth of the
overhanging casement; and the mournful character of the scene without,
where dimly, through the misty rains, gloomed the dark foliage of the
cedars, made them insensibly draw closer to each other in the instinct
of love when the world frowns around it. Percival wanted the courage to
say that he had come to take farewell, though but for a day, and Helen
spoke first.
“I cannot guess why it is, Percival, but I am startled at the change I
feel in myself--no, not in health, dear Percival; I mean in mind--during
the last few months,--since, indeed, we have known each other. I
remember so well the morning in which my aunt’s letter arrived at the
dear vicarage. We were returning from the village fair, and my good
guardian was smiling at my notions of the world. I was then so giddy
and light and thoughtless, everything presented itself to me in such
gay colours, I scarcely believed in sorrow. And now I feel as if I were
awakened to a truer sense of nature,--of the ends of our being here; I
seem to know that life is a grave and solemn thing. Yet I am not less
happy, Percival. No, I think rather that I knew not true happiness till
I knew you. I have read somewhere that the slave is gay in his holiday
from toil; if you free him, if you educate him, the gayety vanishes,
and he cares no more for the dance under the palm-tree. But is he less
happy? So it is with me!”
“My sweet Helen, I would rather have one gay smile of old, the arch,
careless laugh which came so naturally from those rosy lips, than hear
you talk of happiness with that quiver in your voice,--those tears in
your eyes.”
“Yet gayety,” said Helen, thoughtfully, and in the strain of her pure,
truthful poetry of soul, “is only the light impression of the present
moment,--the play of the mere spirits; and happiness seems a forethought
of the future, spreading on, far and broad, over all time and space.”
“And you live, then, in the future at last; you have no misgivings now,
my Helen? Well, that comforts me. Say it, Helen,--say the future will be
ours!”
“It will, it will,--forever and forever,” said Helen, earnestly; and her
eyes involuntarily rested on the Cross.
In his younger spirit and less imaginative nature Percival did not
comprehend the depth of sadness implied in Helen’s answer; taking it
literally, he felt as if a load were lifted from his heart, and kissing
with rapture the hand he held, he exclaimed: “Yes, this shall soon, oh,
soon be mine! I fear nothing while you hope. You cannot guess how those
words have cheered me; for I am leaving you, though but for a few hours,
and I shall repeat those words, for they will ring in my ear, in my
heart, till we meet again.”
“Leaving me!” said Helen, turning pale, and her clasp on his hand
tightening. Poor child, she felt mysteriously a sentiment of protection
in his presence.
“But at most for a day. My old tutor, of whom we have so often
conversed, is on his way to England,--perhaps even now in London. He has
some wrong impressions against your aunt; his manner is blunt and rough.
It is necessary that I should see him before he comes hither,--you know
how susceptible is your aunt’s pride,--just to prepare him for meeting
her. You understand?”
“What impressions against my aunt? Does he even know her?” asked Helen.
And if such a sentiment as suspicion could cross that candid innocence
of mind, that sentiment towards this stern relation whose arms had never
embraced her, whose lips had never spoken of the past, whose history was
as a sealed volume, disturbed and disquieted her.
“It is because he has never known her that he does her wrong. Some old
story of her indiscretion as a girl, of her uncle’s displeasure,--what
matters now?” said Percival, shrinking sensitively from one disclosure
that might wound Helen in her kinswoman. “Meanwhile, dearest, you will
be prudent,--you will avoid this damp air, and keep quietly at home, and
amuse yourself, sweet fancier of the future, in planning how to improve
these old halls when they and their unworthy master are your own. God
bless you, God guard you, Helen!”
He rose, and with that loyal chivalry of love which felt respect the
more for the careless guardianship to which his Helen was intrusted, he
refrained from that parting kiss which their pure courtship warranted,
for which his lip yearned. But as he lingered, an irresistible impulse
moved Helen’s heart. Mechanically she opened her arms, and her head sank
upon his shoulder. In that embrace they remained some moments silent,
and an angel might unreprovingly have heard their hearts beat through
the stillness.
At length Percival tore himself from those arms which relaxed their
imploring hold reluctantly; she heard his hurried step descend the
stairs, and in a moment more the roll of the wheels in the court
without; a dreary sense, as of some utter desertion, some everlasting
bereavement, chilled and appalled her. She stood motionless, as if
turned to stone, on the floor; suddenly the touch of something warm on
her hand, a plaining whine, awoke her attention; Percival’s favourite
dog missed his master, and had slunk for refuge to her. The dread
sentiment of loneliness vanished in that humble companionship; and
seating herself on the ground, she took the dog in her arms, and bending
over it, wept in silence.