 | CHAPTER XIV. Clarence, or, A tale of our own times |  |
14. CHAPTER XIV.
“Is't possible that on so little acquaintance you should like
her?—that but seeing you should love her?”
As you like it.
We have violated the consecrated privacy in
which Miss Clarence sheltered her romantic taste,
to prepare our readers for a sally that might otherwise
appear extravagant. It was a night to call
forth all the secret correspondencies between the
spirit and the outward world; a night when the
soul responds harmonious to the voice of nature;
when the intellectual life, that like the electric principle,
pervades the material world, becomes visible
and audible, is seen in the starry depths of heaven,
and speaks in the `viewless air.' It was a night—
just such as every body has seen, though perchance
not thus marked—in midsummer, sweet, bright, and
soft. There had been a slight shower, and the
atmosphere was charged with the perfume of all the
wild flowers that abound in the forest in June—the
month of flowers. The clouds had broken away
and dispersed, save here and there a few light
silvery forms, that as they melted away in the moon-light,
seemed the very coinage of the brain, shaped
in fancy's changing mould; now winged spirits,
now graces wreathing themselves in flowers; now
fairies at their elfin gambols, and now—nothing.
On such a night it is treason against nature to
steep the senses in sleep; voluntarily to close the
thought Gertrude, and obeying a sudden impulse,
she threw on her shawl, and creeping softly down
stairs, she entered the apartment where the only
member of the family who was out of bed, was
drowsily adjusting his ledger. “I am going down
to the falls,” she said.
“Miss! you'll see them far plainer by daylight.”
Gertrude did not think it worth while to explain
the advantage of the claire obscure, and simply
requested a lamp might be left standing in the
entry for her. The man assented without expressing
any inconvenient curiosity or surprise. The
head of the financial department of the `rural resort'
was a little ancient gentleman, (gentleman by
courtesy—illimitable republican courtesy!) who
trudged on in his narrow walk of life without looking
to the right or left to scan the motives, or even
observe the conduct of his fellow-travellers. That
a lady should desire to see the falls by moonlight,
appeared to him no more strange than that she
should wish to view them by daylight. If he
valued falls, it was as `water privileges;' and the
only `view' he took of picturesque objects was of
their effect on the bright side of the landlord's
ledger. Gertrude, therefore, happily escaped a
remonstrance, and soon found herself in the little
path traversing the deep wood which borders the
precipitous bank of the West Canada creek—a narrow,
deeply embedded stream, that after winding,
leaping, and foaming in its unnoticed solitude for
centuries, has, within the last few years, become one
of the staple curiosities of the country.
Miss Clarence had passed a few weeks of the preceding
summer at Trenton, and was secure in her
familiarity with the forest-paths. It seemed as if all
nature were hushed in silence to listen to the music
of the dashing waters. Not a breath of air was stirring.
The leaves reposed in the still atmosphere.
The moon looked as if she were immoveably set in
the far, cloudless depths of the heavens, and where
her rays stole in through the lofty branches, and
slept on the moss-grown trunks, or dewy herbage,
not the slightest quivering of the leaves broke or
varied the clear defined outline of the bright spaces.
There is something vast and oppressive in such immobility
and stillness, and Gertrude felt, in approaching
the brawling, noisy, little stream, as if it
were a living soul—a being endowed with feeling
and sympathy, and voice to speak them. She rapidly
descended the several flights of steps, that afford
but a slippery and inconvenient passage down
a precipitous rock of a hunbred feet in height—so
grudgingly does art seem to have lent her aid to her
mistress nature—but here nature may well scoff at
her handmaid's negligence, for here she reigns a
queen of beauty; every heart does her homage;
every heart! the very trees, as they bend from the
walled banks and almost embower the sportive
stream, seem in the act of reverence.
Gertrude pursued the usual walk along the margin
of the stream, now passing with security over
the broad, flat rocks, and now cautiously creeping
around the jutting buttresses, whose bases are fretted
by the foaming torrent, and whose sides afford a perilous
passage along a shelving ledge, scarcely wide
had none of the physical sensitiveness that renders
some persons incapable of approaching a rapid
stream without dizziness. Self-possessed, and sure-footed,
she passed the most difficult passages without
fear and without danger. She ascended to the summit of
the first fall by the natural and rough stair-way, and
pursuing her walk, canopied by the over-arching
rocks, and creeping along the shelving shore, she
attained the side of the foaming, deep abyss, into
which the stream rushes at two bold leaps. She stood
for some moments gazing on the torrent, and almost
deafened by its roar, when she was startled by a
footstep close to her. She turned, and saw the
stranger who seemed, that evening, destined to cross
her path at every turn. He bowed respectfully, and
said he had not expected the pleasure of meeting any
one at that extraordinary hour—but he added, `no
hour could be more fit for a devotee to nature to visit
her sanctuary.'
Gertrude thought there was something like a sarcastic
smile playing about his lip, as if his reading
of `a devotee to nature,' was `a mighty romantic
young lady,' a construction she felt was warranted,
but a light in which she did not quite like to appear.
“Neither did I,” she said, returning the stranger's
smile, “think of the possibility of meeting any one
this evening. I came simply for the pleasure-of seeing
the falls by moon-light—by all other lights I
am familiar with them.”
“But no other light can,” replied the stranger,
“be so well adapted to them. Broad day light, and
a party of exclaiming, professed admirers of scenery,
prose.”
“Yes,” said Gertrude, pleased with a feeling so
exactly corresponding with her own. “Solitude
and moon-light are certainly the best accompaniments
to fine scenery. They are like the vehicle
of music to the inspirations of the poet.”
“And this is fine scenery,” said the stranger; “I
have been scrambling along the bank for two miles
above this place, and never have I seen such various
and startling beauty. The river has so many
abrupt turns, and graceful sweeps—at every
step there is a new picture, as if you had turned another
leaf in the book of nature. I have seen three
falls, above this, of less magnitude, and I have been
told they occur, at intervals, for several miles. But
the falls are only one feature. The sides of the
stream are varied and every where beautiful. In
some places richly wooded; in others, stern, bare,
perpendicular rocks—now sending over their beetling
summits a little cascade, that falls at your feet
in diamond drops, and then crested with a hanging
cedar that waves like a warrior's plume—now receding
and sloping, and mantled with moss and fern, or
sending out from their clefts, sturdy trees—sylvan
sentinels on nature's battlements. In one place the
rocks recede and are concave, and the river appears
like an imprisoned lake, or a magician's well,—
there, I confess, I listened for an `open sessime,'
and thought it possible I might see an enchanted
damsel, walk forth, with her golden pitcher.”
“But you saw none,” said Gertrude. “Ours
is not the country of enchantments—nature is merely
nor rendered sublime by traditionary tales, nor supernatural
graces, or terrors.”
“No, thank heaven, no terrors. I was never
better pleased than now, with living in a country
where a lady may walk forth, at midnight, without
fear or danger.”
Gertrude felt the awkwardness of her position,
the moment it was alluded to, and she rather abruptly
asked the stranger, `if he had ever seen
Niagara?'
`He was ashamed to confess he had not. It was
the fashion,' he said, `to compare Trenton to Niagara,
but he thought Trenton must be about as
much like Niagara, as a frolicsome child was like
to Hercules, or the finite to the infinite.'
“And yet,” said Gertrude, “I hear the comparison
often made, and Trenton often preferred.
She is a younger favorite and has the advantage
of youth and novelty over the sublime torrent. She
has not been heard of by every body in the four
quarters of the globe; nor seen and talked of by
half the world. We feel something of the pride
of discoverers in vaunting her beauty. She has
too, her caprices and changes, and does not show
the same face to all. This is one of her peculiar
charms. There is such a pleasure in saying, `Oh
what a pity you did not see the falls as we did!'
and `ah,' with a shrug, `we but just escaped with
our lives. There had immense rains fallen, and the
passes were all but impassable.' There are no
such lucky chances of superiority at Niagara. Like
a monarch, Niagara always appears in the same
to the elements; it is neither materially abated nor
augmented by them. Niagara is like the ocean,
alone and incomparable in its grandeur.” It was
apparent that Gertrude had seen Niagara, and
the stranger naturally asked her many questions in
relation to it. From Niagara he adverted to kindred
topics. Not a water-fall, natural bridge, or
mountain-resort, was passed by, till the meeting
was protracted to the last limit of propriety. There
is a peculiar pleasure in meeting with a stranger
who discovers at once kindred tastes and feelings
with our own. If it be a single sentiment, it is
sometimes like a word in the `correspondencies,' of
a certain mystical sect, which may be a key to a
whole volume. Acquaintance makes rapid strides
in such circumstances; and it was not singular that
the stranger, whose imagination was no doubt
stimulated by the time and place of their encounter,
should linger in Gertrude's presence. He felt there
was no propriety in detaining her any longer, if
she intended to prosecute her walk; nor, much as
he desired to do it, could he, after her declaration,
that she had come out for a solitary stroll, offer to
attend her; and inwardly praying she might say
no, he asked if she meant to proceed farther. She
answered—for she was not in the palace of truth,
nor dared she follow her inclinations—`yes,' and the
stranger, with evident reluctance, bade her good
night, and soon disappeared.
Gertrude now proceeded very slowly up the next
acclivity. The walk had lost its charms. Her
and with conjectures who he could be. `He did
not seem,' she thought, `to remember our first
meeting this evening; his mind must have been intent
on his approaching interview with Mrs. Layton.
If I had had but one glance at him, I should
never have forgotten him.' She pondered over his
interview with Mrs. Layton. `Could he be her
husband? No, he was far too young. Could he
be Emilie's lover? No, such a lover could never
need the interposition of parental authority.' Suddenly,
and at the thought she stopped stock still,
it occurred to her that he wonderfully resembled the
image of Gerald Roscoe, impressed on her mind by
her father's often repeated descriptions. She passed
the stranger's features in review: his dark complexion,
bold expanded forehead, singularly black
hair, a stature and form cast in the heroic mould;
the prevailing darkness of his face, relieved by a
smile that disclosed a set of as white and beautiful
teeth as ever decorated a mouth. `How often has
my father said,' thought Gertrude, `that Gerald's
smile was electrifying;' that it was `like the sun
bursting through a cloud—a smile of intelligence,
arch, sportive, and good-humored.' `Could this
stranger be described more accurately?'
Gertrude was startled and roused from her reverie
by what she fancied to be a strain of music. It
seemed wafted over the torrent, and not mingling
with its din, as if the breathing of some spirit above
her. There was no visible agent. `Am I deceived
by the solitude, the scene, the hour, or is it an unearthly
sound,?' thought she. She looked timidly
familiar. “It cannot be!” she exclaimed, and yet
impelled by an irresistible impulse, she sprang forward
in the direction whence the sound came.
“Should it be he!” she cried fearfully, and hurrying
through a tangled path, she came out on a
broad projecting rock, that although a few feet below
the summit of the lower fall, commanded a full
view of it. On that summit stood a figure enveloped
in a white dress, and so shaded by branches, that
hung like banners over the glittering waters, that
it was impossible to say whether the figure were
man or woman; whether it were human, or some
strange visitant from another world. While Gertrude
gazed fearfully, the person advanced to the
brink of the water, threw the flute into the torrent,
bent over it, and clasped his hands as if in prayer.
“Louis!—Louis Seton! oh, God of mercy, save
him!” shrieked Gertrude. The scream of agony
reached his ear, and arrested him; he looked wildly
around. She reiterated her cries and waved her
handkerchief. He saw her and descended the cliff
towards her so swiftly and recklessly that she covered
her eyes in terror, lest she should see him
plunge into the abyss.
As he drew near, she ventured again to look at
him. His cheeks were crimsoned with fever, his
eyes had a supernatural brightness, his fair brow
was as pale as marble, and his long flaxen hair,
which had at all times a sentimental and student-like
air, was in the wildest disorder. He had carelessly
thrown over his under garments a white dressing-gown,
and his whole appearance confirmed
But when he said, in his usual low-toned gentle
voice, “You called me—did you not, Gertrude?”
she replied, half reassured, and still half doubtful,
“Yes; I feared you were venturing too near the
fall, and,” she added, with a smile of admirable self-possession,
“I thought myself fortunate to meet you
just at the very moment I was returning homeward,
and dreading to retrace the way alone.”
“Oh, do not go yet! Why go away from this
beautiful scene? It is a glimpse of heaven; I will
never leave it but for a brighter,” he added, in a tone
of unwonted decision and confidence; “Sit down
on this rock, Gertrude—I did not expect this—this
is the first blissful hour of my life. Do not look so
terrified—this is the gate of heaven—you shall see
how I will throw off the load of life, and leap
through it; Oh, it was very good of you, to come
out to see this—come, sit down!”
There was something irresistibly appealing, and
affecting in his manner, and Gertrude smothered her
fears and sat down; “I dreamed,” he continued,
“an angel would show me the way—it's very
strange—I cannot account for it;” he passed his
hand over his brow, like one who would disentangle
his recollections, “I do not think, Gertrude, it ever
occurred to me, that you were to be that angel.”
“But I am,” said Gertrude, rising, and hoping
to govern him, by humoring his wild fancies, “I
am, and you are bound to follow whither I lead.
Come, we must hasten home, Louis—follow me, I
intreat you.” He rose and followed, half-singing,
and half-screaming.
`This will not do, I am exciting his delirium,'
thought Gertrude; and stopping suddenly, she said,
with all the composure she could command, “I
ought, indeed, to be an angel to flit over these
rocks at this unearthly rate. We had best return to
our every-day characters, Louis; it is childish to
risk our lives, in this foolish way.”
Her natural tone and manner, for a moment, restored
Seton to himself, and his thoughts reverted to their accustomed
channel. “It is then a delusion,” he said
“yes—yes, life is a delusion—hope a delusion—and
yet, who can live without hope? I cannot, and why
should I, passively, remain here to suffer? Gertrude,
did you see my flute, as it silently floated
away? but a moment before, the woods rung
with the music, my troubled heart poured into it.
Think you, Gertrude, it would be as easy to still
that heart, as the poor instrument?”
“But the heart is not yours, Louis,” said Gertrude,
assuming a playfulness, difficult to affect,
while she was in a panic; “you gave me your
heart, you know, and you have no right to resume
it.”
“Yes, I gave it to you, Gertrude, and it was a
good gift—a true loving heart—but you would not
take it—you could not—you know you said so—
but, one thing I tell you, Miss Clarence, you will
go forth into the world, you will be sought, and
flattered, and you will learn, from bitter experience,
the value of a true, faithful heart—no wealth can
buy it—wealth! wealth! that was a cruel letter; it
was the last drop in the cup. Gertrude, I felt as if
well, now.”
Gertrude became more alarmed, at every new incoherency;
and felt her total helplessness, should
he again attempt the violence on himself, he had
purposed. It struck her, that she might, possibly,
lure him onward, by addressing his love of his art,
next to his love for her, his strongest passion;
without replying, or adverting, to any thing he had
said. “Come, Louis!” she exctaimed, “we are
wasting time—you promised me, some moon-light
sketches of the falls; and, farther on, there is a
beautiful view—if we do not hasten, we shall lose
the best light for it. She walked at as quick a pace
as she dared; and Seton, obedient as a bird to his
lady's whistle, followed her. They proceeded on
their return, beyond the first fall; and Gertrude
meant to lead him on, without alluding again to the
view, but his painter's eye, as it rolled from shore to
shore, caught the point of sight. “Ah! here it is,”
he said, “beautiful as a painter's dream—but I
have no port-folio, no paper—never mind, I can
draw on the impalpable air. I will put you in the
fore-ground—you were in the fore-ground of all
my pictures—my air-drawn pictures,” he added, with
a faint smile.
“But I must have a picture, that I can see—here,
take my handkerchief—you can make a perpendicular
and a horizontal line, and write light and shadow,
that is enough, you know, for an artist's
sketch.”
He kissed the handkerchief devoutly, spread it on
the scene intently; the preparation for an hahabitual
occupation, restored for a time, the equilibrium
of his mind; his thoughts returned to their
natural channel. “Such scenes as these,” he said,
“are the despair of the painter.”
“Why the despair? you never fail in your water
views. Mrs. Layton said she was afraid to let Argus
see your picture of the lake, lest he should try
to lap the water.”
“Ah, that was sleeping water; but who can
paint this beautiful motion—this sound, he voice
of the waterfall—the spray, the most etherial of all
material things—the light mist rising, and floating
around those over-hanging woods, like the drapery
of spirits, made visible to mortal sense?”
“But you can imitate the most exquisite tints of
flowers; and surely, you can paint these wild geraniums,
and blue-bells.”
“Yes, I can imitate them; but in the still picture,
will they speak to us as they do now, looking out in
wild and tender beauty, from the crevices of these
stupendous rocks? I can paint the vines that richly
fringe those beetling crags, I might attempt their
expression of security; but can I give their light
fantastic grace, their brightening and deepening hues,
as they wave in the gentlest breath of heaven?”
“Oh, no, certainly not! you cannot make all the
elements of nature tributary to your art; you cannot
work miracles; you can but repeat in the picture,
one aspect of the scene. You can give the
deep amber tint of the water, but not every varying
shade it takes from the passing clouds. You can
trickling of the drops, as they swell, and fall
from ledge to ledge. A picture is, of course, dumb
nature; it addresses but one sense; it is what you
can do, that constitutes the glory of your art; and it
is a weakness, Louis, to dwell on what you cannot
do.”
Gertrude had unwarily touched the wrong key.
Seton sprang to his feet—“a weakness, is it Gertrude?
do you reproach me with my weakness?—
Yes, it is the extreme of weakness; but I have struggled
against it—far, far worse, I have quietly endured
it: I will not longer—why should I? The world
cares not for me; nor I for the world. I have floated
on its dark, troubled surface, like those bubbles
on the stream—they dissolve and are forgotten. So
shall I be.”
He spoke with the resolute tone of despair. Gertrude's
heart sunk within her; but calling forth all
her courage, she said, “I agree with you, Louis;
the world has dark, tiresome passages enough; but
even the worst of them, like our rugged path here,
may be cheered by a light from above. The light
always shines. Cannot you open your bosom to it?”
“Gertrude!” he replied, with a bitter smile;
“do not mock me: tell those fretted waters to give
back the image of the heavens, serene and unbroken:
bid the stream glide quietly over these sharp
rocks: ask that solitary pine to go and bend among
its fellows. It is far easier to contend with nature,
than with the elements of the soul. I am wearied
with the conflict. I have struggled, and I am subdued.
I have had such horrid dreams. My cruel
scorn ringing in my ears—your voice, louder than
all the rest.”
“Do not think of it—it was a dream—nothing
but a dream, Louis.”
“Yes it was a dream: and now you speak to
me in your own kind voice—this is reality.” He
took her hand and pressed it to his scorchiug lips:
“I have heard the parting spirit had always some
intimation of the future—of good, or evil: this is
good—this is light to my heart: I have no more
fear. Farewell—farewell!” Again and again he
kissed her hand: “it is over now, Gertrude,” and
he sprang towards the rushing stream.
Gertrude grasped his arm, and, shivering with
terror, detained him forcibly. “Have you no pity
on me, Louis? do not leave me here alone; attend
me round these dreadful rocks; I shall never
get back to my father without your help; you can
return directly. Come, do not—do not,” she continued,
imploringly, “refuse me this last kindness;
come, quickly.” She moved forward, and perceiving
that he followed, she ran along the broken shore,
sprang from the rolling stones, and leaped from
crag to crag, forgetful of all dangers but one, till
she came to the last projecting rock, where the foot-hold
is extremely narrow, and rendered most perilous
by the agitation of the water, which at times
lashes the side of the rock, but five or six feet
below the narrow margin, on which the passenger
treads, in a position not quite upright, but
rather inclining over the stream. The hazard of
this passage was extreme. Seton still followed and
him so far, might break at any moment. The incoherent
sounds he uttered at every step, now
escaping in indistinct murmurs, and then swelling
to shrieks, indicated, too truly, the rapid access
of his delirium. Gertrude's courage failed—a nervous
sickness came over her—her head turned, her
feet faltered, and she retreated a few steps, and
sunk to the ground.
It was but a momentary weakness; she ejaculated
a prayer for resolution and strength, and sprang to
her feet again. “I am rested now, Louis,” she
said; “once round this rock, we are almost home;
follow me, dear Louis.” She advanced to the perilous
path; and proceeded around the projecting
cliff, without again faltering.
Seton followed to the front of the rock and there
stopped, and stood fixed and immoveable, as if he
were part of it. His face was towards Gertrude,
but his eye was glazed and turned upwards: it appeared
that his senses were paralyzed, and that he
neither saw, heard, nor felt; for though Gertrude
urged, supplicated, and wrung her hands in agony,
he maintained the same, statue-like stillness, looking
like an image carved in the rock, before which
a terror-struck suppliant was standing. Gertrude
dared not advance towards him—his position did
not admit assistance—and the slightest movement,
even though involuntary, might prove fatal. She
cried to Heaven for aid, but while the unavailing
prayer was on her lips, Seton slipped gently from
the rock into the current below. In another breath
his body swept past her. A little lower down, the
it was broken by the rocks and tossed in rapids. He
evidently struggled against the current. “Oh! he
tries to save himself,” cried Gertrude. An eddy
seemed to favor his efforts, and impel him towards
the shore. “Merciful God, help him!” she screamed,
and sprang forward, in the hope that she
might herself extend some aid; but, instantly, a
counter-current swept him off towards the rapids,
and his destruction seemed near and inevitable.
Gertrude gazed after him, speechless, motionless—
as if awaiting the doom of fate. Suddenly there
was a plash in the water, and a person appeared
approaching the descending body. “Should he
resist—” cried Gertrude. But he did not resist.
It was at the calmest and most favorable point in
the whole stream for such an interposition, and perilous
as it was, it succeeded; and Seton, who had
not yet quite lost his consciousness, was drawn in
safety to the rocks. Gertrude flew to him. She
knelt beside him, and dried the water from his face
and neck with her shawl. His preserver was active
and efficient. He supported Seton's head on
his breast, and chafed his hands and arms.
Seton was for a few moments incapable of motion
or articulation, but he looked intelligently at Gertrude,
and as if he felt to the heart's core, the joy
and gratitude that lit up her face with an almost
supernatural brightness. When her first emotion
gave place to a more natural tone of feeling, she
would have fainted—but she never fainted: she
would have wept, but there was still something to
be done. She attempted to rise, but her limbs trembled
you to make no effort.” Gertrude started at the
voice, and, for the first time, looking at Seton's
preserver, she perceived he was the stranger. He
smiled at the sudden recognition apparent on her
countenance. “I have been lingering at the steps
here,” he said, as if in reply to her looks, “detained
by my good fortune for your service. You are suffering
even more than your friend from this accident.”
And so she appeared, for Seton was stimulated
by fever. “You both need more assistance
than I alone can give you. I will go for aid, and
return instantly.”
“Oh, not for the world,” replied Gertrude, for
she felt the importance to Seton of keeping the adventure
a secret, “not for the world,” she reiterated.
She perceived the stranger smiled archly at her
earnestness, and she guessed at his interpretation.
`He thinks this, no doubt, an appointed meeting of
lovers, and Louis' fall accidental; that at least
is a happy mistake.' In one particular she was
determined to rectify his misconception. “I came
here,” she continued, “without the slightest expectation
of meeting any one. I therefore can
have neither reluctance nor fear to be left alone.
This foolish trembling will be over in a few
moments, and I will then follow you if you will
have the goodness to give your arm to my friend—
it has already done us a service for which we have
no words to thank you.”
Seton now for the first time broke silence and
attempted, though confused and embarrassed, to
express his gratitude. “I beg you not to waste
will take it for granted, that you are infinitely
obliged to me, for a service that cost me nothing
but a little wetting, a circumstance not altogether
disagreeable on a hot evening. I really have not
encountered the slightest danger; but if I may
make a merit of this accidental service,” he continued,
bowing courteously to Miss Clarence, “I
claim the right to return and escort you, after I
have attended your friend.”
“We are so deeply your debtors, that you may
impose your own conditions. I will await you if
necessary—or meet you.”
“If necessary! pardon me then, if I put some
constraint on your courtesy. The evening is becoming
cool, allow me to wrap my cloak about
you; it shall be fetters and warder till my return.”
As he spoke, he took his cloak from the ground
where he had hastily thrown it, and adjusted it
around Miss Clarence. At another time Gertrude
might have felt a girlish and natural diffidence at
receiving such attentions from a stranger; but serious
emotions give to these little punctilios their
due insignificance and she received his kindness as
quietly as if it were warranted by old acquaintance.
Seton's unnatural strength was the only indication
of the continuance of his fever. He was tranquil
and it appeared probable from the exertions he had
made for self-preservation that his first immersion in
the water had stimulated his reason. Gertrude
watched him anxiously till he disappeared from her
in ascending the steps, and then she gave utterance
to her devout gratitude for his preservation
her to have been miraculously provided. Accustomed
to think and decide independently, she determined
to keep poor Seton's sad affair, so far as
depended on herself, a profound secret. `Even my
falher, kind and indulgent as he is,' she thought,
`would not deem it quite prudent to retain Louis
after this; but have I not solemnly promised to be
a sister to him? and when he most needs a sister's
love and care, I will not abandon him.' From Seton
her thoughts naturally turned to the stranger.
`How very strange our repeated meetings,' she
thought, `how heroic his rescue of Louis! and yet
(she was constrained to confess it) a common man
would have done the same, but not in the same
manner. There was a careless grace about him,
as if great actions were at least familiar to his imagination.'
All her reflections ended in the natural
query, `who can he be?' Suddenly it occurred to
her that his cloak might be labelled, and instantly
throwing it from her shoulders, she sought and
found, neatly wrought in large black letters, Gerald
Roscoe.
Is it fair farther to expound Gertrude's thoughts?
It must be told, that stimulated by an entire new
set of emotions, she rose, threw the cloak from her,
adjusted her hair, which she was mortified to find
had fallen down, and which, as dame nature had
given it neither the canonical heroine wave, or curl,
could not but be ungraceful in disorder.
It certainly appeared to her that destiny had maliciously
arranged the circumstances of her introduction
to the hero of her imagination. How often
when they weave the plot of a little personal romance—how
often had she contrived the particulars
of their first meeting—like a skilful painter, and
with pardonable vanity, arranged the lights and
shadows to give the best effect to the picture. And
now to be first seen by him rambling over perilous
rocks, at the witching time of night, and suspected,
as she knew she must be, of an appointment with a
young man of Seton's appearance, and in such a
fantastical dress, and she such a figure! She remembered
the smile she had detected on Roscoe's
lips, and the thought that she had at least appeared
ridiculous to him, was intolerable. Then she recollected
the Utica scrawl, and was compelled to
admit the conviction that Roscoe had written it.
This wounded her; it touched her feelings where
they were most vulnerable; and, indignant and resentful,
she determined to hasten up the steps and
avoid, if possible, speaking with him again. The
cloak she left on the rock. She could no more
have touched it than if it had been Hercules' fatal
tunic. She forgot that a few moments before she
could scarcely support her own weight, ascended the
several flights of steps without haiting, and had
reached the very last, when she met Roscoe returning.
She was embarrassed and breathless, and without
stopping—without the slightest acknowledgement
of his courtesy, or apology for the trouble she gave
him, “You will find your cloak,” she said, “on
the rocks—good night, sir.” But Roscoe did not
appear to notice her abruptness. “I expected,” he
said, turning and offering his arm, which she declined—he
had the pleasure of finding you there too—I beg
you will not walk so rapidly—you have no occasion
for anxiety about your friend; he reached the
house without difficulty—and his own room,”—he
added, with as Gertrude thought, a very significant
emphasis—“his own room without observation. I
am quite sure of it, for I remained in the entry till I
heard his door close.” Miss Clarence made no reply,
and they walked on a few paces in silence.
Roscoe then said, “I am curious to learn how the
accident happened. I asked your friend, but he
evaded my inquiry—he perhaps felt that his foot
ought not to have faltered, where yours trod safely.”
Gertrude, in her confusion, and desire to shelter
Seton, said, “he was weak from recent illness.”
“An imprudent exposure for an invalid!” returned
Roscoe, with another of his provoking smiles,
“but I honor his self-forgetfulness in so romantic
a cause, and only wonder that a prosaic personage
like myself has been allowed to appear in the drama,
though it be only to turn the wheel of fortune for
others, and be dismissed and forgotten, when I have
enacted my inglorious part.” They had now
reached the door-steps, and he added in a lower
voice, “I am compelled to return immediately to
the village, and proceed thence in the stage-coach
—may I presume to ask the names of my new
acquaintance?”
“Oh, no—do not ask them—do not, I entreat
you, inquire them—do not ever speak of what has
happened to night. The life,” she continued, for
she had now quite recovered the power of thought
worthless if there were any exposure.”
“Shall I make a vow of secresy?” he asked,
bending his knee gracefully to the step, gallantly
taking her hand, and speaking in a tone of raillery
that Gertrude felt made her pathetic appeal almost
ridiculous, “I do make it,” he added with mock
solemnity, “craving only an exception in favor of
one friend, a safe confidante—my mother. I call
on the bright moon to witness my vow,” and in
token of sealing it, his lips approached her hand,
but without presuming to touch it. “Now I have
pledged the honor of a true knight—do I not deserve
a dispensation in my favor?”
While Gertrude hesitated, resolved not to give
her name, and feeling that it was almost childish to
withhold it, a window-sash above their heads was
gently raised, and murmuring a heart-felt `God
bless you,' she escaped into the entry. There she
lingered long enough to ascertain that Mrs. Layton
was speaking to Roscoe; and then, after listening
at Seton's door, and finding all quiet there,
she retired to her room to revolve over and over
again, and to place in various lights and shadows,
the events of the evening.
She had been Roscoe at last! and in spite of her
personal mortification and vexation, she liked him—
she could not help it—she rejoiced in her inmost
soul, that she was still unknown to him as the dreaded
rich miss Clarence, and she finally fell asleep
with the secret, sweet consciousness, that she had
not impressed him as altogether the counter part of
`Miss Eunice Peabody!'
| CHAPTER XIV. Clarence, or, A tale of our own times | |