University of Virginia Library

23. CHAPTER XXIII.

The necessity of the case brought a tolerable composure
to the countenances of both the parties as Beauchampe and
his companion re-entered the room. An instant after, the
wife left it and hurried up to her chamber. Beauchampe's
eye followed her movements curiously. In truth, knowing
the dread and aversion which she had avowed, at mingling
again in society, he was anxious to ascertain how she had
borne herself in the interview with his friend.

“Truly, Beauchampe,” said the latter, as if in answer
to his thoughts—“your wife is a very splendid woman.”

“Ah! do you like her? Did she converse freely with
you? She speaks well, but does not like society much.”

“Very—she has a fine majestic mind. Talks admirably
well. Did you meet with her here?”

“Yes,” said the other, though with some hesitation.
“This farm upon which we live is her mother's.”

“Her mother! ah! what was her maiden name, Beauchampe;
I think you mentioned it in your letter, but it
escapes me now.”

“Cooke, Miss Ann Cooke.”

“Cooke, Cooke—I wonder if she is of the Cookes of
Sunbury? I used to know that family.”

“I think—I believe not—I am not sure, however. I
really cannot say.”

The reply of Beauchampe was made with some trepidation.
The inquiry of Sharpe, which had been urged
very gravely, aroused the only half latent consciousness of
the husband, who began to feel the awkwardness of answering
any more particular questions. Sharpe did not
perceive the anxiety of Beauchampe—he was himself too
much absorbed in the subject of which he spoke.

“Your wife is certainly a very splendid woman in person,
Beauchampe; and her mind appears to be original and
well informed. But she seems melancholy, Beauchampe;
—quite too much so, for a newly made bride. Eh! what
can be the matter?”

“She has had losses—misfortunes—her mother, too, is
an invalid, and she has been compelled to be a watcher for
some time past.”

“And how long have they been neighbours to your
mother? If I recollect, you never spoke of them before?”

“You forget, I have been absent from home some years,”
replied Beauchampe evasively.

“True—I suppose they have come into the neighbourhood
within that time? You did not know your wife in
boyhood, did you?”

“No—I did not. I never saw her till my present visit.”

“I thought not! Such a woman is not to be passed over
with impunity. Her person must attract—and her intellect
must secure and fascinate. I should say no man was ever
more fortunate in his choice. What say you, Barnabas?
We must give Beauchampe a certificate?”

“I suppose so, if you say so; but I can only judge of
Mrs. Beauchampe by appearances. I have had none of
the chat. I agree with you that she is a splendid woman
to the eye, and will take your judgment for the rest.”

“You will be safe in doing so. But how do you find
your horse?”

“Regularly lame. I'm afraid the cursed brute's snagged
or has a nail in his foot. The quick's touched somehow,
for he won't lay the foot to the ground.”

“That's bad! What have you done?”

“Nothing! We can see to do nothing to-night; but by
the peep of day I must be at him. I must have your help,

Beauchampe—with your soap, and turpentine, and whatever
else may be good for such a case?”

Beauchampe gave his assurance with readiness, perhaps
rather pleased than otherwise that the subject should be
changed.

“With your permission then, I will leave you,” said
Barnabas, “and get my sleep while I may. Let your boy
waken me at dawn, if you please, for I am really anxious
about the animal. He is a favourite—a nag among a
thousand.”

“As every man's nag is,” said Sharpe. “You can always
tell a born egotist. He has always the best horse,
and the best gun, the best ox and the best ass, of any man
in the country. He really believes it. But ask Barnabas
about the best wife, and ten to one he says nothing of his
own. He has no boasts—strange to say—about his own
rib—bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh.”

“You are cutting quite too close,” said Barnabas.

“As near to the quick in your case, as in that of your
nag.”

“Almost! But the quick in that region is getting callous.”

“High time, Barnabas—it has been subject to sufficient
induration.”

“At all events I have no dread of your knife—its edge
is quite too blunt to do much hurt. Good night—try it on
Beauchampe. A young man and a young wife—I have
very little doubt you can find the quick in him with a little
probing.”

The quick in Beauchampe's case had already been
found. Good Mr. Barnabas little knew on what delicate
ground he was trespassing.

“A good fellow, that Barnabas,” said Sharpe, “but a
dull one. He really fancies now that his nag is a creature
of great blood and bottom; and a more sorry jade never
paddled to a country muster ground. He will scarcely
sleep to-night with meditating upon the embrocations, the
forentations, the fumigations, and whatever else may be
necessary. But a truce to this, Beauchampe. I have a
better subject. Seriously, my dear boy, I have never been
more pleasantly surprised than in meeting with your wife.
Really, she is remarkably beautiful; and though she is
evidently shy of strangers, yet, as you know I have the art

of bringing women out, I may boast of my ability to say
what stuff she is made of. She speaks with singular force
and elegance. I have never met with equal eloquence in
any woman but one.”

“And who is she.”

“Nay, I cannot tell you that. It is years since I knew
her, and she is no longer the same being: but your wife
very much reminds me of her.”

“Was she as beautiful as Anna?”

“Very near—she was something younger than your
wife—a slight difference—a few years only; but the advantage,
if this were any, is compensated by the superior
dignity and the lofty character of yours. She I allude to—but
it matters not now. Enough that your wife brings her to
my mind as vividly as if the real living presence were before
me, whom I once knew and admired, years ago.”

Thus, with a singular audacity, did Col. Sharpe dally
with this dangerous subject. He did not this perversely—
with wilful premeditation. It seemed as if he could not
well avoid it. Evil thoughts have in them that faculty of
perversely impelling the mind and tongue, which is possessed
by intoxicating liquors. At moments, the wily assassin
strove to avoid the subject, but he returned to it
again, almost the instant after, even as one who recoils
suddenly from the edge of some unexpected precipice, again
and again advances, once more to gaze, with fascinated
vision, down into its dim and perilous depths.

A like fascination did this subject possess over the mind
of Beauchampe. The feeling of confidence, amounting to
defiance, which he expressed to his wife, before their
guests had arrived, whenever they spoke of going into the
world, no longer seemed to sustain him. The moment
that a stranger's lip spoke her name, and those inquiries
were made, which are natural enough in such cases from
the lips of friends, about the connexions and history of the
woman he had married, then did Beauchampe, for the first
time, perceive the painful meshes of deception into which
the unfortunate events in his wife's life would necessarily
involve his utterance. Yet still, with the restlessness of
discontent, did he himself incline his ear to the smallest
reference which his companion made to this subject. His
pride was excited to hear her praises, and the rather barefaced
and bald compliments which had been paid to her intellect

and beauty, were dear to him as the lover and the
worshipper of both. If love be timid, of itself, in the utterance
of eulogium upon the beauties which it admires, it
is equally certain that no subject, from the lips of another,
can be more really grateful to its ear. It was, perhaps, this
sort of pleasure which Beauchampe derived from the subject
and which made him incline to it whenever his companion
employed it. Still, in the language of Mr. Barnabas, there
was an occasional touching of the quick in what Sharpe said,
at moments, under which his sensibilities winced. It was,
therefore, with a mixed or rather divided feeling, neither of
pain nor pleasure, or a compounded one of both, that Beauchampe
conducted his friend to the chamber which was
assigned him—returning afterwards to his own, in a state
of mind, highly excited, almost feverish—dissatisfied with
himself, his friend—with every person but his wife. With
her he had no cause of quarrel. No doubt of her, no sense
of jealousy—no regret, no apprehension disturbed that
devoted passion which made him resolve, under all circumstances,
to link her with his life. If any thing, the effect
of the evening's interview was to make him look with eyes
of greater favour upon her taste for privacy, and the life of
seclusion in which, up to this period, his moments of superior
happiness had been known. But this subject does
not concern us now.

Col. Sharpe was shown into the same chamber which
had been allotted to Mr. Barnabas. In our frontier country,
it need scarcely be stated, that the selfishness which insists
upon chamber and bed to itself is practically rebuked in a
manner the most decided. In some parts, two in a bed
would be thought quite a liberal arrangement; and may
well be thought so, when it is known that four or five is
not an uncommon number—the fifth man being occasionally
placed crosswise, in the manner of a raft-tie, rather,
it would seem, to keep the rest from falling out, than with
the view to making him unnecessarily comfortable. Messrs.
Sharpe and Barnabas were too well accustomed to the condition
of country life to make any scruple about that arrangement
which placed them in the same apartment and
couch; and under existing circumstances, the former was
rather pleased with it than otherwise. He had scarcely
entered the room before he carefully fastened the door;
listened for the retreating steps of Beauchampe, till they

were finally lost, and while Barnabas was wondering at,
and vainly endeavouring to divine the reason of this mystery,
he approached the bed where the other lay, and seated
himself upon it.

“You are not asleep, Barnabas?” he said in a whisper.

“No,” replied the other, with tones made rather husky
by a sudden tremulousness of the nerves. “No! what's
the matter?”

“Matter enough—the strangest matter in the world.
Would you believe that Margaret Cooper, the girl whose
seduction was charged upon me by Calvert, and Beauchampe's
wife are one and the same person!”

“The devil they are!” exclaimed the other, in his surprise
rising to a sitting posture in the bed.

“True as gospel!”

“Can't be possible, Sharpe!”

“Possible, and true. They are the same. I have
spoken with her as Margaret Cooper; the recognition is
complete on both sides; we talked of nothing else while
you and Beauchampe were at the stables.”

“Great God! how awkward! What's to be done?”

“Awkward! Where's the awkwardness? I see nothing
awkward about it. On the contrary, I regard this meeting
as devilish fortunate. I was never half satisfied to lose her
as I did, and to find her again is like finding one's treasure
when he had given up the hope of it for ever.”

“But what do you mean, Sharpe? are you really insensible
to the danger.”

“What danger!”

“Why, that she'll blow you to her husband!”

“What wife would do that, d'ye think? No! no! Barnabas,
she's no such fool. Of course she kept her secret
when she married him. She'll scarcely blab it now.”

“But won't this affair of Calvert get to his ears.”

“What if it does? It can do no mischief. Had you
listened to my examination of Beauchampe—but you're a
dull fellow, Barnabas! Didn't you hear me ask what his
wife's maiden name was?—Maiden name, indeed!—Did
you hear the answer?”

“Yes—he said the name was Cooke.”

“To be sure he did. Ann, or Anna Cooke—his Anna!
Ha! ha! ha! His Anna!”

“But don't laugh so loud, Sharpe; they'll hear you and
suspect.”

“Pshaw, you're timid as a hare in December. Don't
you see that she's imposed upon him a false name. Let
him hear till doomsday of Margaret Cooper and myself,
and it brings him not a jot nigher to the truth. But, of
course, you must tell him of my affair with Calvert, and
give the political version. He can scarce hear any other
version from any other source;—political hacks will
scarcely ever deal in truth when a lie may be had as
easily, and can serve their turn as well. We are representatives
of our several parties and principles, you
know; treating each other roughly—too roughly—without
gloves, and, as usual in such cases, exchanging shots
by way of concluding an ill-adjusted argument. There's
no danger of any thing but what we please meeting
Beauchampe's ears.”

“But, by Jove, Sharpe, this is a d—d ticklish situation
to be in. I'd rather you were not here in his house. I'd
rather be elsewhere myself.”

“You are certainly the most timid mortal. Will you
set off to-morrow with your lame horse.”

“If he can hobble at all, I will, by Jove. I don't like
the situation we're in at all.”

“And by Venus, friend Barnabas, if such be your determination,
you set off alone. I'm not going to give up
my treasure the moment I find it, for any Beauchampe or
Barnabas of you all. No! no! my most excellent, but
most apprehensive friend!—having seen her, how can
you think it. But you have neither eyes nor passion.
By heavens, Barnabas, I am all in a convulsion of joy. I
see her before me now—those dilating eyes, wild, bright,
almost fierce in their brightness, like those of an eagle;
those lips, that brow, and that full and heaving bosom,
whose sweets—”

“Hush! you are mad—if you must feel these raptures,
Sharpe, for God's sake, say nothing about them. They
will hear you in the adjoining room.”

“No! no! it is your silly fears, Barnabas. I am speaking
in a whisper.”

“D—n such whispers, say I. They can be heard by
keen ears half a mile. But you say you spoke with her
—what did she say? Did she abuse you?”

“No! indeed!”

“Is it possible—the b—”

“Hush! hush! You do not understand her. She did
not abuse me, for of Billingsgate she knows nothing.
You must not think of her as of your ordinary town
wenches. She is too proud for any such proceeding.
She threatened me.”

“Ah! How!”

“With her own vengeance and that of her husband.
Told me she had the weapon for me ready sharpened,
and the pistol shotted, and had kept them ready for
years.”

“The Tartar! and what did you say?”

“Laughed, of course, and but for the coming of the
lantern and the husband, I should have silenced her
threats by stopping her mouth with kisses.”

“You're a dare-devil, Sharpe, and you'll have your
throat cut some day by some husband or other.”

“You're whiskers will be gray enough before that time
comes. You know husbands quite as little as you know
wives. Now, as soon as Margaret Cooper began to
threaten me, I knew I was safe.”

“Devilish strange sort of security that.”

“True and certain, nevertheless. People who threaten
much seldom perform. But I have even better security
than this.”

“What's that?”

“She loves me.”

“What! you think so still, do you? You're a conceited
fellow.”

“I know it! That first passion, Barnabas, is the longest
lived. You cannot expel it. It holds on, it lasts
longer than youth. It is the chief memory of youth.
It recalls youth, revives it, and revives all the joys
which come with youth—the bloom, the freshness and
the fragrance. Do you think that Margaret Cooper can
forget that it was my lips that first gave birth to the passion
of love within her bosom—that first awakened its
glow, and taught her,—what before she never knew,—
that there were joys still left to earth, which could yet
restore all the fabled bliss of Eden? Not easily, mon
ami! No, Barnabas,—the man who has once taught
a woman how to love, may be, if he pleases, the perpetual

master of her fate. She cannot help but love him
—she must obey—and none but a fool or a madman can
forfeit the allegiance which her heart will always be ready
to pay to his.”

“I don't know, Sharpe—you always talk these things
well; but I can't help thinking that there's danger.
There's something in this woman's looks very different
from the ordinary run of women.”

“She is different, so far as superiority makes her different,
but the same nature is hers which belongs to all.
Love is the fate that makes or unmakes the whole world
of woman.”

“Maybe so; but this woman seems as proud, and
cold, and stately—”

“Masks, my boy,—glorious masks, that help to conceal
as much fire and passion, and tumultuous love as
ever flamed in any woman's breast.”

“She awes me with her looks, and if she threatened
you, Sharpe, she seems to me the very woman to keep
her threats.”

“If she had not threatened me, Barnabas, I should
have probably set out to-night.”

“It will be a wise step to do so in the morning.”

“No! no! my dear fellow. Neither you nor I go in
the morning. Fortune favours me!—She has thrown in
my way the only treasure which I did not willingly throw
aside myself, and which I have so long sighed, but in
vain, to recover. Shall I now refuse to pick it up and
enshrine it in my breast once more?—No! no! Barnabas!
I am no stoic—I am no such profligate insensible!”

“Why, you don't mean—”

The inquiry was conveyed, and the sentence finished
by a look.

“Do I not! Call me slave, ass, dotard,—any thing that
can express contempt—if I do not. And hark ye, Barnabas,
you must help me.”

“I help you. I'll be d—d if I do! What! to have this
fellow, Beauchampe, slit my carotid? Never! never!”

“Pshaw, you are getting cowardly in your old age.”

“I tell you this fellow, Beauchampe, is a sort of Mohawk
when he's roused.”

“And I tell you, Barnabas, there's no sort of danger—

none at least to you. All that you will have to do will
be to get him out of the way. You wish to ride round
the country—I do not. You wish to try the birds;—
nay, he can even get up an elk hunt for you. He knows
that I have no passion for these things, and it will seem
natural enough that I should remain at home. Do you
take? at the worst, I am the offender,—and the danger
will be mine only. But there will be no danger. I tell
you that Margaret Cooper has only changed in name.
In all other respects she is the same. There can be no
danger if Beauchampe chooses to remain blind, and if you
will assist me in keeping him so.”

“I don't half like it, Sharpe.”

“Pshaw! my good fellow, there's no good reason
why you should like or dislike. The simple question is
whether, in a matter which will not affect you one way
or the other, you are willing to serve your friend. That
is the true and only question. You see for yourself that
there can be no danger to you. I am sure there's no
danger to any body. At all events, be the danger what
it may, and take you what steps you please, I am resolved
on mine. Reconcile to yourself, as you may, the
desertion of your friend in consequence of a timidity
which has no cause whatever of alarm.”

Sharpe rose at this moment, kicked off his boots, and
prepared to undress. The effect of a strong will upon a
feeble one was soon obvious. Barnabas hesitated still,
hemmed and ha'd, dilated once more upon the danger,
and finally subsided into a mood of the most perfect compliance
with all the requisitions of his friend. They carried
the discussion still farther into the night, but that is
is no reason why we should trespass longer upon the
sleeping hours of our readers.