 | CHAPTER XXXII. Vashti, or, "Until death us do part" |  |
32. CHAPTER XXXII.
“MISS DEXTER, have you succeeded in seeing Mrs.
Gerome since her return?”
“No, sir; she obstinately refuses to admit me,
though I have called twice at the house. Yesterday I received
a letter in answer to several that I have addressed to her, all of
which she returned unopened. Since you have already learned
so much of our melancholy history, why should I hesitate to
acquaint you with the contents of her letter? You know the
object of her journey north, and I will read you the result.”
The governess drew a letter from her pocket, and Dr. Grey
leaned his face on his hand and listened.
“Edith, — No lingering vestige of affection, no remorseful
tenderness, prompted that mission from which I have recently
returned, and only the savage scourgings of implacable duty
could have driven me, like a galley-slave, to my hated task.
The victim of a horrible and disfiguring disease which so completely
changed his countenance that his own mother would
scarcely have recognized him, — and the tenant of a charity hospital
in the town of —, I found that man who has proved the
Upas of your life and of mine. During his delirium I watched
and nursed him — not lovingly (how could I?) but faithfully,
kindly, pityingly. When all danger was safely passed, and his
clouded intellect began to clear itself, I left him in careful
hands, and provided an ample amount for his comfortable
maintenance in coming years. I spared him the humiliation
of recognizing in his nurse his injured and despised wife; and,
as night after night I watched beside the pitiable wreck of a
once handsome, fascinating, and idolized man, I fully and freely
forgave Maurice Carlyle all the wrongs that so completely
stranded my life. To-day he is well, and probably happy, while
he finds himself possessed of means by which to gratify his
extravagant tastes; but how long his naturally fine constitution
can hold at bay the legion of ills that hunt like hungry wolves
along the track of reckless dissipation, God only knows.
“For some natures it is exceedingly difficult to forgive, — to
forget, impossible; and while my husband's abject wretchedness
and degradation disarmed the hate that has for so many
years rankled in my heart, I could never again look willingly
upon his face. Edith, you and I have nothing in common but
miserable memories, which, I beg you to believe, are sufficiently
vivid, without the torturing adjunct of your countenance;
therefore, pardon me if I decline to receive your visits, and
return the letters that are quite as welcome and cheering to my
the mother, who would fain look no more upon the harrowing
relics. I do not wish to be harsh, but I must be honest, and
our intercourse can never be renewed in this world.
“In bygone days, when I loved you so fondly and trusted
you so fully, it was my intention to share my fortune with you;
and, since I find that you have not forfeited my confidence in
the purity of your purposes, such is still my wish. I enclose a
draft on my banker, which I hope you will deem sufficient to
enable you to abandon the arduous profession in which you
have worn out your life. If I can feel assured that I have been
instrumental in contributing to the peace and ease of the years
that may yet be in store for you, it will serve as one honeyed
drop to sweeten the dregs of the cup of woe I am draining.
Edith, do not refuse the only aid I can offer you in your loneliness;
and accept the earnest assurance that I shall be grateful
for the privilege of promoting your comfort. Affection and
trust I have not, and a few paltry thousands are all I am now
able to bestow. By the love you once professed, and in the
name of that compassion you should feel for me, I beg of you,
despise not the gift; and let the consciousness that I have saved
you from toil and fatigue quiet the soul and ease the heart of a
lonely woman, who has shaken hands with every earthly hope.
I have done my duty, my conscience is calm and contented, and
I sit wearily on the stormy shore of time, waiting for the tide
that will drift into eternity the desolate, proud soul of
Tears rolled over the governess' cheeks, and, refolding the
letter, she said, sorrowfully, —
“My poor, heart-broken Vashti! She has resumed the name
which old Elsie gave her because it was her mother's; and how
mournfully appropriate it has proved. I could be happy if
permitted to spend the residue of my days with her; but she
decrees otherwise, and I have no alternative but submission to
her imperious will.”
Dr. Grey did not lift his face where the shadow of a great,
voiceless grief hung heavily, and his low tone indexed deep and
painful emotion, when he answered, —
“I sincerely deplore her unfortunate decision, for isolation
only augments the ills from which she suffers. Many months
have elapsed since I saw her last, but Robert Maclean told me
to-day that she was sadly changed in appearance, and seemed in
feeble health. She did not tell you that she had been dangerously
ill with varioloid, contracted while nursing her husband.
Although not in the least marked or disfigured, the attack must
have seriously impaired her constitution, if all that Robert tells
me be true. Since her return, one month ago, she has not left
her room.”
“Dr. Grey, exert your influence in my behalf, and prevail
upon her to admit me.”
“Miss Dexter, you ascribe to me powers of persuasion which,
unfortunately, I do not possess; and Mrs. Carlyle's decree is
beyond the reach of human agency. To the few who are earnestly
interested in her welfare, there remains but one avenue
of aid and comfort, — faithful, fervent prayer.”
“Perhaps you are not aware of the exalted estimate she
places on your character, nor of the value she attaches to your
opinions. Of all living beings, she told me she reverenced and
trusted you most; and you, at least, would not be denied access
to her presence.”
She could not see the tremor on his usually firm lips, nor the
pallor that overspread his face, and when he spoke his grave
voice did not betray the tumult in his aching heart.
“I am no longer a visitor at `Solitude,' and shall not see its
mistress unless she requires my professional aid. While I am
very deeply interested in her happiness, I could never consent
to intrude upon her seclusion.”
“I know my days are numbered, and after a little while I
shall sleep well under the ancient cedars that shade the headstones
of my father and mother; but I could die more cheerfully,
more joyfully, if Evelyn would only be comforted, and
accept some human friendship.”
“For some weeks you have seemed so much better that I
hoped warm weather would quite relieve and invigorate you.
Spend next winter in Cuba or Mexico, and it will probably add
many months, possibly years, to your life.”
She smiled, and shook her head.
“This beautiful springtime has temporarily baffled the disease,
but for me there can be no restoration. Day by day I feel
the ebbing of strength and energy, and the approach of my
deliverer, death; but I realize also, what the Centaur uttered to
Melampus, `I decline unto my last days calm as the setting of
the constellations; but I feel myself perishing and passing
quickly away, like a snow-wreath floating on the stream.'”
As he looked at the thin, pure face where May sunshine
streamed warm and bright, and marked the perfect peace that
brooded over the changed features, Dr. Grey was reminded of
the lines that might have been written for her, so fully were
they suited to her case, —
Who trod on thorns, who drank the loathsome cup;
The lost in night, in day was found again;
The fallen was lifted up.
They stood together in the blessed noon,
They sang together through the length of days;
Each loving face bent sunwards, like a moon
New-lit with love and praise.”
“My friend, the shadows are passing swiftly from your life,
and, in the mild radiance of its close, you can well afford to
forget the storms that clouded its dawn.”
“Forget? No, Dr. Grey, I neither endeavor nor desire to
forget the sorrows that first taught me the emptiness of earthly
things, the futility of human schemes, — that snapped the frail
reed of flesh to which I clung, and gave me, instead, the blessed
support, the immovable arm of an everlasting God. Ah! that
woman was deeply versed in the heart-lore of her own sex, who
wrote, —
But which is gone, and I must do without,
When I remember something promised me,
But which I never had, nor can have now,
Because the promiser we no more see
In countries that accord with mortal vow;
When I remember this, I mourn, — but yet
My happier days are not the days when I forget.'”
“If Mrs. Carlyle possessed a tithe of your faith and philosophy,
how serene, how tranquilly useful her future years might
prove.”
“In God's own good time her trials will be sanctified to her
eternal peace, and she will one day glide from grief to glory,
for she can claim the promise of our Lord, `The pure in heart
shall see God.' No purer heart than Vashti Carlyle's throbs
this side of the throne where seraphim and cherubim hover.”
In the brief silence that succeeded, the governess observed
the unusually grave and melancholy expression of her companion's
countenance, and asked, timidly, —
“Has anything occurred recently to distress or annoy you?
You look depressed.”
“I feel inexpressibly anxious about Salome, concerning whose
fate I can learn nothing that is comforting. In reply to my letter,
urging him to make every effort to ascertain her locality and
condition, Professor V — writes, that he is now a confirmed
invalid, confined to his room, and unable to conduct the search
for his missing pupil. She left Palermo on a small vessel bound
for Monaco, and her farewell note stated that all attempts to
discover her retreat would prove futile, as she was resolved
to preserve her incognito, and wished her friends in America
to remain in ignorance of her mode of life. Professor V —
surmises that she is in Paris, but gives no good reason for the
conjecture, except that she possibly sought the best medical
advice for the treatment of her throat and recovery of her
voice. His last letter, received yesterday, informed me that one
of Salome's most devoted admirers, a Bostonian of immense
that he was diligently searching for her in Leghorn and Monaco.
She left Palermo alone, and with a comparatively empty
purse.”
“Dr. Grey, are you aware of the suspicions which Muriel has
long entertained with reference to Mr. Granville's admiration
of Salome, and the efforts of the latter to encourage his attentions?”
“I have very cogent reasons for believing that however amenable
to censure Mr. Granville doubtless is, Muriel's distrust of
Salome is totally unjust. If she were capable of the despicable
course my ward is disposed to impute to her, I should cease to
feel any interest in her career or fate; but I cherish the conviction
that she would scorn to be guilty of conduct so ignoble.
Her defects of character I shall neither deny nor attempt to
palliate, but I trust her true womanly heart as I trust my own
manly honor; and a stern sense of justice to the absent constrains
me to vindicate her from Muriel's hasty and unfounded
aspersions. So strong is my faith in Salome's conscientiousness,
so earnest my friendship for her, that since the receipt of Professor
V —'s letter I have determined to go immediately to
Europe, and if possible discover her retreat. My sister's
adopted child must not and shall not suffer and struggle among
strangers, while I live to aid and protect her.”
Miss Dexter rose and laid her thin, feverish hand on his arm,
while embarrassment made her voice tremble slightly, —
“I am rejoiced to learn your decision, and God grant you
speedy success in your quest. Do not deem me presumptuous
or impertinent, if, prompted by a sincere desire to see you
happy, I venture to say, that he who lightly values the pure,
tender, devoted love of such a woman as Salome Owen, —
tramples on treasures that would make his life affluent and
blessed — that neither gold can purchase nor royalty compel.
Under your guidance, moulded by your influence, she would
become a noble woman, — of whom any man might justly
be proud.”
Fearful that she had already incurred his displeasure, and unwilling
through the open door.
In the bright glow of that lovely spring day, the calm face
of Ulpian Grey seemed scarcely older than on the afternoon
when he came to make the farm his home; and though paler,
and ciphered over by the leaden finger of anxiety, it indexed
little of the long, fierce strife, that conscience had waged with
heart.
Lighter and more impulsive natures expend themselves in
spasmodic and violent ebullitions, but the great deep of this
man's serene character had never stirred, until the one mighty
love of his life had lashed it into a tempest that tossed his hopes
like sea-froth, and finally engulfed the only rosy dream of wedded
happiness that had ever flushed his quiet, solitary, sedate
existence.
Having kept his heart in holy subjection to the law of Christ,
he did not quail and surrender when the great temptation rose,
bearing the banner of insurrection; but sternly and dauntlessly
fronted the shock, and kept inviolate the citadel, garrisoned by
an invincible and consecrated will.
The yearning tenderness of his strong, tranquil soul, had enfolded
Mrs. Carlyle, drawing her more and more into the penetralia
of his affection; but from the hour in which he learned
her history he had torn away the clinging tendrils of love, —
had endeavored to expel her from his heart, and to stifle its
wail for the lost idol.
Week after week, month after month, he had driven every
day within sight of the blue smoke that curled above the trees
at “Solitude,” but never even for an instant checked his horse
to gaze longingly towards the Eden whence he had voluntarily
exiled himself.
There were hours when his heart ached for the sight of that
white face he had loved so madly, and the sound of the
mournfully sweet voice, — and his hand trembled at the recollection
of the soft, cold, snowy fingers, that once thrilled his
palms; but he treated these utterances of his heart as mercilessly
death-cry of the victim rings above bark and halloo.
No wall of division, no sea of separation, would have proved
so effectual, so insurmountable, as his own firm resolve that his
earthly path should never cross that of one whom God's
statutes had set apart until death annulled the decree. In this
torturing ordeal he was strengthened by the conviction that he
alone suffered for his folly, — that Mrs. Carlyle was a stranger
to feelings that robbed him of sleep, and clouded his days, —
that the heaving tide of his devoted love had broken against
her frozen heart as idly as the surges of the sea that die in
foam upon the dreary, mysterious ruins of the Serapeon at Pozzuoli.
In the silent watches of the night, as he pondered the brief,
beautiful vision that had so completely fascinated him, he reverently
thanked God that the woman he loved had never reciprocated
his affection, and was not sitting in the ashes of desolation,
mourning his absence. Striving to interest himself more
and more in Stanley and Jessie, who had become inordinately
fond of him, his thoughts continually reverted to Salome, and
that subtle sympathy which springs from the “fellow-being,”
that makes us “wondrous kind” to those whose pangs are fierce
as ours, began faintly and shyly, but surely, to assert itself.
A shadowy, intangible self-reproach brooded like a phantom
over his generous heart, when, amidst the uncertainty that
seemed to overhang the orphan's fate, he remembered the numberless
manifestations of almost idolatrous affection which he
had coldly repulsed.
In the earnest interest that day by day deepened in the absent
girl, there was no pitiable vanity, no inflated self-love,
but a stern realization of the anguish and humiliation that must
now be her portion, and a magnanimous eagerness to endeavor
to cheer a heart whose severest woes had sprung from his
indifference.
More than a year had elapsed, and no letter had ever reached
him, — not even a message in her two brief epistles to Stanley
thwarted him at every turn.
He longed to see the proud, girlish face, with its flashing eyes,
and red lips, and the haughty toss of the large, handsome head;
and the angry tones of her voice would have been welcome
sounds in the house where she had so long tyrannized. To-day,
as Ulpian Grey sat in his own little sitting-room, his eyes were
fixed on a copy of Rembrandt's Nicholas Tulp, which hung over
the mantelpiece; but the mysteries of anatomy no longer riveted
his attention, and his thoughts were busy with memories
of a fond though wayward girl, whom his indifference had
driven to foreign lands, — to unknown and fearful perils.
Through the windows stole the breath of Salome's violets,
and the sweet, spicy odor of the Belgian honeysuckle that she
had planted and twined around the mossy columns that supported
the gallery; and with a sigh he closed his eyes, shut
out the anatomy of flesh, and began the dissection of emotions.
Could Salome's radiant face brighten his home, and win his
heart from its devouring regret? Would it be possible for him
to give her the place whence he had ejected Mrs. Carlyle?
Could he ever persuade himself to call that fair, passionate
young thing, that capricious, obstinate, maliciously perverse
girl, — his wife?
Involuntarily he frowned, for while pity pleaded for the refugee
from home and happiness, the man's honest nature scouted
all shams, and he acknowledged to himself that he could never
feel the need of her lips or hands, — could never insult her
womanhood, or degrade his own nature, by folding to his heart
one whose touch possessed no magnetism, whose presence exerted
no spell over his home.
Salome, his friend, his adopted sister, he wished to discover, to
claim, and restore to the household; but Salome, his wife, —
was a monstrous imaginary incubus that appalled and repelled
him.
The difficulties that presented themselves at the outset of his
it was part of his wise philosophy, that —
The shadow of hills across a level thrown,
And pant like climbers.”
foibles, — of her noble intentions and ignoble executions, — of
her few feeble triumphs, her numerous egregious failures in the
line of duty; and loving Christian charity pleaded eloquently
for her, whispering to his generous soul, “We know the ships
that come with streaming pennons into the immortal ports; but
we know little of the ships that have taken fire on the way
thither, — that have gone down at sea.”
What pure friendship could accomplish he would not withhold,
and life at the farm was not so attractive now that he felt
regret at the prospect of temporary absence.
The disappointment that had so rudely smitten to the earth
the one precious hope born of his acquaintance with “Solitude,”
had no power to embitter his nature, — to drape the
world in drab, or to shroud the future with gloom; and though
his noble face was sadder and paler, Christian faith and resignation
rang blessed chimes of peace in heart and soul, and made
his life a hallowed labor of love for the needy and grief-stricken.
To-day, as he sat alone at the south window, he could overlook
the fields of “Grassmere,” where the rich promise of golden
harvest “filled in all beauty and fulness the emerald cup of the
hills,” and the waving grain rippled in light and shade like the
billows of some distant sunset sea. Basking in the balmy sunshine,
and contemplating his approaching departure for Europe,
a sudden longing seized him to look once more on the face of
Vashti Carlyle, before he bade farewell to his home.
She was in feeble health, and might not survive his absence,
and, moreover, what harm could result from one final visit to
“Solitude,” — from a few parting words to its desolate mistress?
She had sent a message through Robert, that she would
and now hungry heart and soul cried out savagely, —
“Why not? Why not?”
His heavy brows knitted a little, and his mouth grew rigid as
iron, but after some moments the lips relaxed, and with a sad,
patient smile, he repeated those stirring words of Richter to
Herman, — “Suffer like a man the Alp-pressure of fate. Trust
yourself upon the broad, shining wings of your faith, and
make them bear you over the Dead Sea, so as not to fall
spiritually dead within.”
“No, no, Ulpian Grey, — keep yourself `unspotted from the
world.' Strangle that one temptation which borrows the garments
of an angel of light and mercy, and dogs you, sleeping
and waking. I will see her no more till death snaps her
fetters, and I can meet her in the presence of God, who alone
can know what separation costs me. May He grant her strength
to bear her lonely lot, and give me grace to be patient even
unto the end, bringing no reproach on the sacred faith I profess.”
It was the final struggle between love and duty, and though
the vanquished heart wailed piteously, exultant conscience,
like Jupiter of old, triumphantly applauded, “Evan, evoe!”
| CHAPTER XXXII. Vashti, or, "Until death us do part" | |