University of Virginia Library

15. CHAPTER XV.

A week from this had not gone by, when,
while under the hands of our village hair-dresser,
I beheld a picture crowded among the hundred
upon his walls, which filled me with astonishment,
and awakened in my mind some
moving apprehensions. I beheld the scene of
my crime truly done to nature, and just by the
little copse upon which the deed had been committed,
stood a female form, pale and shadowy,
and with a sufficient resemblance to Emily,
to have been considered a portrait. You may
guess my emotion. Having recovered from
the first shock, I inquired, as if without the desire
for an answer, where he got and who had

painted it, and was told in reply that an old
lady had brought it there for sale—the lady was
unknown. Finding the price low—merely nominal,
indeed, he had readily bought it; relying
on the merits of the piece to insure it a
ready sale. I affected to be pleased with it
and paid him his price. Having secured it in
possession, I examined it closely, and was confirmed
in the opinion that the whole was copied
from events in my own history. Beyond this
I could perceive nothing farther. The preparation
of the piece was a mystery, and I had
not the courage to seek its developement. I
cut up the tell-tale fabric with my knife, and
witnessed its destruction, fragment by fragment,
in the flames. Fool that I was, I did not
dream that the artist had yet other copies.
And so it was—another and another, to the
number of three, appeared in the crowded
shop of the hair-dresser. I was too sagacious,
however, to purchase any more. I had begun
to tremble! Still I had not the slightest suspicion
of the author, and though my thoughts
were restlessly employed upon the subject,
they wandered to all persons and conjectured
all things but the right. Still, daily, did Harding
and myself pursue our rambles, and, each
day, through his adroit ingenuity, yielded something
more to the stock of that evidence which
was to overwhelm me. By degrees, he had
penetrated in all directions of that fatal wood;
and, at length, our footsteps were bent, as in
the most casual manner, up the steep sides of
the rock, and over the very path, which, burdened
with the dead body of Emily Andrews,
I had once journeyed alone. My eyes were
again riveted upon that fearful chasm—I heard
the dead fall of her delicate form, as it struck
from side to side in its passage down—I heard
the clattering of the loosened stones which
had accompanied and followed her; and, at
length, the same subtle imagination which
had revived all the circumstances vividly before
one sense, arrayed her reanimated form
as vividly before another. I saw her arise
from the chasm, pale and ghastly as when I
had seen her descend. For a moment the
spell of terror fixed every faculty, and in that
moment, the searching glance of my companion,
had gathered much towards the formation
of his testimony. He had followed the direction
of my glance, and the chasm, half concealed
in the umbrage, and not very obvious
to the gaze, grew distinctly before him. I recovered
from the trance which had for a time
stupified me, and we returned to the village.
In a few days more, and another scene, to me
full of fearful meaning was in the shop of my
hair-dresser. There was the rock—there the
chasm, and just above, in a dim haze that made
vague the expression and outline, but did not
impair the features, stood the phantom person
of Emily, as my imagination had borne it to
my sight but a few days before. Who was it,
that, with so much felicity, could embody my
imaginings. I was thunderstruck, and, through
the means of an agent, I secured this new accuser,
and destroyed it in like manner with
the former. But another self made its appearance,
and, in despair, I gave up the hope
of arresting, in this way, the progress of that
inquiry, which, taking so equivocal a form, and
pursuing a course so mysterious, was doubly
terrible. But Harding, for he was the artist,
did not alone content himself with probing
the secrets of my soul, by exercising my fears
and fancies. He privately took his way to the
family of the murdered girl. He ascertained
the day and date of her absence—he took careful
note of our association—of the expectations
that had been formed in their minds, not less
than in the mind of Emily herself, from the
attentions I had paid her; and though the
true nature of our connexion had been totally
unsuspected by the parents, our intimacy
had been such as to warrant a belief, that,
in the progress of events, something must
necessarily grow out of it. He found that
we had been almost in the daily habit of
meeting, and in the very wood in which
he had first perceived my terrors. He learned,
that, in dragging the stream in its neighborhood,
no traces had been found of the
victim—that a search, made shortly after she
had been missing, and on the same day,
throughout the country, for many miles, had
been ineffectual. He was conscious that few
places of concealment offered themselves in
the circuit so examined, except in the cavity
of rock to which his mind had already adverted;
and, associating the ill disguised apprehension
and horror which I had exhibited while
upon it, he came to the rapid conclusion that
the mystery was to be developed there. Yet
how was he now to proceed? There was still
something wanting to unite together the several
links in the chain of testimony which he
had so assiduously and singularly woven.
The circumstances, though strong, were not
at all conclusive against me; and, having
succeeded so poorly in the first instance,
and with the public prejudice so strongly
against him, he might well dread the overthrow
of his design, in the event of any premature
and partial development. Though perfectly
satisfied that the chasm contained the
remains of the murdered girl, he was yet well
convinced how little the mere development
of the body would avail, unless with some
identifying circumstance, fixing the crime
upon me. Accordingly, he devoted himself
busily to the task of tracing in the details of
the mother, all the particulars of my intimacy
with the daughter. In this scrutiny he happened
upon, read carefully, and copied a
single note having my initials, merely, but
without date, which I had sent her, enclosing
some ornaments for her person and engaging
to meet her on some day in the ensuing
week. The style of expression was guarded
in the extreme, and indicated the feelings of
one who esteemed the individual he addressed,
with a respectful consideration, which
though not love itself, might in time, become
so. The absence of a date, alone, presented a
difficulty, which was only overcome, by a single
passage which the note contained. It spoke
of pressing engagements for a term of some
weeks which would so occupy the attention
of the writer as to leave him no opportunity
of seeing her for that period unless that
which the note suggested was embraced.
What engagements were there of so pressing
a character upon me? Harding knew as well
as myself the nature of my employments, and
felt assured that the assertion was either false,
or that the note had been written at the time,
when my marriage arrangements had been
made; the only circumstance he conceived
likely to have been looked to in my mind, as
calculated to interfere with the pursuit of any
humbler object. This was conjectural, however,
yet the conjecture furnished him with
an additional clue which he suffered not to
escape him. The old lady could say nothing
as to the period when the note had been received—but
the jewels were shown him, and
carefully noting down their kinds and qualities,
he proceeded to the several shops of our
village in which such articles were sold. He
inspected all of corresponding description, and
submitting those in question, he at length found
out to whom and when they were sold. The
dates were supplied, and were so far found to
correspond with events, that it was indubitable
that but four days after their purchase by myself,
Emily Andrews had been lost to her family.
The circumstances were now almost embodied
in the estimation of the law; and assured,
but still unprecipitate, Harding prepared
calmly and quietly the whole narrative, and
awaited impatiently the operation of looked
for events, to unfold the entire history. And
the time came!