University of Virginia Library

11. CHAPTER XI.

I was aroused from this stupor by sounds that
evidently arose in the next chamber. Was it possible
that I had been mistaken in the figure which
I had seen on the bank? or had Carwin, by some
inscrutable means, penetrated once more into this
chamber? The opposite door opened; footsteps
came forth, and the person, advancing to mine,
knocked.

So unexpected an incident robbed me of all presence
of mind, and, starting up, I involuntarily exclaimed,
“Who is there?” An answer was immediately
given. The voice, to my inexpressible
astonishment, was Pleyel's.

“It is I. Have you risen? If you have not,
make haste; I want three minutes conversation with
you in the parlour—I will wait for you there.”
Saying this he retired from the door.

Should I confide in the testimony of my ears?
If that were true, it was Pleyel that had been hitherto
immured in the opposite chamber: he whom
my rueful fancy had depicted in so many ruinous
and ghastly shapes: he whose footsteps had been
listened to with such inquietude! What is man,
that knowledge is so sparingly conferred upon him!
that his heart should be wrung with distress, and
his frame be exanimated with fear, though his safety
be encompassed with impregnable walls! What
are the bounds of human imbecility! He that
warned me of the presence of my foe refused the
intimation by which so many racking fears would
have been precluded.

Yet who would have imagined the arrival of
Pleyel at such an hour? His tone was desponding
and anxious. Why this unseasonable summons?
and why this hasty departure? Some tidings he,
perhaps, bears of mysterious and unwelcome import.

My impatience would not allow me to consume
much time in deliberation: I hastened down. Pleyel
I found standing at a window, with eyes cast down
as in meditation, and arms folded on his breast.
Every line in his countenance was pregnant with
sorrow. To this was added a certain wanncss and
air of fatigue. The last time I had seen him appearances
had been the reverse of these. I was
startled at the change. The first impulse was to
question him as to the cause. This impulse was supplanted
by some degree of confusion, flowing from
a consciousness that love had too large, and, as it
might prove, a perceptible share in creating this impulse.
I was silent.

Presently he raised his eyes and fixed them upon
me. I read in them an anguish altogether ineffable.
Never had I witnessed a like demeanour in
Pleyel. Never, indeed, had I observed an human
countenance in which grief was more legibly inscribed.
He seemed struggling for utterance; but
his struggles being fruitless, he shook his head and
turned away from me.

My impatience would not allow me to be longer
silent: “What,” said I, “for heaven's sake, my
friend, what is the matter?”

He started at the sound of my voice. His looks,
for a moment, became convulsed with an emotion
very different from grief. His accents were broken
with rage.

“The matter—O wretch!—thus exquisitely

fashioned—on whom nature seemed to have exhausted
all her graces; with charms so awful and so
pure! how art thou fallen! From what height
fallen! A ruin so complete—so unheard of!”

His words were again choaked by emotion.
Grief and pity were again mingled in his features.
He resumed, in a tone half suffocated by sobs:

“But why should I upbraid thee? Could I restore
to thee what thou hast lost; efface this
cursed stain; snatch thee from the jaws of this fiend;
I would do it. Yet what will avail my efforts?
I have not arms with which to contend with so consummate,
so frightful a depravity.

“Evidence less than this would only have excited
resentment and scorn. The wretch who should
have breathed a suspicion injurious to thy honor,
would have been regarded without anger; not
hatred or envy could have prompted him; it would
merely be an argument of madness. That my eyes,
that my ears, should bear witness to thy fall! By
no other way could detestible conviction be imparted.

“Why do I summon thee to this conference?
Why expose myself to thy derision? Here admonition
and entreaty are vain. Thou knowest him
already, for a murderer and thief. I had thought
to have been the first to disclose to thee his insamy;
to have warned thee of the pit to which thou art
hastening; but thy eyes are open in vain. O soul
and insupportable disgrace!

“There is but one path. I know you will disappear
together. In thy ruin, how will the selicity
and honor of multitudes be involved! But it must
come. This scene shall not be blooted by his presence.
No doubt thou wilt shortly see thy detested
paramour. This scene will be again polluted by

a midnight assignation. Inform him of his danger;
tell him that his crimes are known; let him fly
far and instantly from this spot, if he desires to
avoid the fate which menaced him in Ireland.

“And wilt thou not stay behind?—But shame
upon my weakness. I know not what I would
say.—I have done what I purposed. To stay
longer, to expostulate, to beseech, to enumerate
the consequences of thy act—what end can it
serve but to blazon thy infamy and embitter our
woes? And yet, O think, think ere it be too late,
on the distresses which thy flight will entail upon
us; on the base, grovelling, and atrocious character
of the wretch to whom thou hast sold thy
honor. But what is this? Is not thy effrontery
impenetrable, and thy heart thoroughly cankered?
O most specious, and most profligate of women!”

Saying this, he rushed out of the house. I saw
him in a few moments hurrying along the path
which led to my brother's. I had no power to
prevent his going, or to recall, or to follow him.
The accents I had heard were calculated to
confound and bewilder. I looked around me to
assure myself that the scene was real. I moved
that I might banish the doubt that I was awake.
Such enormous imputations from the mouth of
Pleyel! To be stigmatized with the names of
wanton and profligate! To be charged with the
sacrifice of honor! with midnight meetings with a
wretch known to be a murderer and thief! with an
intention to fly in his company!

What I had heard was surely the dictate of
phrenzy, or it was built upon some fatal, some incomprehensible
mistake. After the horrors of the
night; after undergoing perils so imminent from
this man, to be summoned to an interview like this;

to find Pleyel fraught with a belief that, instead
of having chosen death as a refuge from the violence
of this man, I had hugged his baseness to my
heart, had sacrificed for him my purity, my spotless
name, my friendships, and my fortune! that even
madness could engender accusations like these was
not to be believed.

What evidence could possibly suggest conceptions
so wild? After the unlooked-for interview
with Carwin in my chamber, he retired. Could
Pleyel have observed his exit? It was not long
after that Pleyel himself entered. Did he build on
this incident, his odious conclusions? Could the
long series of my actions and sentiments grant me
no exemption from suspicions so foul? Was it
not more rational to infer that Carwin's designs
had been illicit; that my life had been endangered
by the fury of one whom, by some means, he had
discovered to be an assassin and robber; that
my honor had been assailed, not by blandishments,
but by violence?

He has judged me without hearing. He has
drawn from dubious appearances, conclusions the
most improbable and unjust. He has loaded me
with all outrageous epithets. He has ranked me
with prostitutes and thieves. I cannot pardon thee.
Pleyel, for this injustice. Thy understanding must
be hurt. If it be not, if thy conduct was sober
and deliberate, I can never forgive an outrage so
unmanly, and so gross.

These thoughts gradually gave place to others.
Pleyel was possessed by some momentary phrenzy:
appearances had led him into palpable errors.
Whence could his sagacity have contracted this
blindness? Was it not love? Previously assured of
my affection for Carwin, distracted with grief and

jealousy, and impelled hither at that late hour by
some unknown instigation, his imagination transformed
shadows into monsters, and plunged him
into these deplorable errors.

This idea was not unattended with consolation.
My soul was divided between indignation at his injustice,
and delight on account of the source from
which I conceived it to spring. For a long time
they would allow admission to no other thoughts.
Surprize is an emotion that enfeebles, not invigorates.
All my meditations were accompanied with
wonder. I rambled with vagueness, or clung to
one image with an obstinacy which sufficiently testified
the maddening influence of late transactions.

Gradually I proceeded to reflect upon the consequences
of Pleyel's mistake, and on the measures
I should take to guard myself against future injury
from Carwin. Should I suffer this mistake to be
detected by time? When his passion should subside,
would he not perceive the flagrancy of his injustice,
and hasten to atone for it? Did it not become
my character to testify resentment for language
and treatment so opprobrious? Wrapt up in
the consciousness of innocence, and confiding in
the influence of time and reflection to consute so
groundless a charge, it was my province to be passive
and silent.

As to the violences meditated by Carwin, and
the means of eluding them, the path to be taken by
me was obvious. I resolved to tell the tale to my
brother, and regulate myself by his advice. For
this end, when the morning was somewhat advanced,
I took the way to his house. My sister was
engaged in her customary occupations. As soon
as I appeared, she remarked a change in my looks.
I was not willing to alarm her by the information

which I had to communicate. Her health was in
that condition which rendered a disastrous tale particularly
unsuitable. I forbore a direct answer to
her inquiries, and inquired, in my turn, for Wieland.

“Why,” said she, “I suspect something mysterious
and unpleasant has happened this morning.
Scarcely had we risen when Pleyel dropped among
us. What could have prompted him to make us
so early and so unseasonable a visit I cannot tell.
To judge from the disorder of his dress, and his
countenance, something of an extraordinary nature
has occurred. He permitted me merely to know
that he had slept none, nor even undressed, during
the past night. He took your brother to walk with
him. Some topic must have deeply engaged them,
for Wieland did not return till the breakfast hour
was passed, and returned alone. His disturbance
was excessive; but he would not listen to my importunities,
or tell me what had happened. I gathered
from hints which he let fall, that your situation
was, in some way, the cause: yet he assured
me that you were at your own house, alive, in good
health, and in perfect safety. He scarcely ate a
morsel, and immediately after breakfast went out
again. He would not inform me whither he was
going, but mentioned that he probably might not
return before night.”

I was equally astonished and alarmed by this information.
Pleyel had told his tale to my brother,
and had, by a plausible and exaggerated picture,
instilled into him unfavorable thoughts of me. Yet
would not the more correct judgment of Wieland
perceive and expose the fallacy of his conclusions?
Perhaps his uneasiness might arise from some insight
into the character of Carwin, and from apprehensions

for my safety. The appearances by
which Pleyel had been misled, might induce him
likewise to believe that I entertained an indiscreet,
though not dishonorable affection for Carwin.
Such were the conjectures rapidly formed. I was
inexpressibly anxious to change them into certainty.
For this end an interview with my brother was
desirable. He was gone, no one knew whither,
and was not expected speedily to return. I had no
clue by which to trace his footsteps.

My anxieties could not be concealed from my
sister. They heightened her solicitude to be acquainted
with the cause. There were many reasons
persuading me to silence: at least, till I had
seen my brother, it would be an act of inexcusable
temerity to unfold what had lately passed. No
other expedient for eluding her importunities occurred
to me, but that of returning to my own
house. I recollected my determination to become
a tenant of this roof. I mentioned it to her. She
joyfully acceded to this proposal, and suffered me,
with less reluctance, to depart, when I told her that
it was with a view to collect and send to my new
dwelling what articles would be immediately useful
to me.

Once more I returned to the house which had
been the scene of so much turbulence and danger.
I was at no great distance from it when I observed
my brother coming out. On seeing me he stopped,
and after ascertaining, as it seemed, which way I
was going, he returned into the house before me.
I sincerely rejoiced at this event, and I hastened to
set things, if possible, on their right footing.

His brow was by no means expressive of those
vehement emotions with which Pleyel had been
agitated. I drew a favorable omen from this circumstance.

Without delay I began the conversation.

“I have been to look for you,” said I, “but
was told by Catharine that Pleyel had engaged you
on some important and disagreeable affair. Before
his interview with you he spent a few minutes with
me. These minutes he employed in upbraiding me
for crimes and intentions with which I am by no
means chargeable. I believe him to have taken up
his opinions on very insufficient grounds. His behaviour
was in the highest degree precipitate and
unjust, and, until I receive some atonement, I shall
treat him, in my turn, with that contempt which
he justly merits: meanwhile I am fearful that he
has prejudiced my brother against me. That is an
evil which I most anxiously deprecate, and which I
shall indeed exert myself to remove. Has he made
me the subject of this morning's conversation?”

My brother's countenance testified no surprize
at my address. The benignity of his looks were
no wife diminished.

“It is true,” said he, “your conduct was the
subject of our discourse. I am your friend, as well
as your brother. There is no human being whom
I love with more tenderness, and whose welfare is
nearer my heart. Judge then with what emotions
I listened to Pleyel's story. I expect and desire
you to vindicate yourself from aspersions so soul,
if vindication be possible.”

The tone with which he uttered the last words
affected me deeply. “If vindication be possible!”
repeated I. “From what you know, do you deem
a formal vindication necessary? Can you harbour
for a moment the belief of my guilt?”

He shook his head with an air of acute anguish.
“I have struggled,” said he, “to dismiss that belief.

You speak before a judge who will profit by
any pretence to acquit you: who is ready to question
his own senses when they plead against you.”

These words incited a new set of thoughts in my
mind. I began to suspect that Pleyel had built his
accusations on some foundation unknown to me.
“I may be a stranger to the grounds of your belief.
Pleyel loaded me with indecent and virulent invectives,
but he withheld from me the facts that
generated his suspicions. Events took place last
night of which some of the circumstances were of
an ambiguous nature. I conceived that these might
possibly have fallen under his cognizance, and that,
viewed through the mists of prejudice and passion,
they supplied a pretence for his conduct, but believed
that your more unbiassed judgment would
estimate them at their just value. Perhaps his tale
has been different from what I suspect it to be.
Listen then to my narrative. If there be any thing
in his story inconsistent with mine, his story is
false.”

I then proceeded to a circumstantial relation of
the incidents of the last night. Wieland listened
with deep attention. Having finished, “This,”
continued I, “is the truth; you see in what circumstances
an interview took place between Carwin
and me. He remained for hours in my closet,
and for some minutes in my chamber. He departed
without haste or interruption. If Pleyel
marked him as he left the house, and it is not impossible
that he did, inferences injurious to my
character might suggest themselves to him. In admitting
them, he gave proofs of less discernment and
less candor than I once ascribed to him.”

“His proofs,” said Wieland, after a considerable
pause, “are different. That he should be

deceived, is not possible. That he himself is not
the deceiver, could not be believed, if his testimony
were not inconsistent with yours; but the doubts
which I entertained are now removed. Your tale,
some parts of it, is marvellous; the voice which
exclaimed against your rashness in approaching the
closet, your persisting notwithstanding that prohibition,
your belief that I was the ruffian, and your
subsequent conduct, are believed by me, because I
have known you from childhood, because a thousand
instances have attested your veracity, and because
nothing less than my own hearing and vision
would convince me, in opposition to her own assertions,
that my sister had fallen into wickedness like
this.”

I threw my arms around him, and bathed his
cheek with my tears. “That,” said I, “is spoken
like my brother. But what are the proofs?”

He replied—“Pleyel informed me that, in going
to your house, his attention was attracted by two
voices. The persons speaking sat beneath the
bank out of sight. These persons, judging by their
voices, were Carwin and you. I will not repeat
the dialogue. If my sister was the female, Pleyel
was justified in concluding you to be, indeed, one
of the most profligate of women. Hence, his accusations
of you, and his efforts to obtain my concurrence
to a plan by which an eternal separation
should be brought about between my sister and this
man.”

I made Wieland repeat this recital. Here, indeed,
was a tale to fill me with terrible foreboding.
I had vainly thought that my safety could be sufficiently
secured by doors and bars, but this is a foe
from whose grasp no power of divinity can save
me! His artifices will ever lay my fame and happiness

at his mercy. How shall I counterwork
his plots, or detect his coadjutor? He has taught
some vile and abandoned female to mimic my
voice. Pleyel's ears were the witnesses of my dishonor.
This is the midnight assignation to which
he alluded. Thus is the silence he maintained when
attempting to open the door of my chamber, accounted
for. He supposed me absent, and meant,
perhaps, had my apartment been accessible, to leave
in it some accusing memorial.

Pleyel was no longer equally culpable. The
sincerity of his anguish, the depth of his despair, I
remembered with some tendencies to gratitude. Yet
was he not precipitate? Was the conjecture that
my part was played by some mimic so utterly untenable?
Instances of this faculty are common.
The wickedness of Carwin must, in his opinion,
have been adequate to such contrivances, and yet
the supposition of my guilt was adopted in preference
to that.

But how was this error to be unveiled? What but
my own assertion had I to throw in the balance
against it? Would this be permitted to outweigh
the testimony of his senses? I had no witnesses
to prove my existence in another place.
The real events of that night are marvellous. Few,
to whom they should be related, would scruple to
discredit them. Pleyel is sceptical in a transcendant
degree. I cannot summon Carwin to my bar,
and make him the attestor of my innocence, and
the accuser of himself.

My brother saw and comprehended my distress.
He was unacquainted, however, with the full extent
of it. He knew not by how many motives I
was incited to retrieve the good opinion of Pleyel.
He endeavored to console me. Some new event,

he said, would occur to disentangle the maze. He
did not question the influence of my eloquence, if I
thought proper to exert it. Why not seek an interview
with Pleyel, and exact from him a minute
relation, in which something may be met with serving
to destroy the probability of the whole?

I caught, with eagerness, at this hope; but my
alacrity was damped by new reflections. Should
I, perfect in this respect, and unblemished as I was,
thrust myself, uncalled, into his presence, and make
my felicity depend upon his arbitrary verdict?

“If you chuse to seek an interview,” continued
Wieland, “you must make haste, for Pleyel informed
me of his intention to set out this evening
or to-morrow on a long journey.”

No intelligence was less expected or less welcome
than this. I had thrown myself in a window
seat; but now, starting on my feet, I exclaimed,
“Good heavens! what is it you say? a journey?
whither? when?”

“I cannot say whither. It is a sudden resolution
I believe. I did not hear of it till this morning. He
promises to write to me as soon as he is settled.”

I needed no further information as to the cause
and issue of this journey. The scheme of happiness
to which he had devoted his thoughts was
blasted by the discovery of last night. My preference
of another, and my unworthiness to be any
longer the object of his adoration, were evinced
by the same act and in the same moment. The
thought of utter desertion, a desertion originating
in such a cause, was the prelude to distraction.
That Pleyel should abandon me forever, because
I was blind to his excellence, because I coveted
pollution, and wedded infamy, when, on the contrary,
my heart was the shrine of all purity, and

beat only for his sake, was a destiny which, as long
as my life was in my own hands, I would by no
means consent to endure.

I remembered that this evil was still preventable;
that this fatal journey it was still in my power to
procrastinate, or, perhaps, to occasion it to be laid
aside. There were no impediments to a visit: I
only dreaded left the interview should be too long
delayed. My brother befriended my impatience,
and readily consented to furnish me with a chaise
and servant to attend me. My purpose was to go
immediately to Pleyel's farm, where his engagements
usually detained him during the day.