University of Virginia Library

25. CHAPTER XXV.

A Few words more and I lay aside the pen for
ever. Yet why should I not relinquish it now?
All that I have said is preparatory to this scene, and
my fingers, tremulous and cold as my heart, refuse
any further exertion. This must not be. Let my
last energies support me in the finishing of this
task. Then will I lay down my head in the lap of
death. Hushed will be all my murmurs in the sleep
of the grave.

Every sentiment has perished in my bosom.
Even friendship is extinct. Your love for me has
prompted me to this task; but I would not have
complied if it had not been a luxury thus to feast
upon my woes. I have justly calculated upon my
remnant of strength. When I lay down the pen
the taper of life will expire: my existence will terminate
with my tale.

Now that I was left alone with Wieland, the
perils of my situation presented themselves to my
mind. That this paroxysm should terminate in
havock and rage it was reasonable to predict. The
first suggestion of my fears had been disproved by
my experience. Carwin had acknowledged his offences,
and yet had escaped. The vengeance which
I had harboured had not been admitted by Wieland,
and yet the evils which I had endured, compared
with those inflicted on my brother, were as nothing.
I thirsted for his blood, and was tormented with an
insatiable appetite for his destruction; yet my brother

was unmoved, and had dismissed him in safety.
Surely thou wast more than man, while I am sunk
below the beasts.

Did I place a right construction on the conduct
of Wieland? Was the error that misled him so
easily rectified? Were views so vivid and faith so
strenuous thus liable to fading and to change? Was
there not reason to doubt the accuracy of my perceptions?
With images like these was my mind
thronged, till the deportment of my brother called
away my attention.

I saw his lips move and his eyes cast up to heaven.
Then would he listen and look back, as if in
expectation of some one's appearance. Thrice
he repeated these gestieulations and this inaudible
prayer. Each time the mist of confusion and doubt
seemed to grow darker and to settle on his understanding.
I guessed at the meaning of these tokens.
The words of Carwin had shaken his belief, and
he was employed in summoning the messenger who
had formerly communed with him, to attest the
value of those new doubts. In vain the summons
was repeated, for his eye met nothing but vacancy,
and not a sound saluted his ear.

He walked to the bed, gazed with eagerness at
the pillow which had sustained the head of the
breathless Catharine, and then returned to the place
where I sat. I had no power to list my eyes to his
face: I was dubious of his purpose: this purpose
might aim at my life.

Alas! nothing but subjection to danger, and exposure
to temptation, can show us what we are.
By this test was I now tried, and found to be cowardly
and rash. Men can deliberately untie the
thread of life, and of this I had deemed myself capable;
yet now that I stood upon the brink of fate,

that the knife of the sacrificer was aimed at my
heart, I shuddered and betook myself to any means
of escape, however monstrous.

Can I bear to think—can I endure to relate the
outrage which my heart meditated? Where were
my means of safety? Resistance was vain. Not
even the energy of despair could set me on a level
with that strength which his terrific prompter had
bestowed upon Wieland. Terror enables us to
perform incredible seats; but terror was not then
the state of my mind; where then were my hopes
of rescue?

Methinks it is too much. I stand aside, as it
were, from myself; I estimate my own deservings;
a hatred, immortal and inexorable, is my due. I
listen to my own pleas, and find them empty and
false: yes, I acknowledge that my guilt surpasses
that of all mankind: I confess that the curses of a
world, and the frowns of a deity, are inadequate
to my demerits. Is there a thing in the world worthy
of infinite abhorrence? It is I.

What shall I say! I was menaced, as I thought,
with death, and, to elude this evil, my hand was
ready to inflict death upon the menacer. In visiting
my house, I had made provision against the
machinations of Carwin. In a fold of my dress an
open penknife was concealed. This I now seized
and drew forth. It lurked out of view; but I now
see that my state of mind would have rendered the
deed inevitable if my brother had lifted his hand.
This instrument of my preservation would have
been plunged into his heart.

O, insupportable remembrance! hide thee from
my view for a time; hide it from me that my heart
was black enough to meditate the stabbing of a

brother! a brother thus supreme in misery; thus
towering in virtue!

He was probably unconscious of my design, but
presently drew back. This interval was sufficient
to restore me to myself. The madness, the iniquity
of that act which I had purposed rushed upon my
apprehension. For a moment I was breathless with
agony. At the next moment I recovered my
strength, and threw the knife with violence on the
floor.

The sound awoke my brother from his reverie.
He gazed alternately at me and at the weapon.
With a movement equally solemn he stooped and
took it up. He placed the blade in different positions,
scrutinizing it accurately, and maintaining,
at the same time, a profound silence.

Again he looked at me, but all that vehemence
and loftiness of spirit which had so lately characterized
his features, were flown. Fallen muscles,
a forehead contracted into folds, eyes dim with unbidden
drops, and a ruefulness of aspect which no
words can describe, were now visible.

His looks touched into energy the same sympathies
in me, and I poured forth a flood of tears.
This passion was quickly checked by fear, which
had now, no longer, my own, but his safety for
their object. I watched his deportment in silence.
At length he spoke:

“Sister,” said he, in an accent mournful and
mild, “I have acted poorly my part in this world.
What thinkest thou? Shall I not do better in the
next?”

I could make no answer. The mildness of his
tone astonished and encouraged me. I continued
to regard him with wistful and anxious looks.

“I think,” resumed he, “I will try. My wife
and my babes have gone before. Happy wretches!
I have sent you to repose, and ought not to linger
behind.”

These words had a meaning sufficiently intelligible.
I looked at the open knife in his hand and
shuddered, but knew not how to prevent the deed
which I dreaded. He quickly noticed my fears,
and comprehended them. Stretching towards me his
hand, with an air of increasing mildness: “Take
it,” said he: “Fear not for thy own sake, nor
for mine. The cup is gone by, and its transient
inebriation is succeeded by the soberness of truth.

“Thou angel whom I was wont to worship!
fearest thou, my sister, for thy life? Once it was
the scope of my labours to destroy thee, but I was
prompted to the deed by heaven; such, at least, was
my belief. Thinkest thou that thy death was sought
to gratify malevolence? No. I am pure from all
stain. I believed that my God was my mover!

“Neither thee nor myself have I cause to injure.
I have done my duty, and surely there is merit in
having sacrificed to that, all that is dear to the heart
of man. If a devil has deceived me, he came in
the habit of an angel. If I erred, it was not my
judgment that deceived me, but my senses. In thy
sight, being of beings! I am still pure. Still will
I look for my reward in thy justice!”

Did my ears truly report these sounds? If I did
not err, my brother was restored to just perceptions.
He knew himself to have been betrayed to the murder
of his wife and children, to have been the victim
of infernal artifice; yet he found consolation in the
rectitude of his motives. He was not devoid of
sorrow, for this was written on his countenance;
but his soul was tranquil and sublime.

Perhaps this was merely a transition of his former
madness into a new shape. Perhaps he had not
yet awakened to the memory of the horrors which
he had perpetrated. Infatuated wretch that I was!
To set myself up as a model by which to judge of
my heroic brother! My reason taught me that his
conclusions were right; but conscious of the impotence
of reason over my own conduct; conscious of
my cowardly rashness and my criminal despair, I
doubted whether any one could be stedfast and wise.

Such was my weakness, that even in the midst
of these thoughts, my mind glided into abhorrence
of Carwin, and I uttered in a low voice, O! Carwin!
Carwin! What hast thou to answer for?

My brother immediately noticed the involuntary
exclamation: “Clara!” said he, “be thyself.
Equity used to be a theme for thy eloquence. Reduce
its lessons to practice, and be just to that unfortunate
man. The instrument has done its work,
and I am satisfied.

“I thank thee, my God, for this last illumination!
My enemy is thine also. I deemed him to
be man, the man with whom I have often communed;
but now thy goodness has unveiled to me
his true nature. As the performer of thy behests,
he is my friend.”

My heart began now to misgive me. His mournful
aspect had gradually yielded place to a serene
brow. A new soul appeared to actuate his frame,
and his eyes to beam with preternatural lustre.
These symptoms did not abate, and he continued:

“Clara! I must not leave thee in doubt. I know
not what brought about thy interview with the
being whom thou callest Carwin. For a time, I
was guilty of thy error, and deduced from his incoherent
confessions that I had been made the victim

of human malice. He left us at my bidding, and I
put up a prayer that my doubts should be removed.
Thy eyes were shut, and thy ears sealed to the
vision that answered my prayer.

“I was indeed deceived. The form thou hast
seen was the incarnation of a dæmon. The visage
and voice which urged me to the sacrifice of my
family, were his. Now he personates a human
form: then he was invironed with the lustre of
heaven.—

“Clara,” he continued, advancing closer to me,
“thy death must come. This minister is evil, but
he from whom his commission was received is God.
Submit then with all thy wonted resignation to a
decree that cannot be reversed or resisted. Mark
the clock. Three minutes are allowed to thee, in
which to call up thy fortitude, and prepare thee for
thy doom.” There he stopped.

Even now, when this scene exists only in memory,
when life and all its functions have sunk into
torpor, my pulse throbs, and my hairs uprise: my
brows are knit, as then; and I gaze around me in
distraction. I was unconquerably averse to death;
but death, imminent and full of agony as that which
was threatened, was nothing. This was not the
only or chief inspirer of my fears.

For him, not for myself, was my soul tormented.
I might die, and no crime, surpassing the reach of
mercy, would pursue me to the presence of my
Judge; but my assassin would survive to contemplate
his deed, and that assassin was Wieland!

Wings to bear me beyond his reach I had not.
I could not vanish with a thought. The door was
open, but my murderer was interposed between that
and me. Of self-defence I was incapable. The

phrenzy that lately prompted me to blood was gone;
my state was desperate; my rescue was impossible.

The weight of these accumulated thoughts could
not be borne. My sight became confused; my
limbs were seized with convulsion; I spoke, but my
words were half-formed:—

“Spare me, my brother! Look down, righteous
Judge! snatch me from this fate! take away
this fury from him, or turn it elsewhere!”

Such was the agony of my thoughts, that I noticed
not steps entering my apartment. Supplicating
eyes were cast upward, but when my prayer was
breathed, I once more wildly gazed at the door. A
form met my sight: I shuddered as if the God whom
I invoked were present. It was Carwin that again
intruded, and who stood before me, erect in attitude,
and stedfast in look!

The sight of him awakened new and rapid
thoughts. His recent tale was remembered: his
magical transitions and mysterious energy of voice:
Whether he were infernal or miraculous, or human,
there was no power and no need to decide.
Whether the contriver or not of this spell, he was
able to unbind it, and to check the fury of my brother.
He had ascribed to himself intentions not malignant.
Here now was afforded a test of his truth.
Let him interpose, as from above; revoke the savage
decree which the madness of Wieland has assigned
to heaven, and extinguish for ever this passion for
blood!

My mind detected at a glance this avenue to
safety. The recommendations it possessed thronged
as it were together, and made but one impression
on my intellect. Remoter effects and collateral
dangers I saw not. Perhaps the pause of an

instant had susficed to call them up. The improbability
that the influence which governed Wieland
was external or human; the tendency of this stratagem
to sanction so fatal an error, or substitute
a more destructive rage in place of this; the sufficiency
of Carwin's mere muscular forces to counteract
the efforts, and restrain the fury of Wieland,
might, at a second glance, have been discovered;
but no second glance was allowed. My first thought
hurried me to action, and, fixing my eyes upon Carwin
I exclaimed—

“O wretch! once more hast thou come? Let
it be to abjure thy malice; to counterwork this
hellish stratagem; to turn from me and from my
brother, this desolating rage!

“Testify thy innocence or thy remorse: exert
the powers which pertain to thee, whatever they
be, to turn aside this ruin. Thou art the author
of these horrors! What have I done to deserve thus
to die? How have I merited this unrelenting persecution?
I adjure thee, by that God whose voice
thou hast dared to counterfeit, to save my life!

“Wilt thou then go? leave me! Succourless!”

Carwin listened to my intreaties unmoved, and
turned from me. He seemed to hesitate a moment:
then glided through the door. Rage and despair
stifled my utterance. The interval of respite was
passed; the pangs reserved for me by Wieland,
were not to be endured; my thoughts rushed again
into anarchy. Having received the knife from his
hand, I held it loosely and without regard; but now
it seized again my attention; and I grasped it with
force.

He seemed to notice not the entrance or exit of
Carwin. My gesture and the murderous weapon
appeared to have escaped his notice. His silence

was unbroken; his eye, fixed upon the clock for
a time, was now withdrawn; fury kindled in every
feature; all that was human in his face gave way
to an expression supernatural and tremendous. I
felt my left arm within his grasp.—

Even now I hesitated to strike. I shrunk from
his affault, but in vain.—

Here let me desist. Why should I rescue this
event from oblivion? Why should I paint this detestable
conflict? Why not terminate at once this
series of horrors?—Hurry to the verge of the precipice,
and cast myself for ever beyond remembrance
and beyond hope?

Still I live: with this load upon my breast; with
this phantom to pursue my steps; with adders
lodged in my bosom, and stinging me to madness:
still I consent to live!

Yes, I will rise above the sphere of mortal passions:
I will spurn at the cowardly remorse that
bids me seek impunity in silence, or comfort in forgetfulness.
My nerves shall be new strung to the
task. Have I not resolved? I will die. The
gulph before me is inevitable and near. I will die,
but then only when my tale is at an end.