LETTER XXI.
To Henry Colden.
October 28, Evening.
I will struggle for sufficient composure to
finish this letter. I have spent the day in reflection,
and am now, I hope, calm enough to
review this most horrid and inexplicable charge.
Look, my friend at the letter she has sent
me. It is my hand writing. The very same
which I have so often mentioned to you as having
been, after so unaccountable a manner, mislaid.
I wrote some part of it, alone, in my own parlour.
You recollect the time. The day after
that night which an heavy storm of rain, and my
fatal importunity prevailed on you to spend under
this roof.
Mark the deplorable consequences of an act,
which the coldest charity would not have declined.
On such a night I would have opened
my doors to my worst enemy. Yet because I
turned not forth my best friend, on such a night,
see to what a foul accusation I have exposed
myself.
I had not finished, but it came into my mind
that something in that which I had a little before
received from you, might be seasonably
noticed, before I shut up my billet. So I
left my paper on the table open, while I ran up
stairs to get your letter which I had left in a
drawer in my chamber.
While turning over cloaths and papers I
heard the street door open, and some one enter.
This did not hinder me from continuing
my search. I thought it was my gossipping
neighbour, Miss Jessup, and had some hopes
that, finding no one in the parlour, she would
withdraw, with as little ceremony as she entered.
My search was longer than I expected, but
finding it at last, down I went, fully expecting
to find a visitant, not having heard any steps
returning to the door.
But no visitant was there, and the paper was
gone! I was surprised, and a little alarmed.
You know my childish apprehensions of robbers.
I called up Molly who was singing at her
work in the kitchen. She had heard the street
door opened and shut, and footsteps over head,
but she imagined them to be mine. A little heavier
too, she recollected them to be, than mine.
She likewise heard a sound as if the door had been
opened and shut softly. It thus appeared that
my unknown visitant had hastily and secretly
withdrawn and my paper had disappeared.
I was confounded at this incident. Who it
was that could thus purloin an unfinished letter
and retire in order to conceal the theft, I
could not imagine. Nothing else had been displaced.
It was no ordinary thief; no sordid villain.
For a time, I thought perhaps, it might be
some facetious body, who expected to find amusement
in puzzling or alarming me. Yet I
was not alarmed; for what had I to fear or to
conceal? the contents were perfectly harmless,
and being fully satisfied with the purity of my
own thoughts, I never dreamed of any construction
being put on them, injurious to me.
I soon ceased to think of this occurrence. I
had no cause as I then thought, to be anxious
about consequences. The place of the lost letter
was easily supplied by my loquacious pen,
and I came, at last, to conjecture that I had
carelessly whisked it into the fire, and that the
visitant had been induced to withdraw, by finding
the apartment empty. Yet I never discovered
any one who had come in and gone out in
this manner. Miss Jessup, whom I questioned
afterwards, had spent that day elsewhere. And
now, when the letter and its contents were almost
forgotten, does it appear before me,
and is offered in proof of this dreadful charge.
After reading my mother's letter, I opened
with trembling hand that which was inclosed.
I instantly recognized the long lost billet. All
of it appeared, on the first perusal, to be mine.
Even the last mysterious paragraph was acknowledged
by my senses. In the first confusion
of my mind, I knew not what to believe
or reject, my thoughts were wandering, and my
repeated efforts had no influence in restoring
them to order.
Methinks, I then felt as I should have felt if
the charge had been true. I shuddered as if to
look back would only furnish me with proofs
of a guilt of which I had not hitherto been conscious:
proofs that had merely escaped remembrance,
or had failed to produce their due
effect, from some infatuation of mind.
When the first horror and amazement were
passed, and I took up the letter and pondered
on it once more, I caught a glimpse suddenly:
suspicion darted all at once into my mind: I
strove to recollect the circumstances attending
the writing of this billet.
Yes: it was clear. As distinctly as if it were
the work of yesterday, did I now remember,
that I stopped at the words nobody; mind that.
The following sentences are strange to me.
The character is similar to what precedes, but
the words were never penned by me.
And could Talbot—Yet what end? a fraud
so—Ah! let me not suspect my husband of such
a fraud. Let me not have reason to abhor his
memory.
I fondly imagined that with his life, my causes
of disquiet were at an end, yet now are my
eyes open to an endless series of calamities
and humiliations which his decease has made
sure.
I cannot escape from them. There is no help
for me. I cannot disprove. What testimony
can I bring to establish my innocence: to prove
that another hand has added these detestable
confessions?
True it is you passed that night under my roof.
Where was my caution? you, Henry, knew mankind
better than I: why did you not repel my
importunities, and leave me in spite of my urgencies
for your stay?
Poor thoughtless wretch that I was, not to be
aware of the indecorum of allowing one of your
sex, not allied to me by kindred—I, too, alone,
without any companion but a servant, to pass the
night in the same habitation.
What is genuine of this note, acknowledges
your having lodged here. Thus much I cannot,
and need not deny; yet how shall I make
those distinctions visible to Mrs. Fielder; how
shall I point out that spot in my billet, where
the forgery begins? and at whose expense must
I vindicate myself? Better incur the last degree
of infamy myself, since it will not be deserved,
than to load him that is gone with reproach.
Talbot sleeps, I hope, in peace, and let me not,
for any selfish or transitory good, molest his ashes.
Shall I not be contented with the approbation
of a pure and all-seeing judge?
But if I would vindicate myself, I have not the
power: I have forfeited my credit with my mother.
With her my word will be of no weight:
surely it ought to weigh nothing. Against evidence
of this kind, communicated by an husband,
shall the wild and improbable assertion of the
criminal be suffered to prevail? I have only my
assertion to offer.
Yet, my good God! in what a maze hast thou
permitted my unhappy feet to be entangled!
With intentions void of blame, have I been pursued
by all the consequences of the most attrocious
guilt.
In an evil hour, Henry, was it that I saw thee
first. What endless perplexities have beset me
since that disasterous moment. I cannot pray
for their termination, for prayer implies hope.
For thy sake, God is my witness, more than
for my own, have I determined to be no longer
thine. I hereby solemnly absolve you from all
engagements to me. I command you, I beseech
you, not to cast away a thought on the
illfated Jane. Seek a more worthy companion,
and be happy.
Perhaps you will feel, not pity, but displeasure,
in recieving this letter. You will not
deign to answer me, perhaps, or will answer
me with sharp rebuke. I have only lived to
trouble your peace, and have no claim to your
forbearance: yet, methinks, I would be spared
the misery of hearing your reproaches, reechoed
as they will be by my own conscience.
I fear they will but the more unfit me for the
part that I wish henceforth to act.
I would carry, if possible, to Mrs. Fielder's
presence a cheerful aspect. I would be to her
that companion which I was in my brighter
days. To study her happiness shall be henceforth
my only office, but this, unless I can
conceal from her an aching heart, I shall be
unable to do. Let me not carry with me the insupportable
weight of your reproaches.
