 | CHAPTER IX. Home as found |  |
9. CHAPTER IX.
“How silver sweet sound lovers' tongues at night,
Like softest music to attending ears!”
Romeo and Juliet.
“A POOR matter, this of the fire-works,” said Mr.
Howel, who, with an old bachelor's want of tact, had
joined Eve and Paul in their walk. “The English
would laught at them famously, I dare say. Have you
heard Sir George allude to them at all, Miss Eve?”
“It would be great affectation for an Englishman to
deride the fire-works of any dry climate,” said Eve
laughing; “and I dare say, if Sir George Templemore
has been silent on the subject, it is because he is conscious
he knows little about it.”
“Well, that is odd! I should think England the very
first country in the world for fire-works. I hear, Miss
Eve, that, on the whole, the baronet is rather pleased
with us; and I must say that he is getting to be very
popular in Templeton.”
“Nothing is easier than for an Englishman to become
popular in America,” observed Paul, “especially if his
condition in life be above that of the vulgar. He has
only to declare himself pleased with America; or, to
be sincerely hated, to declare himself displeased.”
“And in what does America differ from any other
country, in this respect?” asked Eve, quickly.
“Not much, certainly; love induces love, and dislike,
people of other countries, having more confidence in
themselves, do not so sensitively inquire what others
think of them. I believe this contains the whole difference.”
“But Sir George does rather like us?” inquired Mr.
Howel, with interest.
“He likes some of us particularly well,” returned
Eve. “Do you not know that my cousin Grace is to
become Mrs.—I beg her pardon—Lady Templemore,
very shortly?”
“Good God!—Is that possible—Lady Templemore!
—Lady Grace Templemore!”
“Not Lady Grace Templemore, but Grace, Lady
Templemore, and graceful Lady Templemore in the
bargain.”
“And this honour, my dear Miss Eve, they tell me
you refused!”
“They tell you wrong then, sir,” answered the young
lady, a little startled with the suddenness and brusquerie
of the remark, and yet prompt to do justice to all
concerned. “Sir George Templemore never did me
the honour to propose to me, or for me, and consequently
he could not be refused.”
“It is very extraordinary!—I hear you were actually
acquainted in Europe?”
“We were, Mr. Howel, actually acquainted in Europe,
but I knew hundreds of persons in Europe, who
have never dreamed of asking me to marry them.”
“This is very strange — quite unlooked for — to
marry Miss Van Cortlandt! Is Mr. John Effingham
in the grounds?”
Eve made no answer, but Paul hurriedly observed—
“You will find him in the next walk, I think, by
returning a short distance, and taking the first path
to the left.”
Mr. Howel did as told, and was soon out of sight.
“That is a most earnest believer in English superiority,
you an English husband, Miss Effingham, in English
merit.”
“It is the weak spot in the character of a very honest
man. They tell me such instances were much
more frequent in this country thirty years since, than
they are to-day.”
“I can easily believe it, for I think I remember some
characters of the sort, myself. I have heard those who
are older than I am, draw a distinction like this between
the state of feeling that prevailed forty years
ago, and that which prevails to-day; they say that,
formerly, England absolutely and despotically thought
for America, in all but those cases in which the interests
of the two nations conflicted; and I have even
heard competent judges affirm, that so powerful was
the influence of habit, and so successful the schemes
of the political managers of the mother country, that
even many of those who fought for the independence of
America, actually doubted of the propriety of their
acts, as Luther is known to have had fits of despondency
concerning the justness of the reformation he was
producing; while, latterly, the leaning towards England
is less the result of a simple mental dependence,—
though of that there still remains a disgraceful amount
—than of calculation, and a desire in a certain class to
defeat the dominion of the mass, and to establish that
of a few in its stead.”
“It would, indeed, be a strange consummation of
the history of this country, to find it becoming monarchical!”
“There are a few monarchists no doubt springing
up in the country, though almost entirely in a class
that only knows the world through the imagination and
by means of books; but the disposition, in our time, is
to aristocracy, and not to monarchy. Most men that
get to be rich, discover that they are no happier for
their possessions; perhaps every man who has not been
this category, as our friend the captain would call it,
and then they begin to long for some other untried advantages.
The example of the rest of the world is
before our own wealthy, and, faute d'imagination,
they imitate because they cannot invent. Exclusive
political power is also a great ally in the accumulation
of money, and a portion have the sagacity to see it;
though I suspect more pine for the vanities of the exclusive
classes, than for the substance. Your sex, Miss
Effingham, as a whole, is not above this latter weakness,
as I think you must have observed in your intercourse
with those you met abroad.”
“I met with some instances of weakness, in this
way,” said Eve, with reserve, and with the pride of a
woman, “though not more, I think, than among the
men; and seldom, in either case, among those whom
we are accustomed to consider people of condition at
home. The self-respect and the habits of the latter,
generally preserved them from betraying this feebleness
of character, if indeed they felt it.”
“The Americans abroad may be divided into two
great classes; those who go for improvement in
the sciences or the arts, and those who go for mere
amusement. As a whole, the former have struck me
as being singularly respectable, equally removed from
an apish servility and a swaggering pretension of superiority;
while, I fear, a majority of the latter have a
disagreeable direction towards the vanities.”
“I will not affirm the contrary,” said Eve, “for frivolity
and pleasure are only too closely associated in
ordinary minds. The number of those who prize the
elegancies of life, for their intrinsic value, is every
where small, I should think; and I question if Europe
is much better off than ourselves, in this respect.”
“This may be true, and yet one can only regret
that, in a case where so much depends on example,
the tone of our people was not more assimilated
with the same peculiarity, but, whenever I felt in the
mood to hear high monarchical and aristocratical doctrines
blindly promulgated, I used to go to the nearest
American Legation.”
“I have heard, this fact commented on,” Eve
answered, “and even by foreigners, and I confess it
has always struck me as singular. Why should the
agent of a republic make a parade of his anti-republican
sentiments?”
“That there are exceptions, I will allow; but, after
the experience of many years, I honestly think that
such is the rule. I might distrust my own opinion, or
my own knowledge; but others, with opportunities
equal to my own, have come to the same conclusion.
I have just received a letter from Europe, complaining
that an American Envoy Extraordinary, who would
as soon think of denouncing himself, as utter the same
sentiments openly at home, has given an opinion
against the utility of the vote by ballot; and this, too,
under circumstances that might naturally be thought
to produce a practical effect.”
“Tant pis. To me all this is inexplicable!”
“It has its solution, Miss Effingham, like any other
problem. In ordinary times, extraordinary men seldom
become prominent, power passing into the hands
of clever managers. Now, the very vanity, and the
petty desires, that betray themselves in glittering uniforms,
puerile affectations, and feeble imitations of
other systems, probably induce more than half of those
who fill the foreign missions to apply for them, and it
is no more than we ought to expect that the real disposition
should betray itself, when there was no longer
any necessity for hypocrisy.”
“But I should think this necessity for hypocrisy
would never cease! Can it be possible that a people,
as much attached to their institutions as the great
such a base abandonment of all they cherish!”
“How are they to know any thing about it? It is
a startling fact, that there is a man at this instant, who
has not a single claim to such a confidence, either in
the way of mind, principles, manners, or attainments,
filling a public trust abroad, who, on all occasions,
except those which he thinks will come directly before
the American people, not only proclaims himself
opposed to the great principles of the institutions,
but who, in a recent controversy with a foreign nation,
actually took sides against his own country,
informing that of the opposing nation, that the administration
at home would not be supported by the
legislative part of the government!”
“And why is not this publicly exposed?”
“Cui bono! The presses that have no direct interest
in the matter, would treat the affair with indifference
or levity, while a few would mystify the
truth. It is quite impossible for any man in a private
station to make the truth available in any country, in
a matter of public interest; and those in public stations
seldom or never attempt it, unless they see a direct
party end to be obtained. This is the reason that we
see so much infidelity to the principles of the institutions,
among the public agents abroad, for they very
well know that no one will be able to expose them.
In addition to this motive, there is so strong a desire
in that portion of the community which is considered
the highest, to effect a radical change in these very
institutions, that infidelity to them, in their eyes, would
be a merit, rather than an offence.”
“Surely, surely, other nations are not treated in this
cavalier manner!”
“Certainly not. The foreign agent of a prince, who
should whisper a syllable against his master, would be
recalled with disgrace; but the servant of the people
is differently situated, since there are so many to be
all the attacks that the Europeans are so fond of
making on the American system, but those which they
quoted from the mouths of our own diplomatic agents.”
“Why do not our travellers expose this?”
“Most of them see too little to know any thing of
it. They dine at a diplomatic table, see a star or two,
fancy themselves obliged, and puff elegancies that have
no existence, except in their own brains. Some think
with the unfaithful, and see no harm in the infidelity.
Others calculate the injury to themselves, and no small
portion would fancy it a greater proof of patriotism to
turn a sentence in favour of the comparative `energies'
and `superior intelligence' of their own people,
than to point out this or any other disgraceful fact, did
they even possess the opportunities to discover it.
Though no one thinks more highly of these qualities in
the Americans, considered in connexion with practical
things, than myself, no one probably gives them less
credit for their ability to distinguish between appearances
and reality, in matters of principle.”
“It is probable that were we nearer to the rest of
the world, these abuses would not exist, for it is certain
they are not so openly practised at home. I am
glad, however, to find that, even while you felt some
uncertainty concerning your own birth-place, you took
so much interest in us, as to identify yourself in feeling,
at least, with the nation.”
“There was one moment when I was really afraid
that the truth would show I was actually born an Englishman—”
“Afraid!” interrupted Eve; “that is a strong word
to apply to so great and glorious a people.”
“We cannot always account for our prejudices, and
perhaps this was one of mine; and, now that I know
that to be an Englishman is not the greatest possible
merit in your eyes, Miss Effingham, it is in no manner
lessened.”
“In my eyes, Mr. Powis! I do not remember to
have expressed any partiality for, or any prejudice
against the English: so far as I can speak of my own
feelings, I regard the English the same as any other
foreign people.”
“In words you have not certainly; but acts speak
louder than words.”
“You are disposed to be mysterious to-night. What
act of mine has declared pro or con in this important
affair.”
“You have at least done what, I fear, few of your
countrywomen would have the moral courage and
self-denial to do, and especially those who are accustomed
to living abroad—refused to be the wife of an
English baronet of a good estate and respectable
family.”
“Mr. Powis,” said Eve, gravely, “this is an injustice
to Sir George Templemore, that my sense of right
will not permit to go uncontradicted, as well as an
injustice to my sex and me. As I told Mr. Howel,
in your presence, that gentleman has never proposed
for me, and of course cannot have been refused. Nor
can I suppose that any American gentlewoman can
deem so paltry a thing as a baronetcy, an inducement
to forget her self-respect.”
“I fully appreciate your generous modesty, Miss
Effingham; but you cannot expect that I, to whom
Templemore's admiration gave so much uneasiness,
not to say pain, am to understand you, as Mr. Howel
has probably done, too broadly. Although Sir George
may not have positively proposed, his readiness to do
so, on the least encouragement, was too obvious to be
overlooked by a near observer.”
Eve was ready to gasp for breath, so completely by
surprise was she taken, by the calm, earnest, and yet
respectful manner, in which Paul confessed his jealousy.
There was a tremor in his voice, too, usually so clear
and even, that touched her heart, for feeling responds
a real sympathy between the sexes. She felt the
necessity of saying something, and yet they had
walked some distance, ere it was in her power to utter
a syllable.
“I fear my presumption has offended you, Miss Effingham,”
said Paul, speaking more like a corrected
child, than the lion-hearted young man he had proved
himself.
There was deep homage in the emotion he betrayed,
and Eve, although she could barely distinguish his
features, was not slow in discovering this proof of the
extent of her power over his feelings.
“Do not call it presumption,” she said; “for, one
who has done so much for us all, can surely claim
some right to take an interest in those he has so well
served. As for Sir George Templemore, you have
probably mistaken the feeling created by our common
adventures for one of more importance. He is warmly
and sincerely attached to my cousin, Grace Van Cortlandt.”
“That he is so now, I fully believe; but that a very
different magnet first kept him from the Canadas, I am
sure.—We treated each other generously, Miss Effingham,
and had no concealments, during that long and
anxious night, when all expected that the day would
dawn on our captivity. Templemore is too manly and
honest to deny his former desire to obtain you for a
wife, and I think even he would admit that it depended
entirely on yourself to be so, or not.”
“This is an act of self-humiliation that he is not
called on to perform,” Eve hurriedly replied; “such
allusions, now, are worse than useless, and they might
pain my cousin, were she to hear them.”
“I am mistaken in my friend's character, if he leave
his betrothed in any doubt, on this subject. Five
minutes of perfect frankness now, might obviate years
of distrust, hereafter.”
“And would you, Mr. Powis, avow a former weakness
of this sort, to the woman you had finally selected
for your wife?”
“I ought not to quote myself for authority, for or
against such a course, since I have never loved but
one, and her with a passion too single and too ardent
ever to admit of competition. Miss Effingham, there
would be something worse than affectation—it would
be trifling with one who is sacred in my eyes, were I
now to refrain from speaking explicitly, although what
I am about to say is forced from me by circumstances,
rather than voluntary, and is almost uttered without
a definite object. Have I your permission to proceed?”
“You can scarcely need a permission, being the
master of your own secrets, Mr. Powis.”
Paul, like all men agitated by strong passion, was
inconsistent, and far from just; and Eve felt the truth
of this, even while her mind was ingeniously framing
excuses for his weaknesses. Still, the impression that
she was about to listen to a declaration that possibly
ought never to be made, weighed upon her, and caused
her to speak with more coldness than she actually felt.
As she continued silent, however, the young man saw
that it had become indispensably necessary to be explicit.
“I shall not detain you, Miss Effingham, perhaps
vex you,” he said, “with the history of those early
impressions, which have gradually grown upon me,
until they have become interwoven with my very existence.
We met, as you know, at Vienna, for the
first time. An Austrian of rank, to whom I had become
known through some fortunate circumstances,
introduced me into the best society of that capital, in
which I found you the admiration of all who knew
you. My first feeling was that of exultation, at seeing
a young country woman—you were then almost a child,
Miss Effingham—the greatest attraction of a capital
celebrated for the beauty and grace of its women—”
“Your national partialities have made you an unjust
judge towards others, Mr. Powis,” Eve interrupted him
by saying, though the earnestness and passion with
which the young man uttered his feelings, made music
to her ears: “what had a young, frightened, half-educated
American girl to boast of, when put in competition
with the finished women of Austria?”
“Her surpassing beauty, her unconscious superiority,
her attainments, her trembling simplicity and modesty,
and her meek purity of mind. All these did you possess,
not only in my eyes, but in those of others; for
these are subjects on which I dwelt too fondly to be
mistaken.”
A rocket passed near them at the moment, and,
while both were too much occupied by the discourse
to heed the interruption, its transient light enabled
Paul to see the flushed cheeks and tearful eyes of Eve,
as the latter were turned on him, in a grateful pleasure,
that his ardent praises extorted from her, in despite
of all her struggles for self-command.
“We will leave to others this comparison, Mr.
Powis,” she said, “and confine ourselves to less doubtful
subjects.”
“If I am then to speak only of that which is beyond
all question, I shall speak chiefly of my long cherished,
devoted, unceasing love. I adored you at Vienna,
Miss Effingham, though it was at a distance, as one
might worship the sun; for, while your excellent father
admitted me to his society, and I even think honoured
me with some portion of his esteem, I had but little
opportunity to ascertain the value of the jewel that
was contained in so beautiful a casket; but when we
met the following summer in Switzerland, I first began
truly to love. Then I learned the justness of thought,
the beautiful candour, the perfectly feminine delicacy
of your mind; and, although I will not say that these
qualities were not enhanced in the eyes of so young a
man, by the extreme beauty of their possessor, I will
thousand times prefer the former to the latter, unequalled
as the latter almost is, even among your own beautiful
sex.”
“This is presenting flattery in its most seductive
form, Powis.”
“Perhaps my incoherent and abrupt manner of explaining
myself deserves a rebuke; though nothing can
be farther from my intentions than to seem to flatter,
or in any manner to exaggerate. I intend merely to
give a faithful history of the state of my feelings, and
of the progress of my love.”
Eve smiled faintly, but very sweetly, as Paul would
have thought, had the obscurity permitted more than
a dim view of her lovely countenance.
“Ought I to listen to such praises, Mr. Powis,” she
asked; “praises which only contribute to a self-esteem
that is too great already?”
“No one but yourself would say this; but your question
does, indeed, remind me of the indiscretion that I
have fallen into, by losing that command of my feelings,
in which I have so long exulted. No man should
make a woman the confidant of his attachment, until
he is fully prepared to accompany the declaration with
an offer of his hand;—and such is not my condition.”
Eve made no dramatic start, assumed no look of
affected surprise, or of wounded dignity; but she turned
on her lover, her serene eyes, with an expression of
concern so eloquent, and of a wonder so natural, that,
could he have seen it, it would probably have overcome
every difficulty on the spot, and produced the
usual offer, notwithstanding the difficulty that he seemed
to think insurmountable.
“And yet,” he continued, “I have now said so much,
involuntarily as it has been, that I feel it not only due
to you, but in some measure to myself, to add that the
fondest wish of my heart, the end and aim of all my
day-dreams, as well as of my most sober thoughts for the
wife.”
The eye of Eve fell, and the expression of her countenance
changed, while a slight but uncontrollable tremor
ran through her frame. After a short pause, she
summoned all her resolution, and in a voice, the firmness
of which surprised even herself, she asked—
“Powis, to what does all this tend?”
“Well may you ask that question, Miss Effingham!
You have every right to put it, and the answer, at
least, shall add no further cause of self-reproach. Give
me, I entreat you, but a minute to collect my thoughts,
and I will endeavour to acquit myself of an imperious
duty, in a manner more manly and coherent, than I
fear has been observed for the last ten minutes.”
They walked a short distance in profound silence,
Eve still under the influence of astonishment, in which
an uncertain and indefinite dread of, she scarce knew
what, began to mingle; and Paul, endeavouring to
quiet the tumult that had been so suddenly aroused
within him. The latter then spoke:
“Circumstances have always deprived me of the
happiness of experiencing the tenderness and sympathy
of your sex, Miss Effingham, and have thrown me
more exclusively among the colder and ruder spirits
of my own. My mother died at the time of my birth,
thus cutting me off, at once, from one of the dearest
of earthly ties. I am not certain that I do not exaggerate
the loss in consequence of the privations I
have suffered; but, from the hour when I first learned
to feel, I have had a yearning for the tender, patient,
endearing, disinterested love of a mother. You, too,
suffered a similar loss, at an early period, if I have
been correctly informed—”
A sob—a stifled, but painful sob, escaped Eve; and,
inexpressibly shocked, Paul ceased dwelling on his own
sources of sorrow, to attend to those he had so unintentionally
disturbed.
“I have been selfish, dearest Miss Effingham,” he
exclaimed—“have overtaxed your patience—have
annoyed you with griefs and losses that have no interest
for you, which can have no interest, with one happy
and blessed as yourself.”
“No, no, no, Powis—you are unjust to both. I, too,
lost my mother when a mere child, and never knew
her love and tenderness. Proceed; I am calmer, and
earnestly intreat you to forget my weakness, and to
proceed.”
Paul did proceed, but this brief interruption in which
they had mingled their sorrows for a common misfortune,
struck a new chord of feeling, and removed a
mountain of reserve and distance, that might otherwise
have obstructed their growing confidence.
“Cut off in this manner, from my nearest and dearest
natural friend,” Paul continued, “I was thrown,
an infant, into the care of hirelings; and, in this at
least, my fortune was still more cruel than your
own; for the excellent woman who has been so happy
as to have had the charge of your infancy, had nearly
the love of a natural mother, however she may have
been wanting in the attainments of one of your own
condition in life.”
“But we had both of us, our fathers, Mr. Powis.
To me, my excellent, high principled, affectionate—nay
tender father, has been every thing. Without him, I
should have been truly miserable; and with him, notwithstanding
these rebellious tears, tears that I must
ascribe to the infection of your own grief, I have been
truly blest.”
“Mr. Effingham deserves this from you, but I never
knew my father, you will remember.”
“I am an unworthy confidant, to have forgotten
this so soon. Poor Powis, you were, indeed, unhappy!”
“He had parted from my mother before my birth,
child of sufficient worth to make him the subject of interest
sufficient to excite a single inquiry into his fate.”
“Then he never knew that child!” burst from Eve,
with a fervour and frankness, that set all reserves,
whether of womanly training, or of natural timidity,
at defiance.
“Miss Effingham!—dearest Miss Effingham—Eve,
my own Eve, what am I to infer from this generous
warmth! Do not mislead me! I can bear my solitary
misery, can brave the sufferings of an isolated existence;
but I could not live under the disappointments of
such a hope, a hope fairly quickened by a clear expression
from your lips.”
“You teach me the importance of caution, Powis,
and we will now return to your history, and to that
confidence of which I shall not again prove a faithless
repository. For the present at least, I beg that you
will forget all else.”
“A command so kindly—so encouragingly given—
do I offend, dearest Miss Effingham?” Eve, for the second
time in her life, placed her own light arm and beautiful
hand, through the arm of Paul, discovering a bewitching
but modest reliance on his worth and truth,
by the very manner in which she did this simple and
every-day act, while she said more cheerfully—
“You forget the substance of the command, at the
very moment you would have me suppose you most
disposed to obey it.”
“Well, then, Miss Effingham, you shall be more implicitly
minded. Why my father left my mother so
soon after their union, I never knew. It would seem
that they lived together but a few months, though I
have the proud consolation of knowing that my mother
was blameless. For years I suffered the misery of
doubt on a point that is ever the most tender with man,
a distrust of his own mother; but all this has been
happily, blessedly, cleared up, during my late visit to
sister, and as such might have been lenient to her failings;
but a letter from my father, that was written only
a month before my mother's death, leaves no doubt not
only of her blamelessness as a wife, but bears ample
testimony to the sweetness of her disposition. This
letter is a precious document for a son to possess, Miss
Effingham!”
Eve made no answer; but Paul fancied that he felt
another gentle pressure of the hand, which, until then,
had rested so lightly on his own arm, that he scarcely
dared to move the latter, lest he might lose the precious
consciousness of its presence.
“I have other letters from my father to my mother,”
the young man continued, “but none that are so cheering
to my heart as this. From their general tone, I
cannot persuade myself that he ever truly loved her.
It is a cruel thing, Miss Effingham, for a man to deceive
a woman on a point like that!”
“Cruel, indeed,” said Eve, firmly. “Death itself
were preferable to such a delusion.”
“I think my father deceived himself as well as my
mother; for there is a strange incoherence and a want
of distinctness in some of his letters, that caused feelings,
keen as mine naturally were on such a subject, to
distrust his affection from the first.”
“Was your mother rich?” Eve asked innocently;
for, an heiress herself, her vigilance had early been
directed to that great motive of deception and dishonesty.
“Not in the least. She had little besides her high
lineage, and her beauty. I have her picture, which
sufficiently proves the latter; had, I ought rather to
say, for it was her miniature, of which I was robbed
by the Arabs, as you may remember, and I have not
seen it since. In the way of money, my mother had
barely the competency of a gentlewoman; nothing
more.”
The pressure on Paul was more palpable, as he
spoke of the miniature; and he ventured to touch
his companion's arm, in order to give it a surer hold
of his own.
“Mr. Powis was not mercenary, then, and it is a
great deal,” said Eve, speaking as if she were scarcely
conscious that she spoke at all.
“Mr. Powis!—He was every thing that was noble
and disinterested. A more generous, or a less selfish
man, never existed than Francis Powis.”
“I thought you never knew your father personally!”
exclaimed Eve in surprise.
“Nor did I. But, you are in an error, in supposing
that my father's name was Powis, when it was Assheton.”
Paul then explained the manner in which he had
been adopted while still a child, by a gentleman called
Powis, whose name he had taken, on finding himself
deserted by his own natural parent, and to whose fortune
he had succeeded, on the death of his voluntary protector.
“I bore the name of Assheton until Mr. Powis took
me to France, when he advised me to assume his own,
which I did the more readily, as he thought he had
ascertained that my father was dead, and that he had
bequeathed the whole of a very considerable estate to
his nephews and nieces, making no allusion to me in
his will, and seemingly anxious even to deny his marriage;
at least, he passed among his acquaintances for
a bachelor to his dying day.”
“There is something so unusual and inexplicable in
all this, Mr. Powis, that it strikes me you have been
to blame, in not inquiring more closely into the circumstances
than, by your own account, I should think had
been done.”
“For a long time, for many bitter years, I was afraid
to inquire, lest I should learn something injurious to a mother's
name. Then there was the arduous and confined
and the last journey and painful indisposition of my
excellent benefactor, prevented even the wish to inquire
after my own family. The offended pride of Mr. Powis,
who was justly hurt at the cavalier manner in which
my father's relatives met his advances, aided in alienating
me from that portion of my relatives, and put
a stop to all additional proffers of intercourse from me.
They even affected to doubt the fact that my father
had ever married.”
“But of that you had proof?” Eve earnestly asked.
“Unanswerable. My aunt Dunluce was present at
the ceremony, and I possess the certificate given to my
mother by the clergyman who officiated. Is it not
strange, Miss Effingham, that with all these circumstances
in favour of my legitimacy, even Lady Dunluce
and her family, until lately, had doubts of the fact.”
“That is indeed unaccountable, your aunt having
witnessed the ceremony.”
“Very true; but some circumstances, a little aided
perhaps by the strong desire of her husband, General
Ducie, to obtain the revival of a barony that was in
abeyance, and of which she would be the only heir,
assuming that my rights were invalid, inclined her to
believe that my father was already married, when he
entered into the solemn contract with my mother. But
from that curse too, I have been happily relieved.”
“Poor Powis!” said Eve, with a sympathy that her
voice expressed more clearly even than her words;
“you have, indeed, suffered cruelly, for one so young.”
“I have learned to bear it, dearest Miss Effingham,
and have stood so long a solitary and isolated being,
one in whom none have taken any interest—”
“Nay, say not that—we, at least, have always felt
an interest in you—have always esteemed you, and
now have learned to—”
“Learned to—?”
“Love you,” said Eve, with a steadiness that afterwards
placed, was entitled to be treated with a frankness different
from the reserve that it is usual for her sex to
observe on similar occasions.
“Love!” cried Paul, dropping her arm. “Miss
Effingham!—Eve—but that we!”
“I mean my dear father—cousin Jack—myself.”
“Such a feeling will not heal a wound like mine.
A love that is shared with even such men as your excellent
father, and your worthy cousin, will not make
me happy. But, why should I, unowned, bearing a
name to which I have no legal title, and virtually without
relatives, aspire to one like you!”
The windings of the path had brought them near a
window of the house, whence a stream of strong light
gleamed upon the sweet countenance of Eve, as raising
her eyes to those of her companion, with a face
bathed in tears, and flushed with natural feeling and
modesty, the struggle between which even heightened
her loveliness, she smiled an encouragement that it
was impossible to misconstrue.
“Can I believe my senses! Will you—do you—can
you listen to the suit of one like me?” the young man
exclaimed, as he hurried his companion past the window,
lest some interruption might destroy his hopes.
“Is there any sufficient reason why I should not,
Powis?”
“Nothing but my unfortunate situation in respect to
my family, my comparative poverty, and my general
unworthiness.”
“Your unfortunate situation in respect to your relatives
would, if any thing, be a new and dearer tie with
us; your comparative poverty is merely comparative,
and can be of no account, where there is sufficient
already; and as for your general unworthiness, I fear
it will find more than an offset, in that of the girl you
have so rashly chosen from the rest of the world.”
“Eve—dearest Eve—” said Paul, seizing both her
that densely shaded the path, and where the
little light that fell from the stars enabled him still to
trace her features—“you will not leave me in doubt
on a subject of this nature—am I really so blessed?”
“If accepting the faith and affection of a heart that
is wholly yours, Powis, can make you happy, your
sorrows will be at an end—”
“But your father?” said the young man, almost
breathless in his eagerness to know all.
“Is here to confirm what his daughter has just
declared,” said Mr. Effingham, coming out of the
shrubbery beyond them, and laying a hand kindly on
Paul's shoulder. “To find that you so well understand
each other, Powis, removes from my mind one
of the greatest anxieties I have ever experienced.
My cousin John, as he was bound to do, has made me
acquainted with all you have told him of your past
life, and there remains nothing further to be revealed.
We have known you for years, and receive you into
our family with as free a welcome as we could receive
any precious boon from Providence.”
“Mr. Effingham! — dear sir,” said Paul, almost
gasping between surprise and rapture—“this is indeed
beyond all my hopes—and this generous frankness,
too, in your lovely daughter—”
Paul's hands had been transferred to those of the
father, he knew not how; but releasing them hurriedly,
he now turned in quest of Eve again, and found she had
fled. In the short interval between the address of her
father and the words of Paul, she had found means to
disappear, leaving the gentlemen together. The young
man would have followed, but the cooler head of Mr.
Effingham perceiving that the occasion was favourable
to a private conversation with his accepted sonin-law,
and quite as unfavourable to one, or at
least to a very rational one, between the lovers, he
quietly took the young man's arm, and led him
confidential discourse calmed the feelings of both, and
rendered Paul Powis one of the happiest of human
beings.
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