20. CHAPTER XX.
Claude stood a moment motionless, in the attitude
in which Madame Wharton had left him. He
was stunned with the unexpected turn his affairs
had taken, and the long and exciting interview he
had had with this singular person upon the most interesting
theme which could occupy his thoughts.
He could not account for the influence she exercised
over him. He sunk beneath her frown, and rejoiced
in her smile, as if she had, indeed, been the
Goddess of Wisdom in mortal form, descended from
heaven to point out to his eyes, blinded with passion,
the path of duty. Her tones swayed his mind
and touched his heart with a persuasive power; and
in her majestic countenance he traced lineaments
which, in a singular degree, riveted his attention,
and awakened his reverence and love. There are
people who strike the eye at the first glance; produce
an impression of beauty or dignity, which
grows weaker the more they are seen and known.
There are others who, without discovering themselves
at first, disclose in each subsequent interview
most interesting peculiarities of expression
and manner. The form, before unobserved, moves
with an increasing grace and charm, and the countenance
discloses hidden powers. Madame Wharton
was one of this kind. Claude could scarcely
recognise in her the unobtrusive lady whom he first
met in the diligence. The more he saw her, the
more he admired and wondered, the nobler became
her gait, the more impressive and intellectual
her countenance. Her smile discovered a sweetness,
and her eyes a light, which shed, even yet,
around her features a kind of mellow beauty more
imposing than the charms of youth. It was her
character and mind which shone through her face
and actions. When she quitted him—her eyes, lately
so severe, bathed in tears—he could scarcely refrain
from throwing himself at her feet. Indeed,
he had done more. He had sworn to be her slave.
The playful compact, originally commenced in jest,
had suddenly turned to very serious earnest; and,
at the command of this poor and neglected stranger
—as if she had been an angry angel—he had pledged
himself to abandon for ever the prize which
seemed nearly within his reach, and upon which the
whole happiness of his life depended. As he reflected
upon the extent of this pledge, his feelings
rose against it, and already he began to regret it.
Under the fascination of this woman he had signed
his ruin.
“Yes,” he thought, “I have sworn an eternal
adieu to Ida. Had it been but separation, I could
have borne it with patience. The consciousness
that we understood and loved each other, would
have been, at least, one gleam of sunshine on my
path; but this is a tearing asunder of heart and
soul. And, if I feel pain, I know I shall inflict it.
I shall meet her coldly. Her gaze will once more
seek mine in vain. Her smile will be unreturned.
She will wonder. She will tremble. She will
think me capricious and treacherous. Horror at
such baseness will be succeeded by shame, and
shame by resentment. What will become of me?
and what will become of her, if she throw herself
away upon this profligate? Perhaps she will degenerate
into a mere woman of the world. With
him she cannot be happy, unless she ceases to be
what a woman should be. With me, even in poverty
—ah! dangerous and useless thoughts! some demon
breathes them into my mind. I must indulge in
them no more. Whatever pangs it may cost me,
the path I have chosen is right. I knew it even
before this strange being arose, as if out of the
earth, to shame me from my weakness. Yes, I renew
the oath. Ida—sweet angel—for ever adieu!
Only image of earthly happiness, I waft thee to
the winds!”
As he walked on, the afternoon sunshine fell
bright and yellow upon the forest floor. The birds
warbled in the branches—all nature seemed full of
joy. His way led through devious paths and over
fairy-looking bridges; and, penetrating yet farther
into its hitherto unexplored recesses, the wood appeared
to grow deeper and lovelier every moment.
After a winter devoted merely to scenes of fashion,
the peaceful and familiar forms of nature struck his
long unaccustomed eye with a beauty which he had
never before so keenly perceived, and to which the
tender anguish of his soul only rendered him more
susceptible. Everything seemed bathed in enchanting
hues and disposed in graceful outlines. He
was gifted with a lively feeling of that exquisite
perfection which lies even in the rudest and commonest
forms of nature, and his eye did not fall
upon a spot of the earth or heaven without receiving
a sensation of wonder and delight. Sometimes,
through the long avenues, he caught a vista of the
meadows softened in the distance—the windmill
casting its broken shadow upon the ground—or the
sail gliding peacefully along the narrow Spree. The
leaning trees, with their rough-barked trunks immediately
around him, tinged with silver or clothed
with hoary moss; the brown earth, with its glittering
pebbles—the tender lawns—the soft clouds sailing
in the blue air, like swans on a transparent flood
—the whole scene, and the reflections of it, hanging
inverted in the water—all touched his soul with
pensive delight, and made him sigh to gaze on a
world so lovely, and to feel that, amid the thousands
who enjoyed it, he was an outcast and a wretch, to
whom its very charms only brought an augmenta
tion of sorrow.
He stopped and looked around him. A piece of
rude timber, the half-hewn trunk of a tree lately
felled, and not yet removed by the workmen, lay
rough and silent beneath an old oak; but the light
fell upon it in such a way, that, had it been formed
of ivory or gold, it could not have been more beautiful.
A little farther on lay a plough, partly over-turned
in a track of black earth—its print left in an
unfinished furrow—its bright steel edges glittering
in the yellow light through the heavy pieces of
mould which adhered to it. In the mellow sunshine
its worn handle looked like amber. There was
something in the sight of it which aroused a new
train of reflection. He gazed on this rude utensil.
It seemed to reproach the idle and careless life
which he had led in the pursuit of fashionable
pleasures; of a luxurious and vain mode of life, as
little suited to his means and condition as to the
true dignity of human nature. What had he to do
with fashion—with costly pleasure—with weak love?
This simple image rose in his path like a rebuke—
a type of that toil to which the guilt of the first
criminals consigned the human race, and which he
had never known. For how many ages had it been
consecrated by the sweat of honest and humble
hands, of which some, perhaps, with equal firmness,
might have held the helm of state or the truncheon
of war—the monarch's sceptre—the poet's pen?
“Sturdy emblem,” he thought, as he continued
to muse, for it was in musing, instead of action, that
his life had passed away—“simple type of manly
labour and independence—ancient instrument which
a benevolent Creator has given to a race he wishes
to save—at whose touch the brown earth opens and
gives the golden harvest, that sheds joy and splendour
over the fields and valleys, and sends peace,
and sleep, and plenty into the cottage of the poor.
Ah! why did not fate make me but the contented
master of one of these!”
And he went on, dreaming as youth dreams, till
aroused by the cold touch of reality to less pleasing
occupations.
