 | Alice May |  |
ALICE MAY.
1. PART FIRST.
One cheerful autumnal morning, three years ago, a group of lovely
girls was assembled in a window of a fashionable boarding school in
one of the handsome streets crossing Mount Vernon. One or two of
them were seated with embroidery in their hands, but the rest were
standing and talking, and amusing themselves by watching the passers
by; for there was yet an idle quarter of an hour to recitations.
`Do you see that poor old man! how white his hair is, and how be
bends beneath his years, while that empty bag he carries seems a load
for him!' said a pretty blue eyed girl, in a tone of deep sympathy, with
which the expression of her face sweetly harmonized. `Open the win
dow, Ann, and let me throw to him a quarter of a dollar! I never see
an old silver-haired man, but what I think of my dear grandfather, and
for his sake love and pity him.'
`I can never see any thing romantic in an old ragged beggar,' said
a tall, grey-eyed girl, with a very high forehead, and a look like one
of Mrs. Radcliffe's heroines; `If he was an aged minstrel, with a robe
and staff, and flowing locks of silver, and had a harp in his hand, and
sandals on his feet, how delighted it would be! I wish I had lived in
days of chivalry, these modern times are too common place.
`I am content to live when andwhere my life will be most a blessing
to those around me,' said the first speaker, with animation. `Do open
the money. See, he has stopped, and lifts up his aged eyes! Did you
ever behold a look of such eloquent pleading!'
`How much enthusiasm for a mere every day pauper!' said Miss
Letticia, the romantic girl, with a toss of her head.
The window was thrown up; and the example set by the benevolent
girl being followed by the others, the old man received on his tore hat
a shower of silver pieces. How lovely is charity in the young and
beautiful!
The aged beggar lifted up his venerable countenance with a grateful
look, bowed his bared and hoary head low to the pavement, and saying
in a trembling voice, `God bless you, young ladies!' went on his way.
While the window was still up, and they were looking after his feeble
steps—for we all feel an interest in the objects of our charity—a
young gentleman, well mounted upon a dark bay horse, came dashing
along. He was handsome, of a manly figure, and dressed and rode
well.
`Do shut the window down, girls,' said one of the young ladies,
laughing and retreating; `he will certainly think we have opened it on
purpose to look at him; and I don't choose to let any young gentleman
have such vain thoughts of himself—for they are all vain enough now.
See, he is looking this way!'
The young horseman seeing a bevy of pretty girls at an open window
could not well help looking at them very earnestly. Suddenly he
half reined up, his features became animated with a look of surprise
and happy recognition, and bowing with the deepest reverence while
his face crimsoned with embarrassment and joy, he continued on at
the same pace he had been before going.
`He bowed to some one of us! who knows him?' said they all.
`Not a soul I believe—he thought we were foolishly admiring him,
and so impudently acknowledged it,' said another.
`No, he looked as if he recognised one of us! Let us see who looks
conscious, as no one will speak,' said Anna Linton; `look at Alice
May's face! See her blushes and confusion. She is the one!'
Instantly every eye was fixed upon a young dark-eyed brunette not
more than seventeen years of age, whose delicately olive shaded complexion
was incardined with the richest blood; her long-fringed eyelids
were cast to the floor, and she stood silent, beautiful, conscious—her
pretty fingers picking in pieces a rose bud. Never was a maiden of
seventeen lovelier than she who now stood confessed before them, the
which the womanly comb had never desecrated, flowed darkly beautiful
in glossy waves about her finely shaped head and throat. Her
form was singularly graceful, every motion yielding to the eye a new
shape of beauty. The exquisite finish of her arm and hand, would
have made Canova an idolater. Her features were faultless. Her low,
gentle brow, with its dark-arching eyebrows, `like two delicate feathers
plucked from the black breast of the singing ummill,' was a throne
of serenity and beauty. Never were such eyes as beamed beneath!
large, languid, gentle and, but for the purity of the soul within, voluptuous!
Passion was there, but in the shape of love yet vestal and unawakened.
The young and happy heart with all its guileless emotions
unveiled and open, was ever drawing in them, to gladden and win the
hearts of all around her. None beheld her but they loved her. She
was the idol of the school, and the friend of all.
All conscious the lovely girl stood before them, and her downcast
eyes and attitude told a tale each was dying to get at the mystery of.
`Oh, where did you see him?'
`Where did you know him, Alice?'
`Is he from the south—an old lover?'
`Don't stand there blushing and making yourself look so wickedly
lovely! Do tell us!' were the questions with which she was overwhelmed.
Alice, however, laughed and blushed only the deeper, and breaking
away from them fled to her room.
2. II.
Perhaps the curiosity, raillery, and playful interference of others often
induces a young girl to think seriously of the individual about whom
she is teased, and to believe she is in love with him, whom perchance
she has met but once; when, in reality, if he had not been named to
her again after the first accidental meeting, she would never have given
him place in her thoughts. This was not, however, the case with
lovely Alice May! While she is confidentially confessing her meeting
with him to her young friend, Anna Linton, who had followed her to
her chamber and playfully teased her secret out of her, we will give it
to the reader in language of her own.
About a month previous to the period on which our briefly sketched
story is opened, a young gentleman of fortune, recently a graduate of
Harvard, whose name was Edward Orr, and who was a native of Boston,
was one morning riding on horseback, as was his favorite custom'
out of the arched gateway, he was prompted by the momentary impulse
to alight and enter. Without any definite object in view, save to enjoy
in the quiet of his soul the solemn repose of the place, he wandered
on from tomb to tomb, through dell and winding walk, enjoying the romantic
seclusion and experiencing that calm and intellectual delight,
(in which the more hallowed feelings always might,) which the solemn
loveliness of the place inspires in every properly cultivated mind.
Suddenly he emerged from a narrow path, thickly shaded by larch
trees, upon a secluded spot in the most lovely and quiet portion of the
cemetry. Before him, within a few paces, was a young girl arranged
in simple white, her straw hat fallen back from her head, her hands
folded before her, and her eyes directed towards a name upon a small,
exquisitely sculptured monument of white marble. The grace of her
fingers, the gentle earnestness of her bending attitude, the rich beauty
of her face, on which rested an expression of intellectual admiration in
which much of the heart was visible, charmed, surprised, enraptured
him! The dark trees were bending over the spot: the white marble
rose from the verdant sward in strange beauty amid the dark shades
cast by them; and she, in her white robe bending over it, seemed like
an angel watching the tomb to receive and bear heavenward the `arisen,'
when at length the trump of Gabriel should rend it open!
He feared to advance lest he should intrude upon hallowed ground.
His eye fell upon the inscription upon which her soft dark gaze was
bent so thoughtfully. It was simply
To my wife,
Mary.
20.
`What beautiful and touching eloquence in those few simple words!'
she said, in a low sweet voice that came from her heart, while he saw
that a tear glistened down her cheek. `There is a sad story of love
and hope, and joy and woe and death, couched beneath them! How
perfect the taste of the husband who in one simple line records the volumes
of his love! Thus would I be buried. My memory graven in
the hearts of those I love, my name simply carved on my tomb!'
At this moment her eyes were uplifted with the consciousness of being
intently observed, and they met those of the young man, whose
earnest admiring gaze, was not difficult to be translated by any maiden.
She slightly blushed, and instead of flying or betraying any foolish
charmed him.
`I fear, sir, you have heard some pretty nonsense! But I was not
aware I had an auditor! Yet what can be conceived more touching
than what has called forth my soliloquy,' and casting her eyes upon the
inscription, she replaced her bonnet and was retiring.
`It is indeed beautiful and touching,' said Edward lifting his hat as he
stood by the monument. `Will you have the kindness to tell me what
young bride lies buried here?'
The question was put so respectfully, his manner was so pleasing,
his face so intelligently handsome, his voice so rich and low, his eyes
so reverential yet so brilliant, that she could not resist a reply:
`I am ignorant sir.' She then added apologetically, `I have strayed
here away from my party, who calling me till they were tired left me
to myself. I must hasten to find them.'
`I fear you will not find them easy in this labarynth of walks,' said
Edward, seeing her retire. `Allow me to escort you,'
`No,' she answered playfully, yet blushing; `I think I shall not get
lost;' and bounding away he lost sight of her in a bend in the avenue.
For some moments he stood gazing where she had disappeared, and
then with a deep drawn sigh, and with a sensation of gentle melancholy
stealing over him, the first dawning of love, he slowly resumed his ramble.
Deep was the impression she made upon his heart, and as he
walked he was lost in a brown-study, of which she was the mystic volume.
He wandered how far and how long, whether five minutes or an
hour, he did not know, when he was aroused by the side of `the terrace
of tombs,' by a figure crossing his path. He looked up and saw
it was the maiden of the monument, whose image love was then busily
graving upon his heart. She was approaching him, and he saw that
she looked warm, hurried and a little alarmed.
`I am overjoyed to meet you, sir,' she said coming near with a hurried
step. `You will think me a very strange person! but I have as
you predicted, really lost myself! I have been wandering the last half
hour through a hundred paths, and this is the third time I have re-appeared
before these tombs.'
`Will you do me the honor to accept my guidance,' said Edward.
`You will think me a very foolish girl. I certainly have been very
imprudent. As I cannot hope to find my party in this wilderness, you
them in the carriage.'
The young man never felt so happy in his life, as at the moment the
lovely wanderer frankly placed her hand on his arm, and walked by
his side.
Edward was not familiar with the avenues, but listening and hearing
the distant roll of wheels along the turnpike, he carefully noted the
direction of the sound, and struck into the paths that he believed
would lead them towards the highway.
The birds that twittered and chirped in the branches that overhung
their way have not betrayed to us their conversation as they walked;
and we leave our readers to imagine what two young, ardent, intellectual,
enthusiastic persons, thus romantically cast upon each others companionship,
discoursed about at such a season.
`There is Spurzheim's tomb, and not far distant and visible from it
is the gateway,' said Edward as they emerged from a shaded avenue
which they had been slowly traversing. `I must now part from you;
but to bear with me the recollection of this hour as the happiest of my
life?'
His eyes sought hers, but they were downcast, and her blushing
face was averted. She suddenly withdrew her hand from his arm, for
footsteps and voices were heard? The next moment several young
girls preceded by two elderly ladies appeared conducted by one of the
party.
They were all looking earnest, anxious and hurried.
`Your friends?' asked Edward.
`Yes.'
At the same moment she was discovered; and they all came flying
towards her.
Amid the exclamations, embracings, chidings, wanderings, and joy
at recovering her. Alice, after being told a hundred times by half a
dozen dear voices, how much she had been sought for, how much they
believed she had been drowned in `the lake,' or had been spirited
away, or eloped with some lover, was triumphantly escorted along the
turnpike towards the city.
2. PART SECOND.
1. I.
A year elapsed and Alice May left the boarding school to return to
Louisiana—for she was a dark-eyed child of the sunny south. She returned
home with her father a betrothed bride! During the year that
ensued her first interview with Edward Orr, in Mount Auburn, and the
bow she had from him at the window, he had sought her acquaintance,
and intimacy grew to love. They parted in the drawing-room of the
Tremont, when he had called to bid her good bye the evening preceding
her departure. He promised in the spring to come out and be
married—for till then he would not come into the possession of his estate.
Their engagement was known to and approved of by her father,
a tall, handsome man, with a haughty air, and manners something cold
and unprepossessing. Edward did not like him from the first; perhaps
because his arrival in Boston was the signal of his departure from
Alice. He was, however, tender and affectionate to his child, who
seemed to be devotedly attached to him. Of him, Edward had learned
that he was a wealthy planter who resided near Lauvidais in the vicinity
of New Orleans, that he was a widower, and that Alice was his only
child.
The parting between the lovers was favored by the voluntary and judicious
absence of Colonel May from the room, and with the usual protestations
of love, in this case, painfully sincere, and a promise mutually
drawn from each other to write once a weak. Alice at length received
the last lingering kiss—and the next moment was left weeping,
alone.
2. II.
It was the evening of the 22d of February. It was to be celebrated
by one of the most magnificent assemblies that had ever been in the gay
capital of Louisiana. In a planters' villa a few miles from the city was
one fair inmate preparing for the brilliant scene. It was Alice May.
Four months had elapsed since she had left Edward, and her love burned
clear and pure and steady. He was her idol—her heart of hearts!
She wrote to him oftener than he had stipulated, and was thinking of
him daily, hourly. Her life was wrapped up in his, and she knew from
his letters that he loved her with the same unwavering devotion.
She had been much courted, caressed and flattered since her return
home. In every place she was the star of all eyes. But her love for
Edward Orr was the polar star of all her regard, and the compliments,
the flattery and homage she received, made no impression upon her.—
If she had her own will she would have withdrawn from society; for
she cared for no pleasure that he did not share with her. But her father,
proud of her extraordinary beauty, and flattered by the attention
paid her, carried her, to every public place of amusement, with which
the city was then rife. On the present occasion she had entreated to
remain at home, as she had felt all day unusually depressed. But he
had a motive in urging her compliance with his wishes, and she consented
to prepare and accompany him to town in the carriage,
She was seated at her window which looked out upon a spacious
lawn, ornamented with noble elms and sycamores. with a glimpse
of the river beyond. The moon was filling her shield with light as the
twilight deepened, and shone broadly down between the light trellised
columns of the piazza. A mocking bird near by was making the air
musical with a hundred stolen songs, and at intervals from the quartier
of the slaves, came the low chaunt of some Africen air.
Behind Alice was kneeling a young female slave braiding her long,
raven hair; for she had for some months ceased to let it have its freedom.
Reclining on a couch beside her, lay a still beautiful quadroone
about thirty eight years of age. She was an invalid, and her large
black eyes seemed to beam with unearthly beauty. Her hand was thin
and transparent, and a deep rose seemed opening beneath the olive delicacy
of her cheek. She was consumptive, and lay there like a child
unconscious of her danger, and as interested in the trifles about her,
as if Death had not lifted his finger and beckoned her away. Her
with her beauty, while she was yet a child, Colonel May had purchased
her for his wife's attendant. The lady educated her, and made her rather
a friend and companion than a slave. When the handsome Desiree had
reached her twentieth year her mistress died, since which period she
had been a housekeeper and overseer of the other female domestics.—
To her Alice was greatly attached, and the affection of the quadroone
for her young mistress was like that of a mother towards her own child.
`Ah, Miss Alice, your hair is already as long as mine,' she said,
after admiring for some time the raven tresses of the maiden; `and I
have been said to have the most beautiful hair in Louisiana.'
`Was my mother's hair like mine, Desiree?'
`Mistress' hair was fair brown,' answered the slave, with a hesitation
in her manner, and looking as if she would have avoided replying to
the question.
`I wish I could have seen to recollect my mother. She died, alas,
when I was born! Motherless I have been from my birth, and oh, how
have I sighed to lean on a dear mother's bosom.'
The quadroone sighed; then her eyes suddenly sparkled with animation;
she half rose from the couch, and with parted lips eagerly bent
towards her young mistress as if she would speak! but the words died
in her heart as she sank back upon her couch and hid her face in her
hands.
During the remainder of the toilet she remained silent; and at length
Alice, being richly yet tastefully dressed, drove off with her father.
3. III.
The loud, crashing music of the orchestra, pealed through the gorgeous
halls of the St. Louis, and sounds of mirth and festivity reached
their ears as they alighted at the thronged door. As they reached the
hall the floor was already occupied by the dancers, and the noise, and
glare of chandeliers and the motion of the restless crowd was bewidering.
`Come this way, Alice,' said her father, `I wish to introduce you to
the Count Bondier, who has expressed a desire to become acquainted
with you. He is of a distinguished French family, and I wish you to
be civil to him. Perhaps I may as well tell you that I wish him to make
your alliance, and that for so good a match your Boston lover, had best
be no more thought of.' This was whispered in her ear as they crossed
the hall to an alcove where Colonel May had discovered the foreigner.
If Alice had not been a girl of a strong mind and independent native
character, she would have sunk through the floor at this announcement.
As it was she trembled like an aspen leaf, and internally resolved to hate
him. He was presented to her and coldly yet politely received. He
was a good looking Frenchman about thirty with an air of high fashion.
He was at once struck with the charms of which he had heard so much;
and Colonel May taking an opportunity to desert his daughter, left her
dependent on the Count for a protector in the throng. He offered his
arm, which she knew not how to decline in her unprotected state, and
accepted. He found her disinclined to converse, and proof against his
compliments. After trying his best for half an hour to entertain her
and get into her good graces—for the Count's estates were under mortgage,
and the young Louisiana bell was an heiress—he began to despair.
At length her father reappeared, and she flew to his arm in a
way that convinced him of the difficulty of getting a titled son-in-law.
In her presence he invited the Count to dine with them the next day;
an invitation which he accepted, it seemed to her, with great pleasure.
The event so embittered the hours of the assembly that Alice at
length prevailed on her father, on the plea of ill-health, to retire with
her. The ensuing day the Count came, and Colonel May studied to
leave him alone with her. But coldness and distance alone characterised
her manner in his presence.
Day after day he was a visiter to Lauvidais, and daily pressing his
suit by every attention and every gentle device in love's armory. But
in vain. At length he made a bold strike and addressed her. She refused
him civilly but firmly. This enraged her father, who threatened,
unless she gave her consent to marry him within three months he would
deprive her of her inheritance, and shut her up in a convent.
`Give me half that time to decide!' said she with firmness.
`I grant it, Alice! and expect at the end of the period that you will
be prepared to comply with my wishes, and those of M. Bondier, who
is devoted to you! Your alliance with him will place you in the best
society in Paris.'
On her father's departure, Alice fastened her chamber door, and setting
down wrote the following letter:
I write to avail myself of my privilege and duty, as your betrothed
wife, to throw myself, at a crisis which has just occured in my life,
upon your love! A certain Count Bondier is persecuting me with his
attentions, and although I have in every way, not absolutely to insult
him, shown him my repugnance to his suit, and also distinctly and firmly
declined his addresses, yet he pursues them encouraged by my father
who is warmly in favor of an alliance with his powerful family through
me. My father has just left me with a menace that unless I will consent
to marry him at the end of three months, that he will immure me
in a convent, which God knows is to be preferred. I have asked and
obtained six weeks to decide. This letter will reach you in two. It
will take three weeks for you to reach here. I need not ask you to
fly—for my love tells me you will soon be here to claim your lover as
your bride!
This letter was received by Edward Orr, in less than two weeks after
it was penned, and its perusal gave him intense agony. He made instant
preparations to proceed south to rescue her from her fate; but
before his departure he received another letter—it was but a single line.
I have just heard something that has frozen my blood! I write, I
know not what! Do not come! I am lost to you forever!
Edward gazed at the words with a glazed eye! What fearful mystery
was this! What has happened? I will know the worst. Lost to
me forever! No! she cannot be false! I will fly to her—for assuredly
some dreadful evil hath befallen her! How wild and large the
writing! so unlike her usual hand—yet it is her's! Alice, I heed not
your command! I fly to you!'
With this determination, the almost frenzied lover sprang into the
carriage and drove to the depot, his mind tortured with the mystery,
his heart bleeding with the agony of suspense.
3. PART THIRD.
1. I.
The fifteenth day after entering the cars at Boston, Edward Orr was
landed from the Pontchartrain line at the New Orleans depot. During
the whole journey he was in the greatest fever of excitement and suspense.
That some fearful evil hung over Alice he knew; and he feared
that he might hear on his arrival the most fearful results. Driving
to the St. Charles—the most magnificent hotel in the world—he alighted,
and, after taking a room, sent for the gentlemanly proprietor, Mr.
Mudge, whom, very fortunately, he had known in the north. To him
he communicated only so much of his urgent business there as was
necessary; and what he most wished, learned from him the direction
to Colonel May's plantation, and obtained from him fleet horses! Mr.
M. had heard nothing of his daughter, though he had seen Col. May
in the hotel only a week before in company with a Count Bondier, who
had lately lodged there.
At this name Edward started to his feet.
`Is he here now?'
`Yes.'
`He is—he is—that is, is he married?'
`No,' answered the proprietor, witnessing his agitation with surprise.
`He had bachelor rooms. He has left for New York.'
`Alone?'
`Yes.'
This reply was a great relief to the agitated lover. As soon as the
horses were at the door, he sprang into the carriage, and soon left the
city behind him. His horses flew as if winged along the level causeway
by the river side. The scenery of villas, gardens and lawns was
beautiful and novel; but buried in his own thoughts, he heeded nothing.
At length, after they had been driving about an hour, the coachman
drew up at a spacious gateway, and said,
`This is the gate to Colonel May's villa, sir!'
Aroused by his voice, Edward looked around him. It was already
sunset, yet a soft twilight made every object beautiful and distinct.
Through the avenue he caught a glimpse of the dwelling. His heart
wildly palpitated, with the consciousness of being near Alice. He
waited a moment to collect his thoughts and deliberate on what course
to take. He had left the St. Charles hotel without any decided plan,
and driven forward without reflection. As the coachman was about to
drive into the grounds, he bade him stop.
`I will walk to the house. Remain in the highway ready to receive
me at a moment's warning. Possibly I shall bring a lady with me!'
Thus speaking he entered the avenue, and took his way by a cross
path to the house. All was calm and serene. The birds that had
sought their boughs, twittered as he disturbed their repose, and hopped
higher in the tree; a nightingale, startled by his step, would utter a
shrill note of alarm, and fly away into the depths of the grove. The
heavens were of a mellow roseate hue, and the golden atmosphere, fused
by the lingering sun-glow, was like transparent amethyst. He rapidly
walked forward until he came out of the gate near the southern
wing of the mansion. He surveyed the piazza and portico, but no one
was visible but an old African smoking his pipe beneath a pomegranate
tree that grew before a Venetian window. All around wore the air of
luxury, taste and wealth. It was the beau ideal of the villas and grounds
of a Louisiana planter. He could not help being attracted by the beauty
of all that met his eye. But he was too intent upon his object to heed
any thing that had not a direct bearing upon that.
He now reflected that it would be fatal to his hopes if he should meet
Colonel May. Yet how he should avoid him and see Alice he could not
tell. It became him to be secret, cautious and bold.
He therefore remained sometime in the covert of the path until the
shades of evening deepened, and then stole across the lawn to a ground
window which was open. The negro was asleep beneath it, his pipe
gone out and still held in his lips. All was still. Encouraged by the
silence he looked into the drawing room, through the opposite door a
faint light glimmered. He stepped into the room and traversed the gorgeous
carpet with a noiseless step. He crossed another apartment and
came to the door which led into the lighter room. As he came near
he heard a faint moaning, and looking in he beheld lying upon a low
French couch, Colonel May. His face was distorted with mental, rather
and betraying great agony of spirit. A high fever burned his cheek.
He looked also haggard and worn, and at once excited Edward's pity.
By his side knelt two slaves, one of whom, an old man, was soothing
him with kind words, and the other was bathing his hands.
`Where could Alice be?' was Edward's mental inquiry. That she
was in some way the cause of this mental suffering, he was assurred.—
But how—in what way? What should keep her from her father's bedside
if she were—'
He dared not carry out his fearful and agonizing foreboding. His
first impulse was to enter the chamber and demand of the prostrate father
his daughter—his betrothed bride! But the majesty of the poor
man's suffering awed him; and he remained gazing upon him uncertain
how to proceed. Suddenly Colonel May sprang from the couch to his
feet.
`It is no use struggling with this feeling!' he said in tones of deepest
human emotion. `It is hell here—it can be no worse! I will end
it! Alec bring me my pistols!'
`Massa—oh good massa!' implored the slave casting himself at his
feet, and clinging to his knees.
`Slave! obey me!' he cried in a voice that made the poor African
release his hold and rise to his feet.
The pistols were brought and placed on a table by his hand. He
opened the case and took one out and examined it.
`Yes, it is in order. Alec, my faithful servant, see me decently
buried; and I know you will shed a tear for your poor master when he
is gone. I am weary of the madness in my brain, and must end it.
My Alice! thus will I atone to thee for the wrong I have done
thee!'
The slaves cast themselves on their knees by him and covered their
faces. He raised his hand, cocked the pistol and presented it to his
heart, when his hand was caught by Edward Orr.
`Hold, take not the life that is not thine own!'
`Ha, ha, ha! Thou art come too late for thy bride, sir,' said the
suicide; and forcibly disengaging his arm, he placed the muzzle of the
pistol against his temples, and discharged its contents into his brain.
He fell instantly dead at Edward's feet.!
After the horror and intense excitement of the moment was past, and
of Alec the cause of the dreadful scene he had witnessed.
`It is Miss Alice, massa!' said the sobbing African.
`And she—oh, tell me where she is?' he asked with eagerness; for
in his horror at the deed he had witnessed, he forgot the object which
had brought him there.
`Miss Alice went off to some conven', massa, and left behind a letter
dat make massa crazy when he read it, and he never had his sense
since, but keep all de time walk up and down de house, or lay down
groaning and takin' on most pitiful.'
`Alice fled to a convent! Where? What convent?' he asked,
feeling relieved; for he had rather a convent's walls should hold her
than the chateau of Count Bondier.
Finding that nothing more was known either by the African, or any
of the other slaves who now flocked into the room, save that `Mis Alice
had fled to a convent,' he shortly after left and reaching his carriage
drove to town. He was now in a state of the most intense solicitude.
All was mystery inscrutable! She had not been united to
Count Bondier, this at least was a relief. But why should she have
fled to a convent, when three weeks yet remained for her to make up
her decision? What could have led her to pen such a letter to him?
What could have been the nature of that addressed to her father? The
more he reflected upon the affair, the more perplexing it became. His
determination, however, was to ascertain what convent had become her
asylum.
He learned on reaching his hotel that the only two convents in the
state, was the one a league from the city, called the convent d'Ursuline,
and another in the interior, on Red River, known as the convent of
del Sacre Cœur.
By means not necessary to detail here, he learned that she was not
at the former convent; and while the whole capital was astir with the
news of Colonel May's suicide and his daughter's disappearance, he
proceeded to the latter with a letter of introduction he had obtained to
the superior of the convent. On reaching Alexandria, he secured a
guide and galloped across the nine leagues of beautiful prairie to the
convent. It stood in the bosom of a lovely country, and with natural
woodland, copse, and lawn. Its walls rose to the eye above a group of
majestic oaks and were reflected in a lake. Herds of wild cattle were
his approach, lifted their proud heads, shook their arched manes, and
with a cry like the clanging of the bugles of an armed host, galloped
thundering across the plain.
The sun was an hour high when he reached the convent gate, and
rung for admittance, An aged portress open a lattice in the gate and
gravely inquired his business.
`I bear a letter to the superior, and desire to present it in person.'
She retired and in a few moments returned, unbarred the gate, and
admitted him into the outer corridor of the convent. A tall and majestic
female approached him, and announced herself as the lady superior.
`I am the bearer of a letter to you from the Rev. Pierre Du—,
a Roman Catholic priest of New Orleans, and have visited the convent
of the Sacred Heart, to learn if a certain young lady, named Alice May,
had sought asylum there. Edward watched the grave countenance of
the lady superior, as her cold eye moved along the lines; but her features,
schooled to conceal expression, betrayed nothing upon which he
could base hope or fears.
`Follow me, young man!' she said in a low, deep voice, that he
thought trembled with emotion. She led the way along the corridor,
and as he walked the solemn sound of a dirge, fell fitfully upon his ear
and sunk to his heart. He followed her across the court to a door that
opened into the vestibule of the convent chapel. As he approached,
the deep, solemn strain rose and swelled—now loud and startling like a
human wail, now low and painfully plaintive. With a full heart, and
his spirits weighed down by a gloom that he could not throw aside, he
entered the vestibule.
The superior now stopped, threw open the door of the chapel, and
placing one hand upon her bosom with a look of woe and pity, pointed
in silence with the other towards a bier which stood before the altar!
`What means this? speak?' he cried, half the truth rushing upon
his brain.
`There lies the sister Martha, she whom you named Alice May!'
`He rushed past her—broke from her—heedless of her warning, that
no man ever entered there save God's priests, and making his way
through the group of nuns that surrounded the snowy bier, stood before
it. The face of the dead was uncovered, and a single look told him
that it was Alice May's. Calm, peaceful, lovely still in death she lay
there, while he who loved her dearer than life, was kneeling in agony
unsupportable under her.
2. II.
She was borne to her grave in a beautiful and secluded cemetery of
the convent. The lover was permitted to follow her remains—for by
all he was regarded as a brother. There was a mystery to all the sisterhood
about the dead, and they knew not her living ties.
The grave was closed over her remains—the funeral procession returned
to the convent, and Edward kneeled beside the fresh sod, which
enclosed all he loved. Night at length came on in her solemn silence
and starry beauty. Its influence calmed his troubled spirit, and he arose
and slowly left the spot. He sought the convent, and solicited audience
of the lady superior. To her he revealed his passion—all her history as
interwoven with his own—and then besought her to tell him what had
brought her to that sudden death.
The lady superior was deeply affected by his narrative and his intense
grief; but she replied that she would give him no information.—
That two weeks before, she had arrived at the convent with only a single
black servant, who had instantly turned from the gate and returned
to Alexandria. That she applied for admission in the name of charity,
and the portress opened to her.
`When I beheld her,' said the superior, `as she was conducted before
me, I was struck with her beauty, and also with a look of intense
suffering. She simply asked me to give her asylum from the world and
to conceal from it her refuge. She said she wished to take the veil
and never more to be seen, but pass her life in prayer and preparation
for heaven. She then placed jewels in my hands to a large amount,
which she said had been hers, but which she now gave to the church.
We received her as sister Martha; and from that day I became deeply
interested in her. But she communicated to me nothing of her history
save her name. I watched her closely, for I feared, so deep and silent
was her secret sorrow, that she might lose her reason and take her life.
She spent nearly all her time in the chapel before the altar, and was always
flower, till at length a fever seized her, and three days since she died,
like an infant falling asleep, in my arms. Earth has lost a child but
heaven has gained an angel.
The feelings with which poor Edward listened to this simple narrative
cannot be described. After he had become somewhat composed,
he asked if she had left nothing to lead to the cause which drove her to
the convent. The superior said that she had not, and that all to her
was wrapped in mystery.
`All is indeed mystery inscrutable,' said Edward, as he mentally recurred
to the dreadful end of her father, of her strange letter to him,
of her extraordidary flight and sudden death.
There was, however, a solution to the mystery, which, on his return
to New Orleans, Edward Orr afterwards discovered, which, while it inspired
him with wonder and grief, elevated her, if anything could have
done so, infinitely higher in his affection and esteem. If the reader
has the curiosity to know the solution, he will have it gratified in a
subsequent number.
| Alice May | |