University of Virginia Library

11. CHAPTER XI.
THE SACRIFICE.

The amazement and terror depicted on the countenance of Colonel
Harwood it would be impossible to describe. He fixed his eyes upon
the countenance of Satchell with that look of horrified hatred and
impotency with which he would regard a demon.

Satchell met his look with an expression cool, deliberate indifference
and conscious power. From horror the face of his victim
assumed an aspect of the most painful, pitiable, distressing supplication.
As pale as marble and with a trembling tongue Colonel
Harwood bent towards him. For a moment he looked as if he
would sink from his chair to his knees and thus realize Satchell's
assertion. But he did not kneel, with his knees, but it was plain
that he did so with his spirit. Humiliation and the most imploring
deprecation marked his manner.

“Mr. Satchell, my good friend, Mr. Satchell!” he gasped. He
tried to say more but his emotions checked his utterance. With his
hands clasped together he stretched forth his face and neck towards
him as if begging for life.

“Well, Colonel Harwood!” answered Satchell, who could not
look upon him without wonder at his agitation. “You seem to be
alarmed! I have proposed nothing that should produce in you
such horror and fear. I am a man and not a monster. I shall
make your daughter a good husband! Think of it calmly sir. Five
thousand dollars and poverty or your daughter to me and your
present competence. Nay, I repeat that I will give you the papers
for no other price than your daughter's hand!”

“You shall not have it!” gasped the Colonel faintly.

“Very well, you shall not have the papers,” responded Satchell
preparing to rise from his seat. “To-morrow I shall transmit them
to the government. Let the evil be on your own head!”

“Stay, sir, stay. I will talk with you calmly.”

“It were best to do so!”

“Will you inform me how you learned the fact that Caroline
Kent is my daughter?”

“It matters not. It was by accident in the way of my business
in looking up old papers. Let it suffice that I know the fact!”

“You seem to be my evil genius. You have me in your power
in every way. Sir, you will drive me mad! I shall take my life!”

“I do not fear it. There is no difficulty so great that man cannot
overcome it with nerve. There is not a madman who has let
his reason fly in reverses, who if he had guarded it with equanimity
might have arisen out of his troubles. There is not a suicide who if
he had lived might not have redeemed fortune and character. While

there is life all things are possible to a man. None but cowards die
and go mad! Listen to me with composure. Hear the whole matter
between us. I hold treasonable papers written by you to the
enemy that are snifficient to hang you. I offer them to you for your
daughter's hand! That daughter passes to the world as your niece.
Your wife believes her to be your niece, the daughter of a sister
who died years ago in Brazil, at the consulate of her husband. But
you know and I know that sister died childless!”

“You seem to be in league with Lucifer!”

“I have not the honor of this shadowy gentleman's acquaintance.
I find devils enough in the world without going into hell after such
fanciful acquaintances. I propose that you give me your daughter
for your honor. I threaten if you refuse not only to place the papers
at the disposal of the government at Washington, but to divulge
both to your daughter and to your wife the secret you have so carefully
guarded. Now, Colonel Harwood you have the whole matter
plainly presented. The hour grows late,” added Satchell, looking
at his huge silver watch, “I should like a reply at once!”

“At once?” repeated his distressed victim.

“Yes, Colonel Harwood. You can decide now as well as at
another time. You know at this moment as well as tomorrow
whether you will consent for me to mail the treasonable papers to
Washington in the morning.”

“I—I—need a little while to think of it.”

“I will give you five minutes by my watch.”

“Sir, my daughter is very beautiful,” he said with emotion.

“I know it, sir.”

“She is young, scarcely nineteen, accomplished with every grace,
and I dearly love her. To me she is also fondly attached.”

“As my wife you can still love her—she fondly loves you. I
wish to break no ties of affection.”

“But consider the disparity Mr. Satchell. You are at least
forty-eight and —”

“Ugly as she is lovely, I dare say.”

“No I did not say so. But, Mr. Satchell, suppose you have my
consent. You cannot have hers.”

“How do you know?”

“I cannot think that she would consent to marry you without
compulsion.”

“We can't tell what a young woman will do. Matches, with
more disparity of ages have often taken place.”

“But she has never seen you.”

“No, perhaps not.”

“There is an insuperable objection, if I must speak my mind,
Mr. Satchell,” said Colonel Harwood, coloring.

“Speak freely.”

“Your character among men. You know, sir, that you are a
disgraced man. That you hold no enviable position in the opinion
of the world.”

“I understand you. I am the Rogue's lawyer.” But, sir, your

daughter is a natural child. So that it is a fair offset. No honorable
man would wed her. She must either be the wife of a man who
cares little for the opinions and prejudices of society, or else —”

“Else what, sir.”

“Else some honorable man's mistress.”

“Villain!”

“Keep your temper, Colonel. I speak out what you think but
dare not utter; what the world would both think and say, if they
knew the truth. It remains for you to choose what you will do.”

“I did not intend that the secret of her birth should ever transpire,
sir. It was my intention to marry her to some suitable person
as my daughter. This I could now do.”

“No sir, you cannot. If you refuse her to me, she shall know
the secret. And should she keep it and marry an honest gentleman
I would betray the truth to him. Sir, there is no use in farther
prolonging this interview.”

“It is quite as unpleasant to me as it can be to you,” said the
poor man, the sweat standing in drops upon his brow. “But I
can't let you leave without arranging upon some plan for possession
of those damning proofs of treason you hold against me.”

“You know my price,” responded Satchell with the most provoking
firmness.

Colonel Harwood rose from his chair and walked once across the
apartment and back again, slowly and thoughtfully. His countenance
was destitute of all color save ashy paleness. He seemed
possessed with the deepest anguish. He presented the painful spectacle
of one man in the moral power of his fellow, and that fellow-being
without mercy, principle or justice.

Stopping in front of the man who had his destiny and that of his
beloved wife and children in his hands, he said, in a voice that
seemed to come from the sepulchre, it sounded so hollow and
deep,—

“Mr. Satchell, I yield. Take her if she will consent to be
yours. But mark me, sir. I shall not lift a finger towards compelling
her. So far as I am concerned, I give my consent that she
shall be your wife. I will use no influence either one way or the
other. Now that the secret of her birth, which I thought was
sealed forever in my own bosom, is revealed, I give up my hopes
for her. What you have said respecting her is too true. I would
rather, if it must be, that she were even wedded to you than become
that you suggest. Yet, I do not know that I would. Once for all,
I say take her, if she will take you. I make this sacrifice not to
save the five thousand dollars, for I will give it to you now instead,
but to save the anguish and infamy my dishonor will bring upon
my family.”

“I refuse money, Colonel Harwood.”

“I know it. I see that it is useless for me to struggle against my
fate. Give me the papers and take her. But remember, sir, that I
am not to be responsible if she refuses you.”

“That is understood. I will not hold you responsible. But I

shall expect you to see her to-morrow, and make known to her that
it is necessary for your safety and honor that she should become
my wife.”

“I will do it, sir,” gasped Mr. Harwood.

“You will after seeing her call at my office and let me know that
you have done it, and then write me a note introducing me to her
as her future husband.”

“I will do it, sir,” he articulated faintly.

“I will then place in your hands the papers that so nearly touch
your life and honor and happiness.”

“Once they are in my possession, I shall drop on my knees and
devoutly thank God.”

“You will have reason to, sir; for though seven years have
elapsed since the peace of 1815, yet treason is never out-lawed by
statute, unless by special enactment. The fall of the fortress you
commanded, though apparently an accident of war, was, you well
know, brought about by your treasonable understanding with the
enemy. This the letters and plans in my possession clearly prove;
but so artfully did you manage that although the country were surprised
at the surrender, when it was supposed the place was impregnable,
yet no suspicion, beyond mere expressions of astonishment,
fell upon you.”

“Do not speak of it, sir.”

“I do not wish to further. It is understood that you see your
daughter to-morrow.”

“Yes.”

“When shall I see you at my office?”

“At two o'clock.”

“Earlier, if possible, as I have an engagement at that hour.”

“Then at twelve.”

“I will be there in waiting.”

“And to deliver to me the papers?”

“All of them.”

“It will be a happy hour. But, Mr. Satchell, I must express my
surprise at your willingness to surrender the papers upon my mere
consent to give you my daughter. Is it possible you have already
seen her and know that she will marry you?”

“No, sir, I have not seen her.”

“Then you must have great confidence in my influence over her,
or else great faith in your power of persuasion; for remember, sir,
there shall be no force used. Though I am in your power, and
would sacrifice much, very much to free myself, yet I will be no
party to coercion where my child is concerned. Dare, sir, to lay a
hand upon her in sternness and I will take your life! I have not
yet forgotten how to use a sword.”

Satchell smiled, and said, rising from his chair,—

“Colonel, do not let us quarrel now, we have brought matters to
so favorable a crisis. I have no intention of using coercion. If she
does not comply willingly, then you are released from all responsibility.

But remember that if you dare to use a word to urge her to
refuse, I will divulge to her the secret of her birth.”

“The knowledge of it will scarce degrade her if she becomes your
wife. She will think it a lesser evil.”

“I am a philosopher. Your words do not, cannot anger me,
Colonel. Now we understand one another? Tomorrow at
twelve?”

“Yes.”

“Good night, sir.”

The response of Colonel Harwood was scarcely heard; it moved
the lips but did not stir the air. Indeed he seemed scarcely able to
speak at all.

He took the candle and showed his visitor to the outer door. He
closed it after him, and then staggered through the hall to re-enter
the room. Before he crossed the threshold of the sitting-room door
he fell forward, the light flew far from his hand, and he lay upon
his face nearly insensible and in darkness.

Poor man! poor, erring, unhappy gentleman! How bitterly was
retribution coming upon him for youthful excesses, and for the
treason of riper years!

He was not wholly insensible; he was conscious of his misery,
and from time to time groaned heavily. He was completely overcome
by the scene he had passed through. His heart was in that
child! that beautiful, spirited, loving girl, who owed to him life,
but life with dishonor. He loved her more for the wrong he felt he
had done her. Sacredly for her sake he kept the secret of her birth.
Since that event he had become a husband and a father. New
affections, new bonds of love were fastened about his heart; yet he
loved most the child of his first erring passion. He lavished upon
her all that could make her happy, that could render her an ornament
to that society in which he looked forward to see her more
worshipped and caressed.

But now all his hopes had perished; at one fell swoop they had
been swept away!

“Oh God!” he moaned in the silence and darkness where he
lay, “my punishment is greater than I can bear. Who could have
told this fearful, evil man this? But it is known. I must abide
the fate that is before me. Life, honor, happiness, hers and mine,
all are cast into the scale, and she only can turn it and save me.
I will see her to-morrow; I will throw myself upon her mercy. I
will tell her all,—all that I dare to tell her. From my lips she
shall never know that I am her father.”

Such were the thoughts, some of them uttered in broken words,
that passed through his mind. Slowly he rose to his feet, found his
way to the sofa, and sunk upon it powerless with grief.