 | CHAPTER XIX. El Fureidîs |  |
19. CHAPTER XIX.
We have surprised the little Maronite community in
the enjoyment of a leisure hour; but such was far from
being the usual tenor of their lives. Daylight of the next
morning found them scattered, and laboring in their different
vocations; and when Meredith issued from his cell, the court-yard
was deserted, and silence reigned throughout the monastery.
The Superior, it is true, had lingered to inspect
and dress his guest's injured arm, and to serve the frugal
breakfast which the humbler brethren had left ready in
the refectory; but these hospitable duties completed, he
lost no time in setting forth to the farm lands below the
convent, where his aid was required in sowing the vegetable
garden which constituted the principal subsistence
of the household.
Meredith, the only idler about the place, could no longer
indulge the illusion which had linked him as an associate
in the fraternal band. With his customary dress he had
resumed his customary sense of isolation, and was at liberty
to indulge in undisturbed reverie, with no companions
but his own sad thoughts.
These thoughts, however, if not less bitter, were somewhat
diverted by sympathy in the affliction which had
befallen the family of M. Trefoil; the pain in his arm,
which had forbidden sleep at night, and could not be
ignored by day, was a welcome antagonist to mental torturings;
friars was soothing to one who had been so long a wanderer;
and his melancholy, though severe and settled, took
a more placid tone.
He even found a vacant sort of contentment in watching
the monks at their work. As day after day wore monotonously
on, he came to feel a mechanical interest in the
petty toils and plans of the community in which he lived.
With absent-minded accuracy he counted the furrows which
the ploughman accomplished daily, the rows of beans
which the Superior planted, the number of mulberry-trees
which were sprouting in the orchard. The ringing
of the refectory and vesper bells divided and marked the
slow morning hour agreeably, and there was a satisfaction
in seeing men and animals resting after their toils.
But all these things were subordinate to the more engrossing
interest afforded by the vicinity of El Fureidis.
The overseeing of the convent labors might well be an
abstract process; for beyond the mountain gorge lay the
hamlet to which Meredith's imagination continually roved,
and concerning which he indulged in endless speculations.
He could not catch a glimpse of the villa, for the budding
mulberry orchard lay between; he could not see the
stream of factory people going to and from their work,
for the call-bell was now silent and their tasks suspended.
He could not even detect a familiar acquaintance among
the peasantry, for the distance was too great for the recognition
of features, and in costume there was no variety.
He believed he could not be mistaken in the form and
dress of Havilab; but if so, she never once came within
the range of his vision.
Still she was there. It was her home,—he was near
to her. He was satisfied.
Was this then the penance he had prescribed for himself?
No! for Havilah was unhappy,—she was motherless,
and so the penance was annulled.
Sometimes his dreamy acquiescence in his present lot
gave place to an intense longing for further tidings of
his afflicted friends; but this yearning was as often counterbalanced
by the dread of abandoning his present place
of concealment. Under ordinary circumstances he could
have obtained the desired information through one of the
brethren, who might have been intrusted on a secret mission
of inquiry; but the fording-place was, as we have
seen, impassable, the bridge by which Meredith crossed
had been since swept away by the flood, the water was
rushing down the gorge with increasing violence, and all
communication between the convent and the village was
suspended.
This latter circumstance, however, presenting as it did a
natural barrier to Meredith's wishes, proved also an irresistible
incentive to his resolute, defiant temperament, which
was always excited by obstacles. The roaring of the
water in the gorge sounded to him like a perpetual challenge.
It first excited him to meditation, then to resolve,
and finally to action.
“The bridge must be repaired immediately,” was his impulsive
comment upon the report that the stone arch had,
together with the logs, been swept away by the current.
“Impossible, my son, so long as the freshet continues,”
was the grave reply of the Superior. “I have never seen
the stream so high and strong; there is no knowing to what
degree it may rise, and nothing can resist its force.”
“We will see,” thought Meredith; and he immediately
started off to inspect the spot.
His survey confirmed the Superior's opinion. The abutments
banks afforded no facility for founding a new structure; but
some other point on the stream might prove more available,
and, with increased determination to renew the broken link,
he followed up the abrupt windings of the current.
Even Nature seems to lend herself in aid of a resolute
will. At a sharp angle in the gorge an immense boulder
had been swept from its rocky foundation, and precipitated
into the current, where it rested firmly, forming a wedge
between the intercepted waters, which were thus narrowed
to such a degree that a couple of logs suspended from either
bank and supported by this central pier would constitute a
tolerable foot-bridge.
Meredith's sagacious eye at once recognized these advantages,
and one moment sufficed him for the forming of his
scheme and preparing to put it in execution. He could
be only a director in the work; for, owing either to the
severity of his recent injury, or the ignorance of his surgeon,
the suffering in his arm was almost intolerable, and now,
at the end of a week, the limb was stiffened and useless.
But he had plenty of that which will buy other men's
strength, and, the practicability of his plan being made evident
to the Superior, the latter willingly overlooked the
claims of the convent farm in view of the Englishman's
gold, and men and steers were at once drafted for his
service. For two days Meredith's mind was engrossed
in the hewing of the logs, dragging them to the banks,
affixing them in the requisite position, and securing them
at either extremity.
His purpose was at length accomplished. What then?
Should he avail himself of the fruits of his zeal? His
labor finished, and the means of retreat at his command,
what was there to prevent his crossing and paying a visit to
the village?
The opportunity was in itself a temptation. He surely
had not built his bridge for nothing. He could not go home
and rest satisfied with this trifling success. Moreover, it
was nearly night; the moon was at the full, the sky clear.
There would be light to guide him and shadows to conceal.
The impulse was altogether irresistible; and while the half-dozen
comparatively able-bodied friars who had been skilful
and willing assistants in his work gathered up their tools
and returned to the convent, he cut a stout walking-stick
from a straight-limbed tree and set off in an opposite direction.
Never since M. Trefoil commenced his work of improvement
had El Furidîs looked so lovely as on this night.
Each terrace was a spring garden of vegetation. The rough
walls that sustained the gigantic staircase of earth were
overgrown with moss or festooned with vines. The white
cottages, perched one above another, seemed to swing in the
moonlight that came flickering through the trees. Roughly
constructed but abundant fountains were in full play, and
foaming cascades were streaming over projecting cliffs, and
finding channels for themselves in every hollow. The noise
of these busy, hurrying waterfalls would have disturbed a
stranger; but their music was at this season familiar to the
dwellers on the Lebanon, and had hushed them all to their
early slumbers.
It was scarcely nine o'clock in the evening, and yet
Meredith found himself patrolling the village alone. There
was but little fear that his solitary step would disturb the
sound sleep of this hard-working population; still he trod the
rocky pathway with the cautious, measured pace of one
who fears to meet with some unwelcome interruption. His
countenance, too, wore that expression of mysterious awe
which creeps over one who finds himself a stranger in a
His thoughts were with the old man and his child. He
was wondering (he had done little but wonder thus for many
days) whether he still looked so crushed and broken,—
whether she was still sustaining a double burden, and wearing
that face of constrained but heroic fortitude. He longed
to approach the villa,—he felt as if its stone walls could
not hide what he was so eager to know, as if there would
be something in its very aspect which would whisper an
answer to his heart.
Still there was something which held him back,—a certain
shrinking within himself,—a certain sense of banishment
and repulsion, which made the precincts of Havilah's
home seem to him like forbidden ground. So he went
wandering round the village, perambulating the successive
terraces, climbing up to Ayn el Bered, peering into the deep
grotto just beneath the Falcon Perch, then descending to the
foot of the valley, and meditating awhile outside the door of
Father Lapierre's cottage. He met with no human obstacle,
yet he was continually interrupted. One element in nature
appeared to be running riot, and he encountered it at every
step. Whichever way he turned, he found his passage
opposed by some freshly-gushing spring, some intrusive
water-spout, some overflowing conduit or fountain. It
was impossible to escape a wet foot, so many little currents
crossed the path; equally impossible to preserve a
dry head, so many rocks and cottage roofs were dripping
with moisture. There was water here, water there,
water everywhere. One could almost believe that the
white moonlight had melted into rain, and was flooding
the earth.
Meredith could not be unobservant of the mimic deluge.
sank in some natural water-though; nor, as he heard the
earth gurgling at every pore, could he help asking himself
whether, when the soil had drunk its fill, it might not be
swallowed up in its turn, and the village swept down the
mountain-side like lava.
“They know best, however,” thought he, as he looked
down upon a group of sleepers on one of the flat house-tops.
“Happy, tired fellows! Mother Nature soothes them
with dreams of plentiful harvests, while she herself is busy
watering their gardens. Why should I brood over them
like a spirit of evil, prognosticating mischief?” and he
walked away.
He approached the bridge that connected the village
with the factory-grounds and dwelling of M. Trefoil. He
was proceeding to cross it, when, looking up the stream, he
observed a circumstance which surprised him. Both the
factory and the olive-mill, a little lower down, were dependent
upon the force of a natural fall, which leaped over
a projecting cliff a few rods above the bridge, and which
had its source in such an unfailing spring that it was seldom
dry even at midsummer. Now, therefore, one might
have expected to find it swollen into a cataract of sufficient
volume to startle the ear by its roar. On the contrary, it
was silent; the face of the cliff loomed gloomily up, untouched
by the moonlight, which shone brightly elsewhere,
and its bare surface blackened, not only by the depth of
shadow, but by a scanty sprinkling of water, which made
its way over the edge noiselessly, as if escaping from a
leak.
“Strange!” thought Meredith, “that, when every other
water-course is overflowing, this should be dry;” and, diverted
discover some clew to the mystery.
An explanation presented itself in the form of a clumsy
wooden waste-gate, used for regulating the force of the fall,
and shutting off the water at all times, except when required
for manufacturing purposes. This barricade, always available
for economy of power, had been called into constant
use during the introduction of steam-engines into the factory
of M. Trefoil,—an operation which involved the
necessity of having the mill—stream under control.
The last charge which M. Trefoil had given to his foreman
was to close the gate and keep it shut until further
orders. As, owing to the pressure of domestic calamity,
the master's superintendence had since been wanting at
the factory, his final direction continued in full force; and
thus it happened that the stream was prevented from escaping
through its natural channel.
“An excellent agent, no doubt,” thought Meredith, as
he observed how ineffectually the deep, pent-up waters
chafed against their barrier; “but it seems a pity it should
be put in operation at a time when the superfluous floods
are everywhere demanding vent.”
This opinion was still further strengthened, as he paced
along the margin of a broad, deep reservoir, just above the
dam of the fall, and observed the condition of the basin,
which was formed partly by a natural hollow in the mountain
cleft, partly by clumsy barriers of masonry. At some
points the reservoir was already overflowing, and sending
its waters in deep gullies down the mountain-side; at
others, its defences were evidently weak, and incapable of
long resisting the unusual pressure caused by the freshet.
Meredith had often shaken his wise English head as he
observed the imperfect masonry which constituted the artificial
introduced his cane into wide interstices in its stone-work,
having marked a spot where the ill-made bricks of which it
was partially built had crumbled and mouldered away, and
having congratulated M. Trefoil that it never contained
more than a foot of water, its lower foundations being all
that were in any degree secure.
“Are these people mad?” thought he, as the marked the
huge body of water, and fancied that he saw the reservoir
already yielding to the pressure. “They might as well
make their bed on the ocean's edge when the tide is coming
in, as go to sleep and leave this old murderous giant
here, with his mouth open to devour them!” he mentally
exclaimed, as, stooping down to examine a well-remembered
fracture in the stone-work, he found a steady stream gurgling
from the spot, and drenching the ground at his feet.
He looked around him to calculate the consequences of
the probable catastrophe. They seemed to him fearful, but
he had a natural dread of attaching importance to risks
which those more immediately concerned seemed to estimate
but lightly, and, resolving to await some further emergency
before sharing his alarm with any one, he made a careful
circuit of the reservoir and its immediate premises.
“It may stand through the night,” said he to himself.
“It would be a pity to arouse the villagers, for what could
they do, after all? If that waste-gate could be opened now,
it would drain the basin in less than an hour. If it were not
for endangering the works at the factory, I should be
tempted to lift it myself. How strange in M. Trefoil—
how stupid in Asaad—not to foresee this mischief!”
He had nearly retraced his steps to the edge of the cliff,
over which he longed to see the water once more pouring,
when he was startled by a harsh, rumbling sound, and a
became giddy, his feet tottered, and he was compelled to
grasp at the first support which offered itself. Then, as the
ground which had reeled and staggered like a drunken man,
stood still, he also recovered himself and stood still too; but
for one instant only. As if fired by an impulse or a sudden
fear, he bounded forward like one rushing to a rescue. A
passing glance at the feeble walls of the reservoir served to
convince him that they still maintained their position in
spite of the shock; then, without bestowing a look on any
other quarter, to observe the effects of the earthquake, he
diverged to the left of the stream, and made unhesitatingly
for the villa. It was but to run a few rods, leap down a
single terrace, gain the house-top of M. Trefoil, the rear end
of the roof so resting upon the hill-side as to render this the
easiest approach from above. Even at this critical moment
Meredith had sufficient presence of mind to realize that he
should but add to the alarm of the household, if he made his
appearance through the roof; so, avoiding the staircase, he
swung himself down by the aid of the trellis-work which ran
around the veranda, and thus alighted on the upper terrace
of the garden.
He sprang up the steps more hastily than ever before,—
entered the saloon more precipitately. It was no time for
hesitation or apologies. At the same moment, as if she had
been running to greet him, Havilah came quickly from an
inner room, and they met in the centre of the apartment.
She held a lamp in her hand. Her white burnous draped
her form, the hood of the cloak was drawn over her head;
her face was very pale; in the dim light her figure looked
shadowy and ghost-like. The recognition between herself
and Meredith was instantaneous and mutual, but embarrassment
had no place in the manner of either. Surprised
that he was in the neighborhood; but the question, “How
came you here?” was but one among the many eager questions
which shone in her eyes, and which were all expressed
in the quick-breathed words, “What is it? tell me!”
She held out her hand, but it was in emphasis rather
than in welcome. He grasped it in his, but the grasp
seemed merely intended to give weight to the hasty reply,
“A land shock,—I fear another. The reservoir is giving
way,—the people are in danger; and the factories—
Your father, Havilah?”
“O my poor father!—he is in such trouble!”
“I know,” said Meredith, “I know,”—the first “I
know” a mere affirmation,—the second, a volume of tender
sympathy.
“I am afraid you cannot rouse him. Can I do anything?”
she said, with a brave look on her face, which
seemed to promise that she would do what she could.
“Yes, much, if you can only get his orders for me.
Where is he?”
“Here,” and she opened the door into the inner room,—
the winter room, which used to be Ianthe's.
M. Trefoil was sitting on the couch where she used to sit,
and looking straight before him into vacancy. His elbows
rested on his knees, his hands supported his chin. He
betrayed no emotion whatever at sight of Meredith; but as
the latter approached, and, seeing his condition, stood looking
at him with dumb pity, the widowed man moved his
eyes slowly around the room as if seeking something,
then fixed them on his late guest, and said, just above a
whisper, “She's gone!”
Meredith had no word to utter in reply. He stood appalled
in view of the present calamity, and almost forgot
“I loved her! I loved her!” continued poor M. Trefoil,
speaking now to himself, and not even looking at the Englishman;
“O how I loved her!—and she's gone!”
“Father,” exclaimed Havilah, throwing herself on her
knees before him, taking his hands and holding them between
her own, “do you see who has come? It is Mr.
Meredith. Do you know what brings him here?”
“Is he looking for her?” was the mysteriously whispered
reply. “Have you told him that she is not here?”
“He did not expect to see her. He came to look for
you. He wants you to help him,—we all want you.
There is trouble at the factory,—they need the master.
Let us go.” And she rose, pointed to the door, and made
a hasty movement in that direction, striving to entice him
by her example, as one would entice a child.
“Trouble! What sort of trouble? Is anybody dead?”
“No, I hope not dead, but in danger. Perhaps we can
save them. O, think of them!—think of the poor people,
—my mother's poor!” and she laid her hand upon his shoulder,
and looked him beseechingly in the face.
He answered her look by a melancholy stare, then
dropped his head upon his hands, and broke forth in the
piteous cry: “Poor people! O yes, we are all poor people;
she took care of us all. There is nobody to take care
of us now. No matter what happens now,—no matter,—
no matter!”—and he continued to whimper forth the last
words, until they subsided into an indistinct muttering.
His form was bowed down, his face almost resting on his
knees, his whole attitude expressive of utter indifference to
future fate and fortune. Havilah glanced from him to Meredith,
and shook her head despairingly. “It is of no use,”
she signified by an inarticulate motion of her lips.
“Has he been so ever since—?” whispered Meredith,
leaving his question unfinished; for he saw that Havilah
understood his meaning.
She nodded mournfully in the affirmative, and, pointing
towards her father, indicated by a gesture her desire that
Meredith should himself undertake to rouse him from his
stupor of grief.
The young man cleared his voice, went forward, and exclaimed
with forced alacrity: “M. Trefoil, my friend, my
dear friend, do you know me? have n't you a word of welcome
for a traveller?”
The tone and question, striking fresh and clear upon the
torpid senses of M. Trefoil, imparted to them momentary
life and vigor. An intelligent look overspread his features,
memory asserted her power; he suffered Meredith to grasp
his hand, and, slowly rising from his chair, was about to
address to him some coherent and earnest inquiry, when
suddenly the floor keeled like a ship in a heavy sea; there
was a rumbling sound like distant thunder, succeeded by
the crash of falling stones, the frightened cry of startled
cattle, and the sudden whistling of the night-wind. The
old man tottered, looked around him like one bewildered,
then fell back into his chair, where he was at once encircled
by the arms of his daughter, who, precipitated in that
direction, flung herself involuntarily upon her father's neck.
Meredith, thrown completely off his balance, was hurled
violently against the wall, and recovered himself only to
find his position reversed, and to stagger again into the
centre of the apartment, as a second undulation of the earth
caused the floor once more to vibrate. There was an awful
pause, a solemn stillness,—all held their breath and listened;
but the distant sounds died away, slighter pulsations agitated
the room at intervals of some seconds, unaccompanied,
breath came freer, and each of the three occupants of the
apartment looked around, as if seeking to read in each
other's faces some confirmation of the belief that the shock
had for the present subsided.
“There is no time to be lost!” cried Meredith, as the
conviction of present safety and future insecurity rushed
simultaneously to his mind. “There may not be another
shock,” he added, addressing himself to Havilah, “but the
terrace walls are all undermined by the flood, the very hill-side
may be washed away. We must not remain here a
moment.”
Havilah looked anxiously at her father, whose eyes were
wandering inquiringly from the face of his child to that of
the Englishman. “Where can we take him?” she asked
hastily of Meredith.
“There is no danger on the mountain-top, if he had
strength to climb,” said Meredith; “or in the valley, there
are plenty of protected spots. M. Lapierre's cottage,” he
exclaimed, as by a sudden impulse of thought,—“that is
the place of all others; it is cut in the very mountain-side;
nothing can shake it from its foundations. Once there, you
and he are safe. But let us be gone!”—and, suiting the
action to the word, he drew M. Trefoil's arm determinately
within his and started towards the door.
Havilah caught up a cloak, threw it over her father, and
followed.
“Havilah!” whimpered he, looking back over his shoulder,
with a fearful, shuddering expression, “Havilah!”
“Yes, dear, I am coming too,” she replied, making haste to
overtake and support him on the side opposite to Meredith.
“Where are we going,—where?” asked M. Trefoil
wildly, but suffering himself to be led across the threshold.
“To Father Lapierre's cottage,—that is a safe place, you
know; my mother bade us go to him for safety always.”
“So she did! so she did!” said the old man in a tone of
ready assent; and memory thus furnishing an impetus in
the way he was going, he shuffled clumsily and weakly, but
willingly, along.
Not only M. Trefoil's household, but the entire village,
was by this time aroused. The murmur of voices could be
distinguished at a distance, and the excitement and alarm
were becoming universal. In the very beginning of their
progress, the fugitives from the villa were arrested by evidences
of terror and destruction. The steps which led
from the first to the second terrace were fallen into a
ruinous heap; in the garden below, the servants of the
family were huddled together. They hailed their master
and young mistress with loud cries; exclaiming with joy
at their safety, but mingling congratulations with wailing
laments at present disaster and future danger.
“Here, Bachmet; lend your hand to help my father,”
cried Havilah, as she and her companions clambered with
difficulty down the terrace. “Hush, Geita! you must not
alarm your master,” she whispered in an undertone to the
girl, who was attracting her mistress's attention to a corner
of the western wing of the villa, which had fallen in. “Are
you all safe, good Abou?” she inquired of a faithful old
Syrian cook and steward; and when the old man had
responded, “All!” she added, “Thank God! follow us then,
but be quiet.”
They obeyed her in loving reverence; the spirit of awe
not a little augmented among the group by the sudden, and,
as it seemed to them, supernatural appearance of the Englishman
upon the scene.
Thus far the disasters of the night seemed to be confined
less substantial terraces than those of the ancient village,
were consequently more susceptible to accident, both from
flood and earthquake. Beyond the precincts of the garden,
all wore its customary appearance, save where a sinking or
sliding wall denoted the precarious nature of the foundations
on which life and property depended.
“That reservoir holds yet; miraculous!” was the unguarded
exclamation of Meredith, as, crossing the bridge
below the cliff, he looked up and beheld the bare rock
frowning above. “There may still be time,” he murmured
half aloud, and hurrying M. Trefoil on at redoubled speed.
Havilah's eye followed Meredith's,—so did her mind;
she foresaw the nature of the catastrophe which he apprehended;
her quick instinct taught her the only remedy.
“God be praised, you are safe from harm!” gasped Meredith,
as he pushed open the door of Father Lapierre's
hermitage, his broad chest heaving, not from the physical
efforts he had made, but from the deep emotions of thankfulness
with which he ushered the helpless old man and his
child into their place of refuge. “Now I must find Asaad,”
he added in an under tone to Havilah, as she passed him on
the threshold. “Does he still occupy the cottage below the
mulberry orchard?” He waited but an answering nod in
reply, and was gone.
The cottage was empty. The shepherd was not likely to
be asleep at his post when danger awaited his flock. The
atmosphere was comfortable, however. There was a fire
smouldering on the hearth; the iron lamp was trimmed and
burning in its niche: it was evident that the place had been
but recently forsaken. M. Trefoil looked from floor to ceiling,
glanced curiously at various objects as if they excited in
his mind some dim association with the past; then, relapsing
with him, he sunk upon a corner of the divan, suffered his
head to drop upon his hands, and resumed his vacant, indifferent
expression of countenance.
Havilah bestowed on him a look of tender pity. In his-very
immobility, nevertheless, she found encouragement and
assurance for the present emergency. She drew his cloak
closely about him, and imprinted a hasty kiss on his passive
features. Little Geita stood, meanwhile, looking on, and
Ayib, who had followed close upon his mistress's track, had
nestled, in what was now his customary place, at her father's
feet. “Sit here, Geita,” signified Havilah to the Turkish
girl, pointing to a place on the divan. “Do not stir from
his side. Good Abou, you will guard the door. Until I
come back, whenever that may be, remember, Abou, you
must take care of my father.” She pressed her slight figure
against the door; it turned on its pivot, and she glided out
into the moonlight.
| CHAPTER XIX. El Fureidîs | |