University of Virginia Library

34. CHAPTER XXXIV.
CLOTELLE MEETS HER FATHER.

The clouds that had skirted the sky during the day broke at last,
and the rain fell in torrents, as Jerome and Clotelle retired for the night,
in the little town of Ferney, on the borders of Lake Leman. The peals
of thunder, and flashes of vivid lightening, which seemed to leap from
mountain to mountain and from crag to crag, reverberating among the
surrounding hills, foretold a heavy storm.

“I would we were back at Geneva,” said Clotelle, as she heard groans
issuing from an adjoining room. The sounds, at first faint, grew louder

and louder, plainly indicating that some person was suffering extreme
pain.

“I did not like this hotel, much, when we came in,” said Jerome,
relighting the lamp, which had been accidentally extinguished.

“Nor I,” returned Clotelle.

The shrieks increased, and an occasional “She's dead!” “I killed
her!” “No, she is not dead!” and such-like expressions, would be
heard from the person, who seemed to be deranged.

The thunder grew louder, and the flashes of lightening more vivid,
while the noise from the sick-room seemed to increase.

As Jerome opened the door, to learn, if possible, the cause of the cries
and groans, he could distinguish the words, “She's dead! yes, she's
dead! but I did not kill her. She was my child! my own daughter. I
loved her, and yet I did not protect her.”

“Whoever he is,” said Jerome, “he's crack-brained; some robber,
probably, from the mountains.”

The storm continued to rage, and the loud peals of thunder and sharp
flashes of lightening, together with the shrieks and moans of the maniac
in the adjoining room, made the night a fearful one. The long hours
wore slowly away, but neither Jerome nor his wife could sleep, and they
arose at an early hour in the morning, ordered breakfast, and resolved to
return to Geneva.

“I am sorry, sir, that you were so much disturbed by the sick man
last night,” said the landlord, as he handed Jerome his bill. “I should
be glad if he would get able to go away, or die, for he's a deal of
trouble to me. Several persons have left my house on his account.”

“Where is he from?” inquired Jerome.

“He's from the United States, and has been here a week to-day, and
has been crazy ever since.”

“Has he no friends with him?” asked the guest.

“No, he is alone,” was the reply.

Jerome related to his wife what he had learned from the landlord, respecting
the sick man, and the intelligence impressed her so strongly,
that she requested him to make further inquiries concerning the stranger.

He therefore consulted the book in which guests usually register
their names, and, to his great surprise, found that the American's name
was Henry Linwood, and that he was from Richmond, Va.

It was with feelings of trepidation that Clotelle heard these particulars
from the lips of her husband.

“We must see this poor man, whoever he is,” said she, as Jerome finished
the sentence.

The landlord was glad to hear that his guests felt some interest in the

sick man, and promised that the invalid's room should be got ready for
their reception.

The clock in the hall was just striking ten, as Jerome passed through
and entered the sick man's chamber. Stretched upon a mattress, with
both hands tightly bound to the bedstead, the friendless stranger was indeed
a pitiful sight. His dark, dishevelled hair prematurely gray, his long,
unshaven beard, and the wildness of the eyes which glanced upon them
as they opened the door and entered, caused the faint hope which had
so suddenly risen in Clotelle's heart, to sink, and she felt that this man
could claim no kindred with her. Certainly, he bore no resemblance to
the man whom she had called her father, and who had fondly dandled
her on his knee in those happy days of childhood.

“Help!” cried the poor man, as Jerome and his wife walked into the
room. His eyes glared, and shriek after shriek broke forth from his
parched and fevered lips.

“No, I did not kill my daughter!—I did not! she is not dead! Yes,
she is dead! but I did not kill her—poor girl! Look! that is she! No,
it cannot be! she cannot come here! it cannot be my poor Clotelle.”

At the sound of her own name, coming from the maniac's lips, Clotelle
gasped for breath, and her husband saw that she had grown deadly pale.
It seemed evident to him that the man was either guilty of some terrible
act, or imagined himself to be. His eyeballs rolled in their sockets,
and his features showed that he was undergoing “the tortures of that
inward hell,” which seemed to set his whole brain on fire.

After recovering her self-possession and strength, Clotelle approached
the bedside, and laid her soft hand upon the stranger's hot and fevered
brow.

One long, loud shriek rang out on the air, and a piercing cry, “It
is she!—Yes, it is she! I see, I see! Ah! no, it is not my daughter!
She would not come to me if she could!” broke forth from him.

“I am your daughter,” said Clotelle, as she pressed her handkerchief
to her face, and sobbed aloud.

Like balls of fire, the poor man's eyes rolled and glared upon the
company, while large drops of perspiration ran down his pale and emaciated
face. Strange as the scene appeared, all present saw that it was
indeed a meeting between a father and his long-lost daughter. Jerome
now ordered all present to leave the room, except the nurse, and every
effort was at once made to quiet the sufferer. When calm, a joyous
smile would illuminate the sick man's face, and a strange light beam
in his eyes, as he seemed to realize that she who stood before him was
indeed his child.

For two long days and nights did Clotelle watch at the bedside of her
father before he could speak to her intelligently. Sometimes, in his insane

fits, he would rave in the most frightful manner, and then, in a few
moments, would be as easily governed as a child. At last, however,
after a long and apparently refreshing sleep, he awoke suddenly to a
full consciousness that it was indeed his daughter who was watching so
patiently by his side.

The presence of his long absent child had a soothing effect upon Mr.
Linwood, and he now recovered rapidly from the sad and almost hopeless
condition in which she had found him. When able to converse,
without danger of a relapse, he told Clotelle of his fruitless efforts to
obtain a clew to her whereabouts after old Mrs. Miller had sold her to
the slave-trader. In answer to his daughter's inquiries about his family
affairs up to the time that he left America, he said,—

“I blamed my wife for your being sold and sent away, for I thought
she and her mother were acting in collusion; But I afterwards found
that I had blamed her wrongfully. Poor woman! she knew that I
loved your mother, and feeling herself forsaken, she grew melancholy
and died in a decline three years ago.”

Here both father and daughter wept at the thought of other days.
When they had recovered their composure, Mr. Linwood went on again:

“Old Mrs. Miller,” said he, “after the death of Gertrude, aware that
she had contributed much toward her unhappiness, took to the free use
of intoxicating drinks, and became the most brutal creature that ever
lived. She whipped her slaves without the slightest provocation, and
seemed to take delight in inventing new tortures with which to punish
them. One night last winter, after having flogged one of her slaves
nearly to death, she returned to her room, and by some means the bedding
took fire, and the house was in flames before any one was awakened.
There was no one in the building at the time but the old woman
and the slaves, and although the latter might have saved their mistress,
they made no attempt to do so. Thus, after a frightful career of many
years, this hard-hearted woman died a most miserable death, unlamented
by a single person.”

Clotelle wiped the tears from her eyes, as her father finished this story,
for, although Mrs. Miller had been her greatest enemy, she regretted to
learn that her end had been such a sad one.

“My peace of mind destroyed,” resumed the father, “and broken
down in health, my physician advised me to travel, with the hope of
recruiting myself, and I sailed from New York two months ago.”

Being brought up in America, and having all the prejudice against
color which characterizes his white fellow-countrymen, Mr. Linwood
very much regretted that his daughter, although herself tinctured with
African blood, should have married a black man, and he did not fail to
express to her his dislike of her husband's complexion.

“I married him,” said Clotelle, “because I loved him. Why should
the white man be esteemed as better than the black? I find no difference
in men on account of their complexion. One of the cardinal principles
of Christianity and freedom is the equality and brotherhood of
man.”

Every day Mr. Linwood became more and more familiar with Jerome,
and eventually they were on the most intimate terms.

Fifteen days from the time that Clotelle was introduced into her
father's room, they left Ferney for Geneva. Many were the excursions
Clotelle made under the shadows of Mont Blanc, and with her husband
and father for companions; she was now in the enjoyment of pleasures
hitherto unknown.