 | The cavaliers of England, or, The times of the revolutions of 1642 and 1688 |  |
3. PART III.
That the blow may be both swift and steady
Feels if the axe be sharp and true
Since he set its edge anew.”
— Parisina.
Swiftly, indeed, those brief days fled away; and not a
thought of trouble or regret came over the strong mind of Sir
Reginald Vernon.
His part was taken, his line had been laid down from the beginning,
and acting as he did on what he was convinced to be
the road of duty, he was not the man to shrink at the moment
of execution.
He was, moreover, so thoroughly satisfied that the cause of
the Stuarts would prevail, and “the king enjoy his own again,”
that he was untouched by those anxious and sad forebodings
which often almost shake the firmness of the bravest breasts,
when setting forth upon some desperate or dubious enterprise.
He had, it is true, taken precautions in case of the failure of
this done, except some natural doubts regarding the chances of
his own life, on which he looked, as brave men ever will look,
sanguinely, he was prepared to set forth on a campaign against
the established government, with as little dread concerning his
return home, as if he were about to ride out only on a hunting
match.
Between himself and Agnes, there had never existed any
very rapturous or romantic relations, and these had long, in so
far as they ever had existed, subsided into the mere commonplaces
of every-day, decorous, married life. The wily girl had,
moreover, affected so much enthusiasm for the cause of church
and king, the better to confirm him in the prosecution of his
mad schemes, that it cost her little to veil her delight at his departure,
under the disguise of zealous eagerness for the restoration
of the right line.
And never, perhaps, had the unhappy and doomed man so
much admired the beautiful being to whom he was so fatally
linked as when he saw her, on the eve of his departure, with
the white rose in her beautiful fair hair, the chosen emblem of
their party, infusing hope and courage into the meanest of the
tenantry, and adding fresh spirit to the ardor and enthusiasm
of the catholic gentry by her brilliancy, her beauty, and her
indomitable spirits.
Perhaps, indeed, it was fortunate for the guilty woman, that
from the instant of her husband's return home to that of his departure,
the hall was one constant scene of tumult and excitement,
for had it been otherwise it would have been difficult indeed,
for her to have maintained the disguise she had adopted,
or to have blinded her husband, unsuspicious as he was to the
real motives of her joy.
But he was accompanied when he came by a large party of
the Jacobite gentry, and others kept flocking in continually to
be thrown aside altogether, since it was known that the prince
had beaten the first force of regulars sent against him, and captured
Perth, and been promoted regent of England, Ireland,
and Scotland.
Honeywood's dragoons, the only troops in that part of the
country capable of opposing them on their first rising, had, it was
well known, got their route, and marched to reinforce Cope, who
was moving northward to defend Edinburgh, unless Charles Edward
should intercept him; and this fact, added to the prestige
of a first success already gained by the rebels, decided them on
rising instantly, and raising the standard of rebellion, while the
absence of all regular troops, and the dissafection of the northern
militia, should the lord lieutenant attempt to call them out,
set aside all apprehension of their being interrupted, until such
time as their raw levies should be disciplined.
On the appointed morning, therefore, among the flourish of
trumpets, the discharges of a few light field-pieces, and reiterated
shouts of “God save King James,” the white standard
was hoisted, and civil war proclaimed — God grant it may be
for the last time — in England. Above a thousand men were
collected under arms, of whom nearly half were horse, admirably
mounted, thoroughly equipped, and familiar with the management
of their horses, though rather as grooms and huntsmen
than as dragoons or troopers. Still they formed as good a material
as could be desired for the composition of a light cavalry
corps, they were officered by gentlemen, many of whom had
served, and all of whom were skilful in the use of their weapons.
They were full of spirit, and confident in their prowess,
and the valor of their leaders.
Many ladies were present, most of whom, like the fair hostess,
had donned the white rose for Stuart, and wore white
cockades at their bosoms; nor though the ladies Lucy and
were personally attached to the reigning dynasty, did they disdain
to look upon the muster, although they had not assumed
the emblems of the party, much less to talk soft nonsense and
make sweet eyes at the younger and handsomer of the tory
leaders.
Thus matters stood at Vernon in the Vale, on the morning
of the celebrated rising of the '45; and although Agnes was
apprized already that her hopes of betraying and cutting off the
whole party, together with her hated husband, had been thwarted
by the unavoidable call of the dragoons to the north, she
was yet in unusual spirits, for she had no belief in the possibility
of success to the rebels' cause; no fear that Sir Reginald
would escape either the soldier's sword, or the headsman's axe;
and little cared she by which he should fall, so his death should
restore her to liberty.
And hence, never did she look lovelier, or move more gracefully,
or speak more charmingly, than when she bade adieu to
her gallant lord, and saw him with his brave, misguided followers,
set foot in stirrup and ride proudly northward, with banners
to the wind, and music on the summer air.
As Agnes stood on the terrace, with her blue eyes sparkling
with a strange unnatural light, her cheeks flushed crimson, her
glowing lips apart, her whole frame seemingly expanded and
alive with generous enthusiasm, waving her embroidered kerchief
to the parting cavaliers, Maud Gisborough gazed upon
her with a feeling she had never felt before.
It was in part admiration, for she could not but see and confess
her surpassing loveliness; in part, it might be, envy, for
she knew her her own superior in womanly attractions — but it
was something more than this, it was something between wonder
and fear. For she saw now, that there was something
deeper and stronger in the character of her friend, than she
not all right with her.
Maud Gisborough was a light, vain, giddy girl; but the
world and its flatteries or its follies had not corrupted a naturally
good heart, so far that she could not distinguish good from
evil.
She had long perceived, with the quickness of a woman in
all matters relative to the affections, that Agnes Vernon did not
love her husband with that sort of love, which she would have
looked to give and to inspire in a married life. Perhaps, she
half suspected that she did love her brother, Bentinck Gisborough;
but she did not imagine, that there was anything guilty
or dishonorable in that love; that it had ever gone beyond feelings,
and those innocent and Platonic, much less found vent in
words and deeds of shame.
But now a light shone upon her understanding, and she began
to see much which she had not thought of before. And it
was under the impression of such an impulse or instinct, call it
as you will, that she turned to her suddenly, and said in a low
voice, half blushing as she spoke:—
“You are a strange person, Agnes Vernon. One would
think to see you now, so joyous and excited, that you were on
the point of gaining a lover, rather than running great risk of
losing a husband.”
There are moments when the heart is attacked so suddenly,
when overloaded with strong passion, that the floodgates of reserve,
nay, of common prudence, are thrown open on the instant;
and the cherished secrets of the soul, guarded with
utmost care and anxiety for years, are surrendered at the first
call, nay, even without a call, and a life's labor cast to the
winds by the indiscretion of a minute.
Great criminals, who have laid their plans with the extremest
ingenuity, who have defied the strictest cross-examinations,
fault, and their guilt disbelieved through a long course of years,
have, at some chance word of an infant, or at the gossipping
of an old woman, betrayed the secret causelessly, and sent
themselves, by their own act and impulse, to the scaffold, thus
giving rise to the old adage, quos deus vult perdere, prius dementat.
But such is far from being the result or consequence of madness;
showing much more the intense operation of the mind,
than the lack of it. Be this, however, as it may, such a moment
was this with Agnes Vernon; and to the half-casual, half-intended
words of her lover's sister, she replied on the instant:
“It may be that you are right, girl. The gaining of a lover
and the losing of a husband, are not always events so far removed
as you may have imagined.”
“Good faith, Agnes,” replied the other; “I never have imagined
anything about it. It seems to me it were my first essay
to get a husband, not to think how to lose one. But you
are jesting with me, Agnes, for presuming to talk to a staid,
married lady like yourself, about husbands.”
For a few minutes, Agnes Vernon was silent, more than
half aware that she had partially betrayed herself; but, whether
the impulse was too strong for her, or whether she was led
on by the confidence that it was Bentinck's sister to whom she
spoke, after a pause she answered: —
“Take heed, dear girl, take heed, I beseech you, ere you do
get one; for this world has many miseries, but none so dreadful,
I believe, as to be linked to a husband whom you hate!”
“Whom you hate, Agnes! God forbid such a thing were
possible! You do not mean to say that it is so with you?”
“Not so! — not so with me! with whom then should it be
so? Heaven alone knows, how I loathe, how I detest that
man —”
“But wherefore, Agnes? what has he done to you, that you
should so detest him?”
“What rather has he not done to me? Did he not come
and claim me, when I was a girl — a mere girl — a happy girl,
in London — and tear me away from all whom I loved, all who
loved me, and drag me down to these doleful woods here in the
north; and chill me with his stately, stern, cold-blooded, heartless
dignity, till he has turned all my young, warm, healthful
blood, into mere stagnant puddle; till I have been for years as
hopeless as himself, if not as heartless. But Heaven be praised
for it, Maud, there is a good time coming.”
She stopped abruptly, whether she felt that she had gone too
far already, or that the fiery spur which had goaded her to such
strange revelation, had grown cold; and the quick light faded
from her eye, and the flush paled from her cheek, and she let
her head droop upon her bosom, and clasped her hands together,
and wrung them for a moment vehemently.
But Maud Gisborough gazed on her with a cold, fixed eye,
and answered nothing; that conversation had made the gay
girl older by half a lifetime, and more thoughtful than she
would, in any probability, ever have been otherwise.
“I do not understand you, Agnes,” she said, at length, still
gazing upon her with that cold, grave, unsympathizing eye.
“I am not sure that I wish — that I ought — to understand you.
I am going to my sister.”
“God help me,” cried the miserable woman; “I do not know
that I understand myself.”
But Bentinck's sister paused not, nor looked back, but crossed
the terrace, passed through the great hall, ascended the staircase,
and rushing into her sister's chamber, where she sat in
her loose, brocaded dressing-room, reading a light French novel,
while her French fille-de-chambre was brushing the marechal
stunned and bewildered.
“What ails you, Maud?” cried the elder sister, a sharper and
far more worldly girl, “what ails you? have you seen a ghost, that
you look so pale and terrified? give her a glass of the camphor-julep,
Angelique.”
“No! no,” replied the younger girl, waving aside the proper
stimulant. “No, no; leave us a while, good Angelique, I must
speak with my sister, alone.”
“Mais, mon Dieu!” said the cunning French waiting-woman,
with a shrug, “apparement, miladi Maud has found out she has
got one leetle heart of her own, for somebody or oder.”
“Is it so, sis?” said Lucy, laughing at the girl's flippant
impudence, “and have you found a heart, or lost one? But, no,
no,” she continued, alarmed at the increasing paleness of Maud's
pretty features, “it is something more than this. Leave us,
Angelique, and do not return until I ring the bell. Now, Maud,
what is it, little, foolish sister?”
“Lucy,” replied the other, faltering a little in her speech, for
she scarce knew how what she was about to say would be received,
“this is no place for us any longer; nor is Agnes any
companion for us.”
“What do you mean, Maud? Have you gone mad all on a
sudden?”
“You can not conceive, how frightfully she has been talking,
since the gentlemen rode away to join the prince. She
told me in so many words, that she loathed and detested Sir
Reginald; and almost said that she hoped ere long to lose him,
and to get a new lover; and if I do not very greatly err, she
means our brother Bentinck. I do believe she loves Bentinck,
Lucy.”
“Ha! ha! ha! Do you, indeed, believe so, innocent, little
you make me laugh, upon my word and honor. Why, I have
known they loved each other since the first week we were
here. I have seen him kiss her and clasp her in his arms, a
dozen times, when they did not dream that I was near; and she
meets him every evening in the woods somewhere. I am sure
she was with him that night, too, on which she made such an
outcry against some person, who she said, had robbed her. No
such thing! Some one might have detected them together, and
threatened to expose her; and so she wished to have him put
out of the way, whoever it was, to preserve her secret. Bless
you, I saw it with half an eye — I have known it all along. You
are certainly either very innocent, sis, or a very great hypocrite
— one of the two.”
“Very innocent, I hope, Lucy,” replied the girl, blushing
deeply. “I have heard of such things in the great world, but
never thought to see them. What a wretch she must be! and
how wicked of Bentinck, too, and she a married woman! We
must leave her, Lucy — we must leave this place to-morrow.”
“I think so, Maud, dear,” answered the other, still laughing
and bantering; “and, indeed, it was determined a week since,
that we should do so. It is Bentinck's desire; and he wrote
to Hexham, about it before leaving for his regiment — but not,
Maud, darling, because our hostess is a little fie! fie! but because
it will not do for such loyal folk as we to stay in the
house of a proclaimed rebel. Now, do n't be foolish, Maud, I
tell you. You must be very civil to her while we stay here,
and keep your little lips close shut about her naughtinesses; —
in the first place, because you can not speak of them without
getting Bentinck into trouble; and, in the next, because, if anything
happens to Sir Reginald, she is to have all this fine place
and property, and when she gets her right love, her first love —
you know, Maud, dear, she was to have married Bentinck, till
charming sister-in-law!”
“Lucy! Lucy! how can you talk so! But you are not —
you can not be in earnest.”
“Indeed, I am perfectly in earnest, and I had no notion that
you were such a little simpleton. Why, such things happen
every day, and nobody thinks about it, or pays any attention to
them, unless they are found out, and a scandal comes of it.
We girls, I know, are not supposed to know anything about
such things, but we are not blind, or fools altogether; and you
are just as well aware as I am, that a dozen of the fine ladies
of the ton, at whose houses we visit, are not one whit better
than they should be, without taking our dear duchess of Kendal,
into consideration. So just keep yourself as quiet as you
may, and be very sure that as soon as tidings can arrive, we
shall hear from our brother, the earl, ordering us home to Hexham
castle. Now, if you take my advice, you 'll have a headache
this evening, and go to your own chamber, and to-morrow
forget all that has passed, and be just as friendly with this pretty
Agnes, as if nothing had been said. I will go down and
take my coffee with her tête-a-téte, if you will let me ring for
Angelique.”
“I will do as you bid me, Lucy,” replied the other, rising to
leave the room. “But believe me, I do n't like it the least, nor
do I think it will add anything to our fair reputations.”
“To make a scandal about it, would be certainly to destroy
them,” answered the wiser and more worldly sister. “For,
besides bringing down upon our heads the deadly hatred of all
the D'Esterres, and getting anything but thanks from our own
people, all the world say, `Those Gisborough girls know too
much by half,' and set it down to envy or ill-nature, or anything
but modesty or virtue. Believe me, Maud, it is better in
the world's eye to seem innocent, than to be so.”
At this moment the entrance of Mademoiselle Angelique put
an end to the conversation, and not long afterward, Maud left
her sister's chamber, and went to lie down, and think over the
differences between principle and practice, not altogether feigning
a headache.
But Agnes Vernon, after her brief, wild conversation with
her lover's sister, overcome by the excess of her own passions,
faint and exhausted, and agonized by the perception that the
crisis of her fate was at hand, and that if not speedily liberated
from her husband, by some strange catastrophe, detection and
disgrace must be her portion, though she had no blush for the
sin or the shame, was yet overwhelmed by the thought of the
open scandal, and of the world's undisguised scorn.
She could not conceal it from herself, moreover, that she had
already escaped very narrowly being convicted and exposed;
that her infamy was known to many of her own servants, she
had been made painfully aware within the last week, when a
waiting-woman whom she had reproved somewhat sharply for
lightness of demeanor, replied with a flippant toss of her head,
that she saw no reason, for her part, why poor girls had not as
much right to have sweethearts as great ladies; and more too,
seeing that they had no husbands; an insult which she was
compelled to pass in silence, not daring to provoke the vengeance
of the offender.
Nor was this the only risk she had run; for it must not be
supposed that the strange tale of the attempted robbery in the
park, on the night of her last interview with Bentinck, had escaped
the ears of her husband; and when he came to inquire
into the particulars, and heard her version of the story, Sir
Reginald shook his head gravely as he answered:—
“There is something very strange in all this, Agnes — something
which I do not understand. I hope you are not deceiving
me in anything, for I know the person very well, whom
you imagine, but a veritable woman; and although she is a very
singular person, and perhaps not altogether right in her reason,
she is certainly incapable of robbery, or I may add of injuring any
person connected with myself. She has been for many years
one of the trustiest messengers and go-betweens of our party.
Her faith was sorely tried and not found wanting during the
terrible '15, and from that day to this she has been the repository
of secrets, which, if divulged, would set half the noblest
heads in England rolling. She was born in the village at the
park-end, and was foster-sister to my grandmother. She married
a Scotch drover afterward, and went away with him into
the western Highlands, where some adversities befell her — it
was a dark tale — by which her brain became unsettled. She
believes herself to be endowed with second sight, and the country
people regard her as a witch, and dread her accordingly;
but she has not been seen in these parts for many years, coming
when she has had occasion to bring me tidings from the
leaders of our party, under the shadow of the night, and concealing
herself in a vault under the hermitage summer-house,
as it is called, near the waterfall, in the Wild Boar's glen, which
is known only to herself and me, of people now alive. She
had brought me a message on the morning of that day, when I
set forth with Bentinck Gisborough, and has again gone
northward. I shall see her with the army, and will then learn
more of this strange business. But as you love me, Agnes, if
she come here in my absence, suffer her not to be harmed or
interfered with. The lives of hundreds hang upon her tongue.”
No words can express the terror of the miserable wife, as
she learned that the witness of her crime was her husband's
trusted confidante, that he would see her before many days, and
learn unquestionably all that she would most willingly conceal.
There was, however, nothing to be done, and she had only to
in the field, or ere the fatal explanation should take place.
The remainder of his stay at Vernon in the Vale, was fraught
to Agnes with terror and agony most intense and unutterable.
She knew not at what moment the woman might return; she
had no one in whom she could repose the slightest trust, now
that Bentinck Gisborough was afar off with his regiment, and
she well knew that Sir Reginald, cold as he was, and impassive
under the ordinary course of events, was as stern and implacable
as fate itself, where his honor was concerned, and she
foreboded but too surely that the discovery of her guilt would
be the signal for punishment as sudden and as sure as heaven's
thunder.
It was with double ecstacy, therefore, arising from a twofold
cause, that she beheld him mount his horse, and ride away,
never, she trusted, to return.
His departure liberated her from an almost oppressive sense
of immediate peril; and she believed that he was running headlong
on his ruin.
It was under the impulse of her boundless sense of relief
and exultation, that she had given vent to her feelings so incautiously
as to alarm the vain and worldly mind of Maud Gisborough,
and thus, by her own act, she had incurred fresh peril.
Scarcely had Maud left the room, before she became aware
of her own imprudence, and with a vague wish to be entirely
alone, and to review her own position, where she could not be
interrupted — perhaps spurred on by one of those incomprehensible
impulses which seem to urge men to their fate — she took
her mantle and walked away, accompanied by the great deer-hound
which had rescued her before, toward the scene of her
sin and shame.
She soon reached the secluded bower, and entering it cast
herself down on the seat, and sat gazing on the waterfall, and
autumn, scarcely conscious what she was looking upon, so
wildly and unconnectedly did her mind wander over the past
and the present, and strive to unravel the future.
Had she not been in such a mood, she would soon have perceived
by the strangeness of the dog's demeanor that there was
something amiss, for from the moment he had entered the
alcove, he had not ceased to snuff at the crevices of the floor,
as if he scented something, with his eyes glaring and his bristles
erect along the whole line of his neck and shoulders, uttering
at times a low, short whine; until at length he went out,
and, after circling twice or thrice round the little building, laid
himself down at the mouth of the secret trap, and began scratching
violently with his forepaws, in which occupation he at last
became so furiously excited that he burst into a sharp and savage
crying.
This sound it was which first aroused Agnes from her stupor,
but as she stared about her with bewildered eyes, not
understanding what had occurred, a strange indistinct murmur
from below her feet, a faint groan, and a few half articulate
words reached her ears, and riveted her attention, while they
shook her very soul with terror.
The dog heard them too, for he began to bay with increased
fury, and it was not till after a second effort that she could
compel his silence.
Then followed a second, and a third groan, and then a hollow
and unearthly voice came up from the vaults below:—
“Help!” it cried, “help! Oh! in God's name, whoever
you are, help! I am dying — dying in agony of thirst and
famine.”
The words came forth at intervals, as if forced out by the
utmost effort only, with agony indescribable, and were accompanied
with deep racking sighs that seemed to announce a human
An impulse, stronger than her terrors, almost unnatural, urged
her on, though she more than half suspected who was the
speaker. She flew to the trap, seized the dog by the collar,
and tied him with her scarf to an oak sapling which had shot
up in the shadow of the old tree.
Then, after a little effort, she found the spring by which the
door was opened, lifted it, and gazed unconsciously into the
dark cavernous vault, feebly illuminated by the ray of light, half
interrupted by her own figure, which fell into it through the
doorway. It was a moment or two before she could distinguish
objects in the gloom, but as her eyes became accustomed to the
obscurity, she made out the figure of the woman she most
dreaded lying on the bare floor, emaciated to the last degree,
with the dews of death already on her sallow brow. A quantity
of dry clotted gore on the pavement and on her dress explained
the cause of her inability to move thence, as an empty
flask lying near her head, and one of her shoes cut into fragments
and partially eaten, told the extremity to which she had
been reduced in the last week by famine.
“Heaven be thanked!” she muttered as the feeble light fell
upon her glaring eyes. “There is yet time; water, for holy
love, fetch me water.”
“But will you not betray me, if I save you?” — faltered the
wretched Agnes, moved by the sight of so much horror, to the
one soft spot which must remain in the heart, even of the most
depraved of women. “Will you swear to preserve my secret,
if I save you — will you swear it? —”
She spoke quick and short, and in a voice rendered husky by
the intenseness of her excitement.
Then and not till then did the dying woman recognise her,
— “Ah —” she cried — “it is she — the adulteress — the harlot!
floor, from which she had half raised herself under the influence
of renewed hope, and the presence of ready succor.
“No, no, not lost —” cried Agnes eagerly — “not lost, but
saved, if you will swear to be silent —”
“Never!” cried the woman, “never, I will die, sooner.”
“Then die you must,” returned Agnes, shuddering between
the horror of her own purpose, and her dread of the consequences
of her enemy's recovery, “for I can not save you to be
my own destruction.”
“Water, for God's sake! but one drop of water.”
“Swear; and you shall have water, wine, food, surgical advice,
all that wealth can procure, all that the human heart can
desire — only swear, swear, I implore you,” and she clasped
her hands beseechingly, “and let me save you.”
“I must die, then,” muttered the woman hoarsely, “but not
alone — you too, adulteress, you too!” and with a sudden effort
of expiring strength, she raised one of her pistols, levelled and
discharged it at the head of Agnes. The bullet whistled close
beside her, but without harming her; it just grazed, however,
the haunch of the greyhound, who chanced to be in the line of
the aim, and who was struggling already fiercely against the
leash which held him. At the wound he made a yet more violent
spring, and loosening the knot of the scarf, dashed forward
with a fierce yell, leaped over the prostrate form of Agnes, who
had fallen back in terror at the shot, and plunged down headlong
upon his old antagonist.
There was an awful and confused struggle — a mixture of
fierce snarls and broken gasping groans, and before Agnes could
reach the spot — thoughwinged by horror and mercy she rushed
almost with the speed of light, into the area of the fatal vault —
all was over.
But the fierce dog was still nuzzling and crunching the throat
effort that the terrified lady dragged him from his victim,
and led him, licking his bloody chops, and growling angrily, up
the low steps from that scene of horror. She dared not look
back for a second on the multilated corpse, but closed and secured
the trap, with trembling fingers, and fled, pale and haggard,
through the green woods homeward. Haggard and pale,
and with a sense of indistinct blood-guiltiness upon her soul,
though not in the very deed guilty — for when she questioned
her own heart, she was forced to confess to herself that she
would have left the woman there to die alone and untended,
had not the savage hound anticipated her design with unintended
mercy — she felt that the very joy she felt at the death
of her worst enemy, was the joy of the successful murderess.
No wonder that gay Lucy Gisborough found her tête-à-tête
with her handsome hostess insufferably dull, and wondered
what had become of all the light, joyous mirth, and hairbrained
excitement, which were her characteristics, and which, until
now, had never failed her.
Both ladies, in a word, were thoroughly dissatisfied, one with
the other; and it was a relief to both when the hour for retiring
came; nor did it seem other than satisfactory to all parties,
when on the morrow morning, even before the early hour at
which our unsophisticated forefathers of those days were wont
to breakfast, a special courier arrived from Hexham castle, the
bearer of a message from the earl to his fair sisters, that they
should return home with all speed, and of a letter to the lady
Vernon, full of regrets and condolence, that Sir Reginald should
have taken so rash a step as to join the misguided gentlemen,
who had taken up arms for the chevalier (the earl of Hexham
was by far too shrewd a courtier to style a prince, who
within a few months might be king — even although he espoused
the other side — by the odious title of pretender), and
house of a gentleman, who howsoever the earl might privately
respect and esteem him, had yet been proclaimed a rebel.
Hereupon, with a multitude of kisses and protestations, the
ladies parted, all, to say the truth, excellently well pleased to
part; for there never had been any bond of union between them,
except in the person of the now absent major of dragoons; and
Agnes was left to solitude and the insatiate restlessness of her
own over-boiling passions, incessantly craving the presence of
the one loved object of her every thought.
Her children were little company for her, and it seemed
almost as if her undisguised hatred for their father was fast ripening
into a confirmed dislike of them also.
Society she had none, for the secluded habits and grave demeanor
of her husband had deterred the neighboring families
in the first instance from forming intimacy with the stern baronet
and his beautiful wife; and latterly, the increasing rumors
— though secretly whispered only — concerning the looseness
of the lady's conversation, had operated yet more as a decided
bar against her.
She went forth now but seldom, never beyond the precincts
of the park, and passed the most of her time in dark and moody
musings, most unlike to the old levities of her former life.
Only at one time did she arouse herself from this gloom,
which was fast growing habitual to her, and that was when
tidings arrived from the army of Charles Edward's progress
southward, relating the deeds, the victories of his followers,
the wounds, the death, the glory of those who fell in the arms
of triumph.
Then something of their old fire would kindle her blue eyes,
of their ancient brilliancy flush crimson to her pallid cheeks.
A quick, nervous restlessness would agitate her whole frame,
and mark her whole demeanor.
But all this would subside again into the original, cold, and
deathlike quietude, when the despatches were once perused,
and she had learned that her own fate was unaltered — for what
to her mattered the fate of empires.
At first, and for many a day, the tidings were all prosperous
to the prince's faction — first, he had taken Edinburgh, on the
19th of September, and then a few days later he had defeated
Cope at Preston Pans, where Honeywood's dragoons had distinguished
themselves by falling into a sudden panic at the
sight of the highlanders, and running away in spite of all their
officers could do, as fast as their horses could carry them, full
thirteen miles from the field of battle.
Sir Reginald, who had joined the prince, after defeating a
detachment of horse sent to intercept himself, had distinguished
himself greatly, and been slightly wounded in the action.
He wrote in great spirits, and with more show of affection
toward his wife than he had of late manifested toward her, and
congratulating himself on the idea of seeing her a countess ere
a year had passed, the prince having promised to revive an ancient
earldom, which had long been in abeyance, in favor of his
brave supporter.
This letter was rewarded by the faithless wife, so soon as
she was left alone, and its contents thoroughly perused, by being
torn indignantly to atoms, and trampled under foot in a paroxysm
of scorn and fury.
A few days after this she received a visit from her lover, at
the head of a squadron of dragoons, who was now in full retreat
for England, before the victorious armies of the prince,
who was advancing by forced marches into Cumberland. He
came under the pretext of searching for arms and papers, but
in reality, to snatch a few moments of guilty consolation for defeat
from his abandoned paramour, who received him with undisguised
and rapturous affection.
Scarcely a month afterward siege was laid to Carlisle by the
pretender; and after a few days it surrendered to his army,
and with a joyous and triumphant party of his friends and companions,
Sir Reginald Vernon visited the house of his fathers,
eager once more to embrace his beautiful wife and beloved
children.
All was enthusiastic joy and loud triumph. Nothing was
spoken of but an uninterrupted march to London, but a succession
of victories and glories, crowned by the coronation of the
king at Westminster, before the old year should have given
birth to the new.
It was with difficulty and disgust that the wife submitted to
his caresses, the more odious now, that they were aggravated
by his joy, which she termed insolence, and by his success,
which seemed to prostrate the dearest of her hopes. And had
it not been for the revelry and merriment which rendered the
stay of the chevalier's adherents at Vernon in the Vale almost
one continued scene of tumultuous enthusiasm, her husband
could scarce have failed to discover the total alienation of her
feelings.
The only pleasure she tasted during his visit, was his assurance,
that Mabel M`Farlane never having been heard of since
the night of her attack on Agnes, he was well assured that she
had become entirely demented, and during some paroxysm of
insanity had been guilty of the outrage, in consequence of
which she had probably come to her end.
After a brief sojourn, Sir Reginald rejoined the highland
host; and full of high anticipations never to be fulfilled, and
joyous dreams soon to be changed for tears and lamentations,
their proud array took their way southward. For a time longer,
victory still clung to their footsteps. Manchester, with all
the catholic gentry of its ancient county, received the prince
with open arms; and Derby saw his gallant ranks defile, and
gateways.
But there was the limit of his success, the term of his progress.
Thence his retreat commenced, and with retreat, ruin—
for after he had turned his back to the capital, not a man in all the
kingdom looked upon his success as possible, or did not augur his
discomfiture. Within a little more than two months after their
triumphant passage through Carlisle, faint, hopeless, and dispirited,
the army of the unfortunate pretender retreated again through
that old city; but this time so speedy was their transit that Sir
Reginald found no time to visit Vernon in the Vale, merely acquainting
his wife by a brief and desponding letter, that he was
resolved to adhere to the last to the fortunes of Charles Edward,
and since revenge and victory had been denied to him, at
least to die for the noble cause which he had adopted.
A week had not elapsed, before the cavalry of the duke of
Cumberland came up in hot pursuit, thundering on the track of
the rebels, and again Bentinck Gisborough found time for a few
hours of dalliance with his once more exulting mistress.
The parting gleam of victory of Falkirk shed a last lustre
upon the prince's arms, but availed him nothing, and the retreat
was continued so far as to Culloden, where the highland array
was utterly and irretrievably defeated, the rebellion crushed, the
hapless chief a fugitive, literally pursued with bloodhounds
through the fastnesses of his hereditary kingdom, the birthplace
of his royal lineage, and all his brave adherents flying with a
price on their heads, from the vengeance of the house of
Hanover.
The energy and talent which Sir Reginaled Vernon has displayed
throughout the whole insurrection, would alone have
entitled him to the undesirable eminence of especial guiltiness
above all the rebels, but when to this were added the consideration
that he had been actuated even more by hostility to the
any loyalty to the Stuarts, and the secret instigations of the
house of Gisborough, actuated by Bentinck, it was soon understood
that whosoever else might be spared, no mercy would be
shown to Vernon, of Vernon in the Vale.
Meanwhile the prince escaped after incredible fatigues and
hardships. Of his brave adherents, too many perished by platoons
of musketry under the martial law; too many on the
bloody scaffold, victims to a mistaken and disastrous loyalty —
a few escaped, and when vengeance was satiate of blood, a sad
remnant received pardon and swore allegiance to the king.
But of Sir Reginald Vernon no tidings had been received
since in the last charge of Honeywood's dragoons at Culloden,
he was seen resisting desperately to the last, till he was unhorsed,
cut down, and left for dead upon the plain. His body
was not found, however, on the fatal field, and none knew what
had befallen him; but it was generally supposed that he had
escaped from the field only to die in some wretched and forlorn
retreat among the inaccessible fastnesses of the Highland hills.
His name was fast sinking into oblivion, and was remembered
only by his wife, when she congratulated herself on her
liberation from his detested power.
The winter had passed away, and flowers of spring had given
way to the more gorgeous bloom of summer, and still nothing
had been heard of Sir Reginald. Pursuit had ceased after
the rebels. Peace had resumed its sway in the land; and once
more Bentinck Gisborough, and his elder sister Lucy, were
on a visit at Vernon in the Vale.
It will be remembered that Reginald had devised his estates
in trust to this very man, and the arrangement of this trust was
the pretext of the present visit. Lucy accompanied her brother
in order to play decorum, and prevent scandal concerning
the young widow — for such Agnes was now generally regarded,
the mourner for the fate of a husband, whom she now openly
spoke of as a cold, stern, selfish tyrant.
Ill success is a great accuser, a great condemner of the
fallen. And what between the fury of the country against the
vanquished rebels, by which it compensated its terror while
they were victorious, and the address and beauty of Agnes Vernon,
she had come to be regarded as a victim, in some sort, a
very charming, and greatly-to-be-pitied person — a beautiful, innocent
child, ill-assorted with a kind of public Catiline and
domestic Blue-Beard. And Lucy smiled, and jested, and
played the unconscious innocent, while her brother played the
villain, and her hostess the wanton, openly before her unblushing
face.
And the world had begun to whisper that it was a pity that
Sir Reginald's death could not be authenticated, that his widow
might find consolation for all her sufferings and sorrows, in a
more congruous marriage with the young officer who, it was
rumored, had been the first object of her wronged affections.
Such was the aspect of affairs, when late on a July evening,
while Lucy was gazing at the moon through the stained windows,
and Agnes and Gisborough were talking in an under
tone in the shadow of a deep alcove at the farther end of the
withdrawing-room, a servant entered with a billet which he
handed to the lady of the house, saying that it had been brought
in by one of the head forester's children, who had it from a
stranger he had met in the park, near the Wild Boar glen.
Agnes turned pale as she heard his speech, and a half shriek
burst from her lips, as her eyes fell on the handwriting.
It was from her husband, and contained these words only:
“Agnes: By God's grace I am safe thus far; and if I can
lie hid here these four days, can escape to France. On Sunday
night a lugger will await me off the Greene point, nigh the
of, with food and wine so soon as it is dark. Ever my dearest,
whom alone I dare trust.
“It is from him!” whispered Bentinck, so soon as the servant
had retired, which he did not do until his mistress had
read the letter through, and burned it at the taper, saying carelessly,
“It is nothing. A mere begging letter. There is no
answer to it. Give the boy a trifle, and send him home, Robinson.”
“It is from him, Agnes!” whispered Bentinck, in a deep
voice trembling with emotion.
Agnes replied by a look of keen, clear intelligence, laying
her finger on her lip, and no more was said at the time, for
Lucy had paid no attention to what was passing and asked no
question, and Gisborough took the hint.
After a while, however, when the stir created by this little
incident had passed over, she in her turn said carelessly in an
ordinary tone, not whispering so as to excite observation:—
“Yes! It is he, and he must be dealt withal.”
“Ay!” answered Bentinck. “Ay! but how?”
“You must not be here, Gisborough, the while; that is clear.
So order your horse and men for to-morrow morning, and ride
away toward York, or to Hexham, it were better, to your brother's,
and tarry there a week, saying naught of this to anybody.”
“Well? but what then? How shall the rest be done? or
who shall do it?”
“I!” replied the miserable woman, her eye sparkling with
fierce light, but her brow, her cheek, her lip, as white as ashes.
“I!”
“You! Agnes, you!” said her lover, half aghast at such
audacity and cruelty combined.
“Yes! I, infirm of purpose, I! — not with my hand though,
be taken — that we must kill or die. I prefer the former.”
“I will go,” answered Gisborough quickly; and perhaps not
sorry to be away from the spot during the acting of so awful a
tragedy, and to have no absolute participation in the crime. “I
will go, and order my horses now, and set forth at six o' clock;”
and he rose from his seat as if to go and give directions.
“Well, if you must go, I suppose it is better so,” she replied.
“Lucy,” she added, raising her voice, “Bentinck goes to Hexham
to-morrow, to see your brother upon business. Will you
not run up to your room, dearest, and write a few lines to Maud,
with my love, asking her to return hither with him for a few
weeks.”
“Surely, yes, Agnes,” answered the girl, hurrying to obey
her. “I shall be very glad, that is so kind of you.” And she
left the room quite unconscious of what was going on.
Gisborough gazed on his paramour with something between
admiration at her coolness, and disgust at her cold-blooded ferocity,
but the former feeling, backed by her charms, and his
own interests, prevailed.
He drew her toward him, whispering, “You are a strange
girl, Agnes. So soft and passionate in your love, so cold and
stern in your hatred.”
“And do you reproach me with it?”
“Reproach you? I adore you.”
“A truce to these raptures now. This is the time for council
and for action! this deed accomplished, I am yours, all and
for ever — now — where are the nearest soldiers, and of whose
corps?”
“At Edenhall. Ligonier's veteran foot. One company with
Captain de Rottenberg.”
“Enough!” she answered. And, after a few moments'
search in the drawer of a writing-table, she found a piece of
and scrawled some lines on it, in a coarse, masculine hand, ill-spelled,
and ungrammatical, acquainting the officer commanding
the detachment, that by searching the vault under the summer-house,
in the park of Vernon in the Vale, hard by the waterfall
in the Wild Boar's glen, he would secure a prize of importance,
and gain a high reward.
This she directed and endorsed with speed, in the same
manly hand. Then giving it to her lover: “When you are
ten miles hence, on the road to Hexham, let one of your men,
in whom you can place confidence, ride down to Alstone moor,
and forward it thence by express to Edenhall, post-haste. Let
the man use no names — tell him it is for a bet, or what you
will, to divert him — only let him forward it post-haste, and
then follow you direct to Hexham. Once there, invent some
cause to send him off to London, or to my father's it were better
in the New Forest, so all shall be over, or ere he return
again.”
“I will; I see, brave Agnes! clever Agnes!” and again he
gazed at her passionately. “I see; and when he shall return
—”
“His head shall have fallen,” the woman interrupted him,
“and we shall be one for ever — secure and unsuspected; now
leave me. I must go to him, and lull him to security. Fare
you well, and God bless you!”
Most strange that lips, which scarce an instant ago had syllabled
those bloody schemes of adultery and murder, should
dare to invoke a blessing from the all-seeing God. But such
and so inconsistent a thing is humanity.
And then, with fraud on her lips, and treason at her heart,
she went forth, and carried food and wine, comfort, and hope,
and consolation, and more, “the fiend's arch mock,” the unsuspected
caresses of a wanton, to her betrayed and doomed partner,
vault, that charnel-vault, wherein had rotted the mortal
relics of the slaughtered woman, whose bones yet lay bare on
the damp and mouldy pavement.
What passed at that interview, none ever knew. For terror,
if not shame, held her tongue silent, and his was soon cold in
death. Certain it is, however, that she did lull him into false
security; for, on the second morning afterward, when De Rottenberg's
grenadiers, obedient to the note of their anonymous
informer, surrounded the summer-house, and entered the vault,
they found Sir Reginald sleeping, and secured him without
resistance.
The course of criminal justice was brief in those days, and
doubly brief with one so odious to the government and the
country at large, as a Roman catholic rebel.
His trial quickly followed his apprehension; conviction, sentence,
execution, went almost hand to hand with trial, so speedily
did they succeed to it.
No hope of mercy was entertained by Sir Reginald from the
first. The obstinate adherence of his family to the hapless
house of Stuart, forbade that hope, and he made no exertions
to obtain it, neither hurrying rashly upon his fate, nor seeking
weakly to avoid it.
It was observed at the time as strange, that he constantly refused
to see his wife after his arrest, though he spoke of her
respectfully, and even affectionately, to his attendants, and sent
her his miniature, at last, by his confessor. Some attributed
this refusal to a sense of his own past unkindness, and to self-reproach
— others to a fear of compromising her with the government
— but whatever was the cause, he kept it to himself;
and died, with undaunted resolution, commending his soul to
his Maker, and crying with his last breath, “God save King
James!” — under all the appalling tortures which the law denounces,
against those guilty of high treason.
He died, the good, the gallant, the high-minded — a victim
not to disloyalty or wicked partisanship, not to ambitious and
self-seeking motives — but to a mistaken sense of right — a
misguided and blind loyalty to one whom he deemed his rightful
sovereign, to family traditions, and what he believed to be
hereditary duty.
He died — silent! and whether unsuspecting or unforgiving,
even the guilty and fiendish wife who sent him to the reeking
scaffold, slaying him by her thought and deed, as surely as if
she had stricken him with her own hand, though she might
doubt and tremble, never knew to her dying day.
So died, at Carlisle, in his prime of noble manhood, unwept
and soon forgotten, Reginald Vernon. Peace be to his soul!
Vice was triumphant, then, and virtue quite downfallen and
subdued with rampant infamy exulting over her. But the end
was not then. The race is not always to the swift, nor the
battle to the strong.
And so was it seen thereafter.
| The cavaliers of England, or, The times of the revolutions of 1642 and 1688 | |