PART I.
There is peace in the Night of the Early Dead—
It will yield to a glorious morrow! Clarke.
Amid all the brightness and bloom which the imagination conjures up, when we think of the sunny islands lying within the tropics, many mournful associations arise and cast a sadness over the picture. Very few have not had within the circle of their relatives, or friends, some cherished one, who has vainly sought the balmy breezes of those favored spots, with the feverish hope that amid their loveliness Death would forget to launch his arrows for them.
Alas! to die among strangers is usually the fate of those who are thus lured from their homes by a deceitful hope. There, where Nature wears a perpetual verdure—where the fervid sun brings forth a luxuriance of vegetation unknown in more northern regions, the wearied spirit sinks to repose, soothed, or saddened, by the glow of existence around.
A spacious apartment on the southern side of a highly ornamented villa, opened into a magnificent garden, filled with orange-trees, oleanders, and many other gorgeous flowers peculiar to the climate of Cuba; while in the distance the sunlight gleamed upon a row of towering palms, whose stately columns, crowned by their verdant coronal, resembled the pillars of some mighty temple, which found a fitting canopy in the blue arch of heaven, glowing with the gorgeous hues of a tropical sunset.
The floor of this room was inlaid with marble of different colors, and the couch and windows were draped with snowy lace, lightly embroidered at the edges, and looped with cords of blue and silver—tables with marble tops, supporting porcelain vases filled with flowers, were placed between the windows, for these ephemeral children of sunshine were dear to the heart of the dying one. Beside one of these stood a large cushioned chair, in which reclined a young man of delicate features and wasted form. He appeared in the last stages of his fell disease, and the friends who had received him beneath their roof to die, wondered that he should have been deluded with the hope that health could ever again reanimate his bowed and shrunken form. There was an expression of care upon his sharpened features—a feverish restlessness in his manner, which betrayed the spirit's unrest.
At his feet sat a young girl, whose brilliant complexion and pale-brown hair betrayed her Saxon origin; the finely rounded figure, the delicately formed feet and hands, and the gracefully turned head and bust, were all evidences of the grade of life to which she belonged. She held the burning hand of the invalid between her own soft, cool palms, and sung in a sweet low voice an old ballad which told of the ancient greatness of the Saxon race. At a short distance from them sat an elderly lady, clad in deep mourning, and her saddened countenance corresponded well with her weeds.
The young man made an impatient movement, and said—"Sing not to me England's former prowess, dear Edith. What to the dying can such themes be but a bitter mockery? Take your guitar, my sister, and throw your soul into its vibrating strings, while you sing me such a lay as I can fancy the angels of Heaven to be pouring forth around the throne of God."
"Shall I sing the chants of our church, dearest Edgar?" said Edith in a subdued voice.
"Yes—yes—they breathe peace and resignation into my restless soul. When I am dying, my sister, stifle your own feelings as you love me, and pour into my failing senses those magnificent strains. If God sees fit to tear me from you before I can legally provide for you and my beloved mother, I shall be enabled to forget the bitter truth in listening to your sweet voice. You promise me this, Edith?"
"I do—Heaven will sustain me even then, my darling brother, and give me power to forget my own anguish in soothing your last moments."
Edith Euston pressed his hand to her lips, and raising from the floor a guitar which lay beside her, she poured forth a strain of melody which seemed to soothe the senses of the invalid to rest. His eyes closed, and an expression of repose rested on his worn features.
Twilight deepened over the earth—a single ray of light, from the reddened sky, fell through the open window upon the figure of the young girl, and the mother, who sat silent and abstracted, thought as she glanced upon her that even in a higher world her beloved Edith could wear no lovelier outward semblance than was now hers. There was an expression of elevated feeling, of pure tenderness in her upturned face which revealed the high and noble soul within. One fitted to suffer and conquer in the dark struggle which she felt awaited her.
Hers were not the only eyes which contemplated that lovely picture of sisterly devotion upon that twilight eve. Another stood without, beneath the shadow of a high hedge, and gazed upon the unconscious musician with even deeper admiration; and his dark, expressive features lighted up with an emotion almost of reverence. The stars came forth in the translucent depths of ether; the young moon cast her tremulous light over the garden, yet still the intruder lingered in his place of concealment. Twice he put the boughs aside, as if to approach the room and announce his presence, but again receded, as if irresolute and uncertain as to the effect his presence might produce.
At length all became silent. The tones of the instrument died slowly away, and the voice of the singer ceased to pour forth its song. The windows were still unclosed, for the invalid had reached that distressing stage in his malady, when his oppressed breathing required a constant circulation of free air. A lamp burning beneath an alabaster shade was swung from the centre of the ceiling, and its mellow lustre diffused a faint moonlight radiance throughout the apartment.
With suppressed breathing the two ladies watched the sleep of the sick youth, and he who had so earnestly observed every movement of Edith, ventured to approach so near the open window that the heavy and interrupted respiration of young Euston was distinctly audible to him; while his eagle eye sought to penetrate the shadow in which his features reposed, that he might read upon them the ravages made by approaching dissolution.
As he stood thus, the moonlight revealed a tall, well proportioned figure, clad in a suit of black, well fitted to his form. His prominent features and flashing black eyes were half concealed by a large straw hat, which was carelessly placed upon his head. As he gazed upon the sleeping form, his lips curled, and a strange expression of exultation came to his face; his eye wandered triumphantly to the fair brow of Edith.
"Twice rejected," he muttered half audibly—"twice rejected, and with scorn, by yon dainty girl; now methinks my vengeance is almost within my grasp. I hold her future destiny in my power; for this boy cannot drag out his existence another week. Yes, Edith—to labor you have not been bred—to beg you will be ashamed, and he who vainly hopes that time will be granted him to deprive me of my inheritance, will perish from my path, just as he believes himself on the verge of consummating his hatred to me."
Edith softly arose, and making a sign to her mother, glided noiselessly from the room by a distant window, which opened to the floor. The intruder hesitated a moment, and then followed her with light and rapid steps. The flutter of her white dress guided him to the retreat she had chosen, and she had scarcely thrown herself upon a rustic seat beneath the shelter of some orange-boughs, and given vent to her painfully repressed emotion, by a burst of tears, when the dark stranger stood before her. She started up and would have fled, but he spoke, and the sound of his voice seemed to bind her to the spot as by a spell.
"Why would you fly from me, Edith?" he asked. "I come in the spirit of good-will to you and yours."
A struggle seemed to be passing in the mind of the young girl. She wiped her tears away, and after a pause answered in a tone which faltered at first, but grew firm, and even haughty as she proceeded,
"What has brought you hither, Mr. Barclay? Yet why do I ask? To exult in the fate of your unfortunate victim; to watch each painful breath which brings him nearer to his grave, with the certainty that the very eagerness with which he desires a few more days of existence, that he may fulfill a sacred duty, is fast wearing away the faint thread that yet binds him to life. Oh false, unfeeling man! depart, I pray you, if one human instinct yet remains within your callous heart, and leave my unhappy brother to die in peace."
She turned to depart, but Barclay stepped forward and placed his hand on her arm, as if to detain her. She shrunk from his touch with an expression of loathing, which called the crimson to his cheek, but he suppressed his emotion, and said calmly—
"I knew that you would soon need a protector, Miss Euston, and I came hither with the faint hope that I might be able to overcome your cruel prejudices against me—that I might become to you a friend at least, if no dearer title were allowed me."
"You a friend to me!" exclaimed Edith impetuously. "You, who lured my brother from his home, to wreck his existence in the life of dissipation to which you tempted him. Ever feeble from his boyhood, you knew that little was needed to destroy his frail constitution—yet, because he stood between you and the possession of wealth, his life was offered as the sacrifice to your criminal cupidity. And now you come hither to watch the last fluttering throes of existence, fearful that Death may delay his arrows until he shall have passed that hour which entitles him to dispose of his property—and disappoint your hopes, by bequeathing his wealth to those who are dearest to him."
"You are excited, Edith. You judge me too severely. Edgar's own headlong passions destroyed him. I merely urged him to do as others of his years and station, without foreseeing such fatal results. My love for you would have prompted me to save your brother."
"Speak not to me of love—dare not approach the sister of your victim with proffers of affection. The death of Edgar may leave me penniless—nearly friendless—I have been tenderly nurtured, but I would sooner embrace a life of sternest self-denial, of utter poverty, than link myself with infamy in your person. Leave me—and dare not approach the room of my brother, to imbitter his last hours by your presence."
"And your mother, my fair heroine?" said Barclay, in a tone of sarcasm bordering on contempt. "What will become of her if you persist in the rejection of the only person in the wide world on whom you have any claim? She is old, feeble, broken in health and spirit. Ah! will not your proud heart faint when you behold her sharing this life of poverty and self-denial, which seems to you so much more attractive than the home and protection I offer you?"
Edith stifled the tears that sprung anew to her eyes, and after a brief struggle said with composure—
"My mother is too honorable—she has too bitter a disdain of meanness ever to wish her child to sacrifice the truth and integrity of her soul, by accepting the hand of one for whom she has no respect."
"By Heaven!" said Barclay passionately, "you force me to throw away the scabbard and declare war to the knife. Be it so, then. Yonder weak boy cannot survive five of the ten days yet required to complete his majority. Then comes to me—yes to me—all his wealth; and only as my wife shall one ray of my prosperity shine upon you. The gray hairs of your only parent may be brought to the grave by want and sorrow, and unless you relent toward me my heart shall be steeled to her sufferings."
At this picture, which was only too likely to be realized, the courage of the unhappy Edith forsook her, and she exclaimed in faltering tones—
"My dear, dear mother! for her sake any other sacrifice might be borne—but not this—not this. My brother yet lives, and Heaven may in pity prolong his existence beyond the hour he so anxiously prays to see. Then we escape your power."
Barclay laughed mockingly.
"This is the fifteenth, and he is not of age until the twenty-fifth, exactly at the second hour of the morning. One moment only before that time should Death claim his victim the estate is mine, and you dependent on my bounty. Think you that the frail and wasted ghost of a man who struggles for breath in yonder room can live through another week? Hope—yes, hope for the best, for despair will come soon enough. I feel as secure of my inheritance as though it were already mine."
Edith proudly motioned him from her path, and fled toward the house, with his mocking words still ringing in her ears. Her brother yet slept, and as she gazed upon his sunken features it seemed to her as if death were already stamped upon them, and she bent her head above his still face, to convince herself that he yet breathed.
Barclay and Euston were distantly related, and had both been educated by an eccentric kinsman, with the belief among their connections that he designed dividing his ample fortune between them. To the surprise and chagrin of Barclay, he found on the death of Colonel Euston that the whole of his estate was bequeathed to his young cousin, encumbered with an annuity to himself, which appeared to one of his expensive tastes, and lavish prodigality, as absolute poverty.
Edgar Euston was then but seventeen years of age, and of a delicate bodily organization, which did not promise length of days. A clause in Colonel Euston's will offered a temptation to Barclay, which he had not sufficient principle to resist. If Euston died before attaining his majority the estate was to pass into the hands of his kinsman, and no mention was made of the mother or sister of the young heir. Barclay reflected that if he could remove Euston from his path, before he attained his twenty-first year, the coveted wealth would yet be his.
From that hour he made every effort to win the confidence and affection of young Euston. He was his senior by nearly ten years, and possessed a knowledge of the world, and a fascination of manner which was extremely attractive to a youth who had passed the greater portion of his life, at a country residence, in the society of his mother and sister. Euston entered one of our Northern colleges, and under the auspices of his kinsman he soon achieved a reputation which was far more applauded by the wild students than agreeable to the professors. He blindly followed wherever Barclay led, and before he entered his twenty-first year he returned to his early home, with a constitution completely broken by the reckless life he had led, and the symptoms of early decay in his flushed cheek and hollow cough. Vain had been the entreaties and remonstrances of his mother and sister; under the influence of his tempter, they were utterly disregarded—until the hand of disease was laid upon him, and he felt that the only atonement he could offer for all the suffering he had inflicted upon them would probably be denied to him.
He earnestly desired to live, that he might reach that age which would entitle him to make a legal transfer of his property to those who were deservedly dear to him, for in the event of his death without a will, his mother and sister would be left entirely dependent on the tender mercies of his successor. An unfortunate lawsuit had deprived his mother of the property which had become hers on the death of his father, and his own reckless extravagance had dissipated more than the annual revenue of his own property since it came into his possession.
Too late he discovered the baseness of Barclay's motives, and renounced all intercourse with him—but he would not thus be cast off. He had seen and loved the noble-hearted Edith, and he forced his hypocritical offers of service upon the afflicted family, until Edith distinctly assured him that he need never hope for a return to his passion.
Euston had long since abandoned all hope of recovery, but he sought the mild climate of Cuba, trusting that the fatal day might be deferred until he had secured independence to his family, but his physician feared that the very eagerness of his wishes would eventually defeat them. It was mournful, and deeply touching, to witness that clinging to existence in one so young, not from love of life itself, but from a desire to perform an act of justice. That completed, his mission on earth was ended, and Death might claim him without a murmur.
The hours dragged heavily on toward the desired day, and each one as it passed appeared to hurry the poor invalid with rapid strides toward the grave, that seemed eager to claim its prey. Barclay had not again ventured to intrude on Edith, but he nightly hovered around the room of the dying youth, and gloated on the wasted and death-like form which held his earthly fortunes in his hands.
A skillful physician had accompanied Euston from his native land, and his unremitting attention, aided by the tender nursing of his affectionate sister, seemed as if they would eventually reap their reward in the preservation of life beyond the hour of his majority.
In pain and weariness time slowly waned, but it still left him life and an unclouded mind; and the bold, bad heart, that nightly watched him, feared that the wealth he so ardently coveted, might yet elude his grasp.
The evening of the twenty-fifth at last arrived. Euston reclined in his chair as we first beheld him, wrapped in a brocade dressing-gown, whose brilliant colors made his extreme pallor the more remarkable; a table was drawn close beside him, and on it, at his own desire, was placed his repeater, from which his eyes scarcely wandered. His breath came slowly and gaspingly, and at brief intervals his physician moistened his parched lips with a restorative cordial, and murmured words of encouragement in his ear.
As before, Edith sat at his feet, with her guitar, ready to stifle her deep emotion, and fulfill her promise to sing to him while his parting soul was struggling for release from its earthly tenement. His mother leaned over his chair, and bathed his cold brow with her burning tears; in the back-ground sat a clergyman, gazing on the scene with absorbing interest.
Each one in that hushed room felt the approach of the stern tyrant, and all prayed fervently that his dart might be stayed yet a few hours.
"My sister, sing to me. Soothe me into quietness by the loved tones of your voice. It is my only hope for life beyond the desired hour," murmured the dying youth.
With tremulous fingers Edith touched the chords, and poured forth the solemn strains to which he loved to listen, and he sunk back and closed his eyes. At first her voice faltered, but she gradually regained her self-command, and never had those clear, rich tones uttered a sweeter strain, than that which floated around the fluttering spirit, which struggled to release itself from the attenuated form of the early doomed.
Barclay stood without, watching the scene with breathless interest, and a terrible struggle was passing in his dark and stormy soul. Euston might live beyond the hour of two, and he would then be a beggar. His eye wandered toward Edith, so nobly devoted, so purely beautiful; and the tempter whispered,
"She might save you—ennoble you; the love, the sweet influence of such a woman are all powerful. Once yours, you could surround her with such an atmosphere of care and tenderness, that her heart must be won to love you—to forget the past. Without her, you are doomed—doomed. What matters a few more moments of existence to one like him, when the eternal welfare of a human being hangs trembling in the balance? Deprived of the means of living, Edith will have no choice—she must marry you, or debase her pride of soul before the iron sway of poverty. Her mother is old—infirm; and for her sake, the daughter will listen to your proffers of love. Take your destiny into your own hands. Cowardly soul! why falter now? It is but completing your own work. He is your victim—you know it, and feel it in every pulse of your throbbing heart. Years of usefulness might have been his, but for you; then complete the sacrifice without hesitation. What avails it to have accomplished so much, if the reward escapes you at the last moment?"
Such were the wild thoughts that oppressed his soul during those terrible hours. He saw that the parchment which disinherited him was placed beside Euston, and the pen stood in the inkstand, ready to do its service, so soon as the hand of the watch pointed to the hour of two; and he ground his teeth in impotent rage, as the moments flitted by, and Euston yet continued to breathe.
Terrible is the watch of love beside the flitting soul which parts in peace; but how much more awful was that vigil, in which the anguish of bereavement was doubly embittered by the fear of future want to those who had been reared amid all the refinements of luxury. The mother looked upon her remaining child, and felt that she was not formed to struggle with poverty and neglect, and the daughter bent her earful eyes on that venerable form, and in the depths of her soul, prayed that her old age might be spared ;he grinding cares of want.
The watch struck the half hour—then the quarter—and a feeble motion of Euston stopped the hand of Edith as she swept it over the strings of her instrument. She arose and stood beside him; a breathless silence reigned throughout the apartment, only broken by the monotonous ticking of the watch, which struck upon the excited nerves of those around with a sound as distinct as the reverberations of thunder.
Not a word was uttered until the hand pointed to the hour, then, as if endued with sudden energy, the dying man stretched forth his hand, and grasping the pen, said in a firm, distinct voice,
"Now let me sign my name, and yield up my spirit to the angel that has been beckoning me away for hours. My mother—my sister, God has vouchsafed to me a mercy I did not deserve. Thank Heaven! your interests are safe. You are free from his power."
At that instant a strange cry was heard; a bird flew into the room, and, dazzled by the light, flapped his wings against the shade of the lamp, overturned it, and left the apartment in utter darkness. In the confusion of the moment, a figure glided through the open window, and stood beside the chair of Euston. He noiselessly placed his firm grasp upon his laboring breast, and held it there a single instant. A faint rattling sound was heard, and Edith wildly called for lights.
Noiselessly as he had entered glided that dark form from the side of his victim, and buried itself in the shadows of the trees without. Many lights flashed into the room—they glared coldly on the face of the dead, and the mother sunk senseless in the arms of her daughter.