LIONEL GRANBY.
CHAPTER VIII.
| ——The yews project their shade; the green Spreads her soft lap; the waters whisper sleep: Here thou mayest rest secure. Vacuna, by Sneyd Davies.. |
Leaving with speed the painful spectacle of my wounded friend, I fled into the close and matted undergrowth of the forest, and pausing for a moment to deliberate, I resolved to return to Chalgrave, and brave the remote risk of a criminal prosecution for an offence which juries tolerate with mercy, and courts with connivance. I was willing to trust to that deep-seated public opinion which enacts laws through one principle, and controls their execution from another; and from whose opiate breath the grim repose of the duelling law has never awakened. I passed through many of the classic paths of the old college, and suddenly diverging from the view of its rude and grotesque steeple, advanced into the broad road. I had not walked far before I perceived that I was pursued. Reasoning upon the principle that retreat is more or less allied to meanness, I soon found the hand of my pursuer firmly fixed on my shoulder, while he said, with a stern voice, "Mr. Granby, you are my prisoner! I arrest you in the name of the Commonwealth."
The powerful and iron grasp which was rivetted to my shoulder, declared the utter folly of resistance. Through the fading twilight I could discern the form of a roughly-built, and the countenance of a brave man; while the odd mixture of his apparel, coarse boots and a gaudy watch-chain, white ruffles and broad plated buttons, told the brief history of many a struggling argument between his purse and gentility.
"Release me," said I, "and this (showing a purse, through the net-work of which a golden sea leaped up to the eye,) shall be your reward."
"Mr. Granby," he replied, throwing his hand suddenly from me, as if a serpent had stung him, "we are now equal. I will teach you that I am as far above dishonor as you are. Put up your purse, for I solemnly swear that you shall not leave this spot until you have satisfied me for your gross and ungenerous insult. Take this pistol—I have another; either make an apology or fight. I will measure the distance, and you may give the word."
I was struck at once by the innate honor and Virginian feeling of the man; and throwing the pistol aside, I tendered him my hand, expressing at the same time my regret in having acted so indiscreetly.
"Why do you arrest me?" continued I. "It was an open duel, and Mr. Ludwell is not dead."
"Is that then the case?" he replied. "Will you pledge me your honor that such is the truth? I was told that it was an unfair duel, and I have put myself to great inconvenience to arrest you."
I gave the pledge required, and I was immediately released from the grasp of the Commonwealth; her chivalric man of law professing himself satisfied of my innocence, complimenting me on being a gentleman, and wishing me good night with a profound and dignified bow. I was in no humor to moralize on this singular scene; yet I could not forbear to smile at this strangest of all paradoxes—that he who was prepared to enforce the duelling law, should be so far elevated above its vulgar penalty, that he could at pleasure either neutralize its severity, or trample on its express ordinances, lending a credulous heart to the dreamy nonsense of chivalry, and a deaf ear to the trumpet-tongued voice of Be it enacted. Such is public opinion, and such are laws; when in conflict, a Mezentian union—when acting in harmony, the firmest and most durable base for the fabric of government.
Pursuing my course, I fortunately encountered Scipio, who was going to the college with his accustomed budget of letters, and dismounting him, with orders to go and attend the sick couch of Arthur, I took his horse, and rode rapidly on to Chalgrave. The night wore sullenly and gloomily away, and ere morning, one of those fast, yet light snow-storms, which rush on with a momentary though softened fierceness, had thrown a spotless mantle around the trees, the hills and plains of Virginia. I passed two or three of our negroes on the skirts of the plantation, standing with slouched hats and folded arms, like so many statues of ebony on a marble floor. 'Tis then that melancholy spreads its deepest gloom over a Virginian farm—a solitude fearful, still, and echoless—while all nature bows to its stern influence. The cattle are gathered to the farm-pen, to ruminate over a rasping shuck, or a marrowless corn-stalk. From a pool in the stable yard, a dense and curling vapor overshadows a motley group of ducks and geese, who are quarrelling and floundering in undisputed possession of their odorous empire; while the lengthened face of the prisoned plough-horse takes a more pallid hue from the sympathy of melancholy, and is protruded on the scene like that eternal spectre of death which is ever flitting athwart the path of life. Within the house there is a confused hurrying to and fro of menials in search of wood, carpets, and rugs, while the mistress fairly frets herself into philosophy amid the snow, mud, and her own contradictory orders. A glance from the window will disclose a crowd of negroes collected around the wood-yard, waiting to carry the logs cut by one, who with a heavy whirl of his ponderous axe, and a loud moan, scatters his wounded chips at every stroke. He is then on the crest of the highest wave of vanity, and will ever and anon rest his axe to tell of the broad clearings which have opened beneath his giant arm. I looked on this quiet and familiar scene with an aching eye and a throbbing heart; yet I was soothed into peace by that witching spell which spreads its empire from "Indus to the Pole." It was home—that spot over whose fairy circle my heart, like the gnomon, had dialled all its sunlit hours of joy and happiness; and in the gushing memory of childhood's romance, I almost forgot that the stain of blood was on my hands.
I did not disturb the family until they were seated at breakfast; and in reply to my mother's inquiries concerning Arthur's health, I hesitated not to relate to her the whole detail of the tragic meeting. Lucy entered the room ere I had finished my sad narrative, and catching the truth of my tale, suddenly stared at me with a full and lustreless eye, and looking up for a moment, fell with an hysteric shriek on the floor. My mother's stern pride subdued her swelling feelings, and rising from her seat, with a starting tear in her eye, she led Lucy from the room. Frederick remained cold and unmoved, throwing his fork into his plate, and playing with his tea-spoon with an air of frigid indifference. My uncle alone advanced to me, and seizing my hand, exclaimed in a generous though quivering voice, "I will not forsake you, my dear boy! You have been indiscreet and passionate, but your honor is untainted! I knew that you could not wilfully kill Arthur. Come with me; an express shall be sent to the college instantly. The odds are greatly in favor of his recovery. I have in the library a table of fifty duels, prepared by my pen, and strengthened by my experience. Out of that number but four were killed, and ten wounded. There is only one bad sign in the whole affair, and that is the fact that Arthur fell too soon. I have known many a man carry two balls in his body before he would droop. No wadding entered his body, for my pistols do not bear it; and you may hope for the best."
My uncle's plan of sending an express to the college was approved by the whole family, and in a short time the house re-echoed to repeated calls for the ostler. He soon made his appearance, and in reply to my mother's directions, he gave the usual stable diary of a Virginian farm.
"Why, ma'am, there is not a horse on the land fit to ride. Mass Charles sent the mare out of the county on yesterday to Col. C.'s for a pointer puppy, and as the boy did not come back in time, he has sent another on the black horse to look for him. The chariot horses Mass Charles sent to the court house, with a barrel of cider royal to Capt. R.; and Miss Lucy's pony has not got a shoe to his foot."
"Where is the overseer?" said my mother, who was too much accustomed to scenes of this character to lose any of the calmness of her temper.
"Oh, he went to the warrant-trying yesterday evening to dispute the blacksmith's account; and I heard him say that he would stay at the shop till he could have the beards of two of Mass Charles' Levier fishing hooks altered. Now, if mistress must send, I will get one of the blooded plough-horses, and he will make out as well as any."
This ready auxiliary of a Virginian hurry was necessarily adopted; and in a short time the old servant, encased in a pair of ponderous boots, enveloped in an overcoat which fitted him like a shroud, and mounted on a plough-horse—the gaunt anatomy of poverty—wended his way to fulfil a mission of charity and repentance.
The return of the messenger brought the agreeable tidings of Arthur's convalescence; and when, at the expiration of a week, Scipio delivered me a letter from Arthur, full of undiminished friendship, the spirits of our whole household rose to unusual elevation. They were satisfied that he was now secure from every burst of my dangerous temper; and when I told them that I was guiltless of his blood, I found my recompense in the blush of mingled pride and gratitude which mantled over the cheek of Lucy. My misfortune, in humbling my pride, had the happy effect of silencing that "fearful felicity" of elocution (as Sir Philip Sidney terms it) which made my uncle the zealous annalist of duels, pistols, chivalry, and arrangements.
How naturally does the heart, when oppressed by disease, or humbled by misfortune, turn, like the wounded deer, to the silent refuge of solitude—invoking, under its peaceful shade, that balm of life—woman's love—that rare medicinal, which pours its rosy health into the wounds of manhood's fretted existence. Ambition—the quick pulse of bloated avarice—the rotten pageantry of the world—and the fret and faction of life, may for a while lure us from its sacred altar; yet in our moments of despair, we turn to its holy shrine with renewed devotion, and ever find its radiance, like the brightness of the tropic-lights, flitting its steady blaze around the darkness of our destiny. I was so deeply cursed by temper, and depraved by its exercise, that the love which commonly cheats us into happiness, or obliterates ennui, brought no relief to my lacerated spirit. Romance no longer culled its flattering trophies from the memory of Isa Gordon. I looked on her as one who was too proud to bow to my despotic love, while I had gained by absence from her at college a spirit of freedom and independence. She was my first love; and, despite the dictates of common sense, I was almost compelled to believe that such love was of the purest and firmest character, merely because I had fallen into it in the ignorance and inexperience of boyhood. What a paradox! and how fondly does stupidity cherish it! The boy's heart is a tablet on which is shadowed the outline of an April day—a gorgeous sunshine plays around his imagination, and the fleeting clouds which disturb it, never dim the horizon before him. He loves from nature—he is ever a poligamist—and mistakes the fervor of passion for the truth of love; while his youth, which cures every disease, soon cicatrizes the wound of despised affection. 'Tis manhood's destiny to writhe under the slow and searching poison of unrequited constancy. He lays all the powers of his heart, mind, and education, at the foot of woman; and the blow which prostrates him, shakes to its base a granite fabric. He knows the value of the priceless feeling which he offers, and demands in return a heart which must make him the god of its idolatry. I was egotistical and selfish in my reasoning; yet that very reasoning, in teaching me to forget Isa Gordon, made my heart loiter with a holy enthusiasm around the memory of Ellen Pilton. She had written to me in a style of affectionate and confiding attachment; and though I did not answer her letters, she still continued to write, and wondered why I did not receive them. No dream of my treachery ever entered her guileless heart, and she knew not that her letters were the harvest of my revenge. Suddenly I ceased to hear from her, and I then found that the darkest passion of our nature loses its poisoned fang when struck by the magic wand of love. Could I forget her purity and gentleness of character—the impassioned tenderness with which she had entrusted the destiny of her life—the aspirations of her untainted youth—and all the faith and fervor of her virgin innocence—to whom? to one who had gained this unique gem, as the plaything of a fiend.
Stimulated by jealousy, and prompted by a desire to satisfy myself of Ellen's truth, I resolved to visit a college friend who lived in the immediate vicinity of her father's residence, and there patiently wait until I might have an opportunity of seeing her. My uncle was my confidant; and when I entered his room for the purpose of disclosing my intentions, I found him seated as usual amid a crowd of antique volumes, while his eyes were keenly gloating over the original-brained tittle-tattle of "Howel's Letters." His large centre table displayed a motley mixture of the stable, chase, and library. On a copy of the Divine Legation lay a curb-bit. The Castle of Indolence was crowded into an old-fashioned stirrup. A dog collar belonging to one of King Charles' breed, surmounted Clarendon. Two broken throat-lashes were placed on State Trials, and a pair of spurs had worked their rowels deep into the binding of Stith's History of Virginia. The Defence of Poesy, Rhymer's Foedera, Fuller's Holy State, Catullus, and Tom Jones, were tied together with a bridle rein; while a full record (tested by the clerk of the council, and dated July 9th, 1630,) of the trial of Doctor John Pott, late Governor of Virginia, for cattle stealing, spread its broad pages over the whole table. I caught a glimpse of a long and copious commentary which my uncle had written at the foot of it, in which he had proved the innocence of the Ex-Governor, and the perjury of Kingsmell, the principal witness, whom as the record narrates, "Doctor Pott endeavored to prove an hypocrite by a story of Gusman of Alfrach the rogue."
I soon declared the purpose of my visit, and that I was determined to see Ellen Pilton.
"I do not like her name," said my uncle; "it would have a plebeian sound in any part of the world; yet her mother bore a proud title, and as she loves you, do not act dishonorably. I take it for granted that she loves you merely because you affirm it, but you may rest assured that she will yet make a goose of you. Coquetry—arrant coquetry, is the business, the pursuit, the occupation of woman's life. They learn its treacheries when they dress their first doll; its edge is sharpened by every lover; and many a belle who dies in early glory, coquettes with the priest who shrives her. Venus commenced its practice the moment she was born; and though untaught in its mysteries, she laughingly bid the Tritons to look some other way. Horace reads us many a fine truth about it, and Tibullus and Propertius tell in trembling lines of the fascinations of that female garb which was brought from the Coian Isle. Our Virginian girls have a prescriptive right to all its prerogatives. Oh, there was rare coquetry when that gentle ship landed its blushing freight at Jamestown! Old "Dust and Ashes,"1 that fast friend of the colony, and he who stole this title from a sexton, that under its shade he might nobly endow a free school in Virginia, made their invoice in a gay doublet, and copied the bill of lading with a smile on his care-worn cheek, and a fresh posy in his bosom. Our proud ancestor, Sir Eyre Granby, was present when they landed, and saw them leaping and gambolling about the shore like young minnows in a mountain stream. One fair girl, with a dove-like face and a sparkling eye, gave Sir Eyre a silver tobacco pipe, which she had brought from home for the stranger who should most interest her maiden heart. Alas! he was a married man; and all he could do was to kiss her hand and give her a bunch of flowers. The anxious bachelors who found a wife on that day, imitated his example; and to this hour, Virginia's maidens ask no better declaration of love than this silly compliment. Take care, my dear boy, of their hands; do not look at their rings; and let the flowers grow where God planted them. If they should be sick, do not show too much tenderness. I have known coquetry assume every type of fierce fever and pining atrophy; and remember, that the last dyke in the fortress of coquetry, is the coral cheek of consumption. Go, and learn from experience, and may Cupid prosper you."
1 "Mr. Nathaniel Barber, the chief manager and book-keeper of the Company's lotteries." Stith 216. Even at that dark period public education though a puling was a lusty child—'tis now a paper mummy.
Early on the next morning I left Chalgrave; and finding the outer gate of the plantation closely barred with fence rails, I was about to dismount and open it, when my old nurse made her appearance, exclaiming, "Let it alone, Mass Lionel; I barred it—for I did not want you to go from home to-day till I could see you. Bad luck is hanging over our family. Is not this the seventh day of the month?—the day on which your stout old grandfather died, and on which your father sickened unto death. Did I not last night gather the wild hemlock from his grave; and with a lock of his hair, and a piece of the caul which covered your baby face, try seven times the charm which an Obi man taught my mother? Oh! it was a dreadful sight; I saw you mangled and wounded, and your white hand was red with blood. I heard an owl shriek seven times on the wall of our graveyard; it flew in at my window, put out my light, and left me in darkness. Do not go away now."
"Do you still take me for a child? I must go; farewell, dear mammy."
"Oh! call me dear mammy once more," she replied, "and let me kiss you for the last time."
I granted her request, and rode rapidly away, while I vainly endeavored to keep down the fear and superstition with which her narrative had filled my bosom. My journey was long and tedious, and ere night I had lost myself in the mazes and tortuous paths of a forest road. On every side I was met by gates, drawbars, and gaps—the necessary appendages in the economy of Virginian idleness,—and wandered about until I was finally fairly lost in a broad thicket of luxuriant myrtle. Trusting to the sagacity of my horse, he brought me into an open road, at the extremity of which a feeble light caught my eye. Advancing to it, I found a crowd of negroes gathered in a cabin, and dancing with that joyous flush of elastic carelessness which a negro only feels, to the music of a banjo, triangle, and squirrel-skin fiddle. All of them offered to show me the way, and each invariably decreased the distance in proportion to the anxiety which my inquiries expressed. I took the direction which I had thus received, and late at night I passed by an old-fashioned house, from a lower window of which shot a feeble and fluttering light. Here I met a negro who informed me that I was on the Pilton plantation—that the mansion-house was before me—that he was the best axe-man on the land—that his Mass Edmund had just come home on a fine horse—and that Miss Ellen was sick and poorly. A pang of remorse passed through my bosom; and reckless of every principle of honor, I determined to approach nearer to the house, and gaze, like the pilgrim, on that shrine which held the worshipped idol of my heart. Riding rapidly away from the negro, I suddenly turned my course, and dismounting from my horse, leaped over the garden wall. Cautiously threading my path through tangled shrubbery, leafless rosebushes, and crooked hedges, I quickly turned, as the light from the house streamed before me, and looking up to the window, I beheld the form of Ellen Pilton in an attitude which arrested my attention, and chained my footsteps to the earth. Her head was resting on her right hand, while in her left she held the fatal evergreen which had marked with tenderness our earliest acquaintance. A dark and fleecy cloud of long and luxuriant hair swept over her marbled brow. Her cheek was illuminated with a vermillion glow, like those bright colors which decorate the holiness of some antique missal, while the ardent gaze which she bestowed on this memorial of my treachery, mingled itself with the patient melancholy which disease had written on her face. I saw her weep like a child, as she replaced it in her bosom; and at that moment the giant voice of conscience rang through my heart, pealing the knell of my perfidy and duplicity. Chastened by contrition—humbled by the consciousness of my own falsehood—and elevated by this unerring indication of her singleness of heart, I felt the contagion of resistless sympathy, and on that silent spot I poured out the pure orisons of a love which had sprung from the blackest passion of my nature. I continued in a fixed posture for many moments, inebriated into utter forgetfulness of my flagrant violation of honor. A feeling of debasement came over me, and yielding to its influence, I turned away from the window. My position was no sooner changed, than I was met by Edmund Pilton,—his face almost touching my shoulder.
"Mr. Granby," said he, in a voice of stifled anger, "an eavesdropper!—a cowardly intruder on female privacy!—I wish him profit in his honorable profession, and may darkness ever hide his blush of shame."
I staggered back with fear and agitation; and for the only time in my life I felt as a coward. Nature had given me courage, and education had endowed me with that chivalry which feared only the shame of fear; yet that consciousness of disgrace which wrecks the proudest heart, left me the shuddering craven of its withering power.
"Mr. Pilton must excuse me," I replied; "I was endeavoring to find the way to—" here I half uttered a rising falsehood. "I will satisfy him at another time of my innocence—I must now retire."
"Certainly, sir," said he, "you may retire, and rest in the shade of your victorious laurels; but remember—" and here his hollow voice increased in volume, and quivered with passion, "that if ever you again approach my sister in any shape or form, I will put you to death, even in her hallowed presence. I refused your foolish challenge; but there is a point beyond which prudence loses all its virtues, and the next time I chastise you for an insult to a sister, your blood shall write the record. Neither darkness shall conceal, cowardice protect, nor lunacy excuse you!"
I might have been more humbled by my own sense of degradation, but the last word was a talisman which awoke into frenzy the demoniac hate which had long rioted in my bosom; and approaching nearer to Pilton, I leaped at him, and grasped his throat with the fierceness of the tiger. He was better built, more athletic, and stronger than myself, and in the struggle that ensued, I found myself fast wasting away; yet I could hear his short and strangled breath laboring under the iron grasp of my fingers. He now drew a small knife, and began to cut the hand which held his throat. I felt the warm blood trickling over its relaxed strength; and releasing my hold, I sunk upon the ground. He instantly fell upon me; and after a long and violent scuffle, I succeeded in rescuing myself. We were again on our feet, and I now had time to draw a small dirk from my bosom. He was ignorant that I was armed; and approaching him, as he leaned breathless and exhausted against a tree, I struck him with the weapon just below his shoulder. He gave one groan, and reeled to the earth. I was about to repeat the blow, when a piercing shriek burst upon my ear,—and Ellen Pilton fell upon the body of her prostrate brother.
"Oh, God!" she cried, "kill him not—spare him!—take my life! Is it you, Lionel?" she screamed, as she looked up and recognized my features—"and would you murder my brother—you would not, dear Lionel."
I was silent.
"Go away—I loathe, I abhor, I hate you!"
Ere the first light of day had kissed the tranquil waters of the Chesapeake, my jaded horse was browzing on the fertile meadows of the Rappahannock, and I found a refuge on board the good ship "Tobacco Plant," Capt. Z., bound to London.