A man less deeply read in the human heart, or less persevering in his Christian charities, would have turned away and left her, as one utterly irreclaimable, but the missionary was both too wise and too good thus to relinquish the influence he had gained. There was something artificial in the daring front and reckless impiety of the being before him, which betrayed a strange, but not uncommon, desire to be supposed worse than she really was.
With the ready tact of a man who has made character a study, he saw that words of reproof or authority were unlikely to soften a heart so stern in its mental pride, and his own kind feelings taught him the method of reaching hers. This keen desire to learn something of her secret history would have been surprising in a man of less comprehensive benevolence, and even in him there was a restless anxiety of manner but little in accordance with his usual quiet demeanor. His voice was like the breaking up of a fountain when he spoke again.
“Catharine,” he said.
She started at the name—her arms dropped—she looked wildly in his eyes:
“Oh! I mentioned the name,” she muttered, refolding her arms and drawing a deep breath.
“Catharine Montour, this hardihood is unreal; you are not thus unbelieving. Has the sweet trustfulness of your childhood departed forever? Have you no thought of those hours when the young heart is made up of faith and dependence—when prayer and helpless love break out from the soul, naturally as moisture exhales when the sun touches it? Nay,” he continued, with more powerful earnestness, as he saw her eyes waver and grow dim beneath the influence of his voice, “resist not the good spirit, which even now is hovering about your heart, as the ring-dove broods over its desolated nest. Hoarded thoughts of evil beget evil. Open your heart to confidence and counsel. Confide in one who never yet betrayed trust—one who is no stranger to sorrow, and who is too frail himself to lack charity for the sins of others. I beseech you to tell me, are you not of English birth?”
Tears, large and mournful tears, stood in Catharine Montour’s eyes. She was once more subdued and humble as an infant. A golden chord had been touched in her memory, and every heart-string vibrated to the music of other years. She sat down and opened her history to that strange man abruptly, and as one under the influence of a dream.
“Yes, I was born in England,” she said; “born in a place so beautiful that any human being might be happy from the mere influence of its verdant and tranquil quietness. No traveller ever passed through that village without stopping to admire its verdant and secluded tranquillity. Back from the church stood the parsonage, an irregular old building, surrounded by a grove of magnificent oaks, through which its pointed roof and tall chimneys alone could be seen from the village. A tribe of rooks dwelt in the oaks, and a whole bevy of wrens came and built their nests in the vines. With my earliest recollection comes the soft chirp of the nestlings under my window, and the carolling song which broke up from the larks when they left the long grass in the graveyard, where they nested during the summer nights.
“My father was rector of the parish, the younger son of a noble family. He had a small, independent fortune, which allowed him to distribute the income from his living among the poor of the village. My mother was a gentle creature, of refined and delicate, but not comprehensive, mind. She loved my father, and next to him, or rather as a portion of himself, me. As a child, I was passionate and wayward, but warm of heart, forgiving and generous. My spirit brooked no control; but my indulgent father and sweet mother could see nothing more dangerous than a quick intellect and over-abundant healthfulness in the capricious tyranny of my disposition. I was passionately fond of my mother, and when she sometimes stole to my bedside and hushed me to sleep with her soft kisses and pleasant voice I would promise in my innermost heart never to grieve her again; yet the next day I experienced a kind of pleasure in bringing the tears to her gentle eyes by some wayward expression of obstinacy or dislike.”