Vashti; Or, Until Death Us Do Part

by Augusta J. Evans

Mrs. Gerome sat erect, with her hands resting on the balustrade, and under that mysteriously white moon her pearl-pale face looked as hopelessly cold and rigid as any Persepolitan sphinx, that nightly fronts the immemorial stars which watch the ruined tombs of Chilminar.

Raising her fingers to her forehead, she lifted and shook a band of the shining white hair, and resumed her narration, in the same steady, passionless tone.

“These gray locks were the fruit of that bridal day, for, on the afternoon that we sailed, I was taken very ill with what was called congestion of the brain,—was unconscious throughout the voyage, and when we reached Liverpool, my hair, once so black and glossy, was as you see it now. Ah! how often, since that time, have I heard poor Elsie mourning over my mother’s untimely death, and quoting that ancient superstition, ‘You should never wean a child while trees are in blossom; otherwise it will have gray hair.’ Mr. Wright was so prostrated by grief at what had occurred, that he survived my departure only a few weeks; and at his death, Mr. Carlyle attempted to seize and control my estate. Urging the plea of my minority, he insisted upon assuming the charge of my property, and in order to consummate his avaricious designs, and screen his name from opprobrium, he told the world that I was hopelessly insane; and that the discovery of this fact, one hour after his marriage, had induced him to send me abroad under the care of a faithful and judicious nurse. To give plausibility to this statement, a paragraph was inserted in the New York papers announcing that I was a raving maniac and an inmate of an English asylum for lunatics. Mr. Clayton, my lawyer, was the sole surviving witness of my 371 final interview, and of its financial provisions; and, had he yielded to bribes and threats which were unsparingly offered, God only knows what would have been my fate, since the tender mercies of my husband destined me to the cheerful and attractive precincts of a mad-house. To Mr. Clayton’s stern integrity and brave defence, I am indebted for the preservation of my fortune and the defeat of a daring and iniquitous scheme to arrest me in London and commit me to the custody of an asylum-warden. Fortunately for me, he lived long enough to transfer to my own guardianship, when I attained my majority, the estate which had cost me every earthly hope. Six months after my departure from America I bade farewell to Europe, and plunged into the most remote and unfrequented portions of the East, where I wished to remain unknown and unnoticed. In a half-defiant and half-superstitious mood, I had assumed the talismanic and mystical name of Alga Gerome, with the faint hope that it might shield me from the intrigues and persecutions which I felt assured would always dog the steps of Evelyn Carlyle. Having appointed a cautious and confidential agent in New York and Paris, I destroyed all traces of my whereabouts, and became as utterly lost to the world as though the portals of the grave had closed upon me. Without friends, and accompanied only by Elsie and her son Robert, I lived year after year in wandering through strange lands. Books and pictures were my solace, and to strangle time I first devoted myself to drawing and painting. After a while I came back to Rome, and frequented the studios and galleries, perfecting myself in the mechanical department of Art. But fear of encountering some familiar face drove me from the Eternal City, and a sudden whim took me to Madeira, where I spent the only portion of my life to which I recur with any degree of satisfaction. There, surrounded by magnificent scenery, and safe from intrusion, I intended to drag out the remainder of my dreary years; but poor Elsie grew so restless, so homesick, so impatient to visit the graves of her household band, that I finally allowed myself to be persuaded into returning to my native land. Robert preceded us, and purchased this 372 secluded spot, which I had stipulated must be upon the sea-shore and secure from all intrusion. Avoiding New York, I came reluctantly to Boston, thence to ‘Solitude,’ without seeing or hearing of any whom I had once known. When I was twenty-one, I transferred to Mr. Carlyle the sum of thirty thousand dollars, as a final settlement; but my agent scrupulously obeyed my instructions, and no human being, save himself, is aware of my place of residence or the name under which I am sheltered. Strenuous efforts have been made by Mr. Carlyle to unearth his wretched dupe, but since I left England, nearly eight years ago, he has been unable to discover any trace of my location. From time to time I received bills, contracted by him, and paid by my lawyer after I left New York; and in my escritoire are two accounts of jewellers, where I find charged the flashing ring and costly diamond cross, which I refused to retain but for which I paid, after my separation. Prone to dissipation, Mr. Carlyle plunged into excesses that would have squandered royal portions, and my agent writes that his eagerness to ascertain where I am residing has recently increased, in consequence of his pecuniary necessities, although the terms of our separation deprive him of every shadow of claim upon me or my purse. Such, Dr. Grey, is the shattered idol of my girlish adoration,—such the divinity of dust upon which I spent the treasures of my love and trust. Gray-haired, gray-hearted, mocked, and maddened in the dawn of my confiding womanhood, nominally a wife, but in reality a nameless waif, shut out from happiness, and pitied as a maniac,—such, is that most desolate and isolated woman, whom, as Agla Gerome, you have known as the mistress of this lonely place. As for my name, I sometimes wonder whether in the last great gathering in the court of Heaven, my own mother will know what to call her unbaptized child,—whether the sins charged against me will be read out as those of Vashti, or Evelyn, or Agla. Elsie persistently clung to Vashti, and verily there seems a grim fitness in her selection,—a dismal analogy between my blasted life and that of the discrowned Persian Queen. Be that as it may, if I miss a name I surely shall not miss the equity that 373 man denies me. ‘So long as ye both shall live.’ When I look out in springtime, over the blossoming earth, daisies, and violets, and primroses range themselves into lines that spell out these hated words of an ever-echoing vow, and if, in midnight hours, I raise my weary eyes, the sleepless stars revengefully group themselves, and flash back to me, in burning characters, ‘Till death us do part.’ Up yonder, behind sun, and planet, and nebulæ, I shall look God in the face, and pointing to my withered heart and blighted life, can say truly, ‘At least I kept the ruins free from perjury; there, at your feet, is the oath unsullied, that I called you to accept on the awful day when I knelt at your altar.’ Love, honor, and obedience, Maurice Carlyle’s unworthiness rendered impossible; but the vow which consecrated and set me apart, which forbade the thought that other men might offer homage and affection, or even ordinary tributes of admiration, I have kept sacredly and faithfully. I might have plunged into the whirlpool of fashionable life, and found temporary oblivion of my humiliation and disappointment; but from such a career my whole being revolted, and in seclusion I have dragged out a dreary series of years that can scarcely be termed life. Recently I have been honored by several proposals for a divorce, on condition of an additional settlement of money upon my eminently chivalric and devoted husband; but my invariable reply has been, human legislation is impotent to cancel the statutes of Almighty God, which declare that only death can free what Jehovah has joined together, and the legal provisions of man crumble and shrivel before the divine command, ‘For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth.’ With what impatience, what ceaseless yearning, I await the cold touch of that deliverer who alone can sever my galling, detested fetters, none but the God above us can understand and realize. The eagerness with which I once anticipated my bridal hour does not approximate the intensity of my longing for the day of my death. O merciful God! surely, surely, I have been sufficiently tortured, and the tardy release can not be far distant.”

She raised her face skyward, as if invoking Divine aid, but 374 her wan lips were voiceless; and only the song of the surf mingled with the whisper of trembling poplars, whose fading leaves gleamed ghostly and chill under the silver sheen of that broad white moon.

“There heavily, across the troubled night, A warning comet trails her hideous hair, And underneath, the wroth sea-waves are white.”

During the hour in which Dr. Grey listened to the recital of this woman’s hapless career, she became as utterly dead to him as though shroud and sepulchre had already claimed her; and when she ceased speaking, he looked as sorrowfully down at her fair, frozen face, as if the coffin-lid were shutting it forever from his view.

Henceforth she was as sacred in his sad eyes as some beloved corpse, and bowing his head upon his hands, he prayed long but silently that God would strengthen him for the duties of a desolate future,—would sanctify this grievous disappointment to his eternal welfare, and grant him power to lead heavenward the heart of the only woman whom he had ever desired to call his own.

Putting away the beautiful dreams wherein this regal form had moved to and fro as crown and queen of his home and heart, he calmly resigned the cherished scheme that linked this woman’s life with his; and felt that he would gladly barter all his earthly hopes for the assurance, that, throughout eternity, he might be allowed the companionship which time denied him.

Mrs. Gerome rose, and folding her mantle around her, said proudly,—

“Married life, unhallowed by love, is more acceptable in your righteous eyes than my isolated existence; and you have passed sentence against me. So be it. Strange code of morality you Christians hug to your hearts, squeezing the form that holds no spirit; but some day I shall be acquitted by that incorruptible tribunal where God alone has the right to judge us. Till then, farewell.”