Excited by the awful picture of desolation I had drawn, I slid down upon my knees and raised my clasped hands, as if pleading for life beneath the axe of the executioner. I must have been the very personification of despair, with my hair wildly sweeping round me, and hands locked in agony.
"To live on, live on together, year after year, cold and estranged, without love, without hope,"—I continued, unable to check the words that came now as in a rushing tide,—"Oh! is it not dreadful, Ernest, even to think of? There is no evil I could not bear while we loved one another. If poverty came,—welcome, welcome. I could toil and smile, if I only toiled for you, if I were only trusted, only believed. There is no sacrifice I would not make to prove my faith. Do you demand my right hand?—cut it off; my right eye?—pluck it out;—I withhold nothing. I would even lay my heart bleeding at your feet in attestation of my truth. But what can I do, when the idle breath of others, over which I have no power, shakes the tottering fabric of your confidence, and I am buried beneath the ruins?"
"You have never loved like me, Gabriella, or you would never dream of the possibility of its being extinguished," said he, in a tone of indescribable wretchedness. "I may alienate you from me, by the indulgence of insane passions, by accusations repented as soon as uttered,—I may revile and persecute,—but I can never cease to love you."
"O Ernest!" It was all gone,—pride, anger, despair, were gone. The first glance of returning love,—the first acknowledgment of uttered wrong, were enough for me. I was in his arms, next to his heart, and the last hours seemed a dream of darkness. I was happy again; but I trembled even in the joy of reconciliation. I realized on what a slender thread my wedded happiness was hanging, and knew that it must one day break. Moments like these were like those green and glowing spots found on the volcano's burning edge. The lava of passion might sweep over them quick as the lightning's flash, and beauty and bloom be covered with ashes and desolation.
And so the cloud passed by,—and Ernest was, if possible, more tender and devoted, and I tried to cast off the prophetic sadness that would at times steal over the brightness of the future. I was literally giving up all for him. I no longer derived pleasure from the society of Mr. Regulus. I dreaded the sportive sallies of Dr. Harlowe. I looked forward with terror to the return of Richard Clyde. I grew nervous and restless. The color would come and go in my face, like the flashes of the aurora borealis, and my heart would palpitate suddenly and painfully, as if some unknown evil were impending. Did I now say, as I did a few months after my marriage, that I preferred the stormy elements in which I moved, to the usual calm of domestic life? Did I exult, as the billows swelled beneath me and bore me up on their foaming crests, in the power of raising the whirlwind and the tempest? No; I sighed for rest,—for still waters and tranquil skies.
It is strange, that a subject which has entirely escaped the mind, when associations naturally recall it, will sometimes return and haunt it, when nothing seems favorable for its reception.
During my agitated interview with my unhappy father, I had forgotten Therésa La Fontaine, and the boy whose birthright I had unconsciously usurped. Mr. Brahan, in speaking of St. James and his two wives, said they had both disappeared in a mysterious manner. That boy, if living, was my brother, my half-brother, the legitimate inheritor of my name,—a name, alas! he might well blush to bear. If living, where was he, and who was he? Was he the heir of his father's vices, and was he conscious of his ignominious career? These questions constantly recurred, now there was no oracle near to answer. Once, and only once, I mentioned them to Mrs. Linwood.
"You had better not attempt to lift the veil which covers the past," she answered, in her most decided manner. "Think of the suffering, not to say disgrace, attached to the discovery of your father,—and let this brother be to you as though he had never been. Tempt not Providence, by indulging one wish on the subject, which might lead to shame and sorrow. Ernest has acted magnanimously with regard to the circumstances, which must have been galling beyond expression to one of his proud and sensitive nature. And I, Gabriella,—though out of delicacy to you,—I have forborne any allusion to the events of the last winter, have suffered most deeply and acutely on their account. I have suffered for myself, as well as my son. If there is any thing in this world to be prized next to a blameless conscience, it is an unspotted name. Well is it for you, that your own is covered with one, which from generation to generation has been pure and honorable. Well is it for you, that your husband's love is stronger than his pride, or he might reproach you for a father's ignominy. Remember this, when you feel that you have wrongs to forgive. And as you value your own happiness and ours, never, my child, seek to discover a brother, whom you would probably blush to acknowledge, and my son be compelled to disown."
She spoke with dignity and emphasis, while the pride of a virtuous and honored ancestry, though subdued by Christian grace, darkened her eyes and glowed on her usually colorless cheek. I realized then all her forbearance and delicacy. I understood what a deep wound her family pride must have received, and how bitterly she must have regretted a union, which exposed her son to contact with degradation and crime.
"I would not have spoken as I have, my daughter," she added, in a softened tone, "but with your limited knowledge of the world, you cannot understand the importance attached to unblemished associations. And never mention the subject to Ernest, if you would not revive memories that had better slumber for ever."