“Isidora!” he whispered in the softest tones he could assume, approaching the casement, at which his pale and beautiful victim stood; “Isidora! will you then be mine?”—“What shall I say?” said Isidora; “if love requires the answer, I have said enough; if only vanity, I have said too much.”—“Vanity! beautiful trifler, you know not what you say; the accusing angel himself might blot out that article from the catalogue of my sins. It is one of my prohibited and impossible offences; it is an earthly feeling, and therefore one which I can neither participate or enjoy. Certain it is that I feel some share of human pride at this moment.”—“Pride! at what? Since I have known you, I have felt no pride but that of supreme devotedness,—that self-annihilating pride which renders the victim prouder of its wreath, than the sacrificer of his office.”—“But I feel another pride,” answered Melmoth, and in a proud tone he spoke it,—“a pride, which, like that of the storm that visited the ancient cities, whose destruction you may have read of, while it blasts, withers, and encrusts paintings, gems, music, and festivity, grasping them in its talons of annihilation, exclaims, Perish to all the world, perhaps beyond the period of its existence, but live to me in darkness and in corruption! Preserve all the exquisite modulation of your forms! all the indestructible brilliancy of your colouring!—but preserve it for me alone!—me, the single, pulseless, eyeless, heartless embracer of an unfertile bride,—the brooder over the dark and unproductive nest of eternal sterility,—the mountain whose lava of internal fire has stifled, and indurated, and inclosed for ever, all that was the joy of earth, the felicity of life, and the hope of futurity!”
“As he spoke, his expression was at once so convulsed and so derisive, so indicative of malignity and levity, so thrilling to the heart, while it withered every fibre it touched and wrung, that Isidora, with all her innocent and helpless devotedness, could not avoid shuddering before this fearful being, while, in trembling and unappeaseable solicitude, she demanded, “Will you then be mine? Or what am I to understand from your terrible words? Alas! my heart has never enveloped itself in mysteries—never has the light of its truth burst forth amid the thunderings and burnings in which you have issued the law of my destiny.”—“Will you then be mine, Isidora?”—“Consult my parents. Wed me by the rites, and in the face of the church, of which I am an unworthy member, and I will be yours for ever.”—“For ever!” repeated Melmoth; “well-spoken, my bride. You will then be mine for ever?—will you, Isidora?”—“Yes!—yes!—I have said so. But the sun is about to rise, I feel the increasing perfume of the orange blossoms, and the coolness of the morning air. Begone—I have staid too long here—the domestics may be about, and observe you—begone, I implore you.”—“I go—but one word—for to me the rising of the sun, and the appearance of your domestics, and every thing in heaven above, and earth beneath, is equally unimportant. Let the sun stay below the horizon and wait for me. You are mine!”—“Yes, I am yours; but you must solicit my family.”—“Oh, doubtless!—solicitation is so congenial to my habits.”—“And”—— “Well, what?—you hesitate.”—“I hesitate,” said the ingenuous and timid Isidora, “because”—— “Well?”—“Because,” she added, bursting into tears, “those with whom you speak will not utter to God language like mine. They will speak to you of wealth and dower; they will inquire about that region where you have told me your rich and wide possessions are held; and should they ask me of them, how shall I answer?”
“At these words, Melmoth approached as close as possible to the casement, and uttered a certain word which Isidora did not at first appear to hear, or understand—trembling she repeated her request. In a still lower tone the answer was returned. Incredulous, and hoping that the answer had deceived her, she again repeated her petition. A withering monosyllable, not to be told, thundered in her ears,—and she shrieked as she closed the casement. Alas! the casement only shut out the form of the stranger—not his image.
CHAPTER XXI.
He saw the eternal fire that keeps,
In the unfathomable deeps,
Its power for ever, and made a sign
To the morning prince divine;
Who came across the sulphurous flood,
Obedient to the master-call,