His first glance had shown him that the trunks had been disturbed, and a cautious effort been made to replace the contents as they were before. Uttering some energetic expletives of wrath, he knelt beside one to ascertain how far the examination had been carried, when, reaching the packages of letters and papers at the bottom, he saw there, too, unmistakable evidence of a pretty thorough examination having been held of their contents.
If he had been enraged before, this filled him with uncontrollable fury. He stamped his foot heavily upon the floor, and his whole frame shook violently, while with gnashing teeth he called down a fearful imprecation upon the head of this wretched violator, whoever it might be, of the sad and mournful secrets of his past life, which he had held sealed in his own bosom, so sternly, so long, and, alas! so vainly. Those letters revealed all. Some prying reptile had thus slimed the holy penetralia of his proud life!
The very thought was horror—loathing! A shudder of unutterable disgust crept through him; an uncontrollable fury blazed through his soul; his eyes glittered with almost demoniac fire; his face turned deathly white, and his teeth ground and clattered like the clamp of a wild boar’s tusks, and yet he made no tragic start; he stood still, with his arms clutching each other across his breast, and his eyes looking out into the blank distance, through which their concentrated light seemed to pierce to some far object. He at length pronounced slowly—
“Yes, my curse shall follow you; be you man or woman, it shall overtake you in terror! I feel the prophecy in me! The wretch who has thus contaminated those chaste and loved mementoes, shall yet feel my curse! My consciousness is filled with it! I know not how, or when, or where! my curse shall reach and blast the author of this sacrilege!—bah!” and his face writhed into the devilish mockery of a smile; “it is almost sufficient vengeance, one would think, that the wretch found no money!”
Starting suddenly forward, he commenced pacing to and fro with long strides, with knitted brows, compressed lips, and eyes bent upon the floor.—For more than an hour he thus silently communed with himself, without the change of a muscle in expression, when drawing a long sigh, he threw off this frigid look in a degree, merely saying in a low voice, “My curse is good!” and returned to the table to resume his seat and his labors.
As he did so, his eye fell upon a note directed to himself, which, as it had been placed in no very conspicuous position among the objects on the table, had, till now, escaped his attention. He reached it, and the dainty crow-quilled hand of the superscription, the snowy envelope, and the pure white seal, disclosed at once the woman.—He regarded it for a moment, coldly, and without any expression of interest or surprise, and with a slight sneer upon his face, broke the seal, when out slipped a gilt-edged note, which he opened and read aloud with a jeering tone:
Friend—May I not claim to be thy friend in common with the whole world, who have learned to love thee, through thy beautiful thoughts? Stricken, sad, and suicidal child of genius, may I not steal into the tiger’s lair of thy savage isolation, to bring one single ray of blessing, to tell thee how, at least, one human soul has throbbed to the seraphic eloquence of powers, that, alas!—I appeal to your inmost consciousness!—are being rapidly destroyed by your obstinate seclusion in labor, and by the vices of wine and tobacco, which are its necessary attendants. You have it in you to be saved; your soul is tall and strong as an archangel; your vices are the withes of grass that bind you; and love, social love, the calm and genial reciprocation of domestic sympathies, can alone redeem you.
You are proud—I know it! but pride will yield to gentleness, and in a distant land among strangers, the tearless, motherless boy, will not reject a mother’s proffer of a mother’s yearnings. You naughty, haughty child, we must save you from yourself, in spite of yourself!
Yours spiritually,
Marie.
Manton, whose face had, during this reading, writhed with almost every conceivable expression, tossed the letter from him as he finished it, with the exclamation—“Pah! this must be Doctor E. Willamot Weasel’s lecture-woman! Impudent adventuress in every line, as I expected!” And he resumed his pen and his labors, continuing in a low voice as he commenced his writing—“Unfortunate allusion, by the way, to the withes of grass—we cannot help being reminded of a certain Mr. Samson, and a Miss or Mrs. Delilah. Curse her! how came she to speak of my mother?” and grinding his teeth heavily, he proceeded with the work before him, without paying any further attention to the circumstance.