The night was beautiful. The waters of the Channel, often so troubled, were calm as those of a placid lake. The heavens were of that deep transparent purple-black that only summer skies over summer seas ever show. Brighter than diamonds the stars shone down, creating the darkly-brilliant light so much more beautiful than moonbeams. The night was holy. How could thoughts of sin, feelings of revenge, purposes of destruction live in the soul of any man gazing out upon the divine beauty of the sky and sea?
Ah, but Alexander was morally and spiritually ill and insane. He could scarcely be said to belong to the natural world. His spirit seemed already steeped to the lips in that sea of blood seen by the poet-prophet of Italy in his vision of Hell.
How shall he be cured and saved?
And yet he was not unconscious, although he was unimpressed by the beauty of the night.
The deck was almost solitary; the passengers had gone below and turned in, many of them suffering more or less from the effects of sea-sickness; for the boat rolled a little, as small steamboats will roll even on the smoothest seas. No one was left on deck except the man at the wheel, the officers of the watch, and Alexander Lyon and Francis Tredegar.
Francis sauntered up and down the starboard gangway, smoking his cigar, which, at this hour and under these circumstances, was admissible, and meditating most probably on the “coming events” that now “cast their shadows before.”
Francis had no such deep stake in the event as had Alexander, for his life was not to be risked, yet not the less was his spirit darkened within him. He, too, saw the star-spangled firmament above and the smooth sea below, reflecting it as a mirror; but he could not enjoy the vision as once he might have. The crime, the folly of which he had been tempted to become a participant was not yet consummated, but yet he felt that some portion of his own soul was already dead, or paralyzed so that he could not feel the heavenly influence of the scene around him. How should he?
Alexander stood leaning over the bulwarks of the boat, gazing moodily out to sea. I said he was not unconscious of the divine beauty of the night, although he was untouched by it. He saw the glory of the firmament, but as something afar off, which could not reach him, and which he could not reach; but he remembered also that in happier times his spirit was touched, drawn out, elevated, by this heavenly influence. Why could it not affect him now? Why was the divine loveliness beaming down upon this natural world, so silent, cold and still, for him? Why was the living spirit of the night but a dead body for him?
Alas! he knew and felt why. He was a man who had ruined his natural life, and all but ruined his immortal spirit. He had sped too fast and too far on the downward road to perdition to stop himself now. He was like one who, running rapidly down hill, has gained such an impetus that he cannot stop, though he knows that he rushes to death and hell. Alexander knew and felt that dueling was unjustifiable under any circumstances—that it was a tremendous crime—a doubly damnable crime, since it involved at once murder and suicide of body and of soul—perhaps the very worst of crimes; and yet he was bent upon committing it, even though, in doing so, he should lose both body and soul.
The night seemed endless, and the sea boundless, to this sick spirit; yet, just as the watch sounded eight bells and midnight, the boat entered the picturesque harbor of St. Aubins, and soon after landed at the wharf.