I saw her leaning on his full chest, her arms encircling his neck, her little mouth united to his, her soft eyes fixed on his, and he was gazing into hers with the same fondness—only more animal passion added to it. Tears fell like pearly dew from her eyes, and I saw him pause, as he spoke, and wipe them away with his small hand. I listened to hear their voices speak again, unable to explain to myself this singular scene.
“Is not love the same? Can an empty ceremony—said over two lovers—render more binding the greatest, best, and noblest sentiment of our nature. Say, Blanche!—my beautiful one, my ocean pearl!—could the words of the matrimonial service make me more constant,—make me love you more than I now do? You, my heart’s worship, my idol! shall I not give you my whole soul; and what more can I do? If an unhallowed, a conventional form into which I was persuaded—forced; if that wretched link of earth binds me, in earthly form, to another,—what matters it? Consider, love, it is the same, so long as we are constant to our attachment: that constitutes the perfidy. Oh! listen not to the world’s prudence—to the cold calculations of a prudish moral. Let feeling usurp its place, and that I know will triumph—will plead my cause. Come with me this night—now; beneath the light of yonder bright silver. We will seek some other land, or a distant part of this country, where your fault—if that can be called fault which consumates my bliss—will be unknown, unheard of; and we will live in blest harmony and love. Come, dearest; come?”
“No, no!” and her voice was choked by tears. “My love is all wrong: it is unhallowed. You are a married man. If I fly with you, disgrace follows me: you have a wife in England: you must forget me, and I, you. Even were you free, would you marry me? Consider your rank, and I an actress.”
“Blanche, you mean not what you say, when you tell me to forget you. Do you really wish me to return to England to my dull wife—ten years my senior—and the stupidity of home—a home like that? Do you really wish it? If so,—farewell.”
He made a movement to turn away; but she clung still closer to his bosom, and buried her head there.
“Cruel! oh, cruel! I do not want you to go.”
“Consent, then, to go with me. Come now, this moment? I will get a carriage, and morning light shall find us far away. Decide, Blanche, between my loss and my happiness. No answer? Blanche, are you dreaming, love?”
“No; I was thinking of Genevra, my faithful friend. What will she think of my conduct! How mysterious it will seem to her: how ungrateful! but I love her,—oh, so dearly! She is the only woman who ever loved me, and I return her feelings with usury, too. Let me at least run up to her room, and, as she sleeps, kiss her farewell. I feel, for the last time, and here,—while the moon shines so bright above—while I consent to forfeit, for your sake, my good name, inviolate till this moment,—here let me gaze upon those starry spheres, and call down upon her young head their resplendent blessings. Oh, Heavenly Spirit! preserve her as she now is—beautiful and pure as the lily of the valley. Preserve her from that error of the heart which I now commit, which leads me to sin—knowing that sin. Grant that, in some future state, our souls may meet—may hold communion with each other, and be conscious of affinity. Holy influences of heaven! spirit of night and air! grant my prayer.”
I saw her sink upon her knees, clasp her hands on her white neck, and fix her eyes on the starry firmament. Thus she remained a moment, in a breathless ecstacy of thought, when Lord Glenfells gently raised her, and once more folded her to his bosom.
“Why this tumult of passion, dearest? What agitates you so?”