Charles Tyrrell; or, The Bitter Blood. Volumes I and II

by G. P. R. James

True love is an unselfish passion; or, at all events--if the painful doctrine of some philosophers be correct, and there be no affection of the human mind without its share of selfishness--true love partakes thereof as little or less than any other passion, and that share of selfishness which it does admit, is of the noblest and most refined kind. Yet we are inclined to believe that it is without selfishness; for we cannot understand such a thing as being selfish by proxy. It is, in fact, a contradiction in terms; and when we love another so well as to be willing, ready, desirous of sacrificing our convenience, our comfort, our safety, our happiness, ourselves for them, we may admit the doctrine, that it gives us greater satisfaction to do so than not, without admitting that we are selfish in so feeling.

It was about four o'clock in the morning, and Charles Tyrrell sat with Lucy under the shelter of a projecting piece of rock, halfway up the face of one of those cliffs which are common upon that coast, not very difficult of ascent or descent, though enormously high, and presenting perpendicular faces of rock in many parts. They are broken, at various parts, by green flat slopes, by occasional trees and bushes, and by steps or paths of sufficient breadth to enable two, if not three people, to walk abreast.

The road which Hailes was to have taken toward the little village, called Alcombe, passed up one of these paths, along the face of the cliff. He had followed it, more than once, in former years, and had imagined that he remembered it still; but such had not been the case; and, after going on for some time, the whole party found that they were decidedly astray.

Lucy, by this time, was exhausted and fatigued; and it was at length determined, that while she sat and rested herself, Hailes should go on, and endeavour to discover the right path. This was rendered the more necessary by the coming on of a thunder-storm, which had been threatening all night. The rain had only ceased for a time, to come down in greater torrents, and was now mingled with vivid flashes of lightning, illuminating the whole bay. The thunder, probably, would not have been very loud, but it was echoed, and re-echoed, by the cliffs and rocks around. While Charles Tyrrell, after having found a place in which some projecting shelves of rock afforded Lucy a shelter from the rain, sat beside her, and held her to his heart, striving to cheer her with all that hope or fancy could suggest to brighten the future, he thought not of himself, he thought not of the dangers of his own situation, he thought of her alone; of all the perils, and fatigues, and anxieties, to which she had exposed herself for his sake; for her he looked forward to the future with apprehension and anguish, and a thousand, and a thousand times, he cursed himself for having given way to the spirit which tempted him to ask her to accompany him.

Lucy spoke little, for her heart was very much depressed. She felt as if the cup were not yet fully drained, as if there were more bitter yet to be tasted, and her apprehensions for him she loved, trebled her apprehensions for herself. She would not express any such feelings to him, but she could not expel them from her own bosom, and they spread out a cloud of sadness over her, that the moment, the scene, and the circumstances in which they were placed, were not calculated at all to dispel.

Nearly an hour and a half passed without the return of Hailes, and the day began to break dull and heavy, with the rain still pouring down in torrents, and the lightning, from time to time, flashing across the sky. Both Lucy and Charles were beginning to wonder at the fisherman's absence, and to calculate what they should do if he did not return soon, when, at length, his foot was heard coming down toward them; but he unfortunately brought them no good news.

"It is the oddest thing in the world," he said; "I can neither find Alcombe, nor any one to tell me the way, and I think I must go back to the place where we landed, in order to find my road rightly. I saw a little church on the top of the hill, some way off, but that is not it, for it lies down in the bottom of the punch-bowl, like."

"But if there is a church," said Charles Tyrrell, "there must be houses near it, and we had better go on there, at all events, for Miss Effingham is in absolute need of some repose. After she has rested herself there for two or three hours, we can go on to the other place, Wrexton, which the Captain mentioned, and, perhaps, can find some conveyance."

This was, accordingly, agreed upon; and, after waiting a little, to suffer the rain to decrease, which Hailes predicted it would do before long, they took their way up to the top of the cliffs, and crossed the downs by which those cliffs were surmounted, toward a small church, which was now clearly to be seen at a little distance before them.

When they were not half a mile from it, their satisfaction was greatly increased, by seeing a group of people near the church-door, and several coming in and going out; but before they reached it the whole had disappeared, taking their way, apparently, down the cliffs toward the seaside. It was still raining, though not so hard as before; the ground was wet and soft, and Lucy appeared chilly and unwell, although the atmosphere was still warm and sultry; but, alas! no houses were to be seen near the church, which was one of those buildings not uncommon on the coast of England, that served both as a landmark to those at sea, and a place of worship to those on land.