De L'Orme. / The Works of G. P. R. James, Esq., Vol. XVI.

by G. P. R. James

Beckoning him to speak to me, I gave him a hint that I had been tender of his name, and that, if he chose to keep his own counsel, he might yet pass scathless from the rest of the family. "I shall punish you myself, Maître Houssaye," continued I; "for I will teach you to get drunk at proper times and seasons only."

"As I hope to live," answered the trumpeter, "I did but drink two cups; and you well know, monsieur, that two cups of wine to me, or the maître d'hôtel, who have drunk so many hundred tuns in our lives, is but as a cup of cold water to another man. They must have been drugged those two cups--for a certainty, they must have been drugged."

At breakfast, I found Helen with my father. They were alone; for my mother was ill from the agitation of the night before, and had remained in her own chamber, desiring not to be disturbed. The moment my step sounded in the vestibule, Helen's eyes darted towards the door, and I could see the flush of eagerness on her cheek, and the paleness that then overspread it, as she saw my head bound up; and then again the blood mounting quickly, lest any one should see the busy feelings of her swelling heart. It was a mute language which I could read as easily as my own thoughts; but still I would have given worlds to have been permitted to hear and speak to her with the openness of acknowledged love. The breakfast passed over. Helen left the hall; and after a few minutes' conversation, my father went to the library, while I gazed for a moment from the window, meditating over a thousand hopes, in all of which Helen had her part--letting thought wander gaily through a thousand mazy turns, like a child sporting in a meadow without other object than delight, roaming heedlessly here and there, and gathering fresh flowers at every step.

As I gazed, I saw the figure of Helen glide from the door of the square tower, and take her way towards the park.--Now, now then was the opportunity. She had promised not to avoid me any longer. Now then was the moment for which my heart had longed, more than language can express; and snatching a gun to excuse the wanderings, which indeed needed no excuse, I was hastening to pour forth the multitude of accumulated feelings, and thoughts, and dreams, and wishes, which had gathered in my bosom during so many months of silence, when I was called to speak with my father, just as my foot was on the step of the door.

I will own, that if ever I felt undutiful, it was then. However, I could not avoid going, and certainly with a very unwilling heart I mounted the stairs, and entered the library. My father had a letter in his hand, which I soon found came from the Countess de Soissons, and contained a reply favourable to my mother's request, that I might be placed near the person of the prince, her son, so well known under the name of Monsieur le Comte. My father placed it in my hands, and seemed to expect that I should be very much gratified at the news; but I could only reply, as I had done before, that I had not the least inclination to quit my paternal home, without, indeed, it was for the purpose of serving for a campaign or two in the armies of my country. "Well, Louis," replied my father, thinking me doubtless a wayward and whimsical boy, "if you will look at the proscriptum, you will perceive that you are likely to be gratified in that point at least, for the Countess states that his highness, her son, though at present at Sedan, from some little rupture with the court, is likely to receive the command of one of the armies. However, take the letter, consider its contents, and at dinner let me know when you will be prepared to set out."

Glad to escape so soon, I flew out into the park in search of my beautiful Helen. It was now a fine day in the beginning of May, as warm as summer--as bright, as lovely. Nature was in her very freshest robe of green: the air was full of sweetness and balm; and as I went, a lark rose up before my steps, and mounting high in the sunshine, hung afar speck upon its quivering wings, making the whole air thrill with its melodious happiness. I love the lark above all other birds. Though there is something more tender and plaintive in the liquid music of the nightingale, yet there seems a touch of repining in its solitude and its gloom: but the lark images always to my mind a happy and contented spirit, who, full of love and delight, soars up towards the beneficent heaven, and sings its song of joy and gratitude in presence of all the listening creation.

All objects in external nature have a very great effect upon my mind; whether I will or not, they are received by my imagination as omens. And catching the lark's song as a happy augury, I sped on upon my way. As much had been done as possible to render the park, which extended behind the château, regular and symmetrical; but the ground was so uneven in its nature, so broken with rocks, and hills, and streams, and dells, that it retained much more of the symmetry of nature than anything else; which, after all, to my taste, is more beautiful than aught man can devise.

If Helen had wandered very far from the house, it would have been a difficult matter to have found her; but a sort of instinct guided me to where she was. I thought of the spot, I believe, which I myself would have chosen for lonely musing--a spot where a bower of high trees arched over a little cascade of about ten feet in height, whose waters, after escaping from the clear pool into which they fell, rushed quickly down the slanting ravine before them, nourishing the roots of innumerable shrubs, and trees, and flowers, and spreading a soft murmur and a cool freshness wherever they turned.

Helen was sitting on the bank over which the stream fell; and though she held in her hand some piece of female work, which, while my mother slept, she had brought out to occupy herself in the park, yet her eyes were fixed upon the rushing waters of the fall. At that moment, catching a stray sunbeam that found its way through the trees, the cascade had decorated itself with a fluttering iris, which, varied with a thousand hues, waved over the cataract like those changeful hopes of life, which, hanging bright and beautiful over all the precipices of human existence, still waver and change to suit every wind that blows along the course of time. My footstep was upon the greensward, so that Helen heard it not; and she continued to sit with her full dark eyes fixed upon the waterfall, her soft downy cheek resting upon the slender, graceful hand, which might have formed a model for the statuary or the painter, and her whole figure leaning forward with that untaught elegance of form and position, which never but once did painter or statuary succeed in representing.

When she did hear me she looked up; but there was no longer the quick start to avoid me, as if she feared a moment's unobserved conversation. Her cheek, it is true, turned a shade redder, and I could see that she was somewhat agitated; but still those dear, tender eyes turned upon me; and a smile, that owned she was happy in my presence, broke from her heart itself, and found its way to her lips.