What will you have, reader? Two, three, four, five days passed away, and passed in the same manner. Veronica became pale and thoughtful, Morley Ernstein agitated and apprehensive.
Lieberg no longer sneered, but sometimes looked in Morley's face, and once laid his hand on his arm, saying--"In my course through life, Morley, I have seen more men render themselves miserable by throwing away happiness that was offered to them, because their vanity was engaged in the pursuit of that which they never could obtain, than by any other means. Morley, you know your own business best; but, I beseech you, let no such vanity affect you, for happiness is never offered to a man twice in life."
Morley made no reply, but gazed steadfastly forth upon the blue waters before him.
CHAPTER L.
On, how often in life, when struggling with temptation, in the darkness of error and of wrong!--oh, how often would we give the best jewel we possess, for one ray of light to guide us back to the bright path that we have forsaken. That light, indeed, is always to be found, till life itself is at an end, though with more difficulty at every step that we take onward in the darkness; for the hand of a beneficent God has planted beacons all across the stormy sea of life, to guide us into port, if we would look for them. But besides these--these steadfast lights, which mark out the right track, and should keep us ever from deviating--there are a thousand circumstances arising, apparently, by the merest accident, which cross our course, like wandering boats, to hail us as they sail, and tell us we have gone astray. It is for some of these that we long when we first find ourselves chartless, amidst the waves of error. We look not for the beacons that guide us back, but too often gaze afar for some distant sail to follow her in hope of help and guidance.
Morley Ernstein leaned his head upon his hand on the morning after his conversation with Lieberg, and, with his brain all in confusion, his heart full of contention, he would have given all he possessed for any little accident which would have forced him away from Venice. He was ashamed of his own irresolution--he felt that he was hurrying on to the destruction of a life of hopes--he felt that he could never love but one--that his love for her--his pure, high, holy love--even in agony and disappointment, was better, far better, than the fiery cup of mere passion; and that though he might know delirious joys and feverish happiness with another, yet the sorrowful memory of Juliet Carr was worth a world of such enjoyments. But he was fascinated, the magic spell was over him--like the glamour, which the Scotch, of old, attributed to the gipsies,--compelling him to follow wheresoever the charmer would. Poor Morley, however, had not to contend against his own passions only, there were obstacles thrown in his way by others; and though on that very morning he took the same resolution which he had followed in Paris, to quit the place at once, yet he was prevented from acting upon it.
"Lieberg," he said, going down to the saloon, where breakfast waited him, "you will think me eccentric and capricious; but I much wish to leave Venice to-day."
"Nay," said Lieberg, in reply, "that is scarcely possible, for me, at least; and I think, Morley, you will not, a second time, deal so brusquely with me, as you did in the French capital. Wait for me, only till the day after to-morrow; and then, however wrong I may think you, I will accompany you at once."
"Why do you think me wrong?" demanded Morley, sharply.
"If I must speak the plain truth, Morley," answered Lieberg, "I think you wrong, because I know all that has happened to you. I am aware that you have been trifled with, deceived, made a sport of, by one who was not worthy of you, and whose conduct you will one day see in its proper light; and I am sure, also, that you have now within your grasp a treasure, which would make you the envy of one half of Europe, and that you will not take it, out of weak regard for a woman who has parted with you, in the most cruel manner. I say you are wrong, Morley, in point of justice to yourself, and equally so to Veronica, for she is not one to exact from you any ties, but those of love; and it would be less painful far to part at an after period, if you find that you cannot be happy together, than to leave her now, when you have taught her to fancy you everything that she has dreamt of as forming the being for whom she could regard the whole of the rest of the world with coldness. But you would be happy! She is too enthusiastic and devoted, ever to lose that dream; and you would find in her that love which alone can give you felicity, and that endless variety which would keep up the charm to the last hour of life. However, to-day you cannot go, for you forget you left your carriage at Mestre, with a broken spring, and it cannot be repaired before to-morrow."