Morley led Juliet forth, and then, in the same grave tone in which he had hitherto spoken, besought her to change her dress, and take some refreshment and repose. "I must go myself," he added, "to make sure that there is assistance at hand, in case of any of the poor wretches in the other boat reaching the shore. Though they abandoned you and their companions, we must not abandon them. Farewell; then, for to-night. Lie down to rest. We shall meet again to-morrow--Juliet."
Juliet gazed on him in silence and sadness, but made no reply, and Morley left her.
About an hour was spent by the young Englishman in sending people with lights along the rocks, but without any result. The boat, with which some of the seamen had left the ship, had, as the master of the vessel said, gone down almost immediately, and the bodies of those that it contained were not found for several days.
With a slow and thoughtful step while the moon began to struggle with the clouds, Morley Ernstein returned to his own dwelling, passed along the corridor, gave some orders to Adam Gray, and entered the saloon. To his surprise, on raising his eyes, he beheld Juliet standing as if watching for his return. Morley paused for a moment, gazed at her with a look full of emotions that could not be spoken; then closed the door, and, advancing, threw his arms around her, and pressed her to his heart. Juliet strove not to withdraw herself, but leaned her face upon his bosom, and wept.
"Juliet," he said, in a low voice, as he felt her heart throbbing against his--"Juliet, we must never part! It is no longer happiness or misery with me, Juliet--it is life or death. You are mine, or no other sun ever rises for me again. Choose, Juliet--choose! The words of fate are upon your lips. If you love me, you are mine--if you love me not, I am nothing!"
"I do--I do," cried Juliet, throwing her own arms around him, and speaking with a vehemence that he had never known her use; "I do love you, Morley--I always have loved you--I never loved any but you. Think not you have suffered alone, Morley,--oh, I have endured more than it is possible for human language to declare! Can you doubt that I love you? if you do, tell me how you will have me prove my love, and I am ready to do it, even though the breaking of my vow should break my heart, and destroy me here, as well as bring wrath upon my head hereafter. Speak, Morley--speak!--Love you? Oh, yes! better than any thing on earth--better, I fear, than heaven!"
Morley clasped her closer to his heart, and pressed his lips again and again upon her brow and cheek; they burned, as if with fire. She had asked him what he would have her do, and now he told her, with all the eloquent words of passion. He saw her gaze wildly upon him: he thought that she hesitated. Then all the fell words with which Lieberg had urged him came back to his memory, and he was about to employ their power upon her also--from the tempted to become the tempter! But happily--oh most happily for both, Juliet replied before he had blasted her esteem.
"Say no more, Morley," she said--"say no more--I am yours for ever;" and she put her hand in his. "Oh, Lord God!" she added, "if I sin in breaking the solemn vow I made to those who first gave me life, forgive me in thy mercy! But for him, on whose account I break it, that life which they gave would now be at an end. His is the existence that I henceforth possess, and surely it can be no crime to dedicate it all to him! I will try, Morley," she continued--"I will try to forget that vow that I have made to those who are dead, or to think that I am now exempt from its obligation; yet I fear it will often return to make your Juliet sad, and that my peace of mind will always be disturbed by the thought of a parent's curse."
Morley cast down his eyes as one bewildered. He gazed thoughtfully on the ground for several moments. He trembled at the feeling of a great escape; and then he murmured--"Here has been some mistake--here has been some mistake!--Tell me, Juliet, what was this vow? It cannot be binding on you now, but yet I must hear it."
"Hear it, Morley, and decide for me," said Juliet, with a melancholy look; "the vow is a double one. My mother, Morley, on her death-bed--after a life of grief and sorrow for having disobeyed her own parent--exacted from me a solemn pledge that I would never become the wife of any man to whom my father forbade me to give my hand. Morley, he did forbid me to unite myself to you. He demanded from me a vow that I would not, on my duty as his child, and his last words were the bitterest--the-most awful curse upon my head if I disobeyed."