Morley Ernstein; or, the Tenants of the Heart

by G. P. R. James

"It was necessary, my dear Ernstein, to make some observation on the business, which these gentlemen would not very much like repeated, otherwise they would dress up so smart a story of it in the newspapers, that Neville, for the rest of his life, would be treated as a gentleman, and have the privilege of plundering all sorts of young fools with impunity."

Notwithstanding all Lieberg's precautions, the report of the affair in the newspapers, was such as newspaper reports but too frequently are. There was so much truth in the statement as to give it perfect verisimilitude, and to render it impossible to say that it was all a lie, but with so much left untold as to create an impression as erroneous as if the whole had been untrue. It appeared by the report, that Sir Morley Ernstein had fought the well-known Mr. Neville, and had been severely wounded in the arm; that the parties had been brought to Bow-street, and bound over to keep the peace, some sharp words passing between them in the office. The statement ended with the words--"The quarrel, we find, took place about a lady!"

CHAPTER XIV.

Morley Ernstein cast down the evening newspaper in disgust, and walked up and down the room with angry feelings in his heart, which would not bear control. Whither was it that his thoughts first wandered? The reader need hardly ask--it was to Juliet Carr. As early in the day as the usages of society had permitted, he had called upon Lady Malcolm, but, as almost invariably happens when one has a particular object in seeing any friend, male or female, both Lady Malcolm herself, and Miss Carr were reported by the servant to be out. His next visit was to Mr. Hamilton, and there the report was very unfavourable. The next was to a surgeon; for his shoulder, though the wound had been but slight, was becoming very painful. The man of healing, of course, put him to ten times more pain, in order to give him relief; and thus Morley had all the most unpleasant preparatives that a man can have, for seeing his name in a newspaper. He had been disappointed in his expectations--he had been grieved for a friend--he had been put to positive pain himself, and now he saw such an account of an affair, which was assuredly not discreditable to himself, as to produce an impression the most to be dreaded, on the minds of those he loved and esteemed. His imagination was a quick one, and with the rapid magic of thought, he summoned to his mind, all that Juliet Carr would think--all that Juliet Carr would feel, on hearing that he had quarrelled with, and fought a swindler "on account of a lady!"

Men little know to what an immense extent their own acquaintance with all the evil and wickedness of the world affects their estimate of other people's thoughts and opinions. The rascal, nine times out of ten, supposes every body to possess the same rascally feelings as himself; and men, in picturing to their own mind the thoughts of women, imagine that those thoughts are founded upon knowledge that few of the gentler sex have any means of possessing. Morley Ernstein, himself, though he believed the mind of Juliet Carr to be as pure as that of an angel, fancied nevertheless, that the moment her eye rested upon that paragraph, she would see him in the midst of scenes of vice and licentiousness, quarrelling with a blackleg, for an abandoned woman.

Morley was quite mistaken, however. It is true, that scarcely one of all the many male eyes which that day read the news of Bow-street, failed to receive exactly such an impression from the paragraph concerning himself. But what did Juliet Carr think? Any thing but what her lover supposed. Juliet Carr was a great reader of character; she was endowed by nature with that discriminating power--for depend upon it, reader, it is a gift, not an acquirement--which enables us by some traits, often even undefinable to ourselves, and generally totally unnoticed by others, to distinguish at once the innate or habitual springs of action in those with whom we are brought in contact. I know not well, whether that gift be most likely to prove a blessing or a curse. It may often guide our actions, but it seldom guides our affections, and too often renders the struggle between inclination and reason, more painful than it always is. Juliet Carr had discovered very rapidly all the principal traits of Morley Ernstein's character; but even had not that been the case, she was not sufficiently acquainted with the evils of the world in general, to conjure up the picture which Morley supposed would present itself to her imagination.

Thus, when she read the account of the duel, she felt quite certain that the cause of quarrel was some impetuous act springing from a generous impulse. When she came to the fact of his having fired in the air, a smile of pleasure brightened her face, crossing the look of painful anxiety with which she had been reading; but when in the end she found that he was wounded, she dropped the paper from her hand with feelings of mingled fear and sorrow, and with something like self-reproach, as if her counsels of the night before had caused the injury under which he suffered. Taking up the newspaper quickly again, she carried it at once into the neighbouring room, where Lady Malcolm was sitting, and pointing out the paragraph with a pale cheek and an anxious eye, which her worthy cousin did not fail to remark, she asked Lady Malcolm, if she could not send to obtain some more certain information as to the real state of their young friend. Lady Malcolm replied, that she would write at once, and the letter was accordingly despatched.

It was now about half-past eight o'clock at night, and to make sure of the note being properly delivered, and that a correct account of Morley Ernstein's health should be brought, Juliet's cousin despatched an old and faithful servant of her own; who was well acquainted with good Adam Gray, the young gentleman's attached dependent. In about three quarters of an hour the man returned, saying, that he had left the note, and that Sir Morley Ernstein must be better, for he had gone out, the waiter said, on purpose to see Miss Barham.

Lady Malcolm remarked that Juliet turned slightly pale, and being the best disposed woman in the world to relieve persons from unpleasant sensations, she replied, "Nonsense! there must be some mistake, William. Did you see old Adam Gray."

"No, my lady," replied the man; "I did not; but the waiter told me; that Sir Morley had especially directed him, if any one called, to say that he had gone to see Miss Barham."