It was this remorse which had stricken Royston Keene sorely, even through his armor of proof, as he knelt, not very long ago, by the side of a death-bed. A woman lay there, scarcely past girlhood, and fair enough to have been the pride of any English household, as daughter or sister or wife. You shall not read unnecessarily an episode of sin and bitter sorrow, and of shame that was not less heavy to bear because the eyes of the world were blinded and saw it not. It is enough to say that the blood of Emily Carlyle was as certainly on her tempter’s head as that of any one of those whom he had slain in open fight with shot or steel. This is what she answered when he asked her to forgive him: “My own, I have forgiven you long ago! I could not help it if I would. I can not reproach you either, for though I have tried hard to repent, I fear, if all were to come over again, I should not act more coldly or wisely. But listen! I know you will be able, if you choose it, to make others love you nearly as well as I have done—and you will choose it. Darling, promise me that, for my sake, you will spare one. I could die easier if I thought my intercession had saved another’s soul, though I was so weak in guarding my own. It might help me too, perhaps—if any thing can help me—where I am going.” Even Royston Keene shivered at the low terror-stricken whisper in which these last words were spoken. He gave the promise though, and remembered it occasionally till—the time for keeping it came.
The major had been spending the evening with Cecil Tresilyan, making arrangements for a pic-nic that was to take place two days later. He had had a passage-of-arms or two with Mrs. Danvers, wherein that strong-principled but weak-minded enthusiast had been utterly discomfited and routed with great slaughter. Altogether it was very pleasant entertainment; and he went to his rest in a state of great contentment and satisfaction. He woke (or seemed to wake) with a sudden start and shudder, for he was aware of the presence of something in the room that was not there when he lay down.
Out of the black darkness a face slowly defined itself, bending over the pillow and creeping close to his own—only a face—he could not distinguish even the outline of a figure. He knew it very well, and the eyes, too—but there was an upbraiding there that, while she lived, he had never seen in those of gentle Emily Carlyle; and a reproach came from the white lips, though they did not move to give it passage. “All forgotten! I—the promise, too. And yet—I suffer—I suffer always.” The sad, pleading expression of the face and eyes vanished then; and a strange, pale glare, not like the moonlight, that seemed to come from within, lighted them up—fixed and rigid, yet eloquent, of unutterable agony: there was written plainly the self-abhorrence of a heart conscious of the coils of 43 the undying worm—the despair of a soul looking far into Futurity, yet seeing no end to the wrath to come. Then the darkness swallowed up all; and, before Keene thoroughly roused himself—with a smothered cry—he knew that he was alone again.
A cold dew lingered on the dreamer’s forehead, as if a breath from beyond the grave had lately passed over it; but terror was not the predominating feeling. He had ruled that timid, trusting girl too long and too imperiously to quail before her disembodied spirit. But a strange sadness overcame him as he pondered upon all that she had endured—and might still be enduring—for his sake: a glimmer of something like generosity and compassion flickered for a brief space over the surface of the cast-steel heart. He rose, and leaned out into the steady, outer moonlight, musing for several minutes, and then began muttering aloud. “It would be as well to clear off one debt at least. I did pass my word. She deserves this sacrifice, if it were only for never complaining: let her have her way. By G—d, I’ll go off to-morrow evening, and I’ll tell Cecil so as soon as I can see her. Bah! what is a man worth if he can not forget? Besides, I don’t know—” The rest of his doubts and scruples he confessed—not even to the stars.
Climate has a great deal to answer for. A sudden tempest or an opportune mist has turned the scale of more battles than some of the most successful generals would have liked to own. If the next morning had broken sullenly, things might have gone far otherwise. But it was one of those brilliant days that make even the invalids not regret, for the moment, that they have given up all English comforts and home-pleasures for the off-chance of wringing another month or two of life out of the wreck of their constitution. Every thing looked bright and in holiday guise, from the wreaths of ivy glistening on the brows of the shattered old castle, down to the ἀνηρίθμονγ ελάσμα of the turquoise-sea. Under the circumstances, it was very unlikely that Royston would keep to his virtuous resolutions. The first half of them he carried out perfectly: he did go straight to Cecil Tresilyan, and tell her of his intentions to depart. She did not betray much of her disappointment or surprise, but she argued with so fascinating a casuistry against the necessity of such a sudden step, that it was no wonder if she soon convinced her hearer of the propriety of at least delaying it. In a case like this an excuse of “urgent private affairs” that would suffice for the most rigid martinet that ever tyrannized over a district or a division sounds absurdly trivial and insincere. When a proud beauty does condescend to plead, a man who really cares for her must be very peculiarly constituted if he remains constant in denial.
The vision of the night had faded away already. Those poor ghosts! They have no chance—the mystics say—against embodied spirits, if the latter only keep up their courage, and choose to assert their supremacy. Besides, they must, perforce, fly before the dawn. And what dawn was ever so bright as the Tresilyan’s smile when she guessed from Royston’s face, without his speaking, that she had won the day?
So the pic-nic came off according to the arrangement. The weather and every thing else looked so promising that even the vinegar in Bessie Danvers’s composition was acidulated; and, when Keene greeted her at the place of rendezvous, she favored him with just such a smile as one of the grim Puritan dames, in a rare interval of courtesy, may have granted to Claverhouse or Montrose—the right of reprobation being reserved. It is greatly to be feared that the Malignant did not appreciate the condescension, his attention was so entirely taken up in another quarter.
Cecil Tresilyan was perfectly dazzling in the splendor and insolence of her beauty: the calm self-possession that usually distinguished her seemed changed into almost reckless high spirits: even her dress betrayed a certain intention of coquetry; and her splendid violet eyes flashed ever and anon with a mischievously mutinous expression that made their glance a challenge. Such a frame of mind the Scotch describe when they speak of a person being “fey,” holding it to be a sure presage of impending disaster.
Oh, guileless maidens! be warned, and trust not to attractive appearances. Lo! there is not a cloud in the sky that smiles over the Nysian vale; all round the roses and lilies are blooming, till the air is faint with their perfume; merry and musical rings the laugh of Persephone, as she goes forth with her comrades a-Maying; but worse things than serpents lurk beneath the waving grass. We, who have read the ancient legend, listen already for the roll of the nether thunder: we know that, in another minute, the earth will disgorge Aïdoneus, the smart ravisher, with his iron chariot: then will come a struggle of the dove in the clutch of the falcon—a cry for help drowned in a hoarse growl of triumph—shrieks and wild disorder among the flying nymphs; but the loveliest of the land will rejoin them never any more. Demēter (like other careful chaperones), when she is most wanted, is far away, tending her corn-lands or reveling in the odors of sacrifice. Finding her after long-baffled search, she will hardly recognize her innocent child in the pale Queen of Shades, that seems worthy of her awful throne far-gleaming through the leaden twilight: the little hand that used to weave garlands so deftly sways the golden sceptre right royally; but the deep, solemn eyes have forgotten how to smile. She who once wept bitterly over her pet bird when it died listens, unmoved, to the clank of Megæra’s scourge, and to the wail of a million spirits in torment. Her beauty is more magnificent than ever, but it is tinged with the austere and dreary majesty that befits the consort of the King of Hell. Ah, woeful mother! desist from intercession, and dry those unavailing tears: it is too late now to tempt her to follow you, even if Hades will let its empress depart for a season: the pure, natural fruits of your upper earth have lost all savor for the lips that once have tasted the fatal pomegranate.
Mr. Fullarton and his family completed the party, which was confined to the Molyneux’s set. The chaplain was strangely nervous, fussy, and important: it seemed as if the possession of some weighty secret that he was eager, yet afraid to divulge, had disturbed his phlegmatic complacency. He took the first opportunity of beseeching Miss Tresilyan to be allowed to act as her escort: it was customary on all these 44 expeditions that each dame and demoiselle, besides the professional muleteer, should be attended by at least one “dismounted skirmisher.” Cecil was rather puzzled by the petition, and by the earnest way in which it was preferred; but she was too happy to deny any body any thing just then; besides which she felt conscious of having visited her pastor of late with a certain amount of neglect, not to say contumely. So she consented, graciously; but the sidelong glance at Keene, asking for his sympathy, did not escape her reverend cavalier.