CHAPTER IX.
THE DAGUERROTYPE.
Bressant occupied two adjoining rooms at Abbie's boarding-house; one contained his bed and the other was fitted up as his study. They were on the second floor of the house, and attainable through two turns in the lower entry, a winding flight of narrow stairs, and an uncertain, darkly erratic route above.
The study was some twelve feet by eight; the floor ornamented by a carpet which, to judge from the size of the pattern, must have been designed to grace some fifty-foot drawing-room. The furniture consisted of a deal table with a folding leaf, a chair, a stove—which, perhaps because it was so small, had been permitted to remain all summer—and a broad-seated lounge with squeaky springs, but quite roomy and comfortable, which monopolized a large portion of the room. The walls were papered with a bewildering diamond pattern, in blue and white. Upon the outside window-sill stood a pot of geraniums, and another of heliotrope.
A good many books were stowed away in various parts of the study; piled one upon another in the corner by the stove, ranged side by side beneath the lounge, carefully disposed upon the inner window-sill, and occupying as much space as could be spared to them on the table. There were few ornaments to be seen; no landscapes or hunting-scenes—no pictures of pretty women—no fancy pieces for the mantel—no wine either, nor cigars, for Bressant neither smoked nor drank. A beautifully-finished and colored drawing of a patent derrick, in plan and side elevation, was pinned to the wall opposite the window. Above the mantel-piece hung an ingeniously-contrived card almanac, by which the day of week and month could be told for a hundred years to come. Two small globes, terrestrial and astronomical, stood upon the table; on the mantel-piece was an ordinary kerosene-lamp, with a conical shade of enamelled green paper, arabesqued in black, and ornamented with three transparencies, representing (when the lamp was lighted) bloody and fiery scenes in the late war; but in the daytime appearing to be nothing more terrible than plain pieces of white tissue-paper.
For two weeks Bressant had done his studying and thinking in this room. He had enormous powers of application, naturally and by acquisition, and the first fortnight had seen them exerted to their full extent. This diligence, however, was practised not so much because the course of study marked out necessitated it, as by way of voluntary self-discipline. His first evening's experience in the Parsonage garden had given the young man a serious shock; a disturbing influence had obtained possession of him, of which he could understand no more than that it appeared to have some connection with Cornelia. It interfered, at unexpected moments, with his processes of thought; it distracted his schemes of argument; it wrote itself unintelligibly upon the page he was reading. It even followed him in his rough tramps up the hills and through the woods, and sometimes shook the hand which held the pen during his compositions.
Bressant knew not how best to combat his novel difficulty. Although called into existence by an extraneous circumstance, it seemed to have struck root in every faculty of his mind, and, what was more, into the inmost core of every faculty. He was possessed, not by seven devils, but by one devil in seven different forms. He felt that the only thing to be done, if he did not intend to make an entire surrender of himself, was to take stern and rigorous measures for deliverance. The best course that suggested itself was to study his sevenfold devil down; taking every precaution, of course, to keep out of the way of all additional contamination; and this course he adopted, and had conscientiously adhered to. It was with very pardonable satisfaction that he felt his malady gradually and surely give way before his unsparing regimen, until by the first of July he considered himself entirely whole and in working order, and beyond danger of relapse.
He sometimes wondered why the professor persisted in inviting him to take dinner, or stay to tea, or sit on the balcony in the evening, or go on a picnic into the woods. Why couldn't the old gentleman divine the cause of his invariable and unhesitating refusals? Leaving other considerations out of the question, would such things be likely to increase his knowledge of theology, or further the lofty schemes of his ambition? He would be glad when that daughter left the house! What was it about her that had so disturbed and beclouded the heretofore untroubled stream? Were other women like her, or was she alone in her dangerous capacity? If the first, with what assurance could he look forward to the intellectual mastery of the world! If the last, what a refinement of misfortune to have been so thrown with her! What if he should give up Professor Valeyon altogether? No, no! if he could not conquer his destiny here, he could not be sure of doing it anywhere. Let him only be self-controlled and prudent—keep carefully and systematically out of the woman's way. Or perhaps—for it was not gratifying or dignified thus to live in terror of a minister's daughter—perhaps he might ultimately learn to associate and hold intercourse with her, unharmed. That would be a triumph worth striving for! Indeed, how could he feel secure until it had been won? Again, did there at present exist any such risk as he had brought himself to imagine? Was not this first ordeal, and its effects, all that was to be apprehended? What if all his anxiety, and self-control, and prudence, had been wasting themselves upon nothing? Would it not be worth while to try the experiment? to prove whether he was still liable to this strange witchery and enchantment? even if so it should turn out, it was still well that the point should be settled once for all. Decided, then, that he should take the first opportunity to put himself to the test.
Thus did the young man argue around his instinct, ignorant that the poison was at that moment circulating in his blood, and prompting the very sophistries that his brain produced. He who is cured begets a wholesome aversion toward what has harmed him; he feels no curiosity to prove whether or no he be yet open to mischief from it. Bressant's poison was in fact an elixir, whose delicious intoxication he had experienced once, and which his whole nature secretly but urgently craved to taste again.