"It was even while I lay grovelling at his feet," pursued Matilda, after a momentary pause, during which she evinced intense agitation, "that this sudden change (excited by this most unheard-of injustice) came over my mind—I rose and stood before him; then asked, in a voice in which no evidence of passion could be traced, what excuse he meant to make to Major Montgomerie for having thus broken off his engagement. He started at my sudden calmness of manner, but said that he thought it might be as well for my sake to name what I had already stated to him in regard to the obscurity of my birth, as a plea for his seceding from the connexion. I told him that, under all the circumstances, I thought this most advisable, and then, pointing to the door, bade him be gone, and never, under any pretext whatever, again to insult me with his presence. When he had departed, I burst into a paroxysm of tears; but they were tears shed not for the loss of him I now despised, but of wild sorrow at my unmerited degradation. That conflict over, the weakness had for ever passed away, and never, since that hour, has tear descended cheek of mine, associated with the recollection of the villain who had thus dared to trifle with a heart the full extent of whose passions he has yet to learn."
There was a trembling of the whole person of Matilda which told how much her feelings had been excited by the recollection of what she narrated, and Gerald, as he gazed upon her beautiful form, could not but wonder at the apathy of the man who could thus have heartlessly thrown it from him for ever.
"Had the injury terminated here," resumed Matilda, "bitter as my humiliation was, my growing dislike for him who had so ungenerously inflicted it, might have enabled me to endure it. But, not satisfied with destroying the happiness of her who had sacrificed all for his sake, my perfidious lover had yet a blow in reserve for me, compared with which his antecedent conduct was mercy. Gerald," she continued, as she pressed his arm with a convulsive grasp, "will you believe that the monster had the infamy to confide to one of his most intimate associates, that his rupture with me was occasioned by his having discovered me in the arms of a slave—of one of those vile beings communion with whom my soul in any sense abhorred? How shall I describe the terrible feeling that came over my insulted heart at that moment. But no, no—description were impossible. This associate—this friend of his—dared on the very strength of this infamous imputation, to pollute my ear with his disrespectful passion, and when, in a transport of contempt and anger, I spurned him from me, he taunted me with that which I believed confined to the breast, as it had been engendered only in the suspicion, of my betrayer. Oh! if it be dreadful to be accused by those whom we have loved in intimacy, how much more is it to know that they have not had even the common humanity to conceal our supposed weakness from the world. From that moment revenge took possession of my soul, and I swore that my destroyer should perish by the hand of her whose innocence and whose peace he had blasted for ever.
"Shortly after this event," resumed Matilda, "my base lover was ordered to join his regiment, then stationed at Detroit. A year passed away, and during that period my mind pondered unceasingly on the means of accomplishing my purpose of revenge; and so completely did I devote myself to a cool and unprejudiced examination of the subject, that what the vulgar crowd term guilt, appeared to me plain virtue. On the war breaking out, Major Montgomerie was also ordered to Detroit, and thither I entreated him to suffer me to accompany him. He consented, for knowing nothing of the causes which had turned my love into gall, he thought it not improbable that a meeting with my late lover might be productive of a removal of his prejudices, and our consequent reunion. Little did he dream that it was with a view to plunge a dagger into my destroyer's false heart, that I evinced so much eagerness to undertake so long and so disagreeable a Journey.
"Little more remains to be added," pursued Matilda, as she fixed her dark eyes with a softened expression on those of Gerald, "since with the occurrences there you are already sufficiently acquainted. Yet there is one point upon which I would explain myself. When I first became your prisoner, my mind had been worked up to the highest pitch of determination, and in my captor I at first beheld but an evil genius who had interposed himself between me and my just revenge, when on the very eve of its consummation. Hence my petulance and impatience while in the presence of your noble General."
"And whence that look, Matilda, that peculiar glance, which you bestowed upon me even within the same hour?"
"Because in your frank and fearless mien I saw that manly honor and fidelity, the want of which had undone me."
"Then if so, why the cold, the mortifying reserve, you manifested when we met at dinner at my uncle's table?"
"Because I had also recollected that, degraded as I was, I ought not to seek the love of an honorable man, and that to win you to my interest would be of no avail, as, separated by the national quarrel, you could not by any possibility be near to aid me in my plans."
"Then," said Gerald reproachfully, "it was merely to make me an instrument of vengeance that you sought me. Unkind Matilda!"