Falkner: A Novel

by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

"Some day you must ask Gerard to relate to you his adventures during this journey. They will come warmly and vividly from him; while mine, as a mere reflex, must be tame. It is his mind I would describe; and I will not pause to narrate the tantalizing cross-questioning that he underwent from a Scotchman—nor the heart-heavings with which he heard allusions made to the divorce case before the lords. A newspaper describing his own conduct was in the hands of one of the passengers; he heard his mother lightly alluded to. He would have leaped from the coach; but that was to give up all. He pressed his hands to his ears—he scowled on those around—his heart was on fire. Yet he had one consolation. He was free. He was going to her—he resolved never to mingle with his fellow-creatures more. Buried in some rural retreat with his mother, it mattered little what the vulgar and the indifferent said about either.

"Some qualms did assail him. Should he find his dear mother? Where was she? his childish imagination refused to paint her distant from Dromore—his own removal from that mansion so soon after losing her, associated her indelibly with the mountains, the ravines, the brawling streams, and clustering woods of his natal county. She must be there. He would drive away the man of violence who took her from him, and they would be happy together.

"A day and a night brought him to Liverpool, and the coachman, hearing whither he wished to go, deposited him in the stage for Lancaster on his arrival. He went inside this time, and slept all the way. At Lancaster he was recognised by several persons, and they wondered to see him alone. He was annoyed at their recognition and questionings; and, though it was night when he arrived, instantly set off to walk to Dromore.

"For two months from this time he lived wandering from cottage to cottage, seeking his mother. The journey from Lancaster to Dromore he performed as speedily as he well could. He did not enter the house—that would be delivering himself up as a prisoner. By night he clambered the park railings, and entered like a thief the demesnes where he had spent his childhood. Each path was known to him, and almost every tree. Here he sat with his mother; there they found the first violet of spring. His pilgrimage was achieved; but where was she? His heart beat as he reached the little gate whence they had issued on that fatal night. All the grounds bore marks of neglect and the master's absence; and the lock of this gate was spoiled; a sort of rough bolt had been substituted. Gerard pushed it back. The rank grass had gathered thick on the threshold; but it was the same spot. How well he remembered it!

"Two years only had since passed, he was still a child; yet to his own fancy how much taller, how much more of a man he had become! Besides, he now fancied himself master of his own actions—he had escaped from his father; and he—who had threatened to turn him out of doors—would not seek to possess himself of him again. He belonged to no one—he was cared for by no one—by none but her whom he sought with firm, yet anxious expectation. There he had seen her last—he stepped forward; he followed the course of the lane—he came to where the road crossed it—where the carriage drove up, where she had been torn from him.

"It was daybreak—a June morning; all was golden and still—a few birds twittered, but the breeze was hushed, and he looked out on the extent of country commanded from the spot where he stood, and saw only nature, the rugged hills, the green corn-fields, the flowery meads, and the umbrageous trees in deep repose. How different from the wild, tempestuous night when she whom he sought was torn away; he could then see only a few yards before him, now he could mark the devious windings of the road, and, afar off, distinguish the hazy line of the ocean. He sat down to reflect—what was he to do? in what nook of the wide expanse was his mother hid? that some portion of the landscape he viewed harboured her, was his fixed belief; a belief founded in inexperience and fancy, but not the less deep-rooted. He meditated for some time, and then walked forward—he remembered when he ran panting and screaming along that road; he was a mere child then, and what was he now? a boy of eleven; yet he looked back with disdain to the endeavours of two years before.

"He walked along in the same direction that he had at that time pursued, and soon found that he reached the turnpike-road to Lancaster. He turned off, and went by the cross-road that leads to the wild and dreary plains that form the coast. The inner range of picturesque hills, on the declivity of which Dromore is situated, is not more than five miles from the sea; but the shore itself is singularly blank and uninteresting, varied only by sand-hills thrown up to the height of thirty or forty feet, intersected by rivers, which at low water are fordable even on foot; but which, when the tide is up, are dangerous to those who do not know the right track, from the holes and ruts which render the bed of the river uneven. In winter, indeed, at the period of spring tides, or in stormy weather, with a west wind which drives the ocean towards the shore, the passage is often exceedingly dangerous, and, except under the direction of an experienced guide, fatal accidents occur.

"Gerard reached the borders of the ocean near one of these streams; behind him rose his native mountains, range above range, divided by tremendous gulfs, varied by the shadows of the clouds, and the gleams of sunlight; close to him was the waste seashore; the ebbing tide gave a dreary sluggish appearance to the ocean, and the river—a shallow, rapid stream—emptied its slender pittance of mountain water noiselessly into the lazy deep. It was a scene of singular desolation. On the other side of the river, not far from the mouth, was a rude hut, unroofed, and fallen to decay—erected, perhaps, as the abode of a guide; near it grew a stunted tree, withered, moss-covered, spectre-like—the sand-hills lay scattered around—the seagull screamed above, and skimmed over the waste. Gerard sat down and wept—motherless—escaped from his angry father; even to his young imagination, his fate seemed as drear and gloomy as the scene around."

[CHAPTER XX]

"I do not know why I have dwelt on these circumstances so long. Let me hasten to finish. For two months Gerard wandered in the neighbourhood of Dromore. If he saw a lone cottage, imbowered in trees, hidden in some green recess of the hills, sequestered and peaceful, he thought, Perhaps my mother is there! and he clambered towards it, finding it at last, probably, a mere shepherd's hut, poverty-stricken, and tenanted by a noisy family. His money was exhausted—he made a journey to Lancaster to sell his watch, and then returned to Cumberland—his clothes, his shoes were worn out—often he slept in the open air—ewes' milk cheese and black bread were his fare—his hope was to find his mother—his fear to fall again into his father's hands. But as the first sentiment failed, his friendless condition grew more sad; he began to feel that he was indeed a feeble, helpless boy—abandoned by all—he thought nothing was left for him but to lie down and die.