Falkner: A Novel

by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

"Ah, sir," replied Mrs. Baker, "would that I could tell, and all my troubles would be over. Read on, sir, and you will see that Mrs. Raby feels sure that the lady would have been a mother to poor Missy; but who, or where she is, is past all my guessing."

The stranger strove to read on; but violent emotion, and the struggle to hide what he felt, hindered him from taking in the meaning of a single word. At length he told Mrs. Baker that, with her leave, he would take the letter away, and read it at his leisure. He promised her his aid in discovering Mrs. Raby's relatives, and assured her that there would be small difficulty in so doing. He then retired, and Mrs. Baker exclaimed, "Please God, this will prove a good day's work."

A voice from the grave had spoken to the stranger. It was not the dead mother's voice—she, whatever her merits and sufferings had been, was to him an image of the mind only—he had never known her. But her benefactress, her hope and trust, who and where was she! Alithea! the warm-hearted friend—the incomparable mother! She to whom all hearts in distress turned, sure of relief—who went before the desires of the necessitous; whose generous and free spirit made her emperess of all hearts; who, while she lived, spread, as does the sun, radiance and warmth around—her pulses were stilled; her powers cribbed up in the grave. She was nothing now; and he had reduced to this nothing the living frame of this glorious being.

The stranger read the letter again and again; again he writhed, as her name appeared, traced by her friend's delicate hand, and the concluding hope seemed the acme of his despair. She would indeed have been a mother to the orphan—he remembered expressions that told him that she was making diligent inquiry for her friend, whose luckless fate had not reached her. Yes, it was his Alithea; he could not doubt. His? Fatal mistake—his she had never been; and the wild resolve to make her such had ended in death and ruin.

The stranger had taken the letter to his inn—but any roof seemed to imprison and oppress him—again he sought relief in the open air, and wandered far along the sands, with the speed of a misery that strove to escape from itself. The whole night he spent thus—sometimes climbing the jagged cliffs, then descending to the beach, and throwing himself his length upon the sands. The tide ebbed and flowed—the roar of ocean filled the lone night with sound—the owl flapped down from its home in the rock, and hooted. Hour after hour passed—and, driven by a thousand thoughts—tormented by the direst pangs of memory—still the stranger hurried along the winding shores. Morning found him many miles from Treby. He did not stop till the appearance of another village put a limit to solitude, and he returned upon his steps.

Those who could guess his crime, could alone divine the combat of life and death waging in his heart. He had, through accident and forgetfulness, left his pistols on the table of his chamber at the inn, or, in some of the wildest of the paroxysms of despair, they had ended all. To die, he fondly hoped, was to destroy memory and to defeat remorse; and yet there arose within his mind that feeling, mysterious and inexplicable to common reason, which generates a desire to expiate and to atone. Should he be the cause of good to the friendless orphan, bequeathed so vainly to his victim, would not that, in some sort, compensate for his crime? Would it not double it to have destroyed her, and also the good of which she would have been the author? The very finger of God pointed to this act, since the child's little hand had arrested his arm at the fatal moment when he believed that no interval of a second's duration intervened between him and the grave. Then, to aid those dim religious misgivings, came the manly wish to protect the oppressed and assist the helpless. The struggle was long and terrible. Now he made up his mind that it was cowardice to postpone his resolve—that to live was to stamp himself poltron and traitor. And now again, he felt that the true cowardice was to die—to fly from the consequences of his actions, and the burden of existence. He gazed upon the dim waste of waters, as if from its misty skirt some vision would arise to guide or to command. He cast his eyes upward to interrogate the silent stars—the roaring of the tide appeared to assume an inorganic voice, and to murmur hoarsely, "Live! miserable wretch! Dare you hope for the repose which your victim enjoys? Know that the guilty are unworthy to die—that is the reward of innocence!"

The cool air of morning chilled his brow, and the broad sun arose from the eastern sea, as, pale and haggard, he retrod many a weary step towards Treby. He was faint and weary. He had resolved to live yet a little longer—till he had fulfilled some portion of his duty towards the lovely orphan. So resolving, he felt as if he paid a part of the penalty due. A soothing feeling, which resembled repentance, stole over his heart, already rewarding him. How swiftly and audibly does the inner voice of our nature speak, telling us when we do right. Besides, he believed that to live was to suffer; to live, therefore, was in him a virtue: and the exultation, the balmy intoxication which always follows our first attempt to execute a virtuous resolve, crept over him, and elevated his spirits, though body and soul were alike weary. Arriving at Treby, he sought his bed. He slept peacefully; and it was the first slumber he had enjoyed since he had torn himself from the spot where she lay, whom he had loved so truly, even to the death to which he had brought her.

[CHAPTER IV]

Two days after, the stranger and the orphan had departed for London. When it came to the point of decision, Mrs. Baker's conscience began to reproach her; and she doubted the propriety of intrusting her innocent charge to one totally unknown. But the stranger satisfied her doubts; he showed her papers betokening his name and station, as John Falkner, captain in the native cavalry of the East India Company, and moreover possessed of such an independence as looked like wealth in the eyes of Mrs. Baker, and at once commanded her respect.

His own care was to collect every testimony and relic that might prove the identity of the little Elizabeth. Her unfortunate mother's unfinished letter—her Bible and prayer-book—in the first of which was recorded the birth of her child—and a seal (which Mrs. Baker's prudence had saved, when her avarice caused her to sell the watch), with Mr. Raby's coat of arms and crest engraved—a small desk, containing a few immaterial papers, and letters from strangers, addressed to Edwin Raby—such was Elizabeth's inheritance. In looking over the desk, Mr. Falkner found a little foreign almanac, embellished with prints, and fancifully bound—on the first page of which was written, in a woman's elegant hand, To dearest Isabella—from her A. R.