These words aroused Captain Sydney's indignation. He accused his son of want of spirit in refusing to resent the occurrences that clouded his youth; and when Harry responded that he felt them deeply, but could not on their account brand himself with dishonor, by breaking the troth already plighted to Ida Lindsay, his father parted from him in anger, declaring that if his son married Ida, he might never expect his blessing.
The thought of uniting his son by indissoluble ties to the child of his early foe, was, indeed, repugnant to the heart of Captain Sydney; and while he remembered his resolve uttered on the night when he went forth from his uncle's roof a desolate, friendless and dishonored being—dishonored through the machinations of his cousin Alfred—he was determined that it should be fulfilled, even though in so doing he thwarted the earnest wishes of the one dearest to him.
A few days afterward Captain Sydney departed upon one of his accustomed voyages, and was absent several months. On his return he found his son just recovering from a lingering fever, brought on, as the physician averred, by distress of mind. He looked very pale and thin, and his father could scarcely help feeling a sensation akin to reproach, as he gazed upon that colorless cheek and wasted form. He knew that this indisposition was occasioned by the manner in which he had treated his son's engagement, for, through the medium of a friend, he had learned that Ida Lindsay had nobly refused longer to encourage attentions, which, as she learned from Harry, were tendered in opposition to his father's desires. Alfred Lindsay, too, had died a few weeks before, and the object of his resentment being no more, Captain Sydney began to feel less reluctant to the match which he had at first looked upon with such violent disapprobation. Conscience told him he had acted cruelly in thus casting a blight over his child's sweetest hopes, and he was determined that he would now do all in his power to further them. And when Harry grew strong enough to bear a conversation upon the subject, he communicated the change in his feelings. Both startled and appalled was he at his son's reply.
"My father, would you mock me with this show of kindness, when it is too late to profit by it? Know you not that she is now dying of consumption? I was sure that she was too delicate to endure the steady occupation necessary for her support—and my presentiment has been verified. Yes, Ida Lindsay is dying! I would have saved her—I would have borne her to a more genial clime, where she might, perhaps, have revived; but she refused to give me a right to be her guardian, for it was against the will of my parent, without whose sanction, she said, our union would never prosper."
He bowed his face, while for an instant his frame shook with emotion. Hastily his father drew nearer to him, but he turned shudderingly from those words of penitence and self-reproach, and dashing aside the extended hand, rushed from the apartment.
It was, indeed, too true—Ida Lindsay was dying! The constant confinement called for by her continued exertions to obtain a livelihood, had proved too much for a constitution by no means strong—and it was his anxiety for her failing health which had caused the illness of Harry Sydney. Oh! what would not the erring father have given for power to recall the past; but it was too late—too late! A few hours after the interview with his son the intelligence of Ida's death was received, and during the whole of the succeeding evening Captain Sydney could plainly distinguish the sound of Harry's footsteps as he wildly paced his chamber, and each echo sent a thrill of remorse to his soul. Little did the repentant and sorrowing parent then think it was the last time that footfall would ever resound in his dwelling—for that night Harry Sydney departed from his home, leaving no trace of his destination. Days, weeks, months passed on, and the heart of his father grew dark with the anguish of despair, for he felt most surely that he should behold his son no more. Whither the latter had gone was a mystery he tried in vain to solve, though sometimes he remembered Harry's predilection for a mariner's life, and blighted as he had been in his affections, might he not now have followed the yearnings of former times, as the only means of gaining oblivion of his sorrows? So, night after night, Captain Sydney sat alone at his deserted hearth—a father, and yet childless, with a host of dark recollections pressing heavily upon his spirit. And at last he sought forgetfulness of his errors in the sparkling wine-cup, whose draught he drained with an intense eagerness, for it enabled him to mock at his misery.
And so five more years passed on, during which period his mind was seldom free from the delirium produced by the practices to which he had resorted; and having, in utter recklessness of spirit dissipated his property, deprived, through his own weakness, of his rank as captain, he was at length forced to lower himself to the grade of a common sailor, for the purpose of obtaining the means of subsistence. Then a severe illness, caused by free indulgence in intoxicating liquors, overtook him—and with sickness came reflection, and he resolved to yield no longer to the voice of the tempter. He recovered from his dangerous indisposition, but remaining fearfully weak, the physician declared that his constitution was completely shattered, and that he was no longer fit for service. At first he insisted upon resuming his wonted occupation, for he had no other way of maintaining himself. The physician seemed to comprehend his reluctance to obey his command, and he now reminded his patient of an institution in the vicinity of New York, where the indigent mariner might find a home.
It was then that Captain Sydney—for so let me still continue to call him—sought the peaceful shades of "the Harbor," where for two years he had, indeed, found all the external comforts of a home, and but for the voices of the past he would have had no cause to repine.
About a twelvemonth after his arrival at "the Harbor," a new inmate was admitted there, in the person of an invalid sailor, who was said to be in a deep decline. He seldom left the apartment allotted to him, save now and then of a warm sunny day, when he would go forth, leaning upon the arm of an attendant, and seating himself upon a bench in the garden beneath the shade of a tree, remain there for hours, gazing silently upon the blue waters of the bay before him. Regarded by all as in a dying state, no one strove at these times to disturb his reverie. His situation had excited universal sympathy, and frequently the other sailors would steal to his side and softly deposit there a small basket of fruit, or some little delicacy which they knew would prove acceptable to him on whom it was bestowed.
Habitually reserved, and cultivating but little intercourse with those around him, it was scarcely a matter of surprise that for some weeks Captain Sydney took but little notice of the sailor of whom I have been speaking. But chance at length brought him more fully beneath the scope of his observation. While one day walking in the garden, buried in thought, almost unconsciously he neared the spot generally occupied by the invalid. But he heeded not the vicinity till startled by the sound of a hollow cough, and looking hastily up, he met the gaze of the feeble stranger. A half-suppressed cry burst from the latter, and springing quickly forward, Captain Sydney caught him in his arms, while the words, "Harry! my son—my son!" came in a tone of agony from his lips. But he heeded not the caresses—he answered not the words of mingled endearment and reproach which his parent murmured as he bent wildly over him; and when at length the stricken father became calm enough to summon assistance, they told him that the spirit of his child was at rest.