The Broken Font: A Story of the Civil War, Vol. 1 (of 2)

by Moyle Sherer

  CHAP. XII.

  Why, alas! and are you he? Be not yet those fancies changed? SIDNEY.

  To Katharine there had been no mystery: she could not doubt that theinvisible minstrel was her cousin Francis, and that he was again toonear for her peace or his own.

  Yet such is the sweet treachery of a loving heart, that she could notbe sad to know, that one so dearly, though so hopelessly, attached toher, was perhaps within sight of the very window of her apartment, andstanding upon some spot where they had formerly walked together injoy. Though resolved not to grant him more than one interview, and todissuade him from seeking any future opportunities of intercourse, shecould not but admit a natural feeling of delight, that she shouldonce more, though but for a few brief moments, look upon him, andlisten to his well remembered voice. In the solitude of her chambershe found that relief and freedom of thought which her spirit needed:her wakeful night was passed in reviewing former, and in shaping outfuture scenes; but of this last exercise of the mind she soon grewweary, for doubt hung over all her future prospects. It was about twohours after midnight, and the house was quite still, when Katharine,in a frame of mind that ill agreed with sleep and peace, arose, andwrapped in her night robe leaned from the casement of her chamber, andgazed out upon the fields and woods, and caught the sheen of the riveras it glided beneath the holy moon. The scene was calm, the airserene, and her anxious spirit was soothed by contemplation. Sheremained long at the window; and as she was retiring turned her eyesto the left, where, beyond the Lime Walk, she could see the blackshade of her favourite cedar near the fish-pond. In the moonlight nearit she discerned the figure of a man walking slowly upon the grass.Her heart beat quick in her bosom; she leaned her brow against thewall: that surely was Francis. A projection of the building threw sucha shadow over her window, that her figure could not be seen, andtherefore she again looked forth and cast her eyes towards the cedar.The figure near paced slowly backwards and forwards, occasionallypausing for a minute or more, as if gazing at the house. Certainly itwas Francis. Forbidden all access to the mansion by the angryprejudices of Sir Oliver, he had recourse to music to tell her of hisreturn. They had often watched the moonbeams together from the terracebelow; they had often been sheltered together beneath the broad armsof that very cedar in the heats of noon, till, suddenly, as bysurprise, they loved and after shunned each other, from the sadknowledge that the barriers to their union were many, were cold, andwere impassable. As all these after-thoughts crossed her noble mind,she suffered herself to look upon her cousin where he kept his lonelyvigil, with that deep interest which must ever be inseparable fromthat being in whose heart we know that our image is enshrined andcherished.

  When the morning star shone brightly out the figure of Francissuddenly disappeared. Katharine now withdrew from the casement; and,exhausted by the various emotions, which had filled and troubled heranxious bosom with apprehension and with delight, she threw herself onher bed without taking off her robe, and slept so very long andprofoundly, that when she awoke she found Mistress Alice seated by herside, with a look of affectionate alarm upon her kind face, and hermaid frightened and in tears. It was already high noon. Katharine,however, knew nothing of the lapse of time; and imagining she might bean hour later than usual, was raising herself up with some expressionabout her strange fit of sleepiness, when her aunt put her hand gentlyupon her, and bade her lie down again. "When Master Randal has seenyou, my dear," she said, "you shall be undressed, and have your bedmade, and be put to rest properly and with comfort. He is below, andhas been here this half hour, but he wished that your slumber shouldnot be broken."

  But the effort to rise had already shown Katharine the unwelcometruth--she was in a high fever:--her head ached, her lips wereparched, her mouth was dry, her skin was burning.

  The good doctor was instantly summoned; and having examined her casewith very careful attention, directed that she should be confined toher bed, and that her chamber should be kept dark and still.

  "It was a violent fever," he said, "which would probably, in anotherstage, take an intermittent form;" but evidently, from the doctor'smanner, it was a case of danger, demanding great watchfulness andskilful treatment.

  Promising Mistress Alice that his visits should be as frequent aspossible, he returned to Warwick at speed, accompanied by a servant,who was to bring back the medicines prescribed.

  The trouble of Sir Oliver almost amounted to terror. His mind was byno means superior to those fears which vulgar errors impose; and as,in addition to the strange music of the evening before, he had thatvery morning seen a hare cross the high road just before his horse'sfeet, he augured no less a calamity than a fatal end to the suddenillness of his beloved daughter.

  Cuthbert Noble, however, rose to the occasion; and though it iscertain that no individual in the family felt a more tender affectionand concern for Katharine Heywood than he did, yet he was enabled, bya wise sympathy, to compose the fears and animate the hopes of SirOliver, and indeed of an entire household; for a despondency fell uponall, which the most comfortable arguments of plain reason and soundreligion did but imperfectly remove.

  For three days the life of Katharine Heywood was, in truth, in veryimminent danger, and the fever was of that malignant nature whichdefied all ordinary treatment: but as the doctor was a man of greatdecision and boldness in his practice, and, at the same time, one whocommitted all events with humility and simplicity to the will of God,he fought bravely with the disease; and after the third night ofpatient watching and vigorous experiments, he subdued it so far thathe could announce to Sir Oliver the safety of his daughter. The crisiswas passed; but her weakness was great, and her recovery very gradual.For the first three days of her attack she was almost withoutconsciousness; but though her head became light, and her mind wasconfused, she uttered nothing in her wanderings which attracted theparticular notice of Mistress Alice, or any of her attendants, or inthe least betrayed the secret of her heart.

  Meanwhile Francis Heywood, in ignorance of the sad condition of hiscousin Katharine, endured all the agony of a suspicion that he was atonce neglected and scorned by her who had been the vision of hislonely hours of labour in a remote plantation, and who, as the verystar of his destiny, had led him back again to the land in which shedwelt, as a land of promise. Liberty was his watchword; and it is truethat when letters spoke so confidently of a civil war as inevitable,he obtained his father's permission to return to England, that hemight join his patriotic countrymen in their contention for the rightsof civil and religious liberty. Nor was this a mere pretext for escapefrom the tame drudgery of colonial life,--the cause of freedom wassacred in his sight, and was precious to his heart. He came to drawthe sword, and bare his bosom in the battle. He had a life to offer onthe altar of duty, and he joyously brought the willing sacrifice; butyet there lay at the bottom of his heart one bright, one good hope. Hemight be lifted, by the fortunes of this war, to renown, to rank, tofortune; he might survive all its chances; he might see peace andhappiness restored:--the present relations between himself and hiswealthy uncle might be greatly altered; the old prejudices against himmight at last give way, and the crowning reward of all his honours andhis fortunes might be the hand of Katharine. This was his dream byday--this was his dream by night:--like some chaste and solemn star,seen brightly shining in solitary and calm glory at the extremity of anarrow and gloomy valley, darkened by the shadows of lofty mountains,so the majestic loveliness of his cousin Katharine, irradiated by allher virtues, shone out beyond the cloudy path of blood and peril, asthe blissful end and rest of all his labours.

  He had not passed a night of such rapture since he last parted fromhis cousin as that on which he reached Milverton, and the whole ofwhich he mused away within sight of the mansion that contained thenoble object of his attachment.

  Although he was fully persuaded that he should be recognised byKatharine as the wandering musician, yet he was in doubt whether shewould afford him an immediate
opportunity of meeting her alone;therefore he prepared an earnest appeal to her, in characters which,though enigmatical to others, would, he well knew, be readilyunderstood by herself. The moon shone that night with so clear abrightness, that he had no sort of difficulty in executing his design.He made a slight fancy sketch, on a small piece of paper, of a settingsun; he introduced the cedar in the fore-ground, and in one corner hewrote, in a small hand, the Italian word "implora:" on the back ofthis paper he faintly sketched a dial-plate, the shadow touching thefigure of seven in the evening. He placed this between the leaves of acopy of Spenser's "Fairy Queen," which he found upon the seat, andwhich he remembered to have been the garden companion of his faircousin in former days. When, on the following evening, the sun hadset, and the silver light of the moon touched all objects with thehues of peace, Francis repaired to the appointed spot with eagersteps, and in confident hope that he should once more behold her forwhom he had all that tender reverence which angelic purity could aloneinspire. He seated himself beneath the well-known tree, and saw withpleasure that the book had been taken away. Katharine, then, hadreceived his "implora," and she would not--she could not--disappointhim, and deny his prayer. The long delay of her coming perplexed him;and, after an hour of anxious waiting, every succeeding minute wasinsupportably slow, and weighty with sadness. He left and resumed hisseat with restless discomposure; he paced the neighbouring bank; hewent into the Lime Walk, to watch for the first glimpse of her distantform; at last, as he was approaching the cedar tree, with his eyesbent on the ground, he for the first time observed a fragment of paperlying near the trunk:--he took it up--it was a part of his note; ithad been torn in halves, and trodden in the dust; it was divided atthe very word "implora." The change of his feeling was, for themoment, terrible. All that he had read or heard of the pride, thecaprice, and inconstancy of woman, rushed upon his memory tostrengthen his black suspicions, and inflame his sudden indignation.But this rage was very soon exhausted, and was succeeded by a sorrowweak as that of infants. He did not weep,--but a few hot tears slowlygathered at long intervals, and fell heavily on the earth. And then herailed upon himself, and defended her neglect of him.

  "It was that accursed music: she ever scorned such fanciful andromantic folly:--how dared I to expect that she, whose words and waysare open as the clear sunshine of noon, should come in the shadows ofevening, with silent footsteps, to a secret meeting with such anoutcast as me--one who may not ring the bell of his kinsman's gatewith better hope than that of rude dismissal? It is all well,Katharine, and yet I loved you loyally, and still will love you: ofthat privilege none can rob me. Like yon planet above me, you are acommon blessing, for which the comforted pilgrim in this thornywilderness glances his eye upward to the bounteous heavens, and thankshis God."

  Another, but a gloomier, vigil in the grounds of Milverton was thuspassed by Francis; and again, when the dawn approached, he withdrew,and retired to a small hostelry in the suburbs of Warwick, where forhis better concealment he had taken up his lodging. Here, however,some relief, if such it could be called, was awaiting him; for as helay reposing on his bed, tired, yet unable to sleep, he overheard thefollowing dialogue between his hostess and a passer by:--

  "Hast thou heard the bad news from Milverton, dame?" said the latter.

  "No; I have not seen my girl a week come to-morrow."

  "Eh, dear, don't you be frighted for your Ruth, but they've got thefever there quite bad. Master Randal, the 'pothecary, was over therethree times yesterday, and all last night."

  "Lord, goody, what shall I do? I must go: my poor dear child is sodelicate for taking of fever, she will be sure to catch it. Who is itthat ha got it? is it the old gentleman, or Mistress Alice?"

  "No, God be merciful to her, 't is that dear, kind, blessed younglady, Mistress Katharine; and they are all in a great take on abouther; for they say that the very night before she was took bad, herpoor dear mother's ghost was seen on the terrace by moonlight, andsung beautiful, and for all every body was so frighted, yet they sayit was like as if an angel had come down out of heaven; and they say,it is a sure sign that Mistress Katharine will die, and go happy."

  There is nothing more strange than the peculiar character of theselfishness of love--but it is ever the same. Francis felt a deep, atrue, an anxious concern for the illness of Katharine: he was keenlyafflicted with self-reproach at the thought that she might perhapshave been so disturbed by his sudden and strange announcement of hisreturn as to have been made nervous and unwell. But this sorrow, ay,and the very apprehension of her death, (which feeling, however, hedid not share,) would have been more endurable than the thought thathe was forgotten, neglected, and scorned by one whom his soul helddear. However, he was, in his own judgment, persuaded that herillness, and all the circumstances attending it, were much exaggeratedby those superstitious fears of the household, for which he couldhimself so very easily account. Descending, therefore, from hischamber, while the old gossips were continuing their talk, he tookoccasion, as soon as her neighbour had passed on, to urge his hostessto lose no time in going to inquire after her daughter; observing thathe had often heard of the family at Milverton, and could not but feela hope that the lady of whom they spoke would soon recover.

  "Precious angel," said the old woman: "I don't know why we should wishit, I am sure, except it be for the sake of others; for there wasnever a body fitter for heaven than that dear young lady."

  It was with keen anguish that, upon the return of his poor hostess inthe afternoon, he learned that the life of Katharine was really indanger. At sunset he took his cloak, and passed the night in aposition near the wood, from whence he could command the curtainedwindow of the sufferer, and watch the dim light within, and thosegloomy shadows which, as nurse or attendant slowly crossed thechamber, occasionally obscured it.

  His was a mind in which hope was ever anticipating enjoyment, or fearmeeting and realising the dreaded misfortune. Now, therefore, with thelamp of a sick room burning faint before him, and with scenery aroundall silvery and spiritual, lying hushed and calm in a silence solemnas the grave, and yet sweet and peaceful as that of heaven, heresigned himself to the belief that Katharine was dying, or, rather,was departing to the abode of blessed spirits. He grew reconciled tothe thought. No clouds of terror darkened it; and, as her pale imagearose distinctly before his mind's eye, he became elevated with thesentiment of her sure and celestial happiness; and there was a feelingof ecstasy in the idea that he might cherish his love for her, as asacred thing, for ever.

  Again, on the following night, he lay enfolded in his cloak, or leanedagainst a distant tree, or paced like a sentinel his lonely round,with his eyes fixed on the light in Katharine's chamber, and hismeditations were sweet. But how tenderly he had been rocked in thecradle of sorrow, and how willingly he had allowed the true state ofhis own heart to be hidden from himself by fancied consolations, wasevident, when, on returning from his watch upon the third morning, helearned from his hostess that the doctor had come home very early,and said, that the dear lady was out of danger. He had just commandenough over his feelings not to betray to her that he took a privateand deep interest in her intelligence; but, rushing up to his room,his hopes, his fears, his grief, his joy, his gratitude, gushed forthfrom his pent-up bosom in a flood of silent tears. He wept upon hisknees.