Modern Flirtations: A Novel

by Catherine Sinclair

  CHAPTER XXIV.

  Captain De Crespigny remained in his sitting-room till a late hour thefollowing night, looking over papers and preparing for his departure toYorkshire, after which he seated himself before the dying embers of hisfire to muse, for the twentieth time, on all that had passed betweenhimself and Marion. More in love with her than he had ever believed itpossible to be with any one, he recalled again and again to mind thethrilling tones of her voice, and the matchless loveliness of hercountenance, till at length his attention being roused by the clockstriking two, he looked at the candles burning dimly in their sockets,and prepared to wish himself good night.

  When about to rise, his attention was suddenly arrested by a rustlingnoise behind. The shadow of a figure became visible on the oppositewall; it was distinctly outlined, and began slowly to move, when,springing to his feet with an exclamation of astonishment, Captain DeCrespigny's eye fell on the tall figure of a woman enveloped in darkdraperies, who stood like a phantom close by his side, without speechor motion. While his eyes were riveted in silent consternation on thismysterious apparition, gradually the cloak was thrown aside, the veildropped, and a countenance became disclosed so white and rigid, sosoul-stricken in sorrow, so utterly without life or motion, that itseemed as if nothing on earth could have looked so supernaturallywretched. No moisture flouted over her large dilated eyes, which wereglassy and fixed, her parted lips were livid as death, a mortalpaleness was on her forehead and cheek, and not a sound became audible,for the grave itself was not more silent. With her emaciated handsriveted together, she stood the very image of woe; while nothing humanappeared in her face but its expression of mortal anguish.

  Captain De Crespigny gazed at this mysterious apparition, unable tobelieve the evidence of his senses. A vital horror thrilled through hisheart; his eyes closed as if he would willingly have closed his visionagainst a sight which blasted him; but at length, by a strong effortcompelling himself to speak, he said, in a low, doubtful tone, "MaryAnstruther! Impossible! I was told long ago you were no more."

  A few quivering, inaudible murmurs, were for some moments her onlyreply, as if unable yet to command herself, till at length, in a toneso low, hollow, and concentrated, that it seemed scarcely human, butresembled a dreary echo from the tomb, she said, fixing a ghastly lookon Captain De Crespigny,

  "No wonder you disown the wreck! I scarcely know myself in mind orbody. Ages of misery have made me the creature I am! Not want, norsuffering, nor humiliation, though these are what you consigned me to,but the bitter agony of being despised and forgotten by yourself,--byyou for whom I steeped my very soul in guilt! You start!--You woulddeny this; but when the Abbe Mordaunt, to gain possession of hisniece's fortune, wished me to assist in getting her driven from thehouse, was it to serve him that I did so? Was it for his offered bribesthat I lent my aid to that guilty work! Oh no! but her child stood inyour way, and therefore I consented. You never knew what I had done foryour sake; but was it not one of the many promises that you havebroken, that sooner or later you would declare me--even me, thewretched Mary Anstruther, your wife. Madness and despair drove me on! Islandered her to Lord Doncaster--got her driven from his house--made mybrother believe she had misrepresented me--that she had caused ourdisgrace and banishment--and you know the fearful end of all. I never,never thought of blood! Oh never! He was mad then! He has been mad eversince; and who can wonder! Her cry rings for ever in my ears, thesharpest on earth--a cry for life. It haunts me night and day! Go whereI will, the shadow pursues me. A shapeless horror is on my mind! Thefear of discovery follows me like a spectre! A whispering sound is inmy ears, desolate and dreary thoughts, and fearful dreams, darkness,poverty, and solitude; my pillow is a pillow of fire; my brain isscorched,--wherever I turn, dead eyes are staring in their sockets atme. Oh! if rivers of tears could restore that murdered being, I mighthave peace!"

  The wretched creature's words poured out like the rushing of a mightytorrent, while her very reason seemed stretched to it utmost verge. Sheleaned against a table, which quivered beneath her trembling form,while her dragged and ghastly features were turned towards Captain DeCrespigny, and she fixed on him, with a look of dismal meaning, theblackest eyes that ever vied with night. Vainly he endeavored towithdraw his gaze from that wild and haggard countenance, or to shuthis ears against the tempest of her words; but there was a compressionat his heart, till his very breath seemed difficult to draw, while helistened to her almost frenzied ravings. At length, in a voice of deepand solemn import, he addressed her, while the color fled from his verylips with agitation, and a cold shudder crept through his frame:

  "Tell me, Mary, I adjure you, what all this means! I have sometimessuspected that Henry De Lancey might be the natural son of my uncle;never till this moment did I fully imagine that the murdered woman wasactually married. I must know all. Rather than remain in this suspense,I will ask Lord Doncaster himself. I am not a man who would inherit oneacre unjustly, or sit tamely down under the suspicion that I might beswindling another out of his rights. Vague apprehensions have sometimescrossed my mind; but give me only a certainty one way or other. Ifbeggary itself be the consequence, I shall act like a man of honor, andlet the law take its course."

  "Ask nothing! suspect nothing! The dark and dreadful story is buried inher grave, never to be heard of more. It rests upon the Abbe Mordaunt'sconscience, and on him be the curse! Look here!" cried she wildlythrowing off her cap, while her hair, which streamed like a long bannerbehind, was perfectly white and silvery. "This was the work of a singleday, and my heart is no less changed. The world itself has altered! Oh!who can tell the unimaginable wretchedness that surrounds me! Youbelieved that I was dead! Would that it had been so! I wish it, andwell may you!" A strange smile gleamed upon her features for a moment,and vanished. "When shall I become like the dust I tread on? When shallI find beneath the green turf a chamber of darkness, of silence, andperhaps of peace! Often, often do I ask myself why I consent to live,when there are a thousand ways of escaping to my only refuge,--death!It is a horrid thought, but it will come. There is no future in mylife! Houseless, friendless, penniless, and without hope,--a fieryanguish is at my heart, as if hell itself were there!"

  "Mary Anstruther!" said Captain De Crespigny, in a hurried tone ofgreat agitation, "I wronged you once. I acknowledge it with sorrow andremorse. We were young indeed then, and you had no cause, surely, tocomplain of my liberality. I offered you----"

  "Yes! yes! yes!" replied she, with frantic vehemence, while her eyes,glazed, and without moisture, were darkened by the shadow of deepdespair. "You offered me everything but what you had promised, and whatalone I would accept. You took from me every blessing of life, andoffered me money! I hated you for supposing me mean enough to acceptit. I would rather die in the street, or perish on a dung-hill, thanreceive your alms. My name branded with infamy, not a roof to cover me,and not a friend in all the earth to pity me; my brother now a terrorand a reproach to all who know him; crazed myself in mind and heart,aloof from all earthly sympathy, branded and alone--what remains forme? Yet I would rather die in an hospital than owe the very air Ibreathe to you."

  "Why, then, do I see you here?" asked Captain De Crespigny, endeavoringto steady the tremulousness of his voice. "I would serve you yet, ifpossible. I cannot entirely forget former times!"

  "Former times!" exclaimed the miserable being, with a heavy sob, whilea rush of agony poured itself out in her voice, and clasping her handsover her burning eyes, tears, such as she had not shed for ages, felllike rain over her face. "Who talks of former times! You! who made mywhole life, past, present, and future, one long agony of suffering! Doyou remind me of former times! Oh! bring them back--those days whichnow seem like a dream, when I was young, innocent, and happy! Who sogay then as I--whose step so joyous--whose eye so bright--who soadmired; and," added she, her voice changing to a low, deep tone ofanguish, "who so loved? It was the delirium of an hour, and what am Inow? Of all the wretched outcasts on earth, the most wretched; while h
ewho has made me so thinks it degradation to waste a thought upon one solost."

  There was a pause for some moments, and she added, in a deep,sepulchral voice,

  "A wide gulph separates us now. I know and feel that. I do not evenwish it otherwise. You are courted and admired in every house, while Iwander like a solitary ghost upon the earth! A furnace of guilt andhorror burns within me! No language is dark and dreadful enough toexpress what I endure. The fresh green turf, and the blue sky above, Idare not look upon; for they speak of days that are for ever past--ofthat short summer filled with hope and joy, which has been followed bythis dreary, endless winter----"

  Captain De Crespigny's eye quailed beneath the look of chilling despairfastened upon himself. The hurricane of her feelings had beenexhausted, but there was an unearthly fixedness in the eye of MaryAnstruther. In her voice, too, a cold, calm, almost spectral solemnityof tone had succeeded to the wild expression of her manner. Herexpression was that of a lull after a storm, the ground-swell thatfollows the hushing of a tempest; and she again stood as at first, paleas death, still and motionless as a corpse, while the long drapery ofher cloak hung as a winding-sheet around her wasted limbs.

  "If there be any thing on earth I can do for you, speak but the word,and it is done," said Captain De Crespigny, with undisguised emotion."My purse, if you will yet accept it, is yours; but remember your verylife is at stake in coming here. I have shut my eyes already too long!I cannot conceal from my own mind that the man who calls himselfHoward, and lives with Sir Arthur Dunbar, must be your brother. He hashidden himself always from me, and I should scarcely even know him ifwe met, but this shall not last. Tell him he must go! Once,--and onceonly, I may for your sake connive at his escape from justice, but letErnest cross my path again, and no earthly power shall induce me toneglect the sacred law that bids us deliver up the murderer to justice.You also at St. John's Lodge, would once have followed the example ofyour unhappy brother's crime. You escaped on that occasion, and I havetried to convince myself it could not be,--that you were already inanother world,--but I will not, even for the sake of our early days, bemade a participator in crime. Go, then, to some distant countrytogether. The sword of the law is suspended over both your heads. Flyfor your very lives. The means shall not be wanting,--and tell yourguilty brother, as I tell you, that if he delays, cost what itmay,--and I know the cost to me will be great indeed, justice shallhave its course."

  "Let me then drink my cup of sorrow to the dregs!" replied Mary, in alow deep whisper. "He will not go! No earthly power can rule him,--noterror in life intimidates him. For myself; I dread nothing now but aprolonged existence. The sooner it is ended by any hand but my own, thebetter. Yours is indeed the fittest. That will only complete the workwhich you began. Give us up then to justice. In remembrance of thosedays when among the green lanes of England you promised to love me,--meonly till death,--deliver us up now to the rope and to the scaffold.Yes!" added she, with a look of fevered anguish, and a frightfulhysterical laugh, "This is as it should be; cheated of innocence,blighted in affection, blistered in heart, trodden down with contempt,driven almost to madness, and delivered up to death. Such be the fateof all who ever trust in man."

  "Leave me! leave me!" said Captain De Crespigny, visibly shuddering."If you desire vengeance, the sight of you, Mary Anstruther, such asyou are now, is more than I can bear. Leave me!"

  "Vengeance!--No!--It was for a good purpose I came, and let me notforget it," said Mary, in a low, broken, bewildered voice, while agleam like sun-light on the stormy wave seemed for a moment to restorethe softness and beauty of youth to her countenance. "I would save youfrom death. My wretched brother long ago suspected that you were theauthor of my ruin. That secret he never could wring from me, and henever shall. Oh, no! I ask no revenge on you. I am grieved, even onceto have reproached you; but it is done, and my tongue shall be silentin the grave before you hear it again. Ernest swore an oath,--a deep,deep oath, that if you had indeed deceived me, nothing should screenyou from his vengeance. Already he was irritated, believing you wishedto marry Miss Howard, and on that subject you know how long he has beencrazed. Ernest never forgives, and never forgets. He lives but forrevenge. He would make you drink a cup bitter as his own. On that fatalnight to which I never dare to look back, the knife he used wasyours,--yes! it was stolen for the very purpose, and you know itspeculiar form. He intended, if detected, to accuse you as an accessaryto the murder. His plans are skillfully laid, and he threatens thus tohurl you from the eminence on which you now stand in society----"

  "Impossible! absurd! Nothing but derangement could make your brotherimagine any mortal would believe a fabrication so atrocious andimprobable!"

  "It will at least excite interest, and his plans are but too well laid.My story might then become public; and little as the world thinks ingeneral of such sorrows as mine, there are some who would pity me.Ernest has the cunning of madness; and he thinks if you and Henry DeLancey were removed, he must succeed to Lord Doncaster. If I live, hisstrange and deadly scheme of revenge shall be circumvented; yet bewareof Ernest! Your life is not safe for an hour! Night and day,--alone orin company, at your table or in your bed, wherever you turn, andwherever you go, beware; for none but myself can tell what his love orhis hatred are. I would prevent mischief for his sake, and--and evenfor yours."

  A dark convulsion passed over the unhappy woman's countenance,--shegazed for several moments at Captain De Crespigny in silent, disastrouswretchedness, and with the livid smile of a broken heart, shedisappeared.

  Captain De Crespigny scarcely slept that night,--the moaning of thewind sounded dismal as the cry of departed spirits in his ears, andwhen at last his eye closed in feverish, restless slumber, he suddenlystarted up, thinking his name had been called out with a shriek ofanguish in accents to which he had long been a stranger, and unable totell whether it had been a dream or a reality, he watched for some timein agitated silence, and towards morning fell into a deep repose.