‘Then, for instance, the last summer evening that he came here, the sun and flowers and quietness brightened his noble features with such happiness, I could tell his heart was at rest; for as he lay in the shade where you are now, I heard him hum the airs he long, long ago played on his guitar. I was rewarded then to feel that the house I kept was pleasant enough to make him forget Angria and recur to home. You must excuse me, Mr Warner, but the west, the sweet west, is both his home and mine.’ Mina paused and looked solemnly at the sun, now softened in its shine and hanging exceedingly low. In a moment her eyes fell again on Warner. They seemed to have absorbed radiance from what they had gazed on: light like an arrow point glanced in them as she said,
‘This is my time to follow Zamorna. I’ll not be robbed of those hours of blissful danger when I may be continually with him. I am not afraid of danger; I have strong nerves; I will die or be with him.’
‘What has fired your eyes so suddenly, Miss Laury?’ asked Lord Hartford, now advancing with Enara from their canopy of roses.
‘The duke, the duke,’ muttered Enara. ‘You won’t leave him, I’ll be sworn.’
‘I can’t, general,’ said Mina.
‘No,’ answered the Italian, ‘and nobody shall force you. You shall have your own way, madam, whether it be right or wrong. I hate to contradict such as you in their will.’
‘Thank you, general, you are always so kind to me.’ Mina hurriedly put her little hand into the gloved grasp of Enara.
‘Kind, madam?’ said he, pressing it warmly, ‘I’m so kind that I would hang the man unshriven who should use your name with other than respect due to a queen.’ The dark, hard-browed Hartford smiled at his enthusiasm.
‘Is that homage paid to Miss Laury’s goodness or to her beauty?’ asked he.
‘To neither, my lord,’ answered Enara briefly, ‘but to her worth, her sterling worth.’
‘Hartford, you are not going to despise me? Was that a sneer?’ murmured Mina aside.
‘No. No, Miss Laury,’ replied the noble general seriously. ‘I know what you are; I am aware of your value. Do you doubt Edward Hartford’s honourable friendship? It is yours on terms such as it was never given to a beautiful woman before.’
Before Miss Laury could answer, a voice from within the mansion spoke her name.
‘It is my lord!’ she exclaimed, and sped like a roe over the sward, through the porch, along the passage, to a summer parlour, whose walls were painted fine pale red, its mouldings burnished gilding, and its window curtains artistical draperies of dark blue silk, covered with gold waves and flowers.
Here Zamorna sat alone; he had been writing. One or two letters, folded, sealed, and inscribed with western directions lay on the table beside him. He had not uncovered since entering the house three hours since, and either the weight of his dragoon helmet, or the gloom of its impending plumes, or else some inward feeling, had clouded his face with a strange darkness.
Mina closed the door and softly drew near; without speaking or asking leave, she began to busy herself in unclasping the heavy helmet. The duke smiled faintly as her little fingers played about his chin and luxuriant whiskers; and then, the load of brass and sable plumage being removed, as they arranged the compressed masses of glossy brown ringlets, and touched with soft cool contact his feverish brow. Absorbed in this grateful task she hardly felt that his majesty’s arm had encircled her waist; yet she did feel it, too, and would have thought herself presumptuous to shrink from his endearment. She took it as a slave ought to take the caress of a sultan, and obeying the gentle effort of his hand, slowly sunk on to the sofa by her master’s side.
‘My little physician,’ said he, meeting her adoring but anxious upward gaze with the full light of his countenance, ‘you look at me as if you thought I was not well — feel my pulse.’ She folded the proferred hand, white, supple, and soft with youth and delicate nurture, in both her own; whether Zamorna’s pulse beat rapidly or not, his handmaid’s did as she felt the slender grasping fingers of the monarch laid quietly in hers.
He did not wait for the report, but took his hand away again, and laying it on her raven curls said, ‘So, Mina, you won’t leave me, though I never did you any good in the world. Warner says you are resolved to continue in the scene of war.’
‘To continue by your side, my lord duke.’
‘But what shall I do with you, Mina? Where shall I put you? My little girl, what will the army say when they hear of your presence? You have read history; recollect that it was Darius who carried his concubines to the field, not Alexander. The world will say Zamorna has provided himself with a pretty mistress. He attends to his own pleasures and cares not how his men suffer.’
Poor Mina writhed at these words as if the iron had entered into her soul. A vivid burning blush crimsoned her cheek, and tears of shame and bitter self-reproach gushed at once into her bright black eyes. Zamorna was touched acutely.
‘Nay, my little girl,’ said he, redoubling his haughty caresses and speaking in his most soothing tone, ‘never weep about it. It grieves me to hurt your feelings, but you desire an impossibility and I must use strong language to convince you that I cannot grant it — -’
‘Oh! don’t refuse me again,’ sobbed Miss Laury. ‘I’ll bear all infamy and contempt to be allowed to follow you, my lord. My lord, I’ve served you for many years most faithfully and I seldom ask a favour of you. Don’t reject almost the first request of the kind I ever made.’ The duke shook his head, and the meeting of his exquisite lips, too placid for the term compression, told he was not to be moved.
‘If you should receive a wound, if you should fall sick,’ continued Mina, ‘what can surgeons and physicians do for you? They cannot watch you and wait on you and worship you like me; you do not seem well now, the bloom is so faded on your complexion and the flesh is wasted round your eyes. My lord, smile and do not look so calmly resolved. Let me go!’
Zamorna withdrew his arm from her waist. ‘I must be displeased before you cease to importune me,’ said he. ‘Mina, look at that letter, read the direction,’ pointing to one he had been writing. She obeyed: it was addressed to Her Royal Highness Mary Henrietta, Duchess of Zamorna, Queen of Angria.
‘Must I pay no attention to the feelings of that lady?’ pursued the duke, whom the duties of war and the conflict of some internal emotions seemed to render rather peculiarly stern. ‘Her public claims must be respected whether I love her or not.’ Miss Laury shrunk into herself. Not another word did she venture to breathe. An unconscious wish of wild intensity filled her that she were dead and buried, insensible to the shame that overwhelmed her. She saw Zamorna’s finger with the ring on it still pointing to that awful name, a name that raised no impulse of hatred, but only bitter humiliation and self-abasement. She stole from her master’s side, feeling that she had no more right to sit there than a fawn has to share the den of a royal lion; and murmuring that she was very sorry for her folly, was about to glide in dismay and despair from the room. But the duke, rising up, arrested her, and bending his lofty stature over as she crouched before him, folded her again in his arms. His countenance relaxed not a moment from its sternness, nor did the gloom leave his magnificent but worn features, as he said,
‘I will make no apologies for what I have said because I know, Mina, that, as I hold you now, you feel fully recompensed for my transient severity. Before I depart, I will speak to you one word of comfort, which you may remember when I am far away, and perhaps dead. My dear girl! I know and appreciate all you have done, all you have resigned, and all you have endured for my sake. I repay you for it with one coin, with what alone will be to you of greater worth than worlds without it. I give you such true and fond love as a master may give to the fairest and loveliest vassal that ever was bound to him in feudal allegiance. You may never feel the touch of Zamorna’s lips again. There, Mina.’ And fervently, almost fiercely, he pressed them to her forehead. ‘Go to your chamber. Tomorrow you must leave for the west.’
> ‘Obedient till death,’ was Miss Laury’s answer, as she closed the door and disappeared.
[Meanwhile ... though Zamorna has apparently directed a letter to his wife in this past scene, he persists in his decision to repudiate her and get revenge on her father, Northangerland, by breaking her heart. Weeks pass without a word from Zamorna, and Mary begins to pine away.]
The duchess dropped her head on her hand.
‘Is the sun shining hot this evening?’ said she. ‘I feel very languid and inert.’ Alas, it was not the mild sun of April glistening even now on the lingering rain drops of the morning which caused that sickly languor. ‘I wish the mail would come in,’ continued the duchess. ‘How long is it since I’ve had a letter now, Amelia?’
‘Three weeks, my lady.’
‘If none comes this evening, what shall I do, Amelia? I shall never get on till tomorrow. Oh, I dread those long, weary, sleepless nights I’ve had lately, tossing through many hours on a wide, lonely bed, with the lamps decaying round me. Now I think I could sleep if I only had a kind letter for a talisman to press to my heart all night long. Amelia, I’d give anything to get from the east this evening a square of white paper directed in that light, rapid hand. Would he but write two lines to me signed with his name.’
‘My lady,’ said Miss Clifton, as she placed a little silver vessel of tea and a plate of biscuit before her mistress, ‘you will hear from the east this evening, and that before many minutes elapse. Mr Warner is in Verdopolis and will wait upon you immediately.’ It was pleasant to see how a sudden beam of joy shot into the settled sadness of Queen Mary’s face.
‘I am thankful to heaven for it,’ exclaimed she. ‘Even if he brings bad news it will be a relief from suspense; and if good news, this heart sickness will be removed for a moment.’
As she spoke, a foot was heard in the antechamber, there was a light tap at the door. Mr Warner entered closely muffled, as it was absolutely necessary that he should avoid remark, for the sacrifice of his liberty would have been the result of recognition. With something of chivalric devotedness in his manner he sunk on one knee before the duchess, and respectfully touched with his lips the hand she offered him. A gleam of eager anxiety darted into his eyes as he rose, looked at her, and saw the pining and joyless shadow which had settled on her divine features, her blanched delicacy of complexion.
‘Your grace is wasting away,’ said he abruptly, the first greeting being past. ‘You are going into a decline; you have imagined things to be worse than they really are; you have frightened yourself with fantastic surmises.’
[Despite his desire to console her, Warner does not bring the longed-for letter. In desperation, Mary resolved to return with him to the front.]
‘I cannot try one effort to soften him, separated by one hundred and twenty miles. He would think of me more as a woman, I am sure, and less as a bodiless link between himself and my terrible father if I were near at hand. Warner, this irritation throughout all my nerves is unbearable. I am not accustomed to disappointment and delay in what I wish. When do you return to Angria?’
‘Tomorrow, my lady, before daylight, if possible.’ ‘And you travel incognito, of course?’
‘I do.’
‘Make room in your carriage then for me. I must go with you. Not a word, I implore you, Mr Warner, of expostulation. I should have died before morning if I had not hit upon this expedient.’ Mr Warner heard her in silence and saw it was utterly vain to oppose her, but in his heart he hated the adventure. He saw its rashness and peril; besides he had calculated the result of the duke’s determination over and over again. He had weighed advantages against disadvantages, profit against loss, the separation from the father against the happiness of the daughter, and in his serene and ambitious eye, the latter scale seemed far to kick the beam. He bowed to the duchess, said she should be obeyed, and left the room.
[Upon their arrival at the front Warner immediately meets with Zamorna.]
‘I knew you were come, Howard,’ said he, ‘for I heard you voice below a quarter of an hour since. Well, have you procured the documents?’
‘Yes, and I have delivered them to your grace’s private secretary.’
‘They were at Wellesley house, of course?’
‘Yes, in the duchess’s own keeping. She said you wished them to be preserved with care.
‘Her grace,’ continued Warner after a brief pause, ‘asked very anxiously after you.’
The stern field-marshal look came over the duke, as he lay giantlike on his couch, and the momentary mildness melted away.
‘I need not ask you how Mary Wellesley looks,’ said he in his deep undertone, ‘because I know better than you can tell me. I say, Howard, did she not ask you for a letter?’
‘She did; she almost entreated me for one.’
‘And you had not one to give her,’ answered his sovereign, while with a low bitter laugh he turned on his couch and was silent.
Warner paced the room with a troubled step. ‘My lord, are you doing right?’ exclaimed he, pausing suddenly. ‘The matter lies between God and your conscience. I know that the kingdom must be saved at any hazard of individual peace or even life; I advocate expediency, my lord, in the government of a state; I allow of equivocal measures to procure a just end; I sanction the shedding of blood and the cutting up of domestic happiness by the roots to stab a traitor to the heart. But nevertheless I am a man, sire, and after what I have seen during the last day or two, I ask your majesty with solemn earnestness: is there no way by which the heart of Northangerland may be reached except through the breast of my queen?’
[Zamorna remains obdurate, and Warner finally quits him, with the intelligence that there is ‘a lady’ in the next room who wishes an audience with him.]
About ten minutes after Warner’s departure, the lady in question entered the room by an inner door. Zamorna was now risen from his couch and stood in full stature before the fire. He turned to her at first carelessly, but his keen eye was quickly lit up with interest when he saw the elegant figure, whose slight, youthful proportions and graceful carriage, agreeing with her dress, produced an effect of such ladylike harmony. While dropping a profound obeisance, she contrived so to arrange her large veil as to hide her face. As she did this, her hand trembled; then she paused and leaned against a bookcase near the door.
Zamorna now saw that she shook from head to foot. Speaking in his tone of most soothing melody, he told her to draw near, and placed a chair for her close by the hearth. She made an effort to obey but it was evident she would have dropped if she had quitted her support. His grace smiled, a little surprised at her extreme agitation.
‘I hope, madam,’ said he, ‘my presence is not the cause of your alarm,’ and advancing, he kindly gave her his hand and led her to a seat. As she grew a little calmer he addressed her again in tones of the softest encouragement.
‘I think Mr Warner said you are the wife of an officer in my army. What is his name?’
‘Archer,’ replied the lady, dropping one silver word for the first time.
‘And have you any request to make concerning your husband? Speak our freely, madam; if it be reasonable, I will grant it.’ She made some answer, but in a tone too low to be audible.
‘Be so kind as to remove your veil, madam,’ said the duke. ‘It prevents me from hearing what you say distinctly.’ She hesitated a moment, then as if she had formed some sudden resolution, she loosened the satin knot that confined her bonnet, and taking off both it and her veil, let them drop on the carpet. His majesty now caught a glimpse of a beautiful blushing face, but in a moment clusters of curls fell over it, and it was likewise concealed by two delicate little white hands with many rings sparkling on the taper fingers.
The sovereign of the east was nonplussed; he had an acute eye for most of these matters, but he did not quite understand the growing, trembling embarrassment of his lovely suppliant. He repeated the question he had before put to the lady respecting the nature of her petition.
‘Sire,’ said she at length, ‘I want your majesty’s gracious permission to see my dear, dear husband once more in this world before he leaves me forever.’ She looked up, parted from her fair forehead her auburn curls, and raised her wild brown eyes, tearful and earnest and imploring, to a face that grew crimson under their glance.
The king’s heart beat and throbbed till its motion could be seen in the heaving of a splendid chest. He seemed fixed in his attitude, standing before the lady, slightly bent over her, an inexpressible sparkle commencing and spreading to a flash in his eyes, the current of his lifeblood rising to his cheek, and his forehead dark with solemn, awful, desperate thought.
Mary clasped her hands and waited. She did not know whether love or indignation would prevail. She saw that both feelings were at work. Her suspense was at and end: the thundercloud broke asunder in a burst of electric passion! He turned from his duchess and flung open the door. A voice rung along the halls of Angria House summoning Warner — a voice having the spirit of a trumpet, the depth of a drum in its tone — -
[Warner is duly rebuked in true imperial style, and dismissed.]
Warner, whose angelic philosophy had been little shaken by this appalling hurricane, would have stopped to give his grace a brief homily on the wickedness of indulging in violent passions; but a glance of entreaty from the duchess prevailed on him to withdraw in silence.
It was with a sensation of pleasurable terror that Mary found herself again alone with the duke. He had not yet spoken one harsh word to her. It was awful to be Zamorna’s sole companion in this hour of his ire but how much better than to be one hundred and twenty miles away from him. She was soon near enough. The duke, gazing at her pale and sweet loveliness till he felt there was nothing in the world he loved half so well — -conscious that her delicate attenuation was for his sake, appreciating too the idolatry that had brought her through such perils to see him at all hazards — threw himself impetuously beside her and soon made her tremble as much with the ardour of his caresses as she had done with the dread of his wrath.
Delphi Complete Works of the Brontes Page 210
