St. George and St. Michael

by George MacDonald

  CHAPTER XXXI.

  THE SLEEPLESS.

  There were more than the marquis left awake and thinking; amongst therest one who ought to have been asleep, for the thoughts that kept herawake were evil thoughts.

  Amanda Serafina Fuller was a twig or leaf upon one of many decayingbranches, which yet drew what life they had from an ancient genealogicaltree. Property gone, but the sense of high birth swollen to a vice, theone thought in her mother's mind, ever since she grew capable of lookingupon the social world in its relation to herself, had been how, withstinted resources, to make the false impression of plentiful ease. Forone of the most disappointing things in high descent is, that thedescent is occasionally into depths of meanness. Some who are proudestof their lineage, instead of finding therein a spur to nobility ofthought and action, find in it only a necessity for prostratingthemselves with the more abject humiliation at the footstool of Mammon,to be admitted into the penetralia of which foul god's favours, theywill hasten to mingle the blood of their pure descent with that of thevery kennels, yellow with the gold to which a noble man, if poor asJesus himself, would loathe to be indebted for a meal. In 'the highcountries' there will be a finding of levels more appalling thanstrange.

  Hence Amanda had been born and brought up in falsehood, had been all herlife witness to a straining after the untrue so energetic, as to assumethe appearance of conscience; while such was the tenor and spirit of theremarks she was constantly hearing, that she grew up with the ingrainedundisputed idea that she and her mother, whom she had only known as awidow, had been wronged, spoiled indeed of their lawful rights, by acombination of their rich relatives; whereas in truth they had been theobjects of very considerable generosity, which they resented the morethat it had been chiefly exercised by such of the family as could leasteasily afford it, yet accepted in their hearts, if not in their words,as their natural right. The intercession through which Amanda had beenreceived into lady Margaret's household, was the contribution towardstheir maintenance of one of their richer connections: the marquishimself, although distantly related, not having previously been aware oftheir existence.

  But Amanda felt degraded by her position, and was unaware that toherself alone she owed the degradation: she had not yet learned that theonly service which can degrade is that which is unwillingly rendered. Tobe paid for such, is degradation in its very essence. Every one whogrumbles at his position as degrading, yet accepts the wages thereof,brands himself a slave.

  The evil tendencies which she had inherited, had then been nourished inher from her very birth--chief of these envy, and a strong tendency todislike. Mean herself, she was full of suspicions with regard to others,and found much pleasure in penetrating what she took to be disguise, andlaying bare the despicable motives which her own character enabled hereither to discover or imagine, and which, in other people, she hated.Moderately good people have no idea of the vileness of which their ownnature is capable, or which has been developed in not a few who pass asrespectable persons, and have not yet been accused either of theft orpoisoning. Such as St. Paul alone can fully understand the abyss ofmoral misery from which the in-dwelling spirit of God has raised them.

  The one redeeming element in Amanda was her love to her mother, butinasmuch as it was isolated and self-reflected, their mutual attachmentpartook of the nature of a cultivated selfishness, and had lost much ofits primal grace. The remaining chance for such a woman, so to speak,seems--that she should either fall in love with a worthy man, if that bestill possible to her, or, by her own conduct, be brought into dismaland incontrovertible disgrace.

  She had stood in the hall within a few yards of Dorothy, and hadintently watched her face all the time Richard was before the marquis.But not because she watched the field of their play was Amanda able toread the heart whence ascended those strangely alternating lights andshadows. She had, by her own confession, conceived a strong dislike toDorothy the moment she saw her, and without love there can be nounderstanding. Hate will sharpen observation to the point of microscopicvision, affording opportunity for many a shrewd guess, and revealingfacts for the construction of the cleverest and falsest theories, butwill leave the observer as blind as any bat to the scope of the whole,or the meaning of the parts which can be understood only from the whole;for love alone can interpret.

  As she gazed on the signs of conflicting emotion in Dorothy's changes ofcolour and expression, Amanda came quickly enough to the conclusion thatnothing would account for them but the assumption that the slypuritanical minx was in love with the handsome young roundhead. How elsecould the deathly pallor of her countenance while she fixed her eyeswide and unmoving upon his face, and the flush that ever and anon sweptits red shadow over the pallor as she cast them on the ground at somebrave word from the lips of the canting psalm-singer, be in the leastintelligible? Then came the difficulty: how in that case was her sharein his capture to be explained? But here Amanda felt herself in her ownprovince, and before the marquis rose, had constructed a very clevertheory, in which exercise of ingenuity, however, unluckily for itstruth, she had taken for granted that Dorothy's nature corresponded toher own, and reasoned freely from the character of the one to theconduct of the other. This was her theory: Dorothy had expected Richard,and contrived his admission. His presence betrayed by the mastiff, andhis departure challenged by the warder, she had flown instantly to thealarm-bell, to screen herself in any case, and to secure the chance, ifhe should be taken, of liberating him without suspicion under cover ofthe credit of his capture. The theory was a bold one, but then itaccounted for all the points--amongst the rest, how he had got thepassword and why he would not tell--and was indeed in the fineness ofits invention equally worthy of both the heart and the intellect of thetheorist.

  Nor were mistress Fuller's resolves behind her conclusions in merit: ofall times since first she had learned to mistrust her, this night mustDorothy be watched; and it was with a gush of exultation over her ownacuteness that she saw her follow the men who bore Richard from thehall.

  If Dorothy knew more of her own feelings than she who watched her, shewas far less confident that she understood them. Indeed she found themstrangely complicated, and as difficult to control as to understand,while she stood gazing on the youth who through her found himselfhelpless and wounded in the hands of his enemies. He was all in thewrong, no doubt--a rebel against his king, and an apostate from thechurch of his country; but he was the same Richard with whom she hadplayed all her childhood, whom her mother had loved, and between whomand herself had never fallen shadow before that cast by the suddenoutblaze of the star of childish preference into the sun of youthfullove. And was it not when the very mother of shadows, the blackness ofdarkness itself, swept between them and separated them for ever, thatfirst she knew how much she had loved him? What if not with the lovethat could listen entranced to its own echo!--love of child or love ofmaiden, Dorothy never asked herself which it had been, or which it wasnow. She was not given to self-dissection. The cruel fingers of analysishad never pulled her flower to pieces, had never rubbed the bloom fromthe sun-dyed glow of her feelings. But now she could not help thevaporous rise of a question: all was over, for Richard had taken thepath of presumption, rebellion, and violence--how then came it that herheart beat with such a strange delight at every answer he made to theexpostulations or enticements of the marquis? How was it that hisapproval of the intruder, not the less evident that it was unspoken,made her heart swell with pride and satisfaction, causing her to forgetthe rude rebellion housed within the form whose youth alone prevented itfrom looking grand in her eyes?

  For the moment her heart had the better of--her conscience, shall I say?Yes, of that part of her conscience, I will allow, which had grown weakby the wandering of its roots into the poor soil of opinion. In thedelight which the manliness of the young fanatic awoke in her, she evenforgot the dull pain which had been gnawing at her heart ever sincefirst she saw the blood streaming down his face as he passed her in thegateway. But when at length he fe
ll fainting in the arms of his captors,and the fear that she had slain him writhed sickening through her heart,it was with a grim struggle indeed that she kept silent and conscious.The voice of the marquis, committing him to the care of mistress Watsoninstead of the rough ministrations of the guard, came with the power ofa welcome restorative, and she hastened after his bearers to satisfyherself that the housekeeper was made understand that he was carried toher at the marquis's behest. She then retired to her own chamber,passing in the corridor Amanda, whose room was in the same quarter, witha salute careless from weariness and pre-occupation.

  The moment her head was on her pillow the great fight began--on thatonly battle-field of which all others are but outer types and pictures,upon which the thoughts of the same spirit are the combatants, accusingand excusing one another.

  She had done her duty, but what a remorseless thing that duty was! Shedid not, she could not, repent that she had done it, but her heart WOULDcomplain that she had had it to do. To her, as to Hamlet, it was acursed spite. She had not yet learned the mystery of her relation to theEternal, whose nature in his children it is that first shows itself inthe feeling of duty. Her religion had not as yet been shaken, to testwhether it was of the things that remain or of those that pass. It iseasy for a simple nature to hold by what it has been taught, so long asout of that faith springs no demand of bitter obedience; but when thevery hiding place of life begins to be laid bare under the scalpel ofthe law, when the heart must forego its love, when conscience seems atwar with kindness, and duty at strife with reason, then most goodpeople, let their devotion to what they call their religion be what itmay, prove themselves, although generally without recognising the fact,very much of pagans after all. And good reason why! For are they notdevoted to their church or their religion tenfold more than to theliving Love, the father of their spirits? and what else is that, be thechurch or religion what it will, but paganism? Gentle and strong at onceas Dorothy was, she was not yet capable of knowing that, however like itmay look to a hardship, no duty can be other than a privilege. Nor wasit any wonder if she did not perceive that she was already rewarded forthe doing of the painful task, at the memory of which her heart achedand rebelled, by the fresh outburst in that same troubled heart of thehalf-choked spring of her love to the playmate of her childhood. Had itfallen, as she would have judged so much fairer, to some one else of themany in the populous place to defeat Richard's intent and secure hisperson, she would have both suffered and loved less. The love, I repeat,was the reward of the duty done.

  For a long time she tossed sleepless, for what she had just passedthrough had so thorougly possessed her imagination that, ever as herwearied brain was sinking under the waves of sleep, up rose the face ofRichard from its depths, deathlike, with matted curls and bloodstainedbrow, and drove her again ashore on the rocks of wakefulness. By and bythe form of her suffering changed, and then instead of the face ofRichard it was his voice, ever as she reached the point of oblivion,calling aloud for help in a tone of mingled entreaty and reproach, untilat last she could no longer resist the impression that she was warned togo and save him from some impending evil. This once admitted, not for amoment would she delay response. She rose, threw on a dressing-gown, andset out in the dim light of the breaking day to find again the room intowhich she had seen him carried.

  There was yet another in the house who could not sleep, and that was TomFool. He had a strong suspicion that Richard had learned the watchwordfrom his mother, who, like most people desirous of a reputation forsuperior knowledge, was always looking out for scraps and orts ofpeculiar information. In such persons an imagination after its kind hasconsiderable play, and when mother Rees had succeeded, without muchdifficulty on her own, or sense of risk on her son's part, in drawingfrom him the watchword of the week, she was aware in herself of a hugeaccession of importance; she felt as if she had been intrusted with thekeys of the main entrance, and trod her clay floor as if the fate ofRaglan was hid in her bosom, and the great pile rested in safety underthe shadow of her wings. But her imagined gain was likely to prove herson's loss; for, as he reasoned with himself, would Mr. Heywood, nowthat he knew him for the thief of his mare, persist, upon reflection, inrefusing to betray his mother? If not, then the fault would at once betraced to him, with the result at the very least, of disgracefulexpulsion from the marquis's service. Almost any other risk would bepreferable.

  But he had yet another ground for uneasiness. He knew well his mother'sattachment to young Mr. Heywood, and had taken care she should have nosuspicion of the way he was going after leaving her the night he toldher the watchword; for such was his belief in her possession ofsupernatural powers, that he feared the punishment she would certainlyinflict for the wrong done to Richard, should it come to her knowledge,even more than the wrath of the marquis. For both of these weightyreasons therefore he must try what could be done to strengthen Richardin his silence, and was prepared with an offer, or promise at least, ofassistance in making his escape.

  As soon as the house was once more quiet, he got up, and, thoroughlyacquainted with the "crenkles" of it, took his way through dusk anddark, through narrow passage and wide chamber, without encountering theslightest risk of being heard or seen, until at last he stood,breathless with anxiety and terror, at the door of the turret-chamber,and laid his ear against it.