CHAPTER XXX.
Hours passed away without either of the guilty parties finding courageor inclination to address the other. The hearts of both were too fullfor utterance--and yet did they acknowledge no sympathy in common.Remorse, shame, fear, regret, simultaneously assailed and weighed downthe mind of Gerald. Triumphant vengeance, unmixed with any apprehensionof self, reigned exclusively in the bosom of Matilda. The intensepassion of the former, like a mist that is dissipated before the strongrays of the sun, had yielded before the masculine and practical displayof the energetic hate of its object, while on the contrary she, whosebeauty of person was now to him a thing without price, acknowledged noother feeling than contempt for the vacillating character of herassociate. In this only did they agree, that each looked upon each inthe light of a being sunk in crime--steeped in dishonor--and while thelove of the one was turned to almost loathing at the thought, the othermerely wondered how one so feeble of heart had ever been linked to sodetermined a purpose.
The only light admitted into the temple was through the window alreadydescribed, and this was so feeble as scarcely to allow of the moredistant objects in the room being seen. Gradually, as the moon sunkbeneath the forest ridge, the gloom increased, until in the end thedarkness became almost profound. At their first entrance Matilda,enshrouding herself in the folds of her cloak, had thrown herself uponthe sofa; while Gerald continued to pace up and down the apartment withhurried steps, and in a state of feeling it would be a vain attempt todescribe. It was now for the first time that, uninfluenced by passion,the miserable young man had leisure to reflect on the past, and thechain of fatality which had led to his present disgraceful position. Herecollected the conversation he had held with his brother on the daysucceeding his escape from the storm; and as the pledge which had beengiven in his name to his dying father, that no action of his life shouldreflect dishonor on his family, now occurred to him in all its force, hegroaned in agony of spirit, less in apprehension of the fate thatawaited him, than in sorrow and in shame that that pledge should havebeen violated. By a natural transition of his feelings, his imaginationrecurred to the traditions connected with his family, and the dreadfulcurse which had been uttered by one on whom his ancestor was said tohave heaped injury to the very extinction of reason--and associating ashe did Matilda's visit to the cottage at Detroit, on the memorable nightwhen he had unconsciously saved the life of Colonel Forrester, with thefact of her having previously knelt and prayed upon the grave that wasknown to cover the ashes of the unhappy maniac, Ellen Halloway, he felta shuddering conviction that she was in some way connected with thatwretched woman. In the intenseness of his new desire to satisfy hisdoubts--a desire which in itself partook of the character of thefatality by which he was beset--he overcame the repugnance he hadhitherto felt to enter into conversation with her, and advancing to thecouch, he seated himself upon its edge at her side.
"Matilda," he said, after a few moments of silence, "by all the love youonce bore me, I conjure you to answer me one question while there istime."
"Fool," returned the American, "I never loved you. A soul like minefeels passion but once. Hitherto I have played a part, but the dramaapproaches to a close, and disguise of plot is no longer necessary.Gerald Grantham, you have been my dupe. You came a convenient puppet tomy hands, and such I used you until the snapped wire proclaimed you nolonger serviceable--no further."
Shame, anguish, mortification, all the most humiliating sensationsnatural to man--for a moment assailed the breast of the unfortunate andguilty Grantham, rendering him insensible even to the greater evil whichawaited him. In the bitterness of his agony, he struck his clenched handagainst his forehead, uttering curses upon himself for his weakness, inone breath, and calling upon his God, in the next, to pardon him for hiscrime.
"This is good," said Matilda. "To see you writhe thus, under the woundinflicted upon your vanity, is some small atonement for the baseviolation of your oath; yet what question would you ask, the solution ofwhich can so much import one about to figure on the scaffold for a crimehe has not even had the courage to commit?"
The taunting manner in which the concluding part of the sentence wasconveyed, had the effect of restoring Gerald in some degree to himself,and he said with considerable firmness:
"What I ask is of yourself--namely, the relationship, if any, you bearto those who lie within the mound, on which I beheld you kneeling on thenight of your first attempt on Colonel Forrester's life?"
"The very recollection of that ill-timed intrusion would prevent me fromsatisfying your curiosity, did not something whisper to me that, in sodoing, I shall add another pang to those you already experience,"returned the American, with bitter sarcasm.
"You are right," said Gerald hurriedly. "My miseries need but theassurance of your connexion with those mouldering bones to be indeedcomplete."
"Then," said Matilda eagerly, and half raising her head, "your cup ofmisery may yet admit of increase. My mother and my father's mother bothsleep within that grave."
"How knew you this?" demanded Gerald quickly. "Instinct could not haveguided you to the spot, and by your own admission you were taken fromthe place of your home while yet a mere child."
"Not instinct, but my father Desborough, pointed out the spot, as he hadlong previously acquainted me with the history of my birth."
"One question more--your grandmother's name?"
"Mad Ellen she was called, an English soldier's wife, who died in givingbirth to my father--and now that you are answered, leave me."
"Almighty Providence!" aspirated Gerald in tones of inconceivable agony,"it is then as I had feared, and this woman has Destiny chosen toaccomplish my ruin."
He quitted the sofa, and paced up and down the room in a state of mindbordering on distraction. The past crowded upon his mind in all theconfused manner of a dream, and, amid the chaos of contending feelingsby which he was beset, one idea only was distinct--namely, that thewretched woman before him had been but the agent of Fate in effectinghis destruction. Strange as it may appear, the idea, so far fromincreasing the acerbity of his feelings, had the tendency to soften hisheart towards her. He beheld in her but a being whose actions had beenfated like his own--and although every vestige of passion had fled, evenalthough her surpassing beauty had lost its subjugating influence, hisheart yearned towards her as one who, wrecked on the same shore, hadsome claim to his sympathy and compassion. All that was now left themwas to make their peace with God, since with man their final accountwould be so speedily closed; and with a view to impress her with a senseof the religious aid from which alone they could hope for consolation,he again seated himself at her side on the edge of the sofa.
"Matilda," he said, in a voice in which melancholy and sternness wereblended, "we have been the children of guilt--the victims of our ownevil passions; but God is merciful, and if our penitence be sincere, wemay yet be forgiven in Heaven, although on earth there is no hope--evenif after this we could wish to live. Matilda, let us pray together."
There was no answer--neither did the slightest movement of her formindicate consciousness that she was addressed. "Matilda," repeatedGerald--still there was no answer. He placed his hand upon her cheek,and thought the touch was cold--he caught her hand, it too was cold andbut for the absence of rigidity he would have deemed her dead.
Scarcely knowing what he did, yet with an indefinable terror at hisheart, he grasped and shook her by the arm, and again, but with greatervehemence, pronounced her name.
"Who calls?" she said, in a faint but deep tone, as she raised her headslowly from the cushion which supported it. "Ha! I recollect. Tell me,"she added more quickly, "was not the blow well aimed. Marked you how thetraitor fell. Villain, to accuse the woman whose only fault was lovinghim too well, with ignominious commerce with a slave!"
"Wretched woman," exclaimed Gerald with solemn emphasis, "instead ofexulting over the evil we have done, let us rather make our peace withHeaven, during the few hours we have yet to live. MatildaDesborough-
-daughter of a murderer; thyself a murderess--the scaffoldawaits us both."
"Coward--fool--thou liest," she returned with suddenly awakened energy."For one so changeling as thyself the scaffold were befitting, but know,if I save had the heart to do this deed, I have also had the head toprovide against its consequences--see--feel--."
One of her cold hands was extended in search of Gerald's. They met, anda vial placed in the palm of the latter, betrayed the secret of herprevious lassitude and insensibility.
Even amid all the horrors which environed him, and called so largely forattention to his own personal danger, Gerald was inexpressibly shocked.
"What! poisoned?" he exclaimed.
"Yes--poisoned!" she murmured, and her hand again sank heavily at herside.
Gerald dashed the vial away from him to the farther end of theapartment, and taking the cold hand of the unhappy woman, he continued:
"Matilda--is this the manner in which you prepare yourself to meet thepresence of your God. What! add suicide to murder?"
But she spoke not--presently the hand he clasped sank heavily from histouch. Then there was a spasmodic convulsion of the whole frame. Thenthere burst a piercing shriek from her lips, as she half raised herselfin agony from the sofa, and then each limb was set and motionless in thestern rigidity of death.
While Gerald was yet bending over the body of his unfortunate companion,shocked, grieved and agitated beyond all expression, the door of thetemple was unlocked, and a man enveloped in a cloak, and bearing a smalldark lantern, suddenly appeared in the opening. He advanced towards thespot where Gerald, stupified with the events of the past night, stoodgazing upon the corpse, almost unconscious of the presence of theintruder.
"A pretty fix you have got into, Liftenant Grantham," said the wellknown voice of Jackson, "and I little calculated, when I advised you tomake love to the Kentucky gals to raise your spirits, that they wouldlead you into such a deuced scrape as this."
"Captain Jackson," said Gerald imploringly; "I am sufficiently aware ofall the enormity of my crime, and am prepared to expiate it; but inmercy spare the bitterness of reproach."
"Now as I'm a true Tennessee man, bred and born, I meant no reproach, andwhy should I, since you could'nt help her doing it, and he pointed toMatilda, yet you know its sometimes dangerous to be found in badcompany. Every body might'nt believe you so innocent as we do."
"Innocent! Captain Jackson," exclaimed Gerald, losing sight of all otherfeelings in unfeigned surprise--"I cannot say that I quite understandyou."
"Why, the meaning's plain enough, I take it. Others might be apt, I say,to think you had something to do with the thing as well as she, andtherefore its just as well you should make yourself scarce. The Colonelsays he would'nt on any account, you should even be suspected."
"The Colonel says--not suspected," again exclaimed Gerald withincreasing astonishment--then, suddenly recollecting the situation ofthe latter--"tell me," he continued, "is Colonel Forrester in danger--ishis life despaired of?"
"Worth a dozen dead men yet, or you would'nt see me taking the thing socoolly. The dagger certainly let the daylight into him, but though thewound was pretty considerably deep, the doctors say its not mortal. Hethinks it might have been worse if you had not come up, and partlystopped her arm when she struck at him."
Gerald was deeply affected by what he had just heard. It was evidentthat Colonel Forrester had, with a generosity to which no gratitude ofhis own could render adequate justice, sought to exonerate him from allsuspicion of participation in the guilty design upon his life, and as heglanced his eye again for a moment upon the lifeless form of hiscompanion, he was at once sensible that the only being who could defeatthe benevolent object of his benefactor had now no longer the power todo so.
"She sleeps sound enough now," said Jackson, again pointing to theill-fated and motionless girl, "but she'll sleep sounder yet beforelong, I take it."
"She will never sleep sounder than at this moment, Captain Jackson,"said Gerald, with solemn emphasis.
"Why, you don't mean to say she has cheated the hangman, Liftenant."
As he spoke, Jackson approached the sofa, and turning the light fullupon the face, saw indeed that she was dead. Gerald shuddered as therays from the lamp revealed for the first time the appalling changewhich had been wrought upon that once beautiful countenance. The openand finely formed brow was deeply knit, and the features distorted bythe acute agony which had wrung the shriek from her heart at the verymoment of dissolution, were set in a stern expression of despair. Theparted lips were drawn up at the corners in a manner to convey the ideaof the severest internal pain, and there was already a generaldiscoloration about the mouth, betraying the subtle influences of thepoison which had effected her death.
Gerald after the first glance, turned away his head in horror from theview, but the Aide-de-camp remained for some moments calmly regardingthe remains of all that had once been most beautiful in nature.
"She certainly is not like what she was when Colonel Forrester firstknew her," he said, in the abstracted tone of one talking withoutreference to any other auditor than himself; "but this comes ofpreferring a nigger to a white man. Such unnatural courses never canprosper, I take it."
"Captain Jackson," said Gerald, aroused by his remark, and with greatemphasis of tone, while he laid his hand impressively on the shoulder ofthe other, "you do her wrong. Guilty as she has been, fearfully guilty,but not in the sense you would imply."
"How do you know this?" asked the Aide-de-camp.
"From her own solemn declaration at a moment when deception could availher not. Even before she swallowed the fatal poison, her horror at theimputation, which drove her to the perpetration of murder, was expressedin terms of indignant warmth that belong to truth alone."
"If this be so," said Jackson, musingly, "she is indeed a much injuredwoman, and deep I know will be the regret of Colonel Forrester when hehears it, for he himself has ever believed her guilty. But come,Liftenant Grantham, we have no time to lose. The day will soon break,and I expect you must be a considerable way from Frankfort beforesunrise."
"I--from Frankfort--before sunrise!" exclaimed Gerald, in perfectastonishment.
"Why, it's rather short warning to be sure; but the Colonel thinks you'dbetter start before the thing gets wind in the morning; for so many ofthe niggers say you wore a sort of a disguise as well as the poor girl,he fears the citizens may suspect you of something more than anintrigue, and insult you desperately."
"Generous, excellent man!" exclaimed Gerald, "how can I ever repay thismost unmerited service?"
"Why, the best way I take it, is to profit by the offer that is made youof getting back to Canada as fast as you can."
"But how is this to be done, and will not the very fact of my flightconfirm the suspicion it is intended to remove?"
"As for the matter of how it is to be done, Liftenant, I have as slick ahorse waiting outside for you as man ever crossed--one of the fleetestin Colonel Forrester's stud. Then as for suspicion, he means to set thatat rest, by saying that he has taken upon himself to give you leave toreturn on parole to your friends, who wish to see you on a case of lifeand death, and now let's be moving."
Oppressed with the weight of contending feelings, which this generousconduct had inspired, Gerald waited but to cast a last look upon theill-fated Matilda; and then with a slow step and a heavy heart for everquitted a scene fraught with the most exciting and the most painfuloccurrences of his life. The first rays of early dawn beginning todevelope themselves as they issued from the temple, Jackson extinguishedhis lamp, and leading through the narrow pass that conducted to thetown, made the circuit of the ridge of hills until they arrived at apoint where a negro (the same who had led the party that bore Matildaand himself to the temple) was in waiting, with a horse ready saddledand the arms and accoutrements of a rifleman.
The equipment of Gerald was soon completed, and with the shot-bag andpowder-horn slung over his shoulder, and the long rifle in
his hand, hesoon presented the appearance of a backwoodsman hastening to the theatreof war.
When he had seated himself in the saddle, Jackson drew forth a wellfilled purse, which he said he had been directed by Colonel Forrester topresent him with to defray the expenses of his journey to the frontier.
Deeply affected by this new proof of the favor of the generous American,Gerald received the purse, saying, as he confided them to the breast ofhis hunting frock--
"Captain Jackson, tell Colonel Forrester from me, that I accept hispresent merely because in doing so I give the best evidences of myappreciation of _all_ he has done for me on this trying occasion. In hisown heart, however, he must look for the only reward to which this mostnoble of actions justly entitles him."
The frank-hearted Aide-de-camp promised compliance with this partingmessage, and after pointing out the route it would be necessary tofollow, warmly pressed the hand of his charge in a final grasp, thattold how little he deemed the man before him capable of the foulintention with which his soul had been so recently sullied.
How often during those hours of mad infatuation, when his weakened mindhad been balancing between the possession of Matilda at the price ofcrime, and his abandonment of her at that of happiness, had theobservation of the Aide-de-camp, on a former occasion, that he "wasnever born to be an assassin," occurred to his mind, suffusing his cheekwith shame and his soul with remorse. Now, too, that conscious of havingfallen in all but the positive commission of the deed, he saw that theunsuspecting American regarded him merely as one whom accident orintrigue had made an unwilling witness of the deadly act of a desperatewoman, his feelings were those of profound abasement and self-contempt.
There was a moment, when urged by an involuntary impulse, he would haveundeceived Captain Jackson as to his positive share in the transaction;but pride suddenly interposed and saved him from the degradation of theconfession. He returned the pressure of the American's hand withemphasis, and then turning his horse in the direction which he had beenrecommended to take, quitted Frankfort for ever.
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