To one subject alone could Theodore attend; he reiterated his declarations of innocence, and in louder accents implored for his accustomed liberty.
The baron had too tenderly loved Theodore, to be entirely unmoved by his protestations and entreaties, and accordingly left the apartment, lest they should exact from him an indulgence he might afterwards repent.
Towards evening of the eighth day Alphonsus' fever began to abate, and the frantic sorrow which had before possessed him began to subside into a silent melancholy.
On the following day the messengers returned; they informed the baron, that they had met with an old woman, who had told them, that a female, answering to the description of Lauretta, and who had talked much of Smaldart castle, had been brought in a vehicle by two men to her cottage, early in the morning of the very day on which Lauretta had been missed, and had remained there during the whole of that day; the woman, they said, had pointed out to them the road along which the men and the female had journeyed, and they had followed the track many leagues, but all their endeavours to discover the object of their search had proved equally fruitless.
Farther conviction of Theodore's guilt beamed upon the baron in this account delivered by the old woman; but conjecture only tended the more to perplex him, and he determined to see her himself, and gain from her such intelligence as she was able to give him: he accordingly commanded two of the horsemen to refresh themselves, and be prepared to set out again with him in an hour's time.
The conduct of Theodore was now exhibiting in striking colours, that villainy will submit to the most humiliating meanness, in the hope of gaining its desired ends. Whenever the domestic visited him, he raved, fawned, and prayed by turns, for the grant of his supplication, till the domestic, sensible how wrongly he should be acting were he to acquiesce, and wishing Theodore not to flatter a hope which he did not mean to realize, gave him a gentle refusal.
Contradiction from a servant Theodore had never yet experienced, and even in his present humiliating state he could not brook it; he therefore seized the domestic by the throat, and throwing him upon the ground, gave a loose to his rage. Stunned by the blow, the man lay in a state of insensibility: Theodore perceived his situation, and determining to avail himself of it, hastily searched his pockets, and having found the key of the outward apartment, he unlocked the door, and sallied cautiously forth, again closing it as he went out.
An hour after mid-day the baron arrived at the cottage; and its hostess, who was no other than Bartha, gave him the same information she had delivered to the horsemen; adding, that the young woman had much wished to write a letter to be conveyed to Smaldart castle, but that she had not been able to furnish her with the requisites; and that her husband had meant to visit the castle on the following day with the message she had then desired her to get conveyed thither, being the first day he could spare from his laborious avocation. The message was only, that she had been conveyed to the cottage by two ruffians, whom she knew to be the instruments of Theodore, and an entreaty that the baron would assist her husband in finding some means to accomplish her rescue.
The wood-cutter, Bartha's husband, then told the baron, that on the afternoon prior to Lauretta's being brought to his cottage, two men had accosted him whilst at his daily labour in the neighbouring wood, and inquired whether he lived near that spot; whether he would give them the use of his dwelling on the following day; and whether money could bribe him to secrecy. "I am very poor," continued the woodman, "and extending my hand to receive a couple of pieces of gold which one of them held in his, I told them I would do any thing but murder to serve them. 'We require nothing but secrecy,' he returned:—'we shall bring a young woman, for whom you must provide a bed, early in the morning, to your cottage, and stay with you all day.' I agreed to this, and having walked with them a few steps to show them where my cot stood, they wished me good night, and left me."
"Proceed," said the baron.
"Well, sure enough, early in the morning they brought a young woman, and my wife took her up stairs, and then one of the men went away with the vehicle in which they had brought her, and came back with only the horses; and at night one of them took the young woman on a horse before him, and they gave me another piece of gold, and away they went, and we have neither seen them, nor heard of them since."
"Would you had informed me of this sooner!" exclaimed the baron. "But complaints are useless where there is no remedy for the evil." So saying, he presented Bartha with a piece of money, and returned to his castle.
Hoping that this incontrovertible proof of Theodore's guilt might be efficacious in drawing from him a confession of the truth, the baron proceeded towards his apartments, where, to his astonishment, he saw extended on the floor, the servant, just recovering from the blow he had sustained, and unable to give any account of Theodore. As his escape had not been long effected, he could not consequently have proceeded far distant from the castle; accordingly every domestic and even the baron himself, ran out in search of him.
Theodore had, during this interval, concealed himself in his bed-chamber, and now seeing from its window the servants and his uncle issue from the portal, he ventured to descend into the hall of the castle, where having met with no interruption to his progress, he ran hastily out of the postern gate, and having reached the stable, he saddled and mounted his steed: all danger now vanished before him, for he knew his pursuers to be on foot, and he was well acquainted with the fleetness of the horse on which he rode; accordingly he clapped spurs to his beast, and galloped dauntlessly forward.
Thus providence in its all-wise direction allots a certain portion of triumph to the machinations of the wicked, which ultimately shall edge them on to become the instruments of their own conviction and punishment.
Shortly after the baron returned to the castle, and four of his vassals were immediately commanded to mount their horses, and set off, in hope of overtaking Theodore. His horse was now missed, and this information caused the baron the more earnestly to urge their speed.
As the slight information which the baron had received relative to Lauretta, tended only to prove that she was in the power of Theodore's agents—a circumstance which the chevalier's recent escape had rendered the more distressing—he forbore to inform Alphonsus either of what he had heard, or of what had that day occurred at Smaldart castle.
Early on the next morning the baron entered the apartment of Alphonsus, and on meeting his eyes, which the opening of the door had drawn towards the baron, he exclaimed, "Joy! joy, Alphonsus! Lauretta is found! Lauretta is in safety!"
The intelligence was too smiling for Alphonsus instantly to believe that his senses had been true to him; he feared to ask a repetition of the baron's words, lest the pleasing idea should vanish in his reiterated voice. He seized the baron's hand, and pressing it in his own, the tears gushed from his eyes.
The baron now put into his hand the letter of Lauretta's own writing, which he had a few minutes before received from the peasant commissioned by the hermit, who had that morning reached the castle.
Although the fever under which Alphonsus laboured had been much abated by the skill of an able physician whom the baron had procured to attend him, yet while the cause, namely, the violent agitation of his spirits, continued, it was not possible that the effect could have been removed; and he was reduced to so weak a state by what he had undergone during the last ten days, not less in body than in mind, that, on receiving tidings at once so joyful, and yet, from the despondent state of his mind, so little expected, it was with great difficulty for some time that life could be retained within him.
At length an hysteric fit of laughter, accompanied by many tears, relieved his overburdened heart, and he pressed alternately to his lips and to his bosom the paper which contained the account of his Lauretta's safety.
When Alphonsus was sufficiently recovered from the frenzy of joy that had possessed him, to attend to the words of the baron, that kind friend informed him, that he would take u
pon himself the office of being Lauretta's guardian and conductor to the castle.
Alphonsus sprang from the bed in which he had before been scarcely able to raise himself; and, declaring himself to be now recovered, entreated to accompany the baron: but to this the physician gave a stern denial, declaring that it was absolutely necessary to his health and safety, that he should not yet leave his bed, or have his composure broken by any avoidable means.
Sufficiently secure of the safety of his Lauretta under the protection of the kind baron, Alphonsus reluctantly yielded to the remonstrances of the physician; and the baron departed, accompanied by two of his servants, and the peasant who was to conduct him to the hermit's cell.
The baron had not proceeded far on his journey to the hermitage, ere he was met by his returning vassals, whose pursuit of Theodore had proved ineffectual: and, as he now knew Lauretta to be removed from the reach of the chevalier, he commanded them to discontinue their search.
On the third day after the baron's departure, Alphonsus was so much recovered as to be permitted to leave his chamber:—his fever had quitted him;—his strength was returning, and his spirits were highly elated, as he dwelt on the mortification which Theodore, whom he vainly imagined still to be the sullen inhabitant of the prison his uncle had decreed him, would in his turn experience, on his seeing Lauretta safely restored to the arms of her husband. Theodore's escape the baron had judged it most advisable to conceal from Alphonsus, as the knowledge of it could only increase his fears for Lauretta's sufferings.
On the evening of the fourth day, the baron was expected to return; and Alphonsus awaited on the tiptoe of expectation the hour that should bring him to his castle. Midnight sounded, and the baron did not arrive: Alphonsus endeavoured to console himself with the possibility of the baron's journey having deceived him in the length of a few hours, and sat listening with anxiety for sounds which he might construe into the approach of the expected carriage. Morning dawned, and disappointment still prevailed: day passed on in a state of inexplicable inquietude; and night closed in with increased apprehensions to the trembling Alphonsus.
About the first hour of the morning, as Alphonsus was traversing his chamber, with a mind swelled with the most hideous phantoms of the fate that might have befallen her in whom his every wish and thought were centred, the distant approach of a carriage fell on his ear. He seized his lamp, and the increasing sound of joy accompanied him as he descended into the hall of the castle. Unacquainted with the exact method of opening the door, and his hand being infirm from agitation, it was some time ere he could effect it; and he drew it back on its hinges, at the very moment the carriage stopped.
Alphonsus issued out with the lamp in his hand; and, having scarcely permitted himself to salute the baron as he left the carriage, he sprang forward to meet Lauretta. Vain thought! Lauretta was not within it.
Grief and astonishment petrified Alphonsus.
The baron took his hand in his, and led him into the hall of the castle.
"Tell me the worst at once," cried Alphonsus. When, at length, after many ineffectual efforts, articulation was again granted him, "Tell me she is dead; the sound will be my summons to her grave."
"Afflict thee not so deeply: she is not dead, though gone from us."
"Gone! how? whither? by what means?" exclaimed Alphonsus, his eyes rolling wildly in their sockets. "Has the vile hermit betrayed her to . . . . . .?"
"Sully not unjustly his venerable name," interrupted the baron. "He has, I fear, suffered much in her cause: when I reached his humble cell, the first object that presented itself to my sight was his lifeless form, stretched on the earth."
"And Lauretta!" cried Alphonsus, waiting to have the sentence filled up by the baron.
"Has baffled my most diligent search of her," added the baron.
"Mysterious heaven!" returned the youth; "who could have learned her retreat?—who have carried her from thence?—Is not the chevalier at this very moment in the castle?"
"Is Theodore then returned?" asked the baron eagerly.
Alphonsus started, and fixed a look of inquiry, surprise, and suspicion, on the baron, that at once convinced him how unguardedly he had spoken, and how fully explicative of Theodore's escape, which he had hitherto so carefully concealed from Alphonsus, the few words he had just uttered had proved. He endeavoured to retract what he had said; but Alphonsus flew to substantial proof; and the deserted apartments, which had been the chevalier's prison, were but a too certain conviction of all his fears.
Ye who have felt, can alone conceive and participate in the poignant feelings of Alphonsus, on this heart-rending discovery:—by turns silent agony and frantic grief possessed him. The plan which one moment suggested, the next taught him to reject; and, from a chaos of ideas, his perturbed mind could fix on no one to adopt in the present moment of despair and madness.
Descending into the hall, he for a short space of time traversed it with hasty and uncertain steps. Suddenly stopping, he exclaimed, "It may not yet be too late to save her! Just heaven, nerve my arm, and guide my steps to the object of my search!" and fled from the hall with hasty steps.
The baron, alarmed by the wild mien of Alphonsus on his discovering the absence of Theodore from Smaldart castle, had ascended to the apartment of the physician, to inform him what had occurred, and summon him to the aid of his patient, at the same moment that Alphonsus had run to investigate the late prison of the chevalier. And, having first sought him in the northern gallery, then in the apartment which had been assigned to him in the castle, and lastly in the great hall, he saw not for some minutes the open gate which bespoke his having left the castle. Immediately on perceiving it, he ran out in search of him: but it was too late: he had mounted a horse, which he had taken from the stable, and departed unseen by any one.
CHAPTER XIII
On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore,
Which Jews might kiss, and infidels adore.
-POPE
During the two first days after the death of the hermit, Lauretta's solitude remained unbroken; and the expectation of being quickly restored to the protection of Alphonsus, tended alone to solace her in the gloomy scene she was constrained to contemplate.
On the evening of the day prior to that on which she had been taught to await the return of the peasant, she had about an hour retired to her straw pallet, when whispering voices met her ear: her heart beat high, her breath became suspended, and she listened awhile in that state of silent anxiety which fears to move, lest it lose the sound it wishes to catch. In a few moments she plainly heard footsteps in the outer division of the cave, and immediately after a voice said, "Give me the light." The light was produced, and the first object which it showed to the expecting eyes of Lauretta was the visage of Theodore.
Lauretta shrieked; and immediately the man who had held the lantern, having given it into the hand of Theodore, advanced, and taking her arm in his, led her from the cave. Theodore secreted the light under his garment, and closely followed them.
The moment Lauretta had so much dreaded was now arrived: agony inexplicable filled her heart, and choked her utterance. Her guide continued to walk quickly forward, and she of necessity suited her steps to his:—neither Theodore nor his companion spoke;—and, when the power of speech returned to Lauretta, she well knew how callous the flinty heart of the chevalier would be to any entreaty she could offer up to him; and she judged also, how deaf to the cries of misery must he be, who would hire himself to be Theodore's agent, whether he was acquainted with his base designs, or had blindly sold himself to execute his will.
A few faintly shining stars served to light them on their way; and Lauretta shortly perceived that they had entered the forest through which she had passed on the morning on which she had so miraculously escaped from her confinement in the castle. They still continued to proceed; and, as they advanced, Lauretta began to discern the fatal building rising above a gentle acclivity, which they were ascending.
&nbs
p; Presently a tucket, much resembling that Lauretta had heard on the second night of her imprisonment in the castle, sounded at a distance: her heart thrilled at the recollection of the delusive hopes that sound had once raised in her panting breast, and she started as the sound met her ear. Her guard, who probably, from the sudden motion of her body, conjectured she was endeavouring to disengage herself from him, drew her arm more strictly within his, and at the same instant turning round his head to Theodore, said, "There they are."—"Then let us stop a few minutes," returned Theodore. "Oh no!" replied the man; "they will be housed long ere we reach the cavern: besides, were they not, they would not see us." "'Tis well," answered Theodore; "proceed then."
"The cavern!" echoed Lauretta's heart; and busy thought, ever ready to torment the breast it inhabits, pointed out that cavern as her destined grave.
The tears burst from her eyes:—the horrible idea of never again beholding her Alphonsus, at that moment so forcibly impressed on her mind, was too heart-rending a sensation for the tide of grief with which it swelled her aching breast to be suppressed; and she was on the point of falling on her knees, and endeavouring to move the mercy of her guard, when a voice, at some distance from her, exclaimed, "Lauretta Byroff!"
"Oh God!" cried Lauretta, "what is it I hear?"
They were still amongst the trees. Theodore called to the man who conducted Lauretta to stop: he obeyed the summons, and they looked round on all sides: no one was to be seen, and all was still.
"This is astonishing," said Theodore. "These words were addressed to you," turning to Lauretta: "explain them, I charge you."
"I am unable," answered Lauretta.
"Is it not your name?" rejoined Theodore, hastily.
"You know Lauretta is my name."
"You equivocate. I ask, whether Byroff is also your name?"
"No," said Lauretta.
"What is it, then?" asked Theodore. "Beware not to deceive me."
The Complete Northanger Horrid Novel Collection (9 Books of Gothic Romance and Horror) Page 265