The Works of William Harrison Ainsworth

by William Harrison Ainsworth

  As the Knight neither broke the silence, nor interrupted his disturbed progress, upon the entrance of the physician, the latter spoke.

  “I was hastening hither, Sir John, when your commands met me, to communicate tidings of—”

  “Of Prestwyche, or whom?” interrupted Chiverton.

  “Of the Lady Ellice,” replied the other.

  “What of her — has she seen — has that miscreant again intruded himself upon her? And yet, why do I ask, what I know cannot have been! Would to God, that he were within these walls — that his insolent rashness would bring him grasp to grasp with the Chiverton; or would,” continued he, stamping with ungovernable passion, that the gulf of hell were between us, to separate us for ever; — and she — but what of her — what of Ellice?”

  “The Lady Ellice,” answered the physician, “is in appearance dangerously ailing, something has surely happened to disturb the customary serenity of her mind.”

  “Then, thou knowest not what has happened,” interrupted Chiverton; “something must have happened, sayest thou! — ha — ha — something has happened. I tell thee, Walter Scymel, tell thee truly, that Reginald Prestwyche hath seen her — hath spoken to her — nay, this very morning saved her life. Thou mayest look, Scymel, but it is so. Prestwyche snatched her from die river, where her horse had rushed with her; bore her to Jaggar’s cave; and there, when I arrived, he came forward with her, as if expecting thanks — thanks! from me, that could laugh to see my own heart’s blood flowing, if his were flowing with it. There he stood with his cool damnable insolent look, as if — By heavens, I would I could have struck him dead!”

  “And what, if I may crave to ask, forbad the accomplishment of the wish?” was the physician’s reply, pronounced with the coolest indifference.

  “How?” returned the Knight, throwing his black glance full upon the speaker; “in the sight of all my followers, thou would’st have had me repay him for the saving of Ellice’s life, by his death? Deep as is my hatred towards him, it were beyond me to do it. And yet, thou, who hast no feud with him, can’st coolly advise his murder — nay, wonder at my lenity. By the mermaid, Walter Scymel, thou wantest but a spice more of the devil in thee, to make thee his peer. Thou wert better lecture me on my folly, for not shewing this piece of gratitude: I see thou longest to talk.”

  “Did I think,” replied Scymel, “that the actions of men were influenced by their own weak wills and inclinations, I might with permission, point out the impolicy of suffering to escape an opportunity of removing so chief an obstacle to your plans; an opportunity which may scarcely again offer. But holding, as I do, that our resolves, and our actions, are not more our own, than the course of the dead leaf, whirled away by the wind, can be said the path of its own choosing, it were useless to argue against what was fixed. It may be the fate of Prestwyche to come into your power, and feel its effects, on another occasion; or, for who shall tell the face of the die till it be cast — it may be, that you shall be entangled in his snares, and yield to his enmity.”

  “Never, Walter,” interrupted the Knight, “never, by heaven, shall it be said, that the Chiverton bowed before Reginald. If, as thy accursed supposition would have it, he should be successful in the death strife between us, I might die, but not yield to him; I might brook his sword — but not his mercy. — The alternative of death, at least, thou wilt not deny, that I might embrace.”

  “If it were so doomed,” returned the fatalist.—” But this is from the mark, Sir John — your sister’s illness is dangerous — further agitation must be avoided. To see Prestwyche again, would be destruction to her, and ruin to your hopes. She labours now under delirium, and on recovering, may be persuaded to think her meeting with him, the mere vision of a disordered imagination. But then again, he must be guarded against.”

  “It were well, if it could be so ordered,” said the Knight; “but how may he he prevented from again intruding on her presence? Whilst her distemper confines her, she is safe from him, but that removed, the opportunities for such a rencontre are many, and scarce to be guarded against. Speak man — thy wit is quick enough at times — answer me; how may this he best done?”

  “Sir,” answered the physician, “I need not ask you, whether you have any regard for Prestwyche, or whether — ?”

  The Knight fiercely interrupted him,—” regard say’st thou? — a curse on thy trifling — I tell thee, man, if there he hatred on earth, deeper than imagination can present, it is mine, for — his name stifles me.

  “If such be your feelings,” replied Scymel, coolly, “can an answer he necessary to you, ask Mahmood Bali — he will answer well, and quickly.”

  As both the speakers turned their looks towards the Moor, and as Chiverton was about to repeat the question, Bali, without otherwise changing his posture, or varying the direction of his eyes, raised slightly the hand that grasped his dagger’s hilt, until the weapon was drawn about an inch from its sheath, and relaxing his hold, suffered it to drop again into the scabbard. In doing this the metal of the hilt and the sheath struck, producing a slight noise. To the hint, so given, the lurid smile of the Moor served as a comment.

  “That were indeed a mode,” said Chiverton, after some pause, “perhaps, the only efficient one, — and yet, I know not why it likes me not. It suits thee well, Scymel, who hast lost, or crushed down all human feelings, or Mahmood yonder, who knows not the meaning of the phrase, and would laugh at it, were it explained to him; it suits ye well to take the nearest ways to arrive at your ends; but I,” added he, his really fine and handsome features assuming a nobler expression than was habitual to them—” I have been born and bred a Chiverton; — a name unstained with dishonour, unknown to treachery; — the custom of whose possessors it has been, to slay their enemy with the sword in battle; not waylay him with the dagger, in secret ambush. Of this thou knowest, and can’st feel, nothing. But this plan I will not embrace.”

  “Of that, Sir,” replied the physician, “you may well be a more fitting judge than Walter Scymel: howbeit, I spoke not but at your command, and according to my own weak ability. Undoubtedly, the scruples of honour have their weight, though your servants may not think them worthy to weigh down the balance, when put in competition with the loss of your worldly state and dignity.”

  “And wherefore should they be endangered,” replied Chiverton, “by my declining to tread in the path, which thy zeal has rashly advised?”

  “It were needless to remind you,” returned Scymel, “that Sir Gamelyn de Vancouver is daily expected here, with your intended bride, his daughter. He will come, Sir, eager for the match; promising himself for his daughter, splendour and opulence equal to his own, and not unwilling to ally himself with a family, so distinguished as yours. So far, Sir, it is well. But tell him, that there is a female heiress in the question, to whom the fair demesnes of Chiverton lawfully belong; — that by the whim of a grandfather, whose disposition of his property the law calls valid, though common sense laughs at them as absurd, you are entitled to not so much as a blade of grass that grows on yonder lands, so long as you have a sister, whose heirs may enjoy the estate you now call yours — tell him this, and see how cooled will be his warmth for the union; — how slight his recollection, or estimation of the honour of the family he purposes to match with.”

  “This might have been spared, Walter Scymel,” answered the Knight; “knowing, as thou dost, that would the happiness of Ellice be increased by the knowledge of her rights, and the enjoyment of these paltry possessions, an hour should not pass e’er she had them all. But to what, as we are now circumstanced, would it tend to do this? Only to enable her to enrich with her possessions this Prestwyche and transfer to him the having and power of a better name than his own.”

  “Prestwyche, Sir,” said the physician, in an indifferent tone, “is of good descent, and not unequal in wealth to the Lady Ellice.”

  “Now, torments on thee for this,” interrupted Chiverton, hastily, “think not of it, Scymel; thou
torturest me man. It cannot, and shall not be — Ellice Chiverton the wife of Reginald Prestwyche! — It were well indeed; — as well, that I, who am, aye, and will be, lord of this hall, and these lands, should sink into a retainer of my generous kinsman, — to sit meekly and fawningly at the lower end of mine own board, a partaker, on sufferance, of the produce of my own lands; to doff my cap at his smile, or his frowns — to thank his generosity for my vails, and a new jerkin yearly. No — this hall and the rock it stands on, and the lands it owns; — aye, and every breathing thing that bears the name of Chiverton, shall perish ere I endure it.”

  “And yet,” replied Scymel, “I know not how this union may be securely prevented, save by the means which your ideas of honour, — their correctness I venture not to dispute, — prompt you to reject. Prestwyche is not one hastily to abandon a project maturely planned, the motives of which are too deeply rooted in his breast to be plucked out, as the light weed of summer heats, from the lighter soil it springs in. He has been well approved, cool in design, as daring in execution; — as unmoved by all suggestions of interest, and escape from peril, as the bare rock by the alternate sunny beams and wild blasts that meet its lofty heights. In thwarting your views, every incentive concurs to induce him to exertion. The feud between you; his interest; his passions; even what the silly world calls his virtues, urge him to your destruction. It may be — I doubt it not — that in the contest either of policy or of force, you would be successful. But you will pardon me, Sir, for suggesting, whether with such a foe, the sure and secret is not the most advisable path. The issue of an open conflict, whatever it were, must be to you injurious, for though defeated, he might escape with life and unsilenced. I need not say that to men who know too much of others affairs, the faculty of speech is dangerous. Mahmood Bali understands well the art of making mutes, more perfectly silent than himself.”

  To the conclusion of this speech, uttered in a sarcastic tone, and accompanied with a corresponding look directed towards its object, the silent Moor answered with a sudden glance of deep and bitter malice; but, as before, without the least change of his position.

  “I fear,” said Chiverton, after a pause employed in doubtfully pacing the extensive apartment, “that it must be as thou say’st; the more so as the welfare of Ellice demands it. This Prestwyche, were he by some fiendish agency to obtain her hand, would soon throw off the sighing lover, and put on the insolent mastery that his untameable nature pants for. Have I not myself — I, who confess it — seen and felt this — this very day, he came upon my sight, with such a confidence of demeanour, such a coolness of audacity, that for a moment I was half abashed. And what, then, would be Ellice’s fate; delicate as thou knowest she is — her own happiness — her very existence, demands, that this stroller be driven from her presence, and her thoughts; — and done it shall be, whatever be the means, or the consequence.”

  He turned away as he ceased speaking, and walked towards one of the deep windows, with some degree of emotion; for by a delusion, not infrequent in minds of a stamp like Chiverton’s, he had argued to others, — if arguing, it could by any strain of language be called, — till, for the moment, he half persuaded himself, that his motives were not devoid of some generous and amiable feeling toward one so closely allied to him as a sister. But if he deceived himself, he did not his hearers. A sneer, most keenly intelligent, passed over the physician’s features, at the weakness of the sophistry, with which the knight had endeavoured to cheat himself and his auditors. At the same time, the renewed expression of triumphing, and malicious mirth, distorted the countenance of the Moor. There was a similitude between the two, but yet with a distinction. For, while Mahmood’s smile seemed that of a daemon, gloating over, and rejoicing in the traces of human folly and wickedness, the physician seemed to contemplate what passed before him more as a matter of curiosity, as an exhibition, the progress and termination of which he was pleased to watch, not as indicative of emotions kindred to those of his own nature, but which he could study, with the same untouched indifference, as the naturalist the customs and habits of the animals he closely observes. The scarcely suppressed grimaces of hellish mirth in the Moor, were such as to raise in the mind, had there been another to watch him, a mingled sensation of fear, horror, and disgust, less appalling, however, than the shudder, that thrilled through the very marrow, at the cold, scornful smile of Scymel.

  The Knight, recovering himself from his transient emotion, again turned; — casting towards the physician that hesitating and inquiring glance, natural to a man, who finding little to rest upon, in the revolving of his own actions and wishes, weakly flies for succour to the opinions and encouragement of others. But the physician was too well read in the human heart — its darker tints at least — not clearly to discern what was passing in Chiverton’s mind, and too much master of himself, to suffer his countenance to tell more than he willed. The penetrating glances of the Knight, therefore, returned, baffled from the inquisition; Scymel, meanwhile, maintaining an imperturbable silence, as one determined that Chiverton should himself speak out the agitated workings of his mind, and dissect his own inmost feelings for the amusement of his auditors, or not obtain the healing of the advice and support he sought for. The oblique looks of Mahmood Bali shewed, from time to time, how keenly he entered into, and enjoyed, the game his companion was playing.

  A bitter expression of mortified anger, shewn only in looks, though seemingly on the point of breaking out into more violent expressions of his feelings, seemed to tell that the Knight was not blind to the temper of his counsellor. But the mind, laid open to the attacks of passion, is so easily, and absolutely, under the dominion of a cooler, and self-possessing spirit, that Chiverton seemed almost in fear of his subtle retainer, and rarely ventured openly to indulge the anger, so natural to his own impetuous disposition, and which the physician’s observations so frequently excited. Finding, therefore, that it was necessary to commence the conference, if he wished to avail himself of Scymel’s counsel, he again enquired what course was to be followed, to guard against the consequences, which the unexpected re-appearance of Prestwyche induced him to apprehend.

  “Sir John,” returned the physician, “I have already ventured to point at the only mode, which my hasty judgment is able to devise, by which Prestwyche may be prevented from thwarting your designs. That he may disclose to the father of the lady, whom you intend to make your bride, circumstances, most necessary to be concealed from him, and which St. Maurice alone can communicate, is too probable to require observation. Perhaps, by deeper consideration, a plan milder than the one proposed, and at the same time equally efficient, might be devised. But if, which appears not unlikely, the mischief were done, e’er the plan be matured, the pleasure of contemplating so ingenious a design, might possibly, hardly outweigh the inconvenience of parting with the honours and possessions of Chiverton.”

  As if eager to escape from the doubts and indecision of his own mind, the Knight hastily answered, “Well, have it as thou wilt; kill, slay, murder — I care not what — manage all — direct all, only rid me of this accursed enemy, and — thou hast not found me ungrateful.”

  An inclination of the head spoke the physician’s answer to the concluding words of Chiverton.

  “And,” continued the Knight, “thou said’st, I bethink me, that Ellice was ailing. Beware that thou drive away her illness; — I would not, for all these fair domains, have ought of evil bechance a hair of her head. I will now go visit her. But, Scymel,” lingering as he departed, and drawing the physician nearer to him, “this Prestwyche? thou wilt be mindful; — thou knowest Mahmood Bali has a dagger.”

  “He has not worn it in vain; — it shall hardly slumber now,” answered Scymel, and satisfied by this assurance the Knight withdrew.

  The physician approached the Moor: “Most enchanting pagan, of what are thy meditations?

  But why do I ask? Thou thinkest, Mahmood Bali, of the feast thou shalt prepare; — of the blood, in which thy soot
y hands shall change their dye. But see thou dost thy task well, my Saracen; the point of thy dagger, or the ball of an arquebuss, well directed, needs not iteration. Well, well, man, thou may’st spare thy looks: — I question not thy skill, an I did, I might chance to know it; to find conviction; thou art rarely wanting in practical illustrations of thy most pleasing theory. Why, thou rejoicest in the bare idea, thine eyes glisten, and thy hand grasps the hilt of that pretty weapon, as naturally as the blade fits the scabbard. But think not of it, Mahmood; — cunning as thou art in conception, deadly in purpose and execution — devil as thou art in all, think not thyself a match for Walter Scymel: — I know thee well; know, that thou hatest me as thou hatest all mankind, though that, in sooth, is the sole quality for which I hate thee not — yet much as I admire thy temper and skill; that fine malignity, with which thou triumphest over the follies and sufferings of the foolish ones of the earth, give me reason to suspect, that thou aimest ought against me, then look to thyself, for one instant: — thou wilt not need to concern thyself, whilst a second shall elapse.”

  If the eyes of the Moor had before merited the epithet which his companion applied to them, of gleaming, they now resembled perfect fires, as they glowed with fury at the physician’s defiance, which, pronounced with the coolness and levity of immeasurable superiority, incensed Mahmood to a state of almost phrenzy. His teeth chattered with rage, and the blood forced itself into his face, with such violence, that the red glow might be seen through his dark skin, like the dull hue of a ruddy flame, half seen through a dense and sable cloud of smoke; whilst his features, not naturally unpleasing, or irregular, were distorted, almost too hideously to be deemed human; an impression easily strengthened by the strange and continuous gibbering of passion, that burst from his throat, as he seemed vainly endeavouring to vent his fury in speech; a faculty, of which either nature or some artificial means, had apparently deprived him. He retained still his unmoved posture, and neither the violent workings of his countenance, nor the appalling and unearthly noise which they were accompanied with, produced the slightest effect upon the physician, unless it were to increase the laughing and scornful smile, with which he continued to behold the Moor.