The Black Dwarf

by Walter Scott

  CHAPTER XV.

  The darksome cave they enter, where they found The woful man, low sitting on the ground, Musing full sadly in his sullen mind.--FAERY QUEEN.

  The intruder on Miss Vere's sorrows was Ratcliffe. Ellieslaw had, in theagitation of his mind, forgotten to countermand the order he had givento call him thither, so that he opened the door with the words, "Yousent for me, Mr. Vere." Then looking around--"Miss Vere, alone! on theground! and in tears!"

  "Leave me--leave me, Mr. Ratcliffe," said the unhappy young lady.

  "I must not leave you," said Ratcliffe; "I have been repeatedlyrequesting admittance to take my leave of you, and have been refused,until your father himself sent for me. Blame me not, if I am bold andintrusive; I have a duty to discharge which makes me so."

  "I cannot listen to you--I cannot speak to you, Mr. Ratcliffe; take mybest wishes, and for God's sake leave me."

  "Tell me only," said Ratcliffe, "is it true that this monstrous match isto go forward, and this very night? I heard the servants proclaim it asI was on the great staircase--I heard the directions given to clear outthe chapel."

  "Spare me, Mr. Ratcliffe," replied the luckless bride; "and from thestate in which you see me, judge of the cruelty of these questions."

  "Married? to Sir Frederick Langley? and this night? It must notcannot--shall not be."

  "It MUST be, Mr. Ratcliff, or my father is ruined."

  "Ah! I understand," answered Ratcliffe; "and you have sacrificedyourself to save him who--But let the virtue of the child atone for thefaults of the father it is no time to rake them up.--What CAN be done?Time presses--I know but one remedy--with four-and-twenty hours I mightfind many--Miss Vere, you must implore the protection of the only humanbeing who has it in his power to control the course of events whichthreatens to hurry you before it."

  "And what human being," answered Miss Vere, "has such power?"

  "Start not when I name him," said Ratcliffe, coming near her, andspeaking in a low but distinct voice. "It is he who is called Elshenderthe Recluse of Mucklestane-Moor."

  "You are mad, Mr. Ratcliffe, or you mean to insult my misery by anill-timed jest!"

  "I am as much in my senses, young lady," answered her adviser, "as youare; and I am no idle jester, far less with misery, least of all withyour misery. I swear to you that this being (who is other far thanwhat he seems) actually possesses the means of redeeming you from thishateful union."

  "And of insuring my father's safety?"

  "Yes! even that," said Ratcliffe, "if you plead his cause with him--yethow to obtain admittance to the Recluse!"

  "Fear not that," said Miss Vere, suddenly recollecting the incidentof the rose; "I remember he desired me to call upon him for aid inmy extremity, and gave me this flower as a token. Ere it faded awayentirely, I would need, he said, his assistance: is it possible hiswords can have been aught but the ravings of insanity?"

  "Doubt it not fear it not--but above all," said Ratcliffe, "let us loseno time--are you at liberty, and unwatched?"

  "I believe so," said Isabella: "but what would you have me to do?"

  "Leave the castle instantly," said Ratcliffe, "and throw yourself at thefeet of this extraordinary man, who in circumstances that seem to arguethe extremity of the most contemptible poverty, possesses yet an almostabsolute influence over your fate.--Guests and servants are deep intheir carouse--the leaders sitting in conclave on their treasonableschemes--my horse stands ready in the stable--I will saddle one for you,and meet you at the little garden-gate--O, let no doubt of my prudenceor fidelity prevent your taking the only step in your power to escapethe dreadful fate which must attend the wife of Sir Frederick Langley!"

  "Mr. Ratcliffe," said Miss Vere, "you have always been esteemed a manof honour and probity, and a drowning wretch will always catch at thefeeblest twig,--I will trust you--I will follow your advice--I will meetyou at the garden-gate."

  She bolted the outer-door of her apartment as soon as Mr. Ratcliffe lefther, and descended to the garden by a separate stair of communicationwhich opened to her dressing-room. On the way she felt inclined toretract the consent she had so hastily given to a plan so hopelessand extravagant. But as she passed in her descent a private door whichentered into the chapel from the back-stair, she heard the voice of thefemale-servants as they were employed in the task of cleaning it.

  "Married! and to sae bad a man--Ewhow, sirs! onything rather than that."

  "They are right--they are right," said Miss Vere, "anything rather thanthat!"

  She hurried to the garden. Mr. Ratcliffe was true to hisappointment--the horses stood saddled at the garden-gate, and in a fewminutes they were advancing rapidly towards the hut of the Solitary.

  While the ground was favourable, the speed of their journey was such asto prevent much communication; but when a steep ascent compelled them toslacken their pace, a new cause of apprehension occurred to Miss Vere'smind.

  "Mr. Ratcliffe," she said, pulling up her horse's bridle, "let usprosecute no farther a journey, which nothing but the extreme agitationof my mind can vindicate my having undertaken--I am well aware that thisman passes among the vulgar as being possessed of supernatural powers,and carrying on an intercourse with beings of another world; but I wouldhave you aware I am neither to be imposed on by such follies, nor, wereI to believe in their existence, durst I, with my feelings of religion,apply to this being in my distress."

  "I should have thought, Miss Vere," replied Ratcliffe, "my character andhabits of thinking were so well known to you, that you might have heldme exculpated from crediting in such absurdity."

  "But in what other mode," said Isabella, "can a being, so miserablehimself in appearance, possess the power of assisting me?"

  "Miss Vere." said Ratcliffe, after a momentary pause, "I am bound bya solemn oath of secrecy--You must, without farther explanation, besatisfied with my pledged assurance, that he does possess the power, ifyou can inspire him with the will; and that, I doubt not, you will beable to do."

  "Mr. Ratcliffe," said Miss Vere, "you may yourself be mistaken; you askan unlimited degree of confidence from me."

  "Recollect, Miss Vere," he replied, "that when, in your humanity, youasked me to interfere with your father in favour of Haswell and hisruined family--when you requested me to prevail on him to do athing most abhorrent to his nature--to forgive an injury and remit apenalty--I stipulated that you should ask me no questions concerning thesources of my influence--You found no reason to distrust me then, do notdistrust me now."

  "But the extraordinary mode of life of this man," said Miss Vere; "hisseclusion--his figure--the deepness of mis-anthropy which he is said toexpress in his language--Mr. Ratcliffe, what can I think of him if hereally possesses the powers you ascribe to him?"

  "This man, young lady, was bred a Catholic, a sect which affords athousand instances of those who have retired from power and affluence tovoluntary privations more strict even than his."

  "But he avows no religious motive," replied Miss Vere.

  "No," replied Ratcliffe; "disgust with the world has operated hisretreat from it without assuming the veil of superstition. Thus far Imay tell you--he was born to great wealth, which his parents designedshould become greater by his union with a kinswoman, whom for thatpurpose they bred up in their own house. You have seen his figure;judge what the young lady must have thought of the lot to which she wasdestined--Yet, habituated to his appearance, she showed no reluctance,and the friends of--of the person whom I speak of, doubted not that theexcess of his attachment, the various acquisitions of his mind, hismany and amiable qualities, had overcome the natural horror whichhis destined bride must have entertained at an exterior so dreadfullyinauspicious."

  "And did they judge truly?" said Isabella.

  "You shall hear. He, at least, was fully aware of his own deficiency;the sense of it haunted him like a phantom. 'I am,' was his ownexpression to me,--I mean to a man whom he trusted,--'I am, in spiteof what you would say, a poor miserable o
utcast, fitter to have beensmothered in the cradle than to have been brought up to scare the worldin which I crawl.' The person whom he addressed in vain endeavoured toimpress him with the indifference to external form which is the naturalresult of philosophy, or entreat him to recall the superiority of mentaltalents to the more attractive attributes that are merely personal.'I hear you,' he would reply; 'but you speak the voice of cold-bloodedstoicism, or, at least, of friendly partiality. But look at every bookwhich we have read, those excepted of that abstract philosophy whichfeels no responsive voice in our natural feelings. Is not personal form,such as at least can be tolerated without horror and disgust, alwaysrepresented as essential to our ideas of a friend, far more a lover?Is not such a mis-shapen monster as I am, excluded, by the very fiatof Nature, from her fairest enjoyments? What but my wealth preventsall--perhaps even Letitia, or you--from shunning me as something foreignto your nature, and more odious, by bearing that distorted resemblanceto humanity which we observe in the animal tribes that are more hatefulto man because they seem his caricature?'"

  "You repeat the sentiments of a madman," said Miss Vere.

  "No," replied her conductor, "unless a morbid and excessive sensibilityon such a subject can be termed insanity. Yet I will not deny that thisgoverning feeling and apprehension carried the person who entertainedit, to lengths which indicated a deranged imagination. He appearedto think that it was necessary for him, by exuberant, and not alwayswell-chosen instances of liberality, and even profusion, to unitehimself to the human race, from which he conceived himself naturallydissevered. The benefits which he bestowed, from a disposition naturallyphilanthropical in an uncommon degree, were exaggerated by the influenceof the goading reflection, that more was necessary from him than fromothers,--lavishing his treasures as if to bribe mankind to receive himinto their class. It is scarcely necessary to say, that the bounty whichflowed from a source so capricious was often abused, and his confidencefrequently betrayed. These disappointments, which occur to all, more orless, and most to such as confer benefits without just discrimination,his diseased fancy set down to the hatred and contempt excited by hispersonal deformity.--But I fatigue you, Miss Vere?"

  "No, by no means; I--I could not prevent my attention from wandering aninstant; pray proceed."

  "He became at length," continued Ratcliffe, "the most ingeniousself-tormentor of whom I have ever heard; the scoff of the rabble, andthe sneer of the yet more brutal vulgar of his own rank, was to himagony and breaking on the wheel. He regarded the laugh of the commonpeople whom he passed on the street, and the suppressed titter, or yetmore offensive terror, of the young girls to whom he was introduced incompany, as proofs of the true sense which the world entertained ofhim, as a prodigy unfit to be received among them on the usual termsof society, and as vindicating the wisdom of his purpose in withdrawinghimself from among them. On the faith and sincerity of two personsalone, he seemed to rely implicitly--on that of his betrothed bride, andof a friend eminently gifted in personal accomplishments, who seemed,and indeed probably was, sincerely attached to him. He ought to havebeen so at least, for he was literally loaded with benefits by him whomyou are now about to see. The parents of the subject of my story diedwithin a short space of each other. Their death postponed the marriage,for which the day had been fixed. The lady did not seem greatly tomourn this delay,--perhaps that was not to have been expected; butshe intimated no change of intention, when, after a decent interval,a second day was named for their union. The friend of whom I spoke wasthen a constant resident at the Hall. In an evil hour, at the earnestrequest and entreaty of this friend, they joined a general party, wheremen of different political opinions were mingled, and where they drankdeep. A quarrel ensued; the friend of the Recluse drew his sword withothers, and was thrown down and disarmed by a more powerful antagonist.They fell in the struggle at the feet of the Recluse, who, maimed andtruncated as his form appears, possesses, nevertheless, great strength,as well as violent passions. He caught up a sword, pierced the heartof his friend's antagonist, was tried, and his life, with difficulty,redeemed from justice at the expense of a year's close imprisonment, thepunishment of manslaughter. The incident affected him most deeply,the more that the deceased was a man of excellent character, and hadsustained gross insult and injury ere he drew his sword. I think, fromthat moment, I observed--I beg pardon--The fits of morbid sensibilitywhich had tormented this unfortunate gentleman, were rendered henceforthmore acute by remorse, which he, of all men, was least capable of havingincurred, or of sustaining when it became his unhappy lot. His paroxysmsof agony could not be concealed from the lady to whom he was betrothed;and it must be confessed they were of an alarming and fearful nature.He comforted himself, that, at the expiry of his imprisonment, he couldform with his wife and friend a society, encircled by which he mightdispense with more extensive communication with the world. He wasdeceived; before that term elapsed, his friend and his betrothed bridewere man and wife. The effects of a shock so dreadful on an ardenttemperament, a disposition already soured by bitter remorse, andloosened by the indulgence of a gloomy imagination from the rest ofmankind, I cannot describe to you; it was as if the last cable at whichthe vessel rode had suddenly parted, and left her abandoned to all thewild fury of the tempest. He was placed under medical restraint. As atemporary measure this might have been justifiable; but his hard-heartedfriend, who, in consequence of his marriage, was now his nearest ally,prolonged his confinement, in order to enjoy the management of hisimmense estates. There was one who owed his all to the sufferer, anhumble friend, but grateful and faithful. By unceasing exertion, andrepeated invocation of justice, he at length succeeded in obtaininghis patron's freedom, and reinstatement in the management of his ownproperty, to which was soon added that of his intended bride, who havingdied without male issue, her estates reverted to him, as heir of entail.But freedom and wealth were unable to restore the equipoise of his mind;to the former his grief made him indifferent--the latter only served himas far as it afforded him the means of indulging his strange and waywardfancy. He had renounced the Catholic religion, but perhaps some ofits doctrines continued to influence a mind, over which remorse andmisanthropy now assumed, in appearance, an unbounded authority. His lifehas since been that alternately of a pilgrim and a hermit, sufferingthe most severe privations, not indeed in ascetic devotion, but inabhorrence of mankind. Yet no man's words and actions have been atsuch a wide difference, nor has any hypocritical wretch ever been moreingenious in assigning good motives for his vile actions, than thisunfortunate in reconciling to his abstract principles of misanthropy,a conduct which flows from his natural generosity and kindness offeeling."

  "Still, Mr. Ratcliffe--still you describe the inconsistencies of amadman."

  "By no means," replied Ratcliffe. "That the imagination of thisgentleman is disordered, I will not pretend to dispute; I have alreadytold you that it has sometimes broken out into paroxysms approachingto real mental alienation. But it is of his common state of mind that Ispeak; it is irregular, but not deranged; the shades are as gradual asthose that divide the light of noonday from midnight. The courtier whoruins his fortune for the attainment of a title which can do him nogood, or power of which he can make no suitable or creditable use, themiser who hoards his useless wealth, and the prodigal who squanders it,are all marked with a certain shade of insanity. To criminals who areguilty of enormities, when the temptation, to a sober mind, bears noproportion to the horror of the act, or the probability of detection andpunishment, the same observation applies; and every violent passion, aswell as anger, may be termed a short madness."

  "This may be all good philosophy, Mr. Ratcliffe," answered Miss Vere;"but, excuse me, it by no means emboldens me to visit, at this latehour, a person whose extravagance of imagination you yourself can onlypalliate."

  "Rather, then," said Ratcliffe, "receive my solemn assurances, that youdo not incur the slightest danger. But what I have been hitherto afraidto mention for fear of alarming you is, that now when we are
withinsight of his retreat, for I can discover it through the twilight, I mustgo no farther with you; you must proceed alone."

  "Alone?--I dare not."

  "You must," continued Ratcliffe; "I will remain here and wait for you."

  "You will not, then, stir from this place," said Miss Vere "yetthe distance is so great, you could not hear me were I to cry forassistance."

  "Fear nothing," said her guide; "or observe, at least, the utmostcaution in stifling every expression of timidity. Remember that hispredominant and most harassing apprehension arises from a consciousnessof the hideousness of his appearance. Your path lies straight besideyon half-fallen willow; keep the left side of it; the marsh lies on theright. Farewell for a time. Remember the evil you are threatened with,and let it overcome at once your fears and scruples."

  "Mr. Ratcliffe," said Isabella, "farewell; if you have deceived one sounfortunate as myself, you have for ever forfeited the fair characterfor probity and honour to which I have trusted."

  "On my life--on my soul," continued Ratcliffe, raising his voice as thedistance between them increased, "you are safe--perfectly safe."