CHAPTER XXVIII.
"Then lock thee fast Alone within thy chamber, there fall down On both thy knees, and grovel on the ground: Cry to thy heart: wash every word thou utter'st In tears (and if't be possible) of blood: Beg Heaven to cleanse the leprosy."
FORD'S PLAYS.
Armstrong, upon the departure of Holden, sat moodily pondering whathad been told him. Were his emotions those of pleasure or of pain? Atfirst, the former. The natural goodness of his disposition madehim instinctively rejoice in the happiness of his friend. For a fewmoments, he forgot himself, and, as long as the forgetfulness lasted,was happy in the participation of the other's hopes. But this frameof mind was only momentary. We have seen how an answer of Holden wassufficient to restore his gloom. Thoughts chased each other in wildconfusion, over which he had no control, which he reproached himselffor admitting--which he would have excluded, if he could. Theconnection between him and the Solitary was one of mutual misfortune.Sorrow was the ligament that united them. For years had he knownHolden, but it was only within a short time, namely, since an awakenedconscience (so he judged, himself) had revealed to him his ownhideousness, that he had been attracted to the Solitary. Should Holdenrecover his son, should his heart expand once more to admit worldlyjoys, would it not be closed to him? As he once felt indifferencetowards Holden, so would not Holden, by a change of circumstances,by the awakening of new desires and new hopes, by the occupancyof emotions the more delightful because fresh and for so longunexperienced, stand to him in other and colder relations? Thesereflections were not clear, distinct, sharply defined. They drovethrough his mind, ragged and torn, like storm-clouds chased by thetempest.
There were two beings struggling with one another in him--the onestriving to encourage the noble feelings of his nature, and drive awaywhatever was inconsistent with truth and reason--the other whisperingdoubt, and selfishness, and despair. He rose and paced, with rapidsteps, the room.
"Has it come to this?" he said to himself, as if wondering at hiscondition. "Am I become incapable of participating in the happiness ofothers? Am I a festering mass of selfishness? O! once it was not so.I will resist these thoughts which come from the bottomless pit. Theyshall not master me. They are the temptations of the Evil One. But canI resist them? Have I not grieved away the spirit? Is there place forrepentance? Am I not like Esau, who sought it in vain with many tears?If he was refused the grace of God, why not I? Why not I, that I maygo to my own place? Already I feel and know my destiny. I feel it inthe terrible looking for of judgment. I feel it in that I do not lovemy neighbor. If I did, would I not sympathize in his happiness? Wouldthis wretched self for ever interpose? I never knew myself before. Inow know the unutterable vileness of my heart. I would hide it fromThee, my God. I would hide it from Thy holy angels--from myself."
That day, Mr. Armstrong stirred not from the house, as long as the sunremained above the horizon. The golden sunshine deepened his mentalgloom. Nor to his eyes was it golden. It was a coppery, unnaturallight. It looked poisonous. It seemed as if the young leaves of springought to wither in its glare.
He heard the laugh of a man in the street, and started as if he hadbeen stung. It sounded like the mockery of a fiend. Was the laughdirected at him? He started, and ran to the window, with a feelingof anger, to see who it was that was triumphing over his misery.He looked up and down the street, but could see no one. Thedisappointment still further irritated him. Was he to be refused thepoor satisfaction of knowing who had wounded him? Was the assassinto be permitted to stab him in the back? Was he not to be allowed todefend himself? He returned and resumed his seat, trembling all over.Faith's canary bird was singing, at the top of its voice. Armstrongturned and looked at it. The little thing, with fluttering wings andelevated head, and moving a foot, as if beating time, poured out atorrent of melody. The sounds, its actions, grated on his feelings. Herose and removed it into another room.
He folded his arms, his head fell upon his chest, and he shut hiseyes to exclude the light. "I am out of harmony with all creation,"he said. "I am fit for a place where no bird ever sings. This is theevidence of my doom. Only the blessed can be in harmony withGod's works. Heaven is harmony--the music of his laws. Evil isdiscord--myself am discord."
Faith had still some influence over him, though even at her entrancehe started "like a guilty thing surprised." Her presence was a charmto abate the violence of the hurricane. He could not resist the gentletones of her voice, and at the spell his calmed spirit trembled intocomparative repose. Armstrong acknowledged it to himself as an auguryof good.
I cannot be wholly evil, he thought, if the approach of a pure angelgives me pleasure. The touch of Ithuriel's spear reveals deformitywhere it exists; in me it discloses beauty.
With her he could talk over the ordinary affairs of the day withcalmness, though it is singular, considering the perfect confidencebetween them, that he never adverted to the communication of Holden,notwithstanding he knew it would possess the highest interest for her.It betrays, perhaps, the weakened and diseased condition of a mind,wincing like an inflamed limb at the apprehension of a touch.
As the father listened and looked at his child, he felt transportedinto a region whither the demons could not come. They could not endureher purity; they could not abide her brightness. Her influence was abarrier mightier than the wall that encircled Paradise, and over whichno evil thing could leap. He therefore kept her by him as much aspossible. He manifested uneasiness when she was away. His consolationand hope was Faith. As the Roman prisoner drank life from the purefountains to which he had given life, so Armstrong drew strength fromthe angelic spirit his own had kindled.
Yet was his daughter unconscious of the whole influence she exerted,nor had she even a distant apprehension of the chaos of his mind.How would she have been startled could she have beheld the seethingcauldron! But into that, only the Eye that surveys all things couldlook.
Thus several days passed by. An ordinary observer would have noticedno change in Armstrong, except that his appetite diminished, and heseemed restless. Doctor Elmer and Faith both remarked these symptoms,but they did not alarm the former, though they grieved the latter.Accustomed to repose unlimited confidence in the medical skill ofthe physician, and too modest to have an opinion adverse to thatof another older than herself, and in a department wherewith he wasfamiliar, and she had no knowledge except what was colored by filialfears and affection, and, perhaps, distorted by them out of itsreasonable proportions, Faith went on from day to day, hoping thata favorable change would take place, and that she should havethe happiness of seeing her dear father restored to his formercheerfulness.
It is painful to follow the sad moods of a noble mind, conscious ofits aberrations, and yet unable to control them. We have not thepower of analysis capable of tracing it through all its windings, andexhibiting it naked to the view, and if we had, might shrink from thetask, as from one inflicting unnecessary pain, both on the writerand the reader. It is our object only so far to sketch the state ofArmstrong's mind, as to make his conduct intelligible.
His restlessness has been alluded to. He found himself unable to sleepas formerly. Long after retiring to rest he would lie wide awake,vainly courting the gentle influence that seemed to shun him the moreit was wooed. The rays of the morning sun would sometimes stream intothe window before sleep had visited his eyelids, and he would risehaggard, and weary, and desponding. And if he did sink into slumber,it was not always into forgetfulness, but into a confused mist ofdreams, more harassing than even his waking thoughts. The difficultyof obtaining sleep had lately induced a habit of reading late into thenight, and not unfrequently even into the morning hours. Long afterhis daughter had sought her chamber, and when she supposed he wasin bed, he was seated in his solitary room, trying to fasten hisattention on a book, and to produce the condition favorable to repose.The darkness of his mind sought congenial gloom. If he openedthe sacred volume, he turned not to the gracious promises ofreconciliation a
nd pardon, and the softened theology of the NewTestament, or to those visions of a future state of beatitude, whichoccasionally light up the sombre pages of the Old, as if the gates ofParadise were for a moment opened, to let out a radiance on a darknessthat would else be too disheartening and distracting; but to thewailings of the prophets and denunciations of punishment. These hefastened on with a fatal tenacity, and by a perverted ingenuity, insome way or other connected with himself, and made applicable tohis own circumstances. Naught could pass through his imagination ormemory, but, by some diabolical alchemy, was stripped of its sanativeand healthful properties, and converted into harm.
"Young's Night Thoughts" was a book that possessed peculiarattractions. For hours would he hang over its distressful pages, andmany were the leaves blotted by his tears. Yet those tears relievedhim not. Still, from time to time, would he recur to the book, as iftempted by a fascination he could not resist, striving to find, ifpossible, in the wretchedness of another, a lower deep than his own.Especially in the solemn hours of the night, when the silence was soprofound, he could fancy he heard the flickering of the candles, heread the book. Then hanging upon image after image of those deploringstrains, and appropriating all their melancholy, intensified throughthe lens of his own dark imagination, he would sink from one depthof wretchedness to another, till he seemed lost away, where no ray oflight could ever penetrate, or plummet sound.
He had been reading one night late, until as if unable to endure theimages of woe it conjured up, he pushed the book away from him. Thenight was dark and stormy, and the rain pouring in torrents. He walkedto the window and looked out. He could see nothing, except as thelandscape was revealed for an instant by a flash of lightning. Hecould hear nothing, except the peals of thunder rolling throughthe valleys. He took a candle, and walked cautiously to the door ofFaith's chamber, to see if she were asleep. The door was ajar, forthe purpose of ventilation, and, shading the light with his hand,Armstrong could see the face of his sleeping daughter without wakingher. She lay in the profound slumber of health and youth, undisturbedby the noise of the thunder, as one conscious of a protectingProvidence. Her left hand was under her cheek, the black hair combedback, and collected under the snowy cap. Her breathing was scarcelyperceptible, but soft and quiet as an infant's. An expression ofhappiness rested on her features, and the color was a little kindledin her cheek, looking brighter in contrast with the linen sheet.
"She sleeps," he thought, "as if there were no sin and misery in theworld. And why should she not? What has she to do with them? Were myspiritual eyes opened, I should see the protecting angels in shininggarments around her bed, unless my approach has driven them away.Heaven takes care of its own. So I could sleep once. Will the timecome when she, too, shall be so guilty she cannot sleep? AlmightyGod forbid! Better she were in her grave. They are fortunate who dieyoung. They are taken from the evil to come. The heart ceases to beatbefore it becomes so hard it cannot repent. Were she to die to-nighther salvation would be assured. What infinite gain! The murderer couldinflict no injury, but would confer a benefit."
Why did he start? Why did he shudder all over? Why did he hastily turnround, and shut the door, and hasten to his own room, locking it afterhim? Why was it he took something from his pocket, and, opening thewindow, threw it violently into the dark? But a moment Armstrongremained in his room. Blowing out the candles, and noiselesslydescending the stairs, he as quietly opened and shut the front door,and stood in the open air.
The storm was at its height. The rain poured with such violence thatin the flashes of lightning he could see the large drops leap fromthe ground. But he felt not that he was wet to the skin. He mindednot that he had left the house without a hat, and that the water wasrunning in streams from his head to the earth. With a rapid pace,approaching running, he fled through the streets, until he reached thegrave-yard. Without a ray to guide him, through a darkness that mightbe felt, he found his way to a grave, it was his wife's. He threwhimself prostrate on his face, and lay motionless.
When Armstrong raised himself from the ground the storm had ceased,the clouds had left the sky, and the stars were shining brilliantly.He gazed around, then looked up into the blue vault. What were thoseinnumerable shining points? Were they worlds, as the learned havesaid? Were they inhabited by beings like himself, doomed to sin andsuffer? Did they suffer, more or less? Could the errors of a few yearsbe expiated by sufferings of ages, as countless as the grains ofsand on the seashore? He struck the palm of his hand violently on hisforehead; he threw out his arm, as if in defiance, toward heaven, andgroaned aloud. It seemed as though from every heaped-up grave thatgroan was echoed, and called to him like an invitation to join thehosts of darkness. He started, and looked again at the gruel sky. Butno voice of comfort was breathed thence. The silver stars were nowsparks of an universal conflagration. With a gesture of despair, heleft the city of the dead.
Silence and darkness still shrouded the house of Mr. Armstrong on hisreturn. He closed the door quietly after him, and, cautiously ashe had descended, ascended the stairs, which, in spite of all hisprecaution, creaked under his feet. The sounds sent a thrill ofalarm through him as though he feared discovery. It was as if he werereturning from some guilty enterprise. Without striking a light, hethrew off his soaked garments, and got into bed. Strange, perhaps, tosay, he soon fell into a sleep, deeper and more refreshing than anyhe had for a long time enjoyed. It may be that the excitement of hissystem was worked off by rapid motion, and exposure to the night airand rain, or that nature, unable longer to endure it, sunk beneaththe tension. It was not until a late hour he arose, when he foundbreakfast awaiting him. After the usual greetings, Faith said:
"Here is your penknife, father, which Felix found lying on the paththis morning. You must have lost it from your pocket."
Mr. Armstrong took the knife, without reply, and, when unobserved,dropped it into the fire.
The Lost Hunter Page 29