Towards the end of a hot,
calm day of June, a stranger arrived at Treby. The variations of
calm and wind are always remarkable at the seaside, and are more
particularly to be noticed on this occasion; since it was the
stillness of the elements that caused the arrival of the stranger.
During the whole day several vessels had been observed in the
offing, lying to for a wind, or making small way under press of
sail. As evening came on, the water beyond the bay lay calmer than
ever; but a slight breeze blew from shore, and these vessels,
principally colliers, bore down close under it, endeavouring by
short tacks to procure a long one, and at last to gain searoom to
make the eastern headland of the bay. The fishermen on shore
watched the manœuvres of the different craft; and even interchanged
shouts with the sailors, as they lay lazily on the beach. At length
they were put in motion by a hail for a boat from a small
merchantman—the call was obeyed—the boat neared the vessel—a
gentleman descended into it—his portmanteau was handed after him—a
few strokes of the oar drove the boat on the beach, and the
stranger leaped out upon the sands.
The new comer gave a brief order,
directing his slight luggage to be carried to the best inn, and,
paying the boatmen liberally, strolled away to a more solitary part
of the beach. "A gentleman," all the spectators decided him to
be—and such a designation served for a full description of the new
arrival to the villagers of Treby. But it were better to say a few
words to draw him from among a vast multitude who might be
similarly named, and to bestow individuality on the person in
question. It would be best so to present his appearance and manner
to the "mind's eye" of the reader, that if any met him by chance,
he might exclaim, "That is the man!" Yet there is no task more
difficult than to convey to another, by mere words, an image,
however distinctly it is impressed on our own minds. The individual
expression and peculiar traits which cause a man to be recognised
among ten thousand of his fellow-men, by one who has known him,
though so palpable to the eye, escape when we would find words
whereby to delineate them.
There was something in the
stranger that at once arrested attention—a freedom, and a command
of manner—self-possession joined to energy. It might be difficult
to guess his age, for his face had been exposed to the bronzing
influence of a tropical climate, and the smoothness of youth was
exchanged for the deeper lines of maturity, without anything being
as yet taken from the vigour of the limbs, or the perfection of
those portions of the frame and face, which so soon show marks of
decay. He might have reached the verge of thirty, but he could not
be older—and might be younger. His figure was active, sinewy, and
strong—upright as a soldier (indeed, a military air was diffused
all over his person); he was tall, and, to a certain degree,
handsome; his dark gray eyes were piercing as an eagle's, and his
forehead high and expansive, though somewhat distorted by various
lines that spoke more of passion than thought; yet his face was
eminently intelligent; his mouth, rather too large in its
proportions, yet grew into beauty when he smiled—indeed, the
remarkable trait of his physiognomy was its great
variation—restless, and even fierce; the expression was often that
of passionate and unquiet thoughts; while at other times it was
almost bland from the apparent smoothness and graceful undulation
of the lines. It was singular, that when communing only with
himself, storms appeared to shake his muscles and disfigure the
harmony of his countenance—and that, when he addressed others, all
was composed—full of meaning, and yet of repose. His complexion,
naturally of an olive tint, had grown red and adust under the
influence of climate—and often flushed from the inroads of vehement
feeling. You could not doubt at the instant of seeing him, that
many singular, perhaps tragical, incidents were attached to his
history—but conviction was enforced that he reversed the line of
Shakspeare, and was less sinned against than sinning—or, at least,
that he had been the active machinator of his fate, not the passive
recipient of disappointment and sorrow. When he believed himself to
be unobserved, his face worked with a thousand contending emotions,
fiery glances shot from his eyes—he appeared to wince from sudden
anguish—to be transported by a rage that changed his beauty into
utter deformity: was he spoken to, all these tokens vanished on the
instant—dignified, calm, and even courteous; though cold, he would
persuade those whom he addressed that he was one of themselves—and
not a being transported by his own passions and actions into a
sphere which every other human being would have trembled to
approach. A superficial observer had pronounced him a good fellow,
though a little too stately—a wise man had been pleased by the
intelligence and information he displayed—the variety of his
powers, and the ease with which he brought forward the stores of
his intellect to enlighten any topic of discourse. An independent
and a gallant spirit he surely had—what, then, had touched it with
destruction—shaken it to ruin, and made him, while yet so young,
abhorrent even to himself?
Such is an outline of the
stranger of Treby; and his actions were in conformity with the
incongruities of his appearance—outwardly unemployed and tranquil;
inwardly torn by throes of the most tempestuous and agonizing
feelings. After landing he had strolled away, and was soon out of
sight; nor did he return till night, when he looked fatigued and
depressed. For form's sake—or for the sake of the bill at the
inn—he allowed food to be placed before him; but he neither ate nor
drank—soon he hurried to the solitude of his chamber—not to bed—he
paced the room for some hours; but as soon as all was still—when
his watch and the quiet stars told him that it was midnight, he
left the house—he wandered down to the beach—he threw himself upon
the sands—and then again he started up and strode along the verge
of the tide—and then sitting down, covering his face with his
hands, remained motionless: early dawn found him thus—but, on the
first appearance of a fisherman, he left the neighbourhood of the
village, nor returned till the afternoon—and now, when food was
placed before him, he ate like one half famished; but after the
keen sensation of extreme hunger was satisfied, he left the table
and retired to his own room.
Taking a case of pistols from his
portmanteau, he examined the weapons with care, and, putting them
in his pocket, walked out upon the sands. The sun was fast
descending in the sky, and he looked, with varying glances, at it
and at the blue sea, which slumbered peacefully, giving forth
scarcely any sound as it receded from the shore. Now he seemed
wistful—now impatient—now struck by bitterer pangs, that caused
drops of agony to gather on his brow. He spoke no word; but these
were the thoughts that hovered, though unexpressed, upon his lips:
"Another day! Another sun! Oh, never, never more for me shall day
or sun exist. Coward! Why fear to die? And do I fear? No! no! I
fear nothing but this pain—this unutterable anguish—this image of
fell despair! If I could feel secure that memory would cease when
my brain lies scattered on the earth, I should again feel joy
before I die. Yet that is false. While I live, and memory lives,
and the knowledge of my crime still creeps through every particle
of my frame, I have a hell around me, even to the last pulsation!
For ever and for ever I see her, lost and dead at my feet—I the
cause—the murderer! My death shall atone. And yet even in death the
curse is on me—I cannot give back the breath of life to her sweet
pale lips! Oh fool! Oh villain! Haste to the last act; linger no
more, lest you grow mad, and fetters and stripes become your fitter
punishment than the death you covet!"
"Yet"—after a pause, his thoughts
thus continued:—"not here, nor now: there must be darkness on the
earth before the deed is done! Hasten and hide thyself, oh sun!
Thou wilt never be cursed by the sight of my living form
again!"
Thus did the transport of passion
embrace the universe in its grasp; and the very sunlight seemed to
have a pulse responsive to his own. The bright orb sunk lower; and
the little western promontory, with its crowning spire, was thrown
into bold relief against the glowing sky. As if some new idea were
awakened, the stranger proceeded along the sands, towards the
extremity of the headland. A short time before, unobserved by him,
the little orphan had tripped along, and, scaling the cliff, had
seated herself, as usual, beside her mother's grave.
The stranger proceeded slowly,
and with irregular steps. He was waiting till darkness should blind
the eyes of day, which now appeared to gaze on him with intolerable
scrutiny, and to read his very soul, that sickened and writhed with
its burden of sin and sorrow. When out of the immediate
neighbourhood of the village, he threw himself upon a fragment of
rock, and—he could not be said to meditate—for that supposes some
sort of voluntary action of the mind—while to him might be applied
the figure of the poet, who represented himself as hunted by his
own thoughts—pursued by memory, and torn to pieces, as Actæon by
his own hounds. A troop of horrid recollections assailed his soul!
there was no shelter, no escape! various passions, by turns,
fastened themselves upon him—jealousy, disappointed love, rage,
fear, and, last and worst, remorse and despair. No bodily torture,
invented by revengeful tyrant, could produce agony equal to that
which he had worked out for his own mind. His better nature, and
the powers of his intellect, served but to sharpen and strike
deeper the pangs of unavailing regret. Fool! He had foreseen
nothing of all this! He had fancied that he could bend the course
of fate to his own will; and that to desire with energy was to
ensure success. And to what had the immutable resolve to accomplish
his ends brought him? She was dead—the loveliest and best of
created beings: torn from the affections and the pleasures of life!
from her home, her child! He had seen her stretched dead at his
feet: he had heaped the earth upon her clay-cold form; and he the
cause! he the murderer!
Stung to intolerable anguish by
these ideas, he felt hastily for his pistols, and rising, pursued
his way. Evening was closing in; yet he could distinguish the
winding path of the cliff; he ascended, opened the little gate, and
entered the churchyard. Oh! how he envied the dead!—the guiltless
dead, who had closed their eyes on this mortal scene, surrounded by
weeping friends, cheered by religious hope. All that imaged
innocence and repose appeared in his eyes so beautiful and
desirable; and how could he, the criminal, hope to rest like one of
these? A star or two came out in the heavens above, and the church
spire seemed almost to reach them, as it pointed upward. The dim,
silent sea was spread beneath: the dead slept around: scarcely did
the tall grass bend its head to the summer air. Soft, balmy peace
possessed the scene. With what thrilling sensations of
self-enjoyment and gratitude to the Creator, might the mind at ease
drink in the tranquil loveliness of such an hour. The stranger felt
every nerve wakened to fresh anguish. His brow contracted
convulsively. "Shall I ever die!" he cried; "will not the dead
reject me!"
He looked round with the natural
instinct that leads a human being, at the moment of dissolution, to
withdraw into a cave or corner, where least to offend the eyes of
the living by the loathsome form of death. The ivied wall and
paling, overhung by trees, formed a nook, whose shadow at that hour
was becoming deep. He approached the spot; for a moment he stood
looking afar: he knew not at what; and drew forth his pistol,
cocked it, and throwing himself on the grassy mound, raised the
mouth of the fatal instrument to his forehead. "Oh, go away! go
away from mamma!" were words that might have met his ear, but that
every sense was absorbed. As he drew the trigger, his arm was
pulled; the ball whizzed harmlessly by his ear: but the shock of
the sound, the unconsciousness that he had been touched at that
moment—the belief that the mortal wound was given, made him fall
back; and, as he himself said afterward, he fancied that he had
uttered the scream he heard, which had, indeed, proceeded from
other lips.
In a few seconds he recovered
himself. Yet so had he worked up his mind to die; so impossible did
it appear that his aim should fail him, that in those few seconds
the earth and all belonging to it had passed away—and his first
exclamation, as he started up, was, "Where am I?" Something caught
his gaze; a little white figure, which lay but a few paces distant,
and two eyes that gleamed on him—the horrible thought darted into
his head—had another instead of himself been the victim? and he
exclaimed in agony, "Gracious God! who are you?—speak! What have I
done!" Still more was he horror-struck when he saw that it was a
little child who lay before him—he raised her—but her eyes had
glared with terror, not death; she did not speak; but she was not
wounded, and he endeavoured to comfort and reassure her, till she,
a little restored, began to cry bitterly, and he felt, thankfully,
that her tears were a pledge that the worst consequences of her
fright had passed away. He lifted her from the ground, while she,
in the midst of her tears, tried to get him away from the grave he
desecrated. The twilight scarcely showed her features; but her
surpassing fairness—her lovely countenance and silken hair, so
betokened a child of love and care, that he was more the surprised
to find her alone, at that hour, in the solitary churchyard.
He soothed her gently, and asked,
"How came you here? what could you be doing so late so far from
home?"
"I came to see mamma."
"To see mamma! Where? how? Your
mother is not here."
"Yes she is; mamma is there;" and
she pointed with her little finger to the grave.
The stranger started up—there was
something awful in this childish simplicity and affection: he tried
to read the inscription on the stone near—he could just make out
the name of Edwin Raby. "That is not your mother's grave," he
said.
"No; papa is there—mamma is here,
next to him."
The man, just bent on
self-destruction, with a conscience burning him to the heart's
core—all concentrated in the omnipotence of his own
sensations—shuddered at the tale of dereliction and misery these
words conveyed; he looked earnestly on the child, and was
fascinated by her angel look; she spoke with a pretty seriousness,
shaking her head, her lips trembling—her large eyes shining in
brimming tears. "My poor child," he said, "your name is Raby
then?"
"Mamma used to call me Baby," she
replied; "they call me Missy at home—my name is Elizabeth."
"Well, dear Elizabeth, let me
take you home; you cannot stay all night with mamma."
"Oh, no; I was just going home
when you frightened me."
"You must forget that; I will buy
you a doll to make it up again, and all sorts of toys; see, here is
a pretty thing for you!" and he took the chain of his watch, and
threw it over her head; he wanted so to distract her attention as
to make her forget what had passed, and not to tell a shocking
story when she got home.
"But," she said, looking up into
his face, "you will not be so naughty again, and sit down where
mamma is lying."
The stranger promised, and kissed
her; and, taking her hand, they walked together to the village; she
prattled as she went, and he sometimes listened to her stories of
mamma, and answered, and sometimes thought with wonder that he
still lived—that the ocean's tide still broke at his feet—and the
stars still shone above; he felt angry and impatient at the delay,
as if it betokened a failing of purpose. They walked along the
sands, and stopped at last at Mrs. Baker's door. She was standing
at it, and exclaimed, "Here you are, Missy, at last! What have you
been doing with yourself? I declare I was quite frightened—it is
long past your bedtime."
"You must not scold her," said
the stranger; "I detained her. But why do you let her go out alone?
it is not right."
"Lord, sir," she replied, "there
is none hereabouts to do her a harm—and she would not thank me if I
kept her from going to see her mamma, as she calls it. I have no
one to spare to go with her; it's hard enough on me to keep her on
charity, as I do. But"—and her voice changed as a thought flashed
across her—"I beg your pardon, sir, perhaps you come for Missy, and
know all about her. I am sure I have done all I can; it's a long
time since her mamma died; and, but for me, she must have gone to
the parish. I hope you will judge that I have done my duty towards
her."
"You mistake," said the stranger;
"I know nothing of this young lady, nor of her parents, who, it
would seem, are both dead. Of course she has other
relations?"
"That she has, and rich ones
too," replied Mrs. Baker, "if one could but find them out. It's
hard upon me, who am a widow woman, with four children of my own,
to have other people's upon me—very hard, sir, as you must allow;
and often I think that I cannot answer it to myself, taking the
bread from my own children and grandchildren, to feed a stranger.
But, to be sure, Missy has rich relations, and some day they will
inquire for her; though come the tenth of next August, and it's a
year since her mother died, and no one has come to ask good or bad
about her, or Missy."
"Her father died also in this
village?" asked the stranger.
"True enough," said the woman;
"both father and mother died in this very house, and lie up in the
churchyard yonder. Come, Missy, don't cry; that's an old story now,
and it's no use fretting."
The poor child, who had hitherto
listened in simple ignorance, began to sob at this mention of her
parents; and the stranger, shocked by the woman's unfeeling tone,
said, "I should like to hear more of this sad story. Pray let the
poor dear child be put to bed, and then, if you will relate what
you know of her parents, I dare say I can give you some advice to
enable you to discover her relations, and relieve you from the
burden of her maintenance."
"These are the first comfortable
words I have heard a long time," said Mrs. Baker. "Come, Missy,
Nancy shall put you to bed; it's far past your hour. Don't cry,
dear; this kind gentleman will take you along with him, to a fine
house, among grand folks, and all our troubles will be over. Be
pleased, sir, to step into the parlour, and I will show you a
letter of the lady, and tell you all I know. I dare say, if you are
going to London, you will find out that Missy ought to be riding in
her coach at this very moment."
This was a golden idea of Mrs.
Baker, and, in truth, went a little beyond her anticipations; but
she had got tired of her first dreams of greatness, and feared
that, in sad truth, the little orphan's relations would entirely
disown her; but it struck her that, if she could persuade this
strange gentleman that all she said was true, he might be induced
to take the little girl with him when he went away, and undertake
the task of restoring her to her father's family, by which means
she at least would be released from all further care on her
account:—"Upon this hint she spake."
She related how Mr. and Mrs. Raby
had arrived with their almost infant child—death already streaked
the brow of the dying man; each day threatened to be his last; yet
he lived on. His sufferings were great; and night and day his wife
was at his side, waiting on him, watching each turn of his eye,
each change of complexion or of pulse. They were poor, and had only
one servant, hired at the village soon after their arrival, when
Mrs. Raby found herself unable to bestow adequate attention on both
husband and child; yet she did so much as evidently to cause her to
sink beneath her too great exertions. She was delicate and fragile
in appearance; but she never owned to being fatigued, or relaxed in
her attentions. Her voice was always attuned to cheerfulness, her
eyes beaming with tenderness: she, doubtless, wept in secret; but
when conversing with her husband, or playing with her child, a
natural vivacity animated her, that looked like hope; indeed, it
was certain that, in spite of every fatal symptom, she did not
wholly despair. When her husband declared himself better, and
resumed for a day his task of instructer to his little girl, she
believed that his disorder had taken a favourable turn, and would
say, "Oh, Mrs. Baker, please God, he is really better; doctors are
not infallible; he may live!" And as she spoke, her eyes swam in
tears, while a smile lay like a sunbeam on her features. She did
not sink till her husband died, and even then struggled, both with
her grief and the wasting malady already at work within her, with a
fortitude a mother only could practise; for all her exertions were
for her dear child; and she could smile on her, a wintry smile—yet
sweet as if warmed by seraphic faith and love. She lingered thus,
hovering on the very limits of life and death; her heart warm and
affectionate, and hoping, and full of fire to the end, for her
child's sake, while she herself pined for the freedom of the grave,
and to soar from the cares and sorrows of a sordid world, to the
heaven already open to receive her. In homely phrase, Mrs. Baker
dwelt upon this touching mixture of maternal tenderness and soft
languor, that would not mourn for him she was so soon to join. The
woman then described her sudden death, and placed the fragment of
her last letter before her auditor.
Deeply interested, the stranger
began to read, when suddenly he became ghastly pale, and, trembling
all over, he asked, "To whom was this letter addressed?"
"Ah, sir," replied Mrs. Baker,
"would that I could tell, and all my troubles would be over. Read
on, sir, and you will see that Mrs. Raby feels sure that the lady
would have been a mother to poor Missy; but who, or where she is,
is past all my guessing."
The stranger strove to read on;
but violent emotion, and the struggle to hide what he felt,
hindered him from taking in the meaning of a single word. At length
he told Mrs. Baker that, with her leave, he would take the letter
away, and read it at his leisure. He promised her his aid in
discovering Mrs. Raby's relatives, and assured her that there would
be small difficulty in so doing. He then retired, and Mrs. Baker
exclaimed, "Please God, this will prove a good day's work."
A voice from the grave had spoken
to the stranger. It was not the dead mother's voice—she, whatever
her merits and sufferings had been, was to him an image of the mind
only—he had never known her. But her benefactress, her hope and
trust, who and where was she! Alithea! the warm-hearted friend—the
incomparable mother! She to whom all hearts in distress turned,
sure of relief—who went before the desires of the necessitous;
whose generous and free spirit made her emperess of all hearts;
who, while she lived, spread, as does the sun, radiance and warmth
around—her pulses were stilled; her powers cribbed up in the grave.
She was nothing now; and he had reduced to this nothing the living
frame of this glorious being.
The stranger read the letter
again and again; again he writhed, as her name appeared, traced by
her friend's delicate hand, and the concluding hope seemed the acme
of his despair. She would indeed have been a mother to the
orphan—he remembered expressions that told him that she was making
diligent inquiry for her friend, whose luckless fate had not
reached her. Yes, it was his Alithea; he could not doubt. His?
Fatal mistake—his she had never been; and the wild resolve to make
her such had ended in death and ruin.
The stranger had taken the letter
to his inn—but any roof seemed to imprison and oppress him—again he
sought relief in the open air, and wandered far along the sands,
with the speed of a misery that strove to escape from itself. The
whole night he spent thus—sometimes climbing the jagged cliffs,
then descending to the beach, and throwing himself his length upon
the sands. The tide ebbed and flowed—the roar of ocean filled the
lone night with sound—the owl flapped down from its home in the
rock, and hooted. Hour after hour passed—and, driven by a thousand
thoughts—tormented by the direst pangs of memory—still the stranger
hurried along the winding shores. Morning found him many miles from
Treby. He did not stop till the appearance of another village put a
limit to solitude, and he returned upon his steps.
Those who could guess his crime,
could alone divine the combat of life and death waging in his
heart. He had, through accident and forgetfulness, left his pistols
on the table of his chamber at the inn, or, in some of the wildest
of the paroxysms of despair, they had ended all. To die, he fondly
hoped, was to destroy memory and to defeat remorse; and yet there
arose within his mind that feeling, mysterious and inexplicable to
common reason, which generates a desire to expiate and to atone.
Should he be the cause of good to the friendless orphan, bequeathed
so vainly to his victim, would not that, in some sort, compensate
for his crime? Would it not double it to have destroyed her, and
also the good of which she would have been the author? The very
finger of God pointed to this act, since the child's little hand
had arrested his arm at the fatal moment when he believed that no
interval of a second's duration intervened between him and the
grave. Then, to aid those dim religious misgivings, came the manly
wish to protect the oppressed and assist the helpless. The struggle
was long and terrible. Now he made up his mind that it was
cowardice to postpone his resolve—that to live was to stamp himself
poltron and traitor. And now again, he felt that the true cowardice
was to die—to fly from the consequences of his actions, and the
burden of existence. He gazed upon the dim waste of waters, as if
from its misty skirt some vision would arise to guide or to
command. He cast his eyes upward to interrogate the silent
stars—the roaring of the tide appeared to assume an inorganic
voice, and to murmur hoarsely, "Live! miserable wretch! Dare you
hope for the repose which your victim enjoys? Know that the guilty
are unworthy to die—that is the reward of innocence!"
The cool air of morning chilled
his brow, and the broad sun arose from the eastern sea, as, pale
and haggard, he retrod many a weary step towards Treby. He was
faint and weary. He had resolved to live yet a little longer—till
he had fulfilled some portion of his duty towards the lovely
orphan. So resolving, he felt as if he paid a part of the penalty
due. A soothing feeling, which resembled repentance, stole over his
heart, already rewarding him. How swiftly and audibly does the
inner voice of our nature speak, telling us when we do right.
Besides, he believed that to live was to suffer; to live,
therefore, was in him a virtue: and the exultation, the balmy
intoxication which always follows our first attempt to execute a
virtuous resolve, crept over him, and elevated his spirits, though
body and soul were alike weary. Arriving at Treby, he sought his
bed. He slept peacefully; and it was the first slumber he had
enjoyed since he had torn himself from the spot where she lay, whom
he had loved so truly, even to the death to which he had brought
her.