Читать книгу: «The Wanderer; or, Female Difficulties (Volume 5 of 5)», страница 2

She was immediately surrounded by waiters; but the gentleman, who, observing only her dress, concluded her to belong to the house, walked on into the kitchen, and asked, in broken English, for the landlord or landlady.

Juliet, whose fall had been the effect of a sudden deprivation of strength, from an abrupt sensation of horrour, had not fainted. She heard, therefore, what passed, and was easily helped to rise; and, shaded by her packet, which, even in her first terrour, she had instinctively held to her face, she made a motion to walk into the air. One of the men, good naturedly, placed her a chair without doors; she sat upon it thankfully, and almost as quickly recovered as she had lost her force, by a reviving idea, that, even yet, thus situated, she might make her escape.

She had just risen with this view, when the voice of the pilot, who was coming round the house, from the stable-yard, forced her hastily to re-enter the passage; but not before she heard him enquire, whether a French gentleman were arrived in that chaise?

Again, now, she glided on towards the stairs; hearing, as she passed, the answer made by the French gentleman himself: 'Oui, oui, me voici. Quelles sont les nouvelles?'¹

The voices of both proved each to be advancing to the passage, to meet the other. Juliet was no longer sensible of bodily weakness; nor scarcely of bodily existence. She seemed to herself a mere composition of terrour. She flew up the stairs, meaning to regain her little chamber; but, mistaking her way, found herself in a gallery, leading to the best apartments. Glad, however, rather than sorry, in the hope she might here be less liable to be sought, she opened the first door; and, entering a large room, locked and bolted herself in, with such extreme precipitance, that already she had sunk upon her knees, in fervent prayer, before a shadow, which caught her eyes, made her look round; when she perceived, at a distant window, a gentleman who was writing.

In the deepest consternation, she arose, hurrying to find the key; which, in her perturbation, she had taken out, and let drop she knew not where.

While earnestly searching it, the gentleman, mildly, yet in a tone of some surprize, enquired what she wanted.

Startled at the sound of his voice, she looked up, and saw Harleigh.

Her conflicting emotions now exceeded all that she had hitherto experienced. To seem to follow, even to his room, the man whom she had adjured, as he valued her preservation, to quit and avoid her; joined sensations of shame so poignant, to those of horrour and anguish, with which she was already overwhelmed, that, almost, she wished her last hour to arrive; that, while finishing her wretchedness, she might clear her integrity and honour.

Harleigh, to whom her dress, as he had not caught a view of her face, proved a complete disguise of her person, concluded her to be some light nymph of the inn, and suffered her to search for the key, without even repeating his question: but when, upon her finding it, he observed that her shaking hand could not, for some time, fix it in the lock, he was struck with something in her general form that urged him to rise, and offer his assistance.

Still more her hand shook, but she opened the door, and, without answering, and with a head carefully averted, eagerly quitted the room; shutting herself out, with trembling precipitation.

Harleigh hesitated whether to follow; but it was only for a moment: the next, a shriek of agony reached his ears, and, hastily rushing forth, he saw the female who had just quitted him, standing in an attitude of despair; her face bowed down upon her hands; while an ill-looking man, whom he presently recollected for the pilot, grinning in triumph, and with arms wide extended, to prevent her passing, loudly called out, 'Citoyen! Citoyen! venez voir! c'est Elle! Je la tien!'²

Harleigh would have remonstrated against this rude detention; but he had no sooner begun speaking, than Juliet, finding that she could not advance, retreated; and had just put her hand upon the lock of a door, higher up in the gallery; when another man, dressed with disgusting negligence, and of a hideous countenance, yet wearing an air of ferocious authority; advancing by large strides, roughly seized her arm, with one hand, while, with the other, he rudely lifted up her bonnet, to examine her face.

'C'est bien!' he cried, with a look of exultation, that gave to his horrible features an air of infernal joy; 'viens, citoyenne, viens; suis moi.'³

Harleigh, who, when the bonnet was raised, saw, what as yet he had feared to surmize, – that it was Juliet; sprang forward, exclaiming, 'Daring ruffian! quit your hold!'

'Ose tu nier mes droits?' cried the man, addressing Juliet; whose arm he still griped; —'Dis! – parles! – l'ose tu?'⁴

Juliet was mute; but Harleigh saw that she was sinking, and bent towards her to save her fall; what, then, was his astonishment, to perceive that it was voluntary! and that she cast herself at the feet of her assailant!

Thunderstruck, he held back.

The man, with an expression of diabolical delight at this posture, cast his eyes now upon her, now upon her appalled defendant; and then, in French, gave orders to the pilot, to see four fresh horses put to the chaise: and, in a tone of somewhat abated rage, bid Juliet arise, and accompany him down stairs.

'Ah, no! – ah, spare – ah, leave me yet! – ' in broken accents, and in French, cried the still prostrate Juliet.

The man, who was large made, tall, and strong, seized, then, both her arms, with a motion that indicated his intention to drag her along.

A piercing shriek forced its way from her at his touch: but she arose, and made no appeal, no remonstrance.

'Si tu peus le conduire toute seule,' said the man, sneeringly, 'soit! Mais vas en avant! Je ne le perdrai plus de vu.'⁵

Juliet again hid her face, but stood still.

The man roughly gave her a push; seeming to enjoy, with a coarse laugh, the pleasure of driving her on before him.

Harleigh, who saw that her face was convulsed with horrour, fiercely planted himself in the midst of the passage, vehemently exclaiming, 'Infernal monster! by what right do you act?'

'De quel droit me le demandez vous?'⁶ cried the man; who appeared perfectly to understand English.

'By the rights of humanity!' replied Harleigh; 'and you shall answer me by the rights of justice! One claim alone can annul my interference. Are you her father?'

'Non!' he answered, with a laugh of scorn; 'mais il y a d'autres droits!'⁷

'There are none!' cried Harleigh, 'to which you can pretend; none!'

'Comment cela? n'est-ce pas ma femme? Ne suis-je pas son mari?'⁸

'No!' cried Harleigh, 'no!' with the fury of a man seized with sudden delirium; 'I deny it! – 'tis false! and neither you nor all the fiends of hell shall make me believe it!'

Juliet again fell prostrate; but, though her form turned towards her assailant, her eyes, and supplicating hands, that begged forbearance, were lifted up, in speechless agony, to Harleigh.

Repressed by this look and action, though only to be overpowered by the blackest surmizes, Harleigh again stood suspended.

Finding the people of the inn were now filling the staircase, to see what was the matter, the foreigner, in tolerable English, told them all to be gone, for he was only recovering an eloped wife. Then, addressing Juliet, 'If you dare assert,' he said, 'that you are not my wife, your perjury may cost you dear! If you have not that hardiness, hold your tongue and welcome. Who else will dare dispute my claims?'

'I will!' cried Harleigh, furiously. 'Walk this way, Sir, and give me an account of yourself! I will defend that lady from your inhuman grasp, to the last drop of my blood!'

'Ah, no! ah, no!' Juliet now faintly uttered; but the man, interrupting her, said, 'Dare you assert, I demand, that you are not my wife? Speak! Dare you?'

Again she bowed down her face upon her hands, – her face that seemed bloodless with despair; but she was mute.

'I put you to the test;' continued the man, striding to the end of the gallery, and opening the last door: 'Go into that chamber!'

She shrieked aloud with agony uncontrollable; and Harleigh, with an emotion irrepressible, cast his arms around her, exclaiming, 'Place yourself under my protection! and no violence, no power upon earth shall tear you away!'

At these words, all the force of her character came again to her aid; and she disengaged herself from him, with a reviving dignity in her air, that shewed a decided resolution to resist his services: but she was still utterly silent; and he saw that she was obliged to sustain her tottering frame against the wall, to save herself from again sinking upon the floor.

The foreigner seemed with difficulty to restrain his rage from some act of brutality; but, after a moment's pause, fixing his hands fiercely in his sides, he ferociously confronted the shaking Juliet, and said, 'I have informed your family of my rights. Lord Denmeath has promised me his assistance and your portion.'

'Lord Denmeath!' repeated the astonished Harleigh.

'He has promised me, also,' the foreigner, without heeding him, continued, 'the support of your half-brother, Lord Melbury, – '

'Lord Melbury!' again exclaimed Harleigh; with an expression that spoke a sudden delight, thrilling, in defiance of agony, through his burning veins.

'Who, he assures me, is a young man of honour, who will never abet a wife in eloping from her husband. I shall take you, therefore, at first, and at once, to Lord Denmeath, who will only pay your portion to your own signature. Go, therefore, quietly into that room, till the chaise is ready, and I promise that I won't follow you: though, if you resist, I shall assert my rights by force.'

He held the door open. She wrung her hands with agonizing horrour. He took hold of her shoulder; she shrunk from his touch; but, in shrinking, involuntarily entered the room. He would have pushed her on; but Harleigh, who now looked wild with the violence of contending emotions; with rage, astonishment, grief, and despair; furiously caught him by the arm, calling out, 'Hold, villain, hold! – Speak, Madam, speak! Utter but a syllable! – Deign only to turn towards me! – Pronounce but with your eyes that he has no legal claim, and I will instantly secure your liberty, – even from myself! – even from all mankind! – Speak! – turn! – look but a moment this way! – One word! one single word! – '

She clapped her hands upon her forehead, in an action of despair; but the word was not spoken, – not a syllable was uttered! A look, however, escaped her, expressive of a soul in torture, yet supplicating his retreat. She then stepped further into the room, and the foreigner shut and double-locked the door.

Triumphantly brandishing the key, as he eyed, sidelong, the now passive Harleigh, he went into the adjoining apartment; where, seating himself in the middle of the room, he left the door wide open, to watch all egress and regress in the passage.

Harleigh now appeared to be lost! The violence of his agitation, while he concluded her to be wrongfully claimed, was transformed into the blackest and most indignant despondence, at her unresisting, however wretched acquiescence, to commands thus brutal; emanating from an authority of which, however evidently it was deplored, she attempted not to controvert the legality. The dreadful mystery, more direful than it had been depicted, even by the most cruel of his apprehensions, was now revealed: she is married! he internally cried; married to the vilest of wretches, whom she flies and abhors, – yet she is married! indisputably married! and can never, never, – even in my wishes, now, be mine!

A sudden sensation, kindred even to hatred, took possession of his feelings. Altered she appeared to him, and delusive. She had always, indeed, discouraged his hopes, always forbidden his expectations; yet she must have seen that they subsisted, and were cherished; and could not but have been conscious, that a single word, bitter, but essentially just, might have demolished, have annihilated them in a moment.

He dragged himself back to his apartment, and resolutely shut his door; gloomily bent to nourish every unfavourable impression, that might sicken regret by resentment. But no indignation could curb his grief at her loss; nor his horrour at her situation: and the look that had compelled his retreat; the look that so expressively had concentrated and conveyed her so often reiterated sentence, of 'leave, or you destroy me!' seemed rivetted to his very brain, so as to take despotic and exclusive hold of all his faculties.

In a few minutes, the sound of a carriage almost mechanically drew him to the window. He saw there an empty chaise and four horses. It was surely to convey her away! – and with the man whom she loathed, – and from one who, so often! had awakened in her symptoms the most impressive of the most flattering sensibility! —

The transitory calm of smothered, but not crushed emotions, was now succeeded by a storm of the most violent and tragic passions. To lose her for ever, yet irresistibly to believe himself beloved! – to see her nearly lifeless with misery, yet to feel that to demand a conference, or the smallest explanation, or even a parting word, might expose her to the jealousy of a brute, who seemed capable of enjoying, rather than deprecating, any opportunity to treat her ill; to be convinced that she must be the victim of a forced marriage; yet to feel every sentiment of honour, and if of honour of happiness! rise to oppose all violation of a rite, that, once performed, must be held sacred: – thoughts, reflections, ideas thus dreadful, and sensations thus excruciating, almost deprived him of reason, and he cast himself upon the ground in wild agony.

But he was soon roused thence by the gruff voice, well recollected, of the pilot, who, from the bottom of the stairs, called out, 'Viens, citoyen! tout est pret.'⁹

With horrour, now, he heard the heavy step of the foreigner again in the passage; he listened, and the sound reached his ear of the key fixing – the door unlocking. – Excess of torture then caused a short suspension of his faculties, and he heard no more.

Soon, however, reviving, the stillness startled him. He opened his door. No one was in the passage; but he caught a plaintive sound, from the room in which Juliet was a prisoner: and soon gathered that Juliet herself was imploring for leave to travel to Lord Denmeath's alone.

What an aggravation to the sufferings of Harleigh, to learn that she was thus allied, at the moment that he knew her to be another's! for however the violence of his admiration had conquered every obstacle, he had always thought, with reluctance and concern, of the supposed obscurity of her family and connections.

Juliet pleaded in vain. A harsh refusal was followed by the grossest menace, if she hesitated to accompany him at once.

The pilot, repeating his call, now mounted the stairs; and Harleigh felt compelled to return to his room; but, looking back in re-entering it, he saw Juliet forced into the passage; her face not merely pale, but ghastly; her eyes nearly starting from her head.

To rescue, to protect her, Harleigh now thought was all that could render life desirable; but, while adoring her almost to madness, he respected her situation and her fame, and re-passed into his chamber, unseen by the foreigner.

Yet he could not forbear placing himself so that he might catch a glance of her as she went by; he held the door, therefore, in his hand, as if, accidentally, at that moment, opening it. She did not turn her head, but assumed an air of resignation, and walked straight on; yet though she did not meet his eye, she evidently felt it; a pale pink suffusion shot across her cheeks; taking place of the death-like hue they had exhibited as she quitted her room; but which, fading away almost in the same moment, left her again a seeming spectre.

A nervous dimness took from Harleigh even the faculty of observing the foreigner. She loves me! was his thought; she surely loves me! And the idea which, not many minutes sooner, would have chaced from his mind every feeling but of felicity, now rent his heart with torture, from painting their mutual unhappiness. It was not a sigh that he stifled, nor a sigh that escaped him; but a groan, a piercing groan, which broke from his sorrows, as he heard her tottering step reach the stairs, while internally he uttered, She is gone from me for ever!

When he thought she would no longer be in sight, he followed to the first landing-place; to catch, once more, even the most distant sound of her feet: but the passage to and fro of waiters, forced him again to mount to his chamber. There, he hastened to the window, to take a view, a last view! of her loved form; but thence, shuddering, retreated, at sight of the chaise and four; destined to whirl her everlastingly away from him, with a companion so undisguisedly dreaded! – so evidently abhorred!

Yet, at the first sound, he returned to the window; whence he perceived Juliet just arrived upon the threshold; looking like a picture of death, and leaning upon a chambermaid, to whom she clung as to a bosom friend; yet not attempting to resist the foreigner; who, on her other side, dragged her by the arm, in open triumph. But, when she came to the chaise-step, she staggered, her vital powers seemed forsaking her; she heaved a hard and painful sigh, and, but for the chambermaid, who knelt down to catch her, had fallen upon the ground.

Harleigh was already half way down the stairs, almost frantic to save her; before he had sufficient recollection to remind him, that any effort on his part might cause her yet grosser insult. He was then again at his window; where he saw a second chambermaid administering burnt feathers, which had already recovered her from the fainting fit; while the mistress of the house was presenting her with hartshorn and water.

She refused no assistance; but the foreigner, who was loudly enraged at the delay, said that he would lift her into the chaise; and bid the pilot get in first, to help the operation.

She now again looked so sick and disordered, that all the women called upon the foreigner to let her re-enter the house, and take a little rest, before her journey. Her eyes, turned up to heaven with thankfulness, even at the proposal, encouraged them to grow clamorous in their demand; but the man, with a scornful sneer, replied that her journey would be her cure; and told the pilot, who was finishing a bottle of wine, to make haste.

The wretched Juliet, resuming her resolution, though with an air of despair, faintly pronounced, that she would get into the carriage herself; and, leaning upon the woman, ascended the steps, and dropt upon the seat of the chaise.

CHAPTER LXXIX

At this moment, a horseman, who had advanced full gallop, hastily dismounting, enquired aloud, whether any French gentleman had lately arrived.

All who were present, pointed to the foreigner; who, not hearing, or affecting not to hear the demand, began pushing away the women, that he might follow Juliet.

The horseman, approaching, asked the foreigner his name.

'Qu'est ce que cela vous fait?'¹⁰ he answered.

'You must come with me into the inn,' the horseman replied, after stedfastly examining his face.

The foreigner, with a loud oath, refused to stir.

The horseman, holding out a paper, clapped him upon the shoulder, saying, that he was a person who had been looked for some time, in consequence of information which had been lodged against him; and that he was to be sent out of the kingdom.

This declaration made, he called upon the master of the house to lend his assistance, for keeping the arrested person in custody, till the arrival of the proper officers of justice.

The man, at first, could find no vent for his rage, except horrid oaths, and tremendous imprecations; but, when he was positively seized, with a menace of being bound hand and foot, if he offered any opposition, he swore that his wife, at least, should accompany him; and put forth his hand towards the chaise, to drag out Juliet.

But Juliet was saved from his grasp by the landlady; who humanely, upon seeing her almost expiring condition, had entered the carriage, during the dispute, with a viol of sal volatile.

The horseman, who was a peace-officer, said that he had no orders to arrest any woman. She might come, or stay, as she pleased.

The foreigner vociferously claimed her; uttering execrations against all who unlawfully withheld her; or would abet her elopement. He would then have passed round to the other door of the chaise, to seize her by force; but the peace-officer, who was habitually deaf to any appeal, and resolute against any resistance; compelled him, though storming, raging, and swearing, his face distorted with fury, his under-jaw dropt, and his mouth foaming, to re-enter the inn.

Juliet received neither relief nor fresh pain from what passed. Though no longer fainting, terrour and excess of misery operated so powerfully upon her nerves, that his cries assailed her ears but as outrage upon outrage; and, though clinging to the landlady, with instinctive entreaty for support, she was so disordered by her recent fainting, and so absorbed in the belief that she was lost, that she knew not what had happened; nor suspected any impediment to her forced journey; till the landlady, now quitting her, advised her to have a room and lie down; saying that no wife could be expected to follow such a brute of a husband to jail.

Amazed, she enquired what was meant; and was answered, that her husband was in the hands of justice.

The violence of the changed, yet mixed sensations, with which she was now assailed, made every pulse throb with so palpitating a rapidity, that she felt as if life itself was seeking a vent through every swelling vein. But, when again she was pressed to enter the house, and not to accompany her husband to prison; she shuddered, her head was bowed down with shame; and, making a motion that supplicated for silence, she seemed internally torn asunder with torturing incertitude how to act.

During this instant, – it was scarcely more, – of irresolution, the landlady alighted, and the chaise was driven abruptly from the door. But Juliet had scarcely had time for new alarm, ere she found that she had only been removed to make way for another carriage; from the window of which she caught a glimpse of Sir Jaspar Herrington.

Nor had she escaped his eye; her straw-bonnet having fallen off, without being missed, while she fainted, her head was wholly without shade.

With all of speed in his power, the Baronet hobbled to the chaise. She covered her face, sinking with every species of confusion and distress. 'Have I the honour,' he cried, 'to address Miss Granville? The Honourable Miss Granville?' —

'Good Heaven! – ' Juliet astonished, and raising her head, exclaimed.

'If so, I have the dulcet commission,' he continued, 'to escort her to her brother and sister, Lord Melbury, and Lady Aurora Granville.'

'Is it possible? Is it possible?' cried Juliet, in an ecstacy that seemed to renovate her whole being: 'I dare not believe it! – Oh Sir Jaspar! dear, good, kind, generous Sir Jaspar! delude me not, in pity!'

'No, fairest syren!' answered Sir Jaspar, in a rapture nearly equal to her own; 'if there be any delusion to fear, 'tis poor I must be its victim!'

'Oh take me, then, at once, – this instant, – this moment, – take me to them, my benevolent, my noble friend! If, indeed, I have a brother, a sister, – give me the heaven of their protection! – '

Sir Jaspar, enchanted, invited her to honour him by accepting a seat in his chaise. With glowing gratitude she complied; though the just returning roses faded from her cheeks, as she alighted, upon perceiving Harleigh, aloof and disconsolate, fixed like a statue, upon a small planted eminence. Yet but momentarily was the whiter hue prevalent, and her skin, the next instant, burned with blushes of the deepest dye.

This transition was not lost upon Harleigh: his eye caught, and his heart received it, with equal avidity and anguish. Ah why, thought he, so sensitive! why, at this period of despair, must I awaken to a consciousness of the full extent of my calamity! Yet, all his resentment subsided; to believe that she participated in his sentiments, had a charm so softening, so all-subduing, that, even in this crisis of torture and hopelessness, it dissolved his whole soul into tenderness.

Juliet, faintly articulating, 'Oh, let us be gone!' moved, with cast down eyes, to the carriage of the Baronet; forced, from remaining weakness, to accept the assistance of his groom; Sir Jaspar not having strength, nor Harleigh courage, to offer aid.

Sir Jaspar demanded her permission to stop at Salisbury, for his valet and baggage.

'Any where! any where!' answered the shaking Juliet, 'so I go but to Lady Aurora!'

Astonished, and thrilled to the soul by these words, Harleigh, who, unconsciously, had advanced, involuntarily repeated, 'Lady Aurora? – Lady Aurora Granville?' —

Unable to answer, or to look at him, the trembling Juliet, eagerly laying both her hands upon the arm of the Baronet, as, cautiously, he was mounting into the carriage, supplicated that they might be gone.

A petition thus seconded, from so adored a suppliant, was irresistible; he kissed each fair hand that thus honoured him; and had just accepted the offer of Harleigh, to aid his arrangements; when the furious prisoner, struggling with the peace-officers, and loudly swearing, re-appeared at the inn-door, clamorously demanding his wife.

The tortured Juliet, with an impulse of agony, cast, now, the hands that were just withdrawn from the Baronet, upon the shoulder of Harleigh, who was himself fastening the chaise-door, tremulously, and in a tone scarcely audible, pronouncing, 'Oh! hurry us away, Mr Harleigh! – in mercy! – in compassion!'

Harleigh, bowing upon the hands which he ventured not to touch, but of which he felt the impression with a pang indescribable, called to the postilion to drive off full gallop.

With a low and sad inclination of the head, Juliet, in a faultering voice, thanked him; involuntarily adding, 'My prayers, Mr Harleigh, – my every wish for happiness, – will for ever be yours!'

The chaise drove off; but his groan, rather than sigh, reached her agonized ear; and, in an emotion too violent for concealment, yet to which she durst allow no vent, she held her almost bursting forehead with her hand; breathing only by smothered sighs, and scarcely sensible to the happiness of an uncertain escape, while bowed down by the sight of the misery that she had inflicted, where all that she owed was benevolence, sympathy, and generosity.

Not even the delight of thus victoriously carrying off a disputed prize, could immediately reconcile Sir Jaspar to the fear of even the smallest disorder in the economy of his medicines, anodynes, sweetmeats, and various whims; which, from long habits of self-indulgence, he now conceived to be necessaries, not luxuries.

But when, after having examined, in detail, that his travelling apparatus was in order, he turned smilingly to the fair mede of his exertions; and saw the deep absorption of all her faculties in her own evident affliction, he was struck with surprise and disappointment; and, after a short and mortified pause, 'Can it be, fair ænigma!' he cried, 'that it is with compunction you abandon this Gallic Goliah?'

Surprised, through this question, from the keen anguish of speechless suffering; retrospection and anticipation alike gave way to gratitude, and she poured forth her thanks, her praises, and her wondering delight, at this unexpected, and marvellous rescue, with so much vivacity of transport, and so much softness of sensibility for his kindness, that the enchanted Sir Jaspar, losing all forbearance, in the interest with which he languished to learn, more positively, her history and her situation, renewed his entreaties for communication, with an urgency that she now, for many reasons, no longer thought right to resist: anxious herself, since concealment was at an end, to clear away the dark appearances by which she was surrounded; and to remove a mystery that, for so long a period, had made her owe all good opinion to trust and generosity.

She pondered, nevertheless, and sighed, ere she could comply. It was strange to her, she said, and sad, to lift up the veil of secresy to a new, however interesting and respectable acquaintance; while to her brother, her sister, and her earliest friend, she still appeared to be inveloped in impenetrable concealment. Yet, if to communicate the circumstances which had brought her into this deplorable situation, could shew her sense of the benevolence of Sir Jaspar, she would set apart her repugnance, and gather courage to retrace the cruel scenes of which he had witnessed the direful result. Her inestimable friend had already related the singular history of all that had preceded their separation; but, uninformed herself of the dreadful events by which it had been followed, she could go no further: otherwise, from a noble openness of heart, which made all disguise painful, if not disgusting to her, Sir Jaspar would already have been satisfied.

The Baronet, ashamed, would now have withdrawn his petition; but Juliet no longer wished to retract from her engagement.