Kitabı oku: «The Wanderer; or, Female Difficulties (Volume 4 of 5)», sayfa 6

'And were none of your little sylphs, Sir, at hand, to point out to you some one who was disinterested in her nature, however inferiour in her fortune?'

'No! alas! no; my sylphs all reserved themselves for my meeting with you! The wicked little imps who then guided and goaded me, incited me to suspect and to watch every thing that seemed lovely or amiable; and the pranks that they played me were endless. They urged me to pursue the glowing Beauty, whose vivid cheeks, crimsoned by the dance, had warmed all my senses at a ball, to her alighting from her carriage, at her return home, with the livid line of fatigue and moonlight! They instigated me to surprize, when ill-dressed, negligent, and spiritless, the charming face and form that, skilfully adorned, had appeared to me Venus attired by the Graces. They twitched me on to dart upon another, whose bloom had seemed the opening of the rose-bud, just as an untoward accident had rubbed off, from one cheek, the sweet pink which remained undiminished upon the other! And when, tired of the deceptions of beauty, I would only follow merit, the wanton little sprites suggested detections still more mischievous. They led me to overhear the softest of maidens insult a poor dependent; they shewed me a pattern of discretion, secretly involved in debt; and the frankest of human lasses, engaged in a clandestine affair! They whisked me, in short, into every crevice of female subtlety. They exhibited all as a drama, and gave me a peep behind the curtain to see the gayest damsel the sulkiest; the most pleasing one, the most spiteful; the delicate one, obstreperous; the bashful one, bold; the generous one, niggardly; and the humble one, a tyrant!'

'Oh wicked imps, indeed, Sir Jaspar! What a view of poor human nature have they deformed for you! And how have you preserved such a stock of philanthropy, while instigated by so much malignity?'

'Alas, my fair love, my history is but that of half the old bachelors existing! We pay, by our aged facility and good humour, for our youthful severity and impertinence! and, after having wasted our early life in conceiving that no one is good enough for us, we consume our latter days in envy of every married man! Now – all too late! I never see a lovely young creature, but my heart calls out what a delicious wife she would make me! were I younger, without reflection, without enquiry, were I younger, I would marry her! Then – when such precipitation might have been pardonable, some difficulty instantly followed the sight of whatever was attractive: one had not fortune enough for my expectations; another, had beauty to make me eternally jealous; another, though charming, was too old to be formed to my taste; another, though lovelier still, was too young to be judged. One was too wise, and might hold me cheap; another was too simple, and might expose me to seeing her held cheap herself. Then – I was so plaguely nice! Now, alas! I am so cursedly easy!'

'Your sylphs, elves, and imps, Sir, or, in other words, your humour and imagination, must seek some counterpoise, and not always, you see, be trusted uncontrouled.'

'You are right, my wise charmer! but we never arrive at judgment, the only counterpoise to our fancies, till we cease to want it! When we are young, in the midst of the world, and in pursuit of beauty, riches, honours, power, fame or knowledge, then, when judgment would either guide us to success, or demolish our senseless expectations, it keeps aloof from us like a stern stranger: and will only hail us as an intimate, when we have no longer any occasion for its services! Of what value is judgment to a goaty old codger, who sits just as snugly over his fire-side, whether his opinions are erroneous or oracular? who wraps himself just as warmly in flannel, whether the world go ill or go well? and who, if, by ignorance or mismanagement, he be cheated, loses only what he cannot enjoy! I first became aware of my folly, by the folly of my nephew. When he was sent forth into the world, my decided – alas! – heir, I told him my case; and urged him to a rational but quick choice, to obviate a similar punishment to fantastical difficulties. He listened, according to the usage of youth, to half what I said; and, adopting only my mistrust, was inattentive to its result; and thus so caricatured my researches, suspicious, and irresolutions, that he has rendered them and myself, even in my own eyes, completely ridiculous. 'Tis a most piteous circumstance that a man can be young only once in his life! Could I but, with my present experience, lop off thirty or forty years of my age, – ah! fair seducer! – how would the desire of giving you pleasure, the fear of causing you pain, the wish to see your face always beaming with smiles – '

Juliet arose to interrupt him; but whither could she go? She again sat down.

The Baronet also arose; and stood for some minutes, covering his eyes with one hand, in deep rumination. Re-seating himself, then, with an air of the most lively satisfaction, 'I have told you,' he cried, 'now, my history. You see in me a whimsical, but contrite old bachelor; whose entailed estate has lost to him his youth, by ungenerous mistrust: but who would gladly devote the large possessions which have fallen to him collaterally, to making the rest of his existence companionable. Shrink not, sweet flower! I mean nothing that can offend you. Tell me but who you are, and, be you whom you may, if you will accept an old protector; if you will deign to become his friend; to give him your conversation, your society, your lovely presence; he will despise the mocking world – and decorate himself for your bridegroom, by a marriage settlement of the whole of his unintailed estate.'

Astonished, and uncertain whether he were serious, Juliet was beginning a playful attack upon his fairy elves; but, stopping her with perturbed earnestness, 'Will you,' he cried, 'accept me? Your beauty, your difficulties, your distresses; your exquisite looks, and witching manners; with my solitude, my repugnance to mercenary watchers, my deep regrets, and my desire of domestic commerce; unite to devote me to you for ever; provided, only I can catch a grain, a single grain, of gentle good will! Give me, then, but this one satisfaction – I ask no more! tell me but whence it comes that, thus formed, thus accomplished, thus wise, thus lovely, – you are helpless, dependent, indigent, and a Wanderer?'

Juliet, though no longer able to doubt his meaning, and though not disposed to suspect his sincerity, felt nevertheless, shocked by such an investigation; though grateful, and even touched by his singular and romantic proposal. Delicacy, however, which keeps back acknowledged belief in unrequited partiality, as scrupulously as it is withheld by timid consciousness, where the partiality is returned; make her again have recourse to his visionary friends, in order to parry a serious reply; but, too much in earnest to submit to any delay, the Baronet, ejaculating, 'Paragon of the world!' was bending over the counter, in an attempt to take her hand; when the sudden opening of the shop-door, which he had himself carefully closed, previous to his declaration, made him draw back, in the utmost confusion; to recover his seat and his crutches, and again demand to look at some ribbons.

CHAPTER LXIX

Gabriella, who had thus long been detained from her business, because the lady, whose orders she had obeyed, had either forgotten that those orders had been issued, or deemed that to wait in an anti-room was the natural fate of an haberdasher; now, entering the shop, saw, with no little surprize, Juliet in close conference with an old bean, who was evidently disconcerted, and embarrassed by the interruption. Remitting, however, all enquiry, and gracefully declining a chair, which was respectfully offered to her by Sir Jaspar, who imagined her to be some customer; she silently employed herself in examining and arranging her unpinned, unrolled, and tumbled ribbons.

The surprize of the Baronet, now, became greater than her own. No plainness of attire could hide, from his scrutinizing eye, a certain native taste with which her habiliments, however simple, were put on; nor could even the band-box which she held in her hand, and which he had supposed to be there from some accident, disguise the elegance of her motions, or conceal her lofty mien. When, therefore, he discovered that she was at home, and that she was an haberdasher, he looked from one lovely companion to the other, with reverential wonder, and uplifted hands. Long profoundly impressed by the beauty of Juliet, by her merit, her youth, her modest yet dignified demeanour, in the midst of all the difficulties of distressed poverty; he was now as powerfully affected by the appearance of Gabriella; whose noble, yet never haughty manners, joined to a tragic expression of constant woe in her countenance, rendered her if not as attractive, at least as interesting as her friend.

A general pause ensued, till Gabriella, fearing that she was obtrusive, retired to the inner room.

Sir Jaspar, wide opening his eyes, and again leaning forward, to hear more distinctly, exclaimed, 'Who is that fine creature? What a majestic port! Yet how sweet a look! She awes while she invites! Who is she?'

Juliet felt enchanted; she even felt exalted by a testimony so impartial and so honourable, to the merit of her friend, and she eagerly answered, 'Your admiration, Sir, does honour to your discernment. Her excellencies, her high qualities, and spotless conduct, might make the proudest Englishman exult to own her for his country-woman; though the lowest Frenchman would dispute, even at the risk of his life, the honour of her birth. Sprung from one of the first houses of Europe, a house not more ancient in its origin, than renowned for its virtues; allies to a family the most illustrious, whose military glory has raised it to the highest ranks in the state; herself an ornament to that birth, an honour to that alliance; she sustains a reverse of fortune, which reduces her from every indulgence to every privation, with a calm courage that keeps her always mistress of herself, and enables her to combat evil by labour, misery by industry! And which never has failed her, but in a personal, bosom affliction, that would equally have shaken her fortitude, in the brightest splendour of prosperity! – '

'Hold! hold, you little torment!' interrupted Sir Jaspar. 'You don't consider what an artillery my wanton sprites are bringing upon me! My poor gouty fingers are so mumbled and pinched, and tweaked, to hurry me to get at my purse, that I cannot catch hold of it for very tremour! – '

'Oh no, Sir Jaspar, no! What she earns, however hardly and however humbly, she thankfully reaps; but she could only submit to accept alms, if bowed down by age, by malady, or by incapacity for work. Yet this spirit is not pride; 'tis but a strong and refined sense of propriety; since from a friend, in the tender persuasion, that participation of fortune ought to be leagued with participation of sentiment, she would candidly receive whatever would not injure that friend to bestow.'

'Divinest of little mortals!' cried Sir Jaspar. 'What whimsey is it, what astonishing whimsey of "the sisters three", that can have nailed to a counter two such delectable beings, to weigh pins and needles, and measure tapes and bobbins? And how, – beautiful witch! with charms, graces, accomplishments, talents such as yours, how is it you submit to such base drudgery in "durance vile," without even making a wry face? without a scowl upon your eye-brow, or a grumble from your throat?'

'Can you look, Sir, at her whom you call my partner, and think of me? She has lost her country; she wastes in exile; she sinks in obscurity; she has no communication with her friends; she knows not even whether they yet breathe the vital air! – nevertheless she works, she sustains herself by her industry and ingenuity; and repines only that she has not still another, has not her loved and lovely infant to sustain also! – and I, shall I complain? – Offspring of a race the most dignified, she toils manually, not to degrade it mentally; – and I, shall I blush to owe my subsistence to my exertions?'

Tears now flowed fast down her cheeks, while the crutches dropt from the feeble hands of the penetrated Baronet, whose eyes, dimmed by compassion, were fastened upon the face of the lovely mourner, when Gabriella re-appeared.

In deep amazement and concern, she hesitated whether she should come forward, to offer comfort; or whether, as she now concluded the old gentleman to be some intimate friend, she ought not again to retire; but Juliet entreated her to return to her place. She resumed, therefore, her business of restoring her ribbons to order; dejectedly announcing, that nothing had been bought; though every thing had been examined, deranged, and tossed about.

Sir Jaspar now, courteously waving his hand, smilingly addressed himself to Gabriella, saying, ''Tis my good Genius, Ma'am, make no doubt of it, that has run away with the feeling of those people you mention! For my good Genius, I must beg you to observe, has frequently taken lessons of the god Mercury, and is nearly as adroit in petty larceny as his godship himself. I should not, therefore, wonder, if, in his eagerness to serve me, he had pilfered from those poor souls, who have used you so ill, every grain he could pick up of decency! For, knowing that ribbons are a commodity of which I want a prodigious stock, he would not suffer your assortment to be diminished, till I had had the pleasure of making my bargains.'

He then selected the piece of ribbon which seemed the most considerable, and desired to have it measured.

Gabriella obeyed, not more amazed than Juliet felt amused.

But, when a similar order was given, for ascertaining the quantity of a second piece, and then a third; Juliet, though delighted at the pleased looks of Gabriella, and charmed with the generosity of the Baronet, began to apprehend, that she might herself be supposed to incur some debt of gratitude for this liberality. She retreated, therefore, with her needle-work, to the adjoining little room.

In a few minutes, she was followed by Gabriella; who, uneasily, asked what she must do with this magnificent old beau, who still while she measured one piece of ribbon, employed himself in selecting another; and who, though so gallant that he never spoke without a compliment, was so respectful, that it was not possible to check him by any serious reproof.

Juliet disclaimed taking any share in his present munificence; yet owned that she had an ancient obligation to him that she was unable, at this moment, to repay; and which, from the delicacy with which it had been conferred, and the seasonable relief which it had procured her, would merit her lasting gratitude. He was brother-in-law, she added, to the lady with whom she had lately resided; and he was as rich as he was benevolent.

Her scruples, then, Gabriella said, were at an end. Juliet, therefore, begged that she would endeavour to enter into conversation with him concerning Brighthelmstone; and try to obtain some particulars relative to the party at Mrs Ireton's.

'I began to fear you had flown away, Ma'am,' said Sir Jaspar, upon Gabriella's re-entrance into the shop; 'and I was much less surprised than concerned; for I had already surmized that you were an angel; though I had failed to remark your wings.'

He then put into her hand three more pieces of ribbon, which he had chosen during her absence.

Gabriella, who understood English well, though she spoke it imperfectly, made her answers in French.

Having now given her ample employment, he sat down to examine, or, rather, to admire at his ease, the lightness and grace with which she executed her office; saying, 'You are not, perhaps, aware, Madam, that there are certain little beings, nameless and invisible, yet active and penetrating, perpetually hovering around us, who have let me a little into your history; and have taken upon them to assure me that you were not precisely brought up to be a shop-keeper? How, then, is it that you have jumbled thus together such heterogeneous materials of existence? leaguing high birth with low life? superiour rank with vulgar employment; and grace, taste, and politeness with common drudgery? How, in short, born and bred to be dangled after by your vassals, and to lollop, the live-long-day, upon sofas and arm-chairs, have you acquired the necessary ingredients for being metamorphosed into a tidy little haberdasher?'

Gabriella, concluding that her situation had been made known to him by Juliet, answered, in a melancholy tone,

'Is this a period, Sir, to consider punctilio? Alas! whence I come, all that are greatest, most ancient, and most noble,¹ have learnt, that self-exertion can alone mark nobility of soul; and that self-dependence only can sustain honour in adversity. Alas, whence I come, the first youth is initiated in the view, if not in the endurance of misfortune! There can be no understanding, or there must be early reflection; there can be no heart, or there must be commiserating sympathy!'

'I protest, Ma'am,' cried Sir Jaspar, looking at her with astonishment, 'I begin to suspect that I came into the world only this morning! Where I may have been rambling, all these years, in the persuasion I was in it already, I have by no means any clear notion! But to see two such instances of wisdom and resignation, united with youth and beauty, makes me believe myself in some new region, never yet visited by vice or folly.'

'Ah, Sir, the French Revolution has opened our eyes to a species of equality more rational, because more feasible, than that of lands or of rank; an equality not alone of mental sufferings, but of manual exertions. No state of life, however low, or however hard, has been left untried, either by the highest, or by the most delicate, in the various dispersions and desolation of the ancient French nobility. And to see, – as I, alas! have seen, – the willing efforts, the even glad toil, of the remnants of the first families of Europe, to procure, – not luxuries, not elegancies, not even comforts, – but maintenance! mean, laborious maintenance! – to preserve, – not state, not fortune, not rank, – but life itself! but simple existence!' —

'Very wonderful personage!' cried Sir Jaspar, his air mingling reverence with amazement; 'and what, – unfold to me, I beg, what is the necromancy through which you support, under such toils, your intellectual dignity? and strangle, in its birth, every struggle of false shame?'

'Alas, Sir, I have seen guilt! – Since then, I have thought that shame belonged to nothing else!'

The eyes of Sir Jaspar were now suffused with tender admiration. 'Fair deity of the counter!' he cried, 'you are sublime! And she, too, – your witching little handmaid; by what kind, dulcet chance, – new in the annals of misfortune, – have two such wonders met? – '

'Ah, rather, Sir, – since you couple us so kindly, – rather ask by what adverse chance we have so long been separated?'

'You have known her, then, some time?'

'We were brought up together! – the same convent, the same governess, the same instructors, were common to both till my marriage. And now, again, – as before that period, – I have not the most distant idea of any possible happiness, that is not annexed to her presence.'

Touched to hear the word happiness once again, even though with such sadness, pronounced by Gabriella; yet alarmed at a discourse that might lead, inadvertently, to some secret history, Juliet was returning, to stop any further detail; when, upon Sir Jaspar's answering, 'Sweet couple! Lord Denmeath, who ought at least, if I understand right, – to take care of one of you will surely make it his business that you should coo together in the same cage?' – she again retreated, anxious to learn what this meant, and hoping that he would become more explicit.

'Lord Denmeath?' repeated Gabriella, 'If you know Lord Denmeath you may be better informed upon this subject than I am myself. Was it at Brighthelmstone that you met with his lordship?'

'It was at Brighthelmstone that I heard of him; and heard that, though wary of speech, he has been incautious in manner, and left little doubt upon the minds of his observers, that this fair flower springs from the same stock as some part of his own family; though she may be one of those sweet, but hapless buds, whose innocence pays for the guilt of its planter. – '

'No, Sir, no!' Gabriella precipitately interrupted him; 'the birth of my friend is unstained, though unequal; the marriage of her parents was legal, though secret. Her mother came not, indeed, from an ancient race; but she was a pattern of virtue, as well as a model of beauty. Could it, indeed, be believed, that a young nobleman of such expectations, in every way, as those of the Earl of Melbury's only son, Lord Granville, would have given his hand to the orphan and destitute daughter of an insolvent man of business, had she not possessed every advantage, nay, every perfection to which human nature can rise?'

Affrighted by this so open relation, drawn forth involuntarily from the nobly ingenuous Gabriella, in the persuasion that Sir Jaspar was already a confidential, and might become a useful friend; Juliet, in the first moment, was advancing to stop it; but her heart, yet more than her ear, was so fascinated by the generous eulogy of her virtuous, though lowly mother, from the offspring of a house whose height, and natal prejudices, might have palliated, upon this subject, the language even of disdain; that she could not prevail with herself to break into what she considered as sacred praise.

''Tis even so, then!' cried Sir Jaspar, with smiling delight; 'this forlorn, but most beautiful Wanderer, – this so long concealed, and mysterious, but most lovely incognita, is the daughter of the late Lord Granville, and the grand-daughter of the late Earl of Melbury!'

Utterly confounded, to hear the secret history of her birth and family thus casually, yet irretrievably discovered, Juliet, trembling, again shrunk back; yet would not, now, and unavailingly, check the ardent zeal of her high-minded friend, since without any added danger, it might procure some useful intelligence.

The willing Baronet, whose sole desire was to keep up the conversation, wanted no urging to relate all that he had gathered from the loquacious Selina. Lord Denmeath, upon the sudden disappearance of Miss Ellis, had been surprised into confessing, that he had a faint notion that he knew something of that young person; that there had been, once, an odd story, – a report – that a young woman was existing in France, who was some way belonging to the late Lord Granville, his sister's husband; though without ever having been acknowledged by the family. He let fall, also, sundry obscure hints of information, of the most serious import, which he had recently received, relating to this young woman; but which he would not divulge, till he had investigated; as he began to surmise, that it had been conveyed to him for some fraudulent and mercenary purpose. Mrs Ireton, to all this, had answered, that she had suspected, from the beginning, that the creature was an adventurer; and that she was now fully convinced that they had been played upon by a supposititious person. Lord Denmeath, though he forbore confirming this assertion, listened to it with a smile of concurrence.

Juliet here felt shocked and confounded; but Gabriella, animated by generous resentment, warmly repeated her asseverations, of the validity of the marriage of Lord Granville with Miss Powel, her friend's mother; though an excess of fear of the inflexible character of the old Earl Melbury had prevented its early avowal; and the death of the concealed wife, while Juliet was yet in arms, had afterwards decided the young widower to guard the secret, till his child should be grown up; or till he should become his own master.

'But where, during this interval,' said Sir Jaspar, 'where, – and what was the hiding-place of that seraphic offspring?'

Till her seventh year, Gabriella answered, she had been consigned to the care of Mrs Powel, her maternal grandmother; who, satisfied of the legality, had herself aided the secresy of the marriage. They had dwelt, during that period, in the same picturesque, but no longer loved retreat, upon the banks of the Tyne, in which Lady Granville, under a feigned name, had been concealed, for the short space of time between her marriage and her death.

Juliet, whose intention had been to gather, not to bestow intelligence, now came forward, and made signs to Gabriella to drop the subject. But this was no longer practicable. Urged by the idea of doing honour to her friend, and incited by adroit interrogatories, or piquant observations, from Sir Jaspar, Gabriella, having insensibly begun the tale, felt irresistibly impelled to make clear the birth and family of Juliet, beyond all doubt or cavil. She continued, therefore, the narration; and Juliet, much agitated, retreated wholly to the inner room.

Under pretence of change of air for his health, Lord Granville, to hide his grief from his father and friends, spent the first year of his widowhood at Montpellier; then the residence of the Bishop of – , the maternal uncle of Gabriella; with whom he formed a friendship that neither time nor absence, not even death itself, had had power to dissolve; and to whom he confided the history and punishment of his clandestine juvenile engagement. Called home, the following year, by the Earl, his father, he had been prevailed upon to marry a lady of quality and large fortune. But, previous to these new nuptials, to secure justice to his eldest born, though he had not the courage to own her; as well as to tranquillize Mrs Powel; he deposited in the hands of that worthy old lady, the certificate of his first marriage; to which he added a deed, that he called the codicil to whatever will he might have made, or might hereafter make; and in which he declared Juliet Granville, born near – , in Yorkshire, to be his lawful daughter, by his first marriage, with Juliet Powel, in Flanders; and, as such, he bequeathed to her the same portion, at his death, that should be settled upon any other daughter, or daughters, that he might have, hereafter, by any subsequent marriage.

The impossibility of obtaining, in the Yorkshire retirement, such means of improvement, as were suitable to the future expectations and lot in life of his little girl, determined Lord Granville to have her conveyed to France for her education. Mrs Powel, who had no other remaining tie upon earth, but a son who was settled in the East Indies, preferred accompanying her little darling to a separation; the fear of which, with the possession of the marriage certificate, and the codicil to the will, had always counteracted her impatience for the discovery ultimately promised. The uncle of Gabriella, the Bishop, consented to take the child under his immediate care; and to place her in the convent in which his sister, the Marchioness of – , had placed his niece. And here the children had been brought up together, with the same opportunities of improvement; except that the little Juliet had the advantage of speaking English with her grandmother; who knew no other language; and who entered the convent as a pensioner. By this means, and by books, Juliet had perfectly retained her native tongue, though she had acquired something of a foreign accent. She was known only as a young English lady of fortune, for whom no expence was to be spared; and the remittances for her board and education were constant, and even splendid. She had been called simply by the name of Mademoiselle Juliette, which had generally been supposed to be the name of her family. Here, from the facility with which she caught instruction, and the ability with which she appropriated its result, she became the most accomplished pupil of the convent and was not more generally, from her appearance, called la belle, than from her acquirements and conduct la sage petite Anglaise. And here, still more united by the same sentiments than by the same studies, Gabriella had formed with her the tender, confiding and unalterable friendship, that had bound them to each other with an even sisterly love.

The Bishop frequently pressed the young lord to avow the birth of Juliet, and to legitimate her claims upon his family: but he always answered, that since she, whose reputation, happiness, and spirits might have paid the avowal, was gone, he could not support the fruitless pain of offending his sickly, but imperious father, by such a discovery, till the necessity of receiving his daughter should make it indispensable.

Previous to this period, Gabriella was taken from the convent, to prepare for her marriage with the Comte de – ; and Juliet, who had then lost her tender grandmother, was invited to the wedding-ceremony, and to remain with her friend till she should be called to her own country. Lord Granville, with that spirit of procrastination which always grows with indulgence, joyfully acceded to this invitation; and remitted to the ensuing summer the public acknowledgment of his daughter. But, ere the ensuing summer arrived, all these projects were rendered abortive! The Bishop, through a news-paper, received the fatal intelligence, that Lord Granville had been killed by a fall from his horse.

While the deeply disappointed and afflicted Juliet was the prey of heavy grief at this event, the Bishop, to whom the grandmother, in dying, had consigned the marriage-certificate, the codicil, and every letter or paper that authenticated the legitimacy of her grandchild, constituted himself guardian and protector of the young orphan.

Convinced that no time should be lost in making known her rights, yet unwilling to risk shocking the old peer by an abrupt address, he stated the affair to Lord Denmeath, brother to Lord Granville's second lady, and guardian of two children by the second marriage. To this communication he received no answer. But, upon writing again, with more energy, and hinting at sending over an agent, Lord Denmeath thought proper to reply. His style was extremely cold. His brother-in-law, he said, had expired, after his fall, without uttering a word. Having, therefore, no knowledge of any secret business, he begged to be excused from entering into a discussion of the obscure affair to which the Bishop seemed to allude.