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CHAPTER XXIII

I have been reading over the record I have written of my life, which has been made with care and a strict adherence to the truth. I am at the present hour sitting alone in the house I have taken and furnished, and to which I hope shortly to bring my beloved Lauretta as my wife. The writing of this record from time to time has grown into a kind of habit with me, and there are occasions in which I have been greatly interested in it myself. Never until this night have I read the record from beginning to end, and I have come to a resolution to discontinue it. My reason is a sufficient one, and as it concerns no man else, no man can dispute my right to make it.

My resolution is, after to-morrow, to allow my new life, soon to commence, to flow on uninterruptedly without burdening myself with the labour of putting into writing the happy experiences awaiting me. I shall be no longer alone; Lauretta will be by my side; I should begrudge the hours which deprived me of her society.

Another thing. I must have no secrets from her; and much that here is recorded should properly be read by no eye than mine. Lauretta's nature is so gentle, her soul so pure, that it would distress her to read these pages. This shall not be. I recognise a certain morbid vein in myself which the continuing of this record might magnify into a disease. It presents itself to me in the light of guarding myself against myself, by adopting wise measures to foster cheerfulness. That my nature is more melancholy than cheerful is doubtless to be ascribed to the circumstances of my child-life, which was entirely devoid of light and gaiety. This must not be in the future; I have a battle to fight, and I shall conquer because Lauretta's happiness is on the issue.

It will, however, be as well to make the record complete in a certain sense, and I shall therefore take note of certain things which have occurred since my conversation with Pierre in his cell. That done, I shall put these papers aside in a secret place, and shall endeavour to forget them. My first thought was to destroy the record, but I was influenced in the contrary direction by the fact that my first meeting with Lauretta and the growth of my love for her are described in it. First impressions jotted down at the time of their occurrence have a freshness about them which can never be imparted by the aid of memory, and it may afford me pleasure in the future to live over again, through these pages, the sweet days of my early intimacy with my beloved girl. Then there is the strange story of Kristel and Silvain, which undoubtedly is worth preserving.

First, to get rid of the miserable affair of the attempt to rob Doctor Louis's house. Pierre was tried and convicted, and has paid the penalty of his crime. His belief in the possession of a soul could not, after all, have had in it the spirit of sincerity; it must have been vaunted merely in pursuance of his cunning endeavours to escape his just punishment; otherwise he would have confessed before he died. Father Daniel, the good priest, did all he could to bring the man to repentance, but to the last he insisted that he was innocent. It was strange to me to hear Father Daniel express himself sympathetically towards the criminal.

"He laboured, up to the supreme moment," said the good priest, in a compassionate tone, "under the singular hallucination that he was going before his Maker guiltless of the shedding of blood. So fervent and apparently sincere were his protestations that I could not help being shaken in my belief that he was guilty."

"Then you believe in demons?" I remarked, amazed at this weakness.

"Not in the sense," said Father Daniel, "that the unhappy man would have had me believe. Reason rejects his story as something altogether too incredulous; and yet I pity him."

I did not prolong the discussion with the good priest; it would have been useless, and, to Father Daniel, painful. We looked at the matter from widely different standpoints. Intolerance warps the judgment; no less does such a life as Father Daniel has lived, for ever seeking to find excuses for error and crime, for ever seeking to palliate a man's misdeeds. Sweetness of disposition, carried to extremes, may degenerate into positive mental feebleness; to my mind this is the case with Father Daniel. He is not the kind who, in serious matters, can be depended upon for a just estimate of human affairs.

Eric and Emilius, after a longer delay than Doctor Louis anticipated, have taken up their residence in Nerac. They paid two short visits to the village, and I was in hopes each time upon their departure that they had relinquished their intention of living in Nerac. I did not give expression to my wish, for I knew it was not shared by any member of Doctor Louis's family.

It is useless to disguise that I dislike them, and that there exists between us a certain antipathy. To be just, this appears to be more on my side than on theirs, and it is not in my disfavour that the feelings I entertain are nearer the surface. Doctor Louis and the ladies entertain a high opinion of them; I do not; and I have already some reason for looking upon them with a suspicious eye. This reason I will presently explain.

When we were first introduced it was natural that I should regard them with interest, an interest which sprang from the story of their father's fateful life. They bear a wonderful resemblance to each other they are both fair, with tawny beards, which it appears to me they take a pride in shaping and trimming alike; their eyes are blue, and they are of exactly the same height. Undoubtedly handsome men, having in that respect the advantage of me, who, in point of attractive looks, cannot compare with them. They seem to be devotedly attached to each other, but this may or may not be. So were Silvain and Kristel until a woman stepped between them and changed their love to hate. Before I came into personal relationship with Eric and Emilius I made up my mind to distrust appearances and to seek for evidence upon which to form an independent judgment. Some such evidence has already come to me, and I shall secretly follow it up.

They are on terms of the most affectionate intimacy with Doctor Louis and his family, and both Lauretta and Lauretta's mother take pleasure in their society; Doctor Louis, also, in a lesser degree. Women are always more effusive than men.

They are not aware of the relations which bind me to the village. That they may have some suspicion of my feelings for Lauretta is more than probable, for I have seen them look from her to me and then at each other, and I have interpreted these looks. It is as if they said, "Why is this stranger here? He is usurping our place." I have begged Doctor Louis to allow me to speak openly to Lauretta, and he has consented to shorten the period of silence to which I was pledged. I have his permission to declare my love to his daughter to-morrow. There are no doubts in my mind that she will accept me; but there are doubts that if I left it too late there would be danger that her love for me would be weakened. Yes, although it is torture to me to admit it I cannot rid myself of this impression. How would this be effected and by whom? By these brothers, Eric and Emilius, and by means of misrepresentations to my injury. I have no positive data to go upon, but I am convinced that they have an aversion towards me, and that they are in their hearts jealous of me. The doctor is blind to their true character; he believes them to be generous and noble-minded, men of rectitude and high principle. They are not so. I have the evidence of my senses in proof of it.

So much have I been disturbed and unhinged by my feelings towards these brothers-feelings which I have but imperfectly expressed-that latterly I have frequently been unable to sleep. Impossible to lie abed and toss about for hours in an agony of unrest; therefore I chose the lesser evil, and resumed the nocturnal wanderings which was my habit in Rosemullion before the death of my parents. These nightly rambles have been taken in secret, as in the days of my boyhood, and I mused and spoke aloud as was my custom during that period of my life. But I had new objects to occupy me now-the home in which I hoped to enjoy a heaven of happiness, with Lauretta its guiding star, and all the bright anticipations of the future. I strove to confine myself to these dreams, which filled my soul with joy, but there came to me always the figures of Eric and Emilius, dark shadows to threaten my promised happiness.

Last week it was, on a night in which I felt that sleep would not be mine if I sought my couch; therefore, earlier than usual-it was barely eleven o'clock-I left the house, and went into the woods. Martin Hartog and his fair daughter were in the habit of retiring early and rising with the sun, and I stole quietly away unobserved. At twelve o'clock I turned homewards, and when I was about a hundred yards from my house I was surprised to hear a low murmur of voices within a short distance of me. Since the night on which I visited the Three Black Crows and saw the two strangers there who had come to Nerac with evil intent, I had become very watchful, and now these voices speaking at such an untimely hour thoroughly aroused me. I stepped quietly in their direction, so quietly that I knew I could not be heard, and presently I saw standing at a distance of ten or twelve yards the figures of a man and a woman. The man was Emilius, the woman Martin Hartog's daughter.

Although I had heard their voices before I reached the spot upon which I stood when I recognised their forms, I could not even now determine what they said, they spoke in such low tones. So I stood still and watched them and kept myself from their sight. I may say honestly that I should not have been guilty of the meanness had it not been that I entertain an unconquerable aversion against Eric and Emilius. I was sorry to see Martin Hartog's daughter holding a secret interview with a man at midnight, for the girl had inspired me with a respect of which I now knew she was unworthy; but I cannot aver that I was sorry to see Emilius in such a position, for it was an index to his character and a justification of the unfavourable opinion I had formed of him and Eric. Alike as they were in physical presentment, I had no doubt that their moral natures bore the same kind of resemblance. Libertines both of them, ready for any low intrigue, and holding in light regard a woman's good name and fame. Truly the picture before me showed clearly the stuff of which these brothers are made. If they hold one woman's good name so lightly, they hold all women so. Fit associates, indeed, for a family so pure and stainless as Doctor Louis's!

This was no chance meeting-how was that possible at such an hour? It was premeditated. Theirs was no new acquaintanceship; it must have lasted already some time. The very secrecy of the interview was in itself a condemnation.

Should I make Doctor Louis acquainted with the true character of the brothers who held so high a place in his esteem? This was the question that occurred to me as I gazed upon Emilius and Martin Hartog's daughter, and I soon answered it in the negative. Doctor Louis was a man of settled convictions, hard to convince, hard to turn. His first impulse, upon which he would act, would be to go straight to Emilius, and enlighten him upon the discovery I had made. And then? Why, then, Emilius would invent some tale which it would not be hard to believe, and make light of a matter I deemed so serious. I should be placed in the position of an eavesdropper, as a man setting sly watches upon others to whom, from causeless grounds, I had taken a dislike. I should be at a disadvantage. Whatever the result one thing was certain-that I was a person capable not only of unreasonable antipathies but of small meannesses to which a gentleman would not descend. The love which Doctor Louis bore to Silvain, and which he had transferred to Silvain's children, was not to be easily turned; and at the best I should be introducing doubts into his mind which would reflect upon myself because of the part of spy I had played. No; I decided for the present at least, to keep the knowledge to myself.

As to Martin Hartog, though I could not help feeling pity for him, it was for him, not me, to look after his daughter. From a general point of view these affairs were common enough.

I seemed to see now in a clearer light the kind of man Silvain was-one who would set himself deliberately to deceive where most he was trusted. Honour, fair dealing, brotherly love, were as nought in his eyes where a woman was concerned, and he had transmitted these qualities to Eric and Emilius. My sympathy for Kristel was deepened by what I was gazing on; more than ever was I convinced of the justice of the revenge he took upon the brother who had betrayed him.

These were the thoughts which passed through my mind while Emilius and Martin Hartog's daughter stood conversing. Presently they strolled towards me, and I shrank back in fear of being discovered. This involuntary action on my part, being an accentuation of the meanness of which I was guilty, confirmed me in the resolution at which I had arrived to say nothing of my discovery to Doctor Louis.

They passed me in silence, walking in the direction of my house. I did not follow them, and did not return home for another hour.

CHAPTER XXIV

How shall I describe the occurrences of this day, the most memorable and eventful in my life? A new life is opening for me. I am overwhelmed at the happiness which is within my grasp. As I walked home from Doctor Louis's house through the darkness a spirit walked by my side, illumining the gloom and filling my heart with gladness.

At one o'clock I presented myself at Doctor Louis's house. He met me at the door, expecting me, and asked me to come with him to a little room he uses as a study. I followed him in silence. His face was grave, and but for its kindly expression I should have feared it was his intention to revoke the permission he had given me to speak to his daughter on this day of the deep, the inextinguishable love I bear for her. He motioned me to a chair, and I seated myself and waited for him to speak.

"This hour," he said, "is to me most solemn."

"And to me, sir," I responded.

"It should be," he said, "to you perhaps, more than to me; but we are inclined ever to take the selfish view. I have been awake very nearly the whole of the night, and so has my wife. Our conversation-well, you can guess the object of it."

"Lauretta, sir."

"Yes, Lauretta, our only child, whom you are about to take from us." I trembled with joy, his words betokening a certainty that Lauretta loved me, an assurance I had yet to receive from her own sweet lips. "My wife and I," he continued, "have been living over again the life of our dear one, and the perfect happiness we have drawn from her. I am not ashamed to say that we have committed some weaknesses during these last few hours, weaknesses springing from our affection for our Home Rose. In the future some such experience may be yours, and then you will know-which now is hidden from you-what parents feel who are asked to give their one ewe lamb into the care of a stranger." I started. "There is no reason for alarm, Gabriel," he said, "because I have used a true word. Until a few short months ago you were really a stranger to us."

"That has not been against me, sir," I said, "and is not, I trust."

"There is no such thought in my mind, Gabriel. There is nothing against you except-except," he repeated, with a little pitiful smile, "that you are about to take from us our most precious possession. Until to-day our dear child was wholly and solely ours; and not only herself, but her past was ours, her past, which has been to us a garden of joy. Henceforth her heart will be divided, and you will have the larger share. That is a great deal to think of, and we have thought of it, my wife and I, and talked of it nearly all the night. Certain treasures," he said, and again the pitiful smile came on his lips, "which in the eyes of other men and women are valueless, still are ours." He opened a drawer, and gazed with loving eyes upon its contents. "Such as a little pair of shoes, a flower or two, a lock of her bright hair."

"May I see it, sir?" I asked, profoundly touched by the loving accents of his voice.

"Surely," he replied, and he passed over to me a lock of golden hair, which I pressed to my lips. "The little head was once covered with these golden curls, and to us, her parents, they were as holy as they would have been on the head of an angel. She was all that to us, Gabriel. It is within the scope of human love to lift one's thoughts to heaven and God; it is within its scope to make one truly fit for the life to come. All things are not of the world worldly; it is a grievous error to think so, and only sceptics can so believe. In the kiss of baby lips, in the touch of little hands, in the myriad sweet ways of childhood, lie the breath of a pure religion which God receives because of its power to sanctify the lowest as well as the highest of human lives. It is good to think of that, and to feel that, in the holiest forms of humanity, the poor stand as high as the rich." He paused a while before he continued. "Gabriel, it is an idle phrase for a father holding the position towards you which I do at the present moment, to say he has no fears for the happiness of his only child."

"If you have any, sir," I said, "question me, and let me endeavour to set your mind at ease. In one respect I can do so with solemn earnestness. If it be my happy lot to win your daughter, her welfare, her honour, her peace of mind, shall be the care of my life. These assured, happiness should follow. I love Lauretta with a pure heart; no other woman has ever possessed my love; to no other woman have I been drawn; nor is it possible that I could be. She is to me part of my spiritual life. I am not as other men, in the ordinary acceptation. In my childhood's life there was but little joy, and the common pleasures of childhood were not mine. From almost my earliest remembrances there was but little light in my parents' house, and in looking back upon it I can scarcely call it a home. The fault was not mine, as you will admit. May I claim some small merit-not of my own purposed earning, but because it was in me, for which I may have reason to be grateful-from the fact that the circumstances of my early life did not corrupt me, did not drive me to a searching for low pleasures, and did not debase me? It seemed to me, sir, that I was ever seeking for something in the heights and not in the depths. Books and study were my comforters, and I derived real pleasures from them. They served to satisfy a want, and, although I contracted a melancholy mood, I was not unhappy. I know that this mood is in me, but when I think of Lauretta it is dispelled. I seem to hear the singing of birds, to see flowers around me, to bathe in sunshine. Perhaps it springs from the fervour of my love for her; but a kind of belief is mine that I have been drawn hither to her, that my way of life was measured to her heart. What more can I say, sir?"

"You have said much," said Doctor Louis, "to comfort and assure me, and have, without being asked, answered questions which were in my mind. Do you remember a conversation you had with my wife in the first days of your convalescence, commenced I think by you in saying that the happiest dream of your life was drawing to a close?"

"I was thinking of Lauretta. Even in those early days I felt that I loved her."

"I understand that now," said Doctor Louis. "My wife replied that life must not be dreamt away, that it has duties."

"I remember the conversation well, sir."

"My wife said that one's ease and pleasures are rewards, only enjoyable when they have been worthily earned; and when you asked, 'Earned in what way?' she answered, 'In accomplishing one's work in the world.'"

"Yes, sir, her words come back to me."

"There is something more," said Doctor Louis, with sad sweetness, "which I should not recall did I not hold duty before me as my chief beacon. Inclination and selfish desire must often be sacrificed for it. You will understand how sadly significant this is to me when I recall what followed. Though, to be sure," he added, in a slightly gayer tone, "we could visit you and our daughter, wherever your abode happened to be. Continuing your conversation with my wife, you said, 'How to discover what one's work really is, and where it should be properly performed?' My wife answered, 'In one's native land.'"

"Those were the words we spoke to one another, sir."

"It was my wife who recalled them to me, and I wish you-in the event of your hopes being realised-to bear them in mind. It would be painful to me to see you lead an idle life, and it would be injurious to you. This quiet village opens out no opportunities to you; it is too narrow, too confined. I have found my place here as an active worker, but I doubt if you would do so."

"There is time to think of it, sir."

"Plenty of time. And now, if you like, we will join my wife and daughter."

"Have you said anything to Lauretta, sir?"

"No. I thought it best, and so did her mother, that her heart should be left to speak for itself."

Lauretta's mother received me with tender, wistful solicitude, and I observed nothing in Lauretta to denote that she had been prepared for the declaration I had come to make. After lunch I proposed to Lauretta to go out into the garden, and she turned to her mother and asked if she would accompany us.

"No, my child," said the mother, "I have things in the house to attend to."

So Lauretta and I went out alone.

It was a lovely day, and Lauretta had thrown a light lace scarf over her head. She was in gay spirits, not boisterous, for she is ever gentle, and she endeavoured to entertain me with innocent prattle, to which I found it difficult to respond. In a little while this forced itself upon her observation, and she asked me if I was not well.

"I am quite well, Lauretta," I replied.

"Then something has annoyed you," she said.

No, I answered, nothing had annoyed me.

"But there is something," she said.

"Yes," I said, "there is something."

"Tell me," she said.

We were standing by a rosebush, and I plucked one absently, and absently plucked the leaves. She looked at me in silence for a moment or two and said, "This is the first time I have ever seen you destroy a flower."

"I was not thinking of it," I said; and was about to throw it away when an impulse, born purely of love for what was graceful and sweet, restrained me, and I put it into my pocket. In this the most impressive epoch in my life no sentiment but that of tenderness could hold a place in my heart and mind.

"Well?" she said, still not suspecting. "Tell me."

"Lauretta," I said, taking her hand, which she left willingly in mine, "will you listen to the story of my life?"

"You have already told me much," she said.

"You have heard only a part," I said, and I gently urged her to a seat. "I wish you to know all; I wish you to know me as I really am."

"I know you as you really are," she said, and then a faint colour came to her cheeks, and she trembled slightly, seeing a new meaning in my earnest glances.

"May I tell you? May I sit beside you?"

"Yes," she said, and gently withdrew her hand from mine.

I told her all, withholding only from her those mysterious promptings of my lonely hours which I knew would distress her, and to which I was convinced, with her as my companion through life, there would be for ever an end. Of even those promptings I gave her some insight, but so toned down-for her sweet sake, not for mine-as to excite only her sympathy. Apart from this, I was at sincere pains that she should see my life as it had really been, a life stripped of the joys of childhood; a life stripped of the light of home; a life dependent upon itself for comfort and support. Then, unconsciously, and out of the suffering of my soul-for as I spoke it seemed to me that a cruel wrong had been perpetrated upon me in the past-I contrasted the young life I had been condemned to live with that of a child who was blessed with parents whose hearts were animated by a love the evidences of which would endure all through his after life as a sweet and purifying influence. The tears ran down her cheeks as I dwelt upon this part of my story. Then I spoke of the happy chance which had conducted me to her home, and of the happiness I had experienced in my association with her and hers.

"Whatever fate may be mine," I said, "I shall never reflect upon these experiences, I shall never think of your dear parents, without gratitude and affection. Lauretta, it is with their permission I am here now by your side. It is with their permission that I am opening my heart to you. They know we are here together. I love you, Lauretta, and if you will bless me with your love, and place your hand in mine, all my life shall be devoted to your happiness. You can bring a blessing into my days; I will strive to bring a blessing into yours."

My arm stole round her waist; her head drooped to my shoulder, so that her face was hidden from my ardent gaze; the hand I clasped was not withdrawn.

"Lauretta," I whispered, "say 'I love you, Gabriel.'"

"I love you, Gabriel," she whispered; and heaven itself opened out to me.

Half an hour later we went in to her mother, and the noble woman held out her arms to her daughter. As the maiden nestled to her breast, she said, holding out a hand to me, which I reverently kissed, "God in His mercy keep guard over you! His blessing be upon you both!"