Lucile Part 16

The great laws of life readjust their infraction, And to every emotion appoint a reaction.

III.

Alfred Vargrave had time, after leaving Lucile, To review the rash step he had taken, and feel What the world would have call'd "his erroneous position."

Thought obtruded its claim, and enforced recognition: Like a creditor who, when the gloss is worn out On the coat which we once wore with pleasure, no doubt, Sends us in his account for the garment we bought.

Ev'ry spendthrift to pa.s.sion is debtor to thought.

IV.

He felt ill at ease with himself. He could feel Little doubt what the answer would be from Lucile.

Her eyes, when they parted--her voice, when they met, Still enraptured his heart, which they haunted. And yet, Though, exulting, he deem'd himself loved, where he loved, Through his mind a vague self-accusation there moved.

O'er his fancy, when fancy was fairest, would rise The infantine face of Matilda, with eyes So sad, so reproachful, so cruelly kind, That his heart fail'd within him. In vain did he find A thousand just reasons for what he had done; The vision that troubled him would not be gone.

In vain did he say to himself, and with truth, "Matilda has beauty, and fortune, and youth; And her heart is too young to have deeply involved All its hopes in the tie which must now be dissolved.

'Twere a false sense of honor in me to suppress The sad truth which I owe it to her to confess.

And what reason have I to presume this poor life Of my own, with its languid and frivolous strife, And without what alone might endear it to her, Were a boon all so precious, indeed, to confer, Its withdrawal can wrong her?

It is not as though I were bound to some poor village maiden, I know, Unto whose simple heart mine were all upon earth, Or to whose simple fortunes mine own could give worth.

Matilda, in all the world's gifts, will not miss Aught that I could procure her. 'Tis best as it is!"

V.

In vain did he say to himself, "When I came To this fatal spot, I had nothing to blame Or reproach myself for, in the thoughts of my heart.

I could not foresee that its pulses would start Into such strange emotion on seeing once more A woman I left with indifference before.

I believed, and with honest conviction believed, In my love for Matilda. I never conceived That another could shake it. I deem'd I had done With the wild heart of youth, and looked hopefully on To the soberer manhood, the worthier life, Which I sought in the love that I vow'd to my wife.

Poor child! she shall learn the whole truth. She shall know What I knew not myself but a few days ago.

The world will console her--her pride will support-- Her youth will renew its emotions. In short, There is nothing in me that Matilda will miss When once we have parted. 'Tis best as it is!"

VI.

But in vain did he reason and argue. Alas!

He yet felt unconvinced that 'TWAS best as it was.

Out of reach of all reason, forever would rise That infantine face of Matilda, with eyes So sad, so reproachful, so cruelly kind, That they harrow'd his heart and distracted his mind.

VII.

And then, when he turned from these thoughts to Lucile, Though his heart rose enraptured he could not but feel A vague sense of awe of her nature. Behind All the beauty of heart, and the graces of mind, Which he saw and revered in her, something unknown And unseen in that nature still troubled his own.

He felt that Lucile penetrated and prized Whatever was n.o.blest and best, though disguised, In himself; but he did not feel sure that he knew, Or completely possess'd, what, half hidden from view, Remained lofty and lonely in HER.

Then, her life, So untamed and so free! would she yield as a wife Independence, long claimed as a woman? Her name So link'd by the world with that spurious fame Which the beauty and wit of a woman a.s.sert, In some measure, alas! to her own loss and hurt In the serious thoughts of a man!... This reflection O'er the love which he felt cast a shade of dejection, From which he forever escaped to the thought Doubt could reach not... "I love her, and all else is naught!"

VIII.

His hand trembled strangely in breaking the seal Of the letter which reach'd him at last from Lucile.

At the sight of the very first words that he read, That letter dropp'd down from his hand like the dead Leaf in autumn, that, falling, leaves naked and bare A desolate tree in a wide wintry air.

He pa.s.s'd his hand hurriedly over his eyes, Bewilder'd, incredulous. Angry surprise And dismay, in one sharp moan, broke from him. Anon He picked up the page, and read rapidly on.

IX.

THE COMTESSE DE NEVERS TO LORD ALFRED VARGRAVE:

"No, Alfred!

If over the present, when last We two met, rose the glamour and mist of the past, It hath now rolled away, and our two paths are plain, And those two paths divide us.

"That hand which again Mine one moment has clasp'd as the hand of a brother, That hand and your honor are pledged to another!

Forgive, Alfred Vargrave, forgive me, if yet For that moment (now past!) I have made you forget What was due to yourself and that other one. Yes, Mine the fault, and be mine the repentance. Not less, In now owning this fault, Alfred, let me own, too, I foresaw not the sorrow involved in it.

"True, That meeting, which hath been so fatal, I sought, I alone! But oh! deem not it was with the thought Of your heart to regain, or the past to rewaken.

No! believe me, it was with the firm and unshaken Conviction, at least, that our meeting would be Without peril to YOU, although haply to me The salvation of all my existence.

"I own, When the rumor first reach'd me, which lightly made known To the world your engagement, my heart and my mind Suffer'd torture intense. It was cruel to find That so much of the life of my life, half unknown To myself, had been silently settled on one Upon whom but to think it would soon be a crime.

Then I said to myself, 'From the thraldom which time Hath not weaken'd there rests but one hope of escape.

That image which Fancy seems ever to shape From the solitude left round the ruins of yore, Is a phantom. The Being I loved is no more.

What I hear in the silence, and see in the lone Void of life, is the young hero born of my own Perish'd youth: and his image, serene and sublime In my heart rests unconscious of change and of time, Could I see it but once more, as time and as change Have made it, a thing unfamiliar and strange, See, indeed, that the Being I loved in my youth Is no more, and what rests now is only, in truth, The hard pupil of life and the world: then, oh, then, I should wake from a dream, and my life be again Reconciled to the world; and, released from regret, Take the lot fate accords to my choice.'

"So we met.

But the danger I did not foresee has occurr'd: The danger, alas, to yourself! I have err'd.

But happy for both that this error hath been Discover'd as soon as the danger was seen!

We meet, Alfred Vargrave, no more. I, indeed, Shall be far from Luchon when this letter you read.

My course is decided; my path I discern: Doubt is over; my future is fix'd now.

"Return, O return to the young living love! Whence, alas!

If, one moment, you wander'd, think only it was More deeply to bury the past love.

"And, oh!

Believe, Alfred Vargrave, that I, where I go On my far distant pathway through life, shall rejoice To treasure in memory all that your voice Has avow'd to me, all in which others have clothed To my fancy with beauty and worth your betrothed!

In the fair morning light, in the orient dew Of that young life, now yours, can you fail to renew All the n.o.ble and pure aspirations, the truth, The freshness, the faith, of your own earnest youth?

Yes! YOU will be happy. I, too, in the bliss I foresee for you, I shall be happy. And this Proves me worthy your friends.h.i.+p. And so--let it prove That I cannot--I do not respond to your love.

Yes, indeed! be convinced that I could not (no, no, Never, never!) have render'd you happy. And so, Rest a.s.sured that, if false to the vows you have plighted, You would have endured, when the first brief, excited Emotion was o'er, not alone the remorse Of honor, but also (to render it worse) Disappointed affection.

"Yes, Alfred; you start?

But think! if the world was too much in your heart, And too little in mine, when we parted ten years Ere this last fatal meeting, that time (ay, and tears!) Have but deepen'd the old demarcations which then Placed our natures asunder; and we two again, As we then were, would still have been strangely at strife.

In that self-independence which is to my life Its necessity now, as it once was its pride, Had our course through the world been henceforth side by side, I should have revolted forever, and shock'd Your respect for the world's plausibilities, mock'd, Without meaning to do so, and outraged, all those Social creeds which you live by.

"Oh! do not suppose That I blame you. Perhaps it is you that are right.

Best, then, all as it is!

"Deem these words life's Good-night To the hope of a moment: no more! If there fell Any tear on this page, 'twas a friend's.

"So farewell To the past--and to you, Alfred Vargrave.

"LUCILE."

X.

So ended that letter.

The room seem'd to reel Round and round in the mist that was scorching his eyes With a fiery dew. Grief, resentment, surprise, Half chocked him; each word he had read, as it smote Down some hope, rose and grasped like a hand at his throat, To stifle and strangle him.