Self control Part 15

'Joyfully will I forgive,' replied Laura, 'when I am a.s.sured that they are indeed abhorred and forsaken'--'They are already forsaken,' said Montreville; 'it rests with you to confirm Hargrave in the right, by consenting to his wishes.'

'I ask but the conviction which time alone can bring,' said Laura, 'and then'--

'And how will you bear it, Laura, if, weary of your perverse delays, Hargrave should relinquish his suit? How would you bear to see the affections you have trifled with transferred to another?'

'Better, far better,' answered Laura, 'than to watch the deepening of those shades of iniquity, that close at last into outer darkness: better than to see each guilty day advance and seal our eternal separation. To lose his affection,' continued she with a sickly smile, 'I would bear as I strive to bear my other burdens; and should they at last prove too heavy for me, they can but weigh me to the earth, where they and I must soon rest together.'

'Talk not so, beloved child,' said Montreville, 'a long life is before you. All the joys that ambition, all the joys that love can offer, are within your power. A father invites, implores, I will not say commands, you to accept them. The man of your choice, to whom the proudest might aspire, whom the coldest of your s.e.x might love, entreats you to confirm him in the ways of virtue. Consent then to this union, on which my heart is set, while yet it can be hallowed by the blessing of your dying father.'

'Oh take pity on me,' Laura would have said, and 'league not with my weak heart to betray me,' but convulsive sobs were all that she could utter. 'You consent then,' said Montreville, choosing so to interpret her silence--'you have yielded to my entreaties, and made me the happiest of fathers.' 'No! no!' cried Laura, tossing her arms distractedly, 'I will do right though my heart should break. No, my father, my dear honoured father, for whom I would lay down my life, not even your entreaties shall prevail.'

'Ungrateful child,' said Montreville; 'what could you have pleaded for, that your father would have refused--your father whom anxiety for your welfare has brought to the gates of the grave, whose last feeling shall be love to you, whose last words shall bless you.'

'Oh most merciful, most gracious,' cried Laura, clasping her hands, and raising her eyes in resigned anguish, 'wilt thou suffer me to be tempted above what I am able to bear! Oh my dear father, if you have pity for misery unutterable, misery that cannot know relief, spare me now, and suffer me to think--if to think be yet possible.'

'Hear me but for one moment more,' said Montreville, who from the violence of her emotion gathered hopes of success. 'Oh no! no!' cried Laura, 'I must leave you while yet I have the power to do right.' And, darting from his presence, she shut herself into her chamber. There, falling on her knees, she mingled bitter expressions of anguish, with fervent prayers for support, and piteous appeals for mercy.

Becoming by degrees more composed, she endeavoured to fortify her resolution by every argument of reason and religion which had formerly guided her determination. She turned to the pa.s.sages of Scripture which forbid the unequal yoke with the unbeliever; convinced that the prohibition applies no less to those whose lives are unchristian, than to those whose faith is unsound. She asked herself whether she was able to support those trials (the severest of all earthly ones,) which the wife of a libertine must undergo; and whether, in temptations which she voluntarily sought, and sorrows which she of choice encountered, she should be ent.i.tled to expect the divine support. 'Holy Father,' she cried, 'what peace can enter where thy blessing is withheld! and shall I dare to mock thee with a pet.i.tion for that blessing on a union which thou has forbidden! May I not rather fear that this deliberate premeditated guilt may be the first step in a race of iniquity! May I not dread to share in the awful sentence of those who are joined to their idols, and be "let alone" to wander in the way that leadeth to destruction?'

Yet, as oft as her father's entreaties rose to her recollection, joined with the image of Hargrave--of Hargrave beseeching, of Hargrave impa.s.sioned--Laura's resolution faltered; and half-desirous to deceive herself, she almost doubted of the virtue of that firmness that could withstand a parent's wish. But Laura was habitually suspicious of every opinion that favoured her inclinations, habitually aware of the deceitfulness of her own heart; and she did not, unquestioned, harbour for a moment the insidious thought that flattered her strongest wishes.

'And had my father commended me to marry where I was averse,' said she, 'would I then have hesitated? Would my father's command have prevailed on me then to undertake duties which I was unlikely to perform? No: there I would have resisted. There, authority greater than a father's would have empowered me to resist; and I know that I should have resisted even unto death. And shall mere inclination give more firmness than a sense of duty! Yet, Oh dear father, think me not unmindful of all your love--or forgetful of a debt that began with my being. For your sake cold and hunger shall be light to me--for you poverty and toil shall be pleasing. But what solitary sorrow could equal the pang with which I should blush before my children for the vices of their father!

What is the wasting of famine to the mortal anguish of watching the declining love, the transferred desires, the growing depravity of my husband!'

In thoughts and struggles like these, Laura pa.s.sed the day alone.

Montreville, though disappointed at his ill success with his daughter, was not without hope that a lover's prayers might prevail where a father's were ineffectual; and believing that the season of Laura's emotion was a favourable one for the attempt, he was anxious for the daily visit of Hargrave.

But, for the first time since his meeting with Laura, Hargrave did not appear. In her present frame, Laura felt his absence almost a relief; but Montreville was uneasy and half alarmed. It was late in the evening when a violent knocking at the house door startled Montreville, who was alone in his apartment; and the next minute, without being announced, Hargrave burst into the room. His hair was dishevelled, his dress neglected, and his eyes had a wildness which Montreville had never before seen in them. Abruptly grasping Montreville's hand, he said, in a voice of one struggling for composure, 'Have you performed your promise--have you spoken with Laura?'

'I have,' answered Montreville; 'and have urged her, till, had you seen her, you would yourself have owned that I went too far. But you look'--

'Has she consented,' interrupted Hargrave--'will she give herself to me?'

Montreville shook his head. 'Her affections are wholly yours,' said he, 'you may yourself be more successful--I fervently wish that you may. But why this strange emotion? What has happened?'

'Nothing, nothing,' said Hargrave, 'ask me no questions; but let me speak instantly with Laura.'

'You shall see her,' returned Montreville, opening the door, and calling Laura, 'Only I beseech you to command yourself, for my poor child is already half distracted.' 'She is the fitter to converse with me,' said Hargrave, with a ghastly smile, 'for I am upon the very verge of madness.'

Laura came at her father's summons; but when she saw Hargrave, the colour faded from her face, an universal tremour seized her, she stopped, and leaned on the door for support. 'Colonel Hargrave wishes to speak with you alone,' said Montreville, 'go with him to the parlour.'

'I cannot,' answered Laura, in words scarcely audible--'this night I cannot.'

'I command you to go,' said the father in a tone which he had seldom employed, and Laura instantly prepared to go. 'Surely, surely,' said she, 'Heaven will not leave me to my own weakness, whilst I act in obedience to you.'

Perceiving that she trembled violently, Hargrave offered her the support of his circling arm; but Laura instantly disengaged herself. 'Will you not lean on me, dearest Laura,' said he; 'perhaps it is for the last time.'

'I hope,' answered Laura, endeavouring to exert her spirit, 'it will be the last time that you will avail yourself of my father's authority to constrain me.'

'Spare me your reproaches, Laura,' said Hargrave, 'for I am desperate.

All that I desire on earth--my life itself depends upon this hour.'

They entered the parlour, and Laura, sinking into a seat, covered her eyes with her hand, and strove to prepare for answering this new call upon her firmness.

Hargrave stood silent for some moments. Fain would he have framed a resistless pet.i.tion; for the events of that day had hastened the unravelling of a tale which, once known to Laura, would, he knew, make all his pet.i.tions vain. But his impatient spirit could not wait to conciliate; and, seizing her hand, he said, with breathless eagerness, 'Laura, you once said that you loved me, and I believed you. Now to the proof--and if that fail--But I will not distract myself with the thought. You have allowed me a distant hope. Recall your sentence of delay. Circ.u.mstances which you cannot--must not know, leave you but one alternative. Be mine now, or you are for ever lost to me.'

Astonished at his words, alarmed by the ill-suppressed vehemence of his manner, Laura tried to read his altered countenance, and feared she knew not what. 'Tell me what you mean?' said she. 'What mean these strange words--these wild looks. Why have you come at this late hour?'

'Ask me nothing,' cried Hargrave, 'but decide. Speak. Will you be mine--now--to-morrow--within a few hours. Soon, very soon, it will be no longer possible for you to choose.'

A hectic of resentment kindled in Laura's cheek at the threat of desertion which she imagined to lurk beneath the words of Hargrave. 'You have,' said she, 'I know not how, extended my conditional promise to receive you as a friend far beyond what the terms of it could warrant.

In making even such an engagement, perhaps I condescended too far. But, admitting it in your own sense, what right have you to suppose that I am to be weakly terrified into renouncing a resolution formed on the best grounds?'

'I have no right to expect it,' said Hargrave, in a voice of misery. 'I came to you in desperation. I cannot--will not survive the loss of you; and if I prevail not now, you must be lost to me.'

'What means this strange, this presuming haste?' said Laura. 'Why do you seem thus wretched?'

'I am, indeed, most wretched. Oh Laura, thus on my knees I conjure you to have pity on me;--or, if it will cost you a pang to lose me, have pity on yourself. And if thy love be too feeble to bend thy stubborn will, let a father's wishes, a father's prayers, come to its aid.'

'Oh Hargrave,' cried Laura, bursting into tears, 'how have I deserved that you should lay on me this heavy load--that you should force me to resist the entreaties of my father.'

'Do not--Oh do not resist them. Let a father's prayers--let the pleadings of a wretch whose reason, whose life depends upon you, prevail to move you.'

'Nothing shall move me,' said Laura, with the firmness of despair, 'for I am used to misery, and will bear it.'

'And will you bear it too if driven from virtuous love--from domestic joy, I turn to the bought smile of harlots, forget you in the haunts of riot, or in the grave of a suicide?'

'Oh for mercy,' cried the terrified Laura, 'talk not so dreadfully. Be patient--I implore you. Fear not to lose me. Be but virtuous, and no power of man shall wrest me from you. In poverty--in sickness--in disgrace itself I will cleave to you.'

'Oh, I believe it,' said Hargrave, moved even to woman's weakness, 'for thou art an angel. But wilt though cleave to me in--'

'In what', said Laura.

'Ask me nothing--but yield to my earnest entreaty. Save me from the horrors of losing you; and may Heaven forsake me if ever again I give you cause to repent of your pity.'

Softened by his imploring looks and gestures, overpowered by his vehemence, hara.s.sed beyond her strength, Laura seemed almost expiring.

But the upright spirit shared not the weakness of its frail abode.

'Cease to importune me,' said she;--'everlasting were my cause of repentance, should I wilfully do wrong. You may break my heart--it is already broken, but my resolution is immoveable.'

Fire flashed from the eyes of Hargrave; as, starting from her feet, he cried, in a voice of frenzy, 'Ungrateful woman, you have never loved me! You love nothing but the fancied virtue to which I am sacrificed.

But tremble, obdurate, lest I dash from me this hated life, and my perdition be on your soul!'

'Oh no,' cried Laura, in an agony of terror, 'I will pray for you--pity you,--what shall I say--love you as never man was loved. Would that it were possible to do more!'

'Speak then your final rejection,' said Hargrave, grasping her hand with convulsive energy; 'and abide by the consequence.' 'I must not fear consequences,' said Laura, trembling in every limb. 'They are in the hands of Heaven.' 'Then be this first fond parting kiss our last!' cried Hargrave, and frantickly straining her to his breast, he rushed out of the room.

Surprise, confusion, a thousand various feelings kept Laura for a while motionless; till, Hargrave's parting words ringing in her ears, a dreadful apprehension took possession of her mind. Starting from her seat, and following him with her arms as if she could still have detained him, 'Oh Hargrave, what mean you?' she cried. But Hargrave was already beyond the reach of her voice; and, sinking to the ground, the wretched Laura found refuge from her misery in long and deep insensibility.

In the att.i.tude in which she had fallen, her lily arms extended on the ground, her death-like cheek resting upon one of them, she was found by a servant who accidentally entered the room, and whose cries soon a.s.sembled the family. Montreville alarmed hastened down stairs, and came in just as the maid with the a.s.sistance of the landlady was raising Laura, to all appearance dead.