Miles Tremenhere Volume Ii Part 9

"She did not speak, or expostulate?" asked Tremenhere.

"No," answered his friend; "she was too much taken by surprise, but I never saw a woman look more confounded in her guilt."

Miles did not speak for some time. Strange, how wrongs, supposed or real, darken the heart to every gleam of pity! It was not his vanity which was wounded--not any feeling of false pride, which urged him to so much apparent heartlessness; it was a disgust pervading his n.o.ble nature, at so much infamy in one so young and fair. Had he deemed her reclaimable, he would have n.o.bly, generously, endeavoured to do so; but, believing what he did, he felt that any further contact with her would irretrievably sully his own honour, and plunge her still deeper into duplicity and sin. _If_ she ever could repent, their separation--his utter contempt for her--might, through shame, open that channel to her.

There was uprightness and conscience in his every thought; he even felt then, that, if he could be convinced she would be true and faithful to his rival, he would seek by the law that release which should enable him (Lord Randolph) to do her justice. With these thoughts in his mind, after a calm survey of all remaining in the ruined temple of his heart, he wrote to this latter, and despatched his friend with the missive, which contained little of accusation, beyond a quiet, cool detail of facts, as he believed them, and giving him a choice of two things, either a solemn a.s.surance to marry Minnie if he divorced her--he, thereby, submitting to the reprehension of the world at large--wherein many might blame him for the calmness of the act, so little in consonance with his real feelings, in preference to the more manly one of first demanding retribution at his hands in a struggle for life, or to meet him muzzle to muzzle, where often the luckier aim carries it above the more skilful. But we are wrong, for the luckier aim would carry undying remorse with it, in any n.o.ble heart, however wronged.

"Live, and let live," and leave vengeance to Heaven.

It would be vain to attempt portraying Lord Randolph's amazement on receipt of this note; he was preparing to leave his apartment to dine with some friends when it reached him. He read, and re-read it; and then, with an air of wonder which would have convinced any unprejudiced person, asked whether really Mr. Tremenhere resided in that hotel?

"Apparently," was the laconic reply, sarcastically delivered.

"He must be mad, then, and deserving only _le Bicetre_," answered Lord Randolph; "where may he be found?"

"By letter or message through me," was the reply.

"You are abrupt, monsieur," said the other, sitting down to write; "nevertheless, pray be seated."

"I prefer standing, _milord_," and he folded his arms doggedly.

It will be seen this was the last person who could successfully conciliate persons in so painful a position.

Lord Randolph wrote:--"You must be mad. I most solemnly a.s.sure you, until this moment, I knew not you were in this hotel. True, I met Mrs.

Tremenhere to-day by accident; but she never named her address, nor I mine. You are at liberty to appeal to law, if it so please you to cast fresh ridicule on yourself; but though I most highly esteem Mrs.

Tremenhere, enough to deem myself a most fortunate man could I call her lawfully mine; still, I have too much self-respect and vanity, under any circ.u.mstances, to seek a certain refusal, by proposing to her. For the rest, your good sense, and I hope, heart, will guide you aright, and make you see the folly of your conduct."

His lords.h.i.+p was ignorant of the manner in which Minnie had been treated, or he would have written more forcibly in her favour. Thus he dismissed his visiter, and departed to dinner. This letter almost shook Tremenhere's calmness to an outburst of rage; he only saw in it cool audacity, and that feeling of honour which makes a man oftentimes perjure himself to redeem a wrong act, and save a woman's reputation.

"Let us seek him," he said, moving towards the door. "I will await you in the street; you can enter and inquire for him." And, with a resolution he did not think himself capable of, well as he knew his own stern nature in wrong, he stood almost on the threshold of his once happy home, whilst his friend entered to inquire where Lord Randolph might be found. This was easily ascertained, and thither the two men followed; he was dining with some friends at the _restaurant_ of great renown, "_Les Trois Freres_," and was in the act of detailing his most extraordinary and unpleasant affair, when a card was handed to him, and on it was "Miles Tremenhere!"

"Show the gentleman into another room," said his lords.h.i.+p with perfect composure, for not one spark of cowardice was in his composition. The waiter obeyed, and in a few minutes he stood before Miles and his companion.

"Your lords.h.i.+p will pardon this unusual method of proceeding," said Tremenhere, with dignity; "but the unsatisfactory nature of your reply to my letter obliges me to call in person, and demand another."

"_Demand!_" exclaimed the other. "What if I refuse?"

"Then it will but remain with me to attach to your lords.h.i.+p's name, one I should regret being forced to call into requisition."

Lord Randolph bit his lip to restrain an angry retort. After a moment's pause, to collect his coolness, he said, "Mr. Tremenhere, I do not deal with you as I should with another, for I look upon you as a lunatic; but for the sake of your most innocent, injured wife, I implore you consider well what you are doing!"

"My lord," answered his opponent, "I have not come to listen to idle words, still less to be again a dupe. I come to demand, unless your heart fail you too much to meet me, to give me the name of _your_ friend, to whom _mine_ may apply; the rest will then regard them."

"Think well, sir," said Lord Randolph again, as calmly as he could be under so much aggravation. "You may some day rue this. I would, for an innocent woman's sake, save you from remorse, and her from ruin."

"By heavens!" exclaimed Miles, turning sarcastically towards his friend, "this man would have me take his mistress to my arms again, and receive him, perchance, as friend! My lord," and he turned wildly in rage upon him, "if there be a coward here, 'tis not Miles Tremenhere, or his friend."

"Oh!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Lord Randolph, drawing a long breath, then keeping silence a moment to subdue himself, he replied, holding out a hand to Miles's friend, "Your card, monsieur, and I will immediately place it in the hands of my friend. I think now, sir," and he bowed to Tremenhere, "our interview may terminate; and may you never regret the day's work which will follow this."

And, holding the card given by the other in his hand, he quietly quitted the apartment. "After all," he said to himself as he moved to the room where his friends were awaiting him, "this fellow requires a severe lesson; it will cure his jealousy." And none was gayer that evening at table than Lord Randolph Gray. Tremenhere was otherwise. There was a monitor in his breast, not silent, for it was full of questionings. Yet to all he replied, "It is justice and retribution,"--and then he sat down with perfect composure, and drew a rough copy of his will, which he purposed having legally executed on the morrow. "I will not leave her unprovided for," he whispered to himself; "this shall be my revenge on her."

The next day but one, Lord Randolph and his adversary met; and Tremenhere was carried from the spot severely, though not dangerously, wounded--a bullet having traversed his side, without, however, touching any vital part, though he became insensible from loss of blood. His opponent, with the manly self-possession which had characterised him throughout, remained until well a.s.sured there existed no danger from the actual wound, and then quitted the Bois de Bologne, where they met, and next day Paris, for Italy. Tremenhere was transported to the nearest house, and there he lay unconscious for many days.

Minnie recovered from her stupor, to find herself in the arms of her attendant, who was too much terrified to quit her and summon a.s.sistance.

This woman had not entered the apartment where her mistress was for some hours; and her absence at the moment of her master's friend's arrival, prevented her knowing what had occurred. As Minnie returned to the warmth of life, and something of its consciousness, she inquired whether Mr. Tremenhere had returned. A reply in the negative being given, she for a moment was lost in wonder; then thought after thought crowded through her brain, and she found amidst them, one to lead her partially to light. Tremenhere was gone--but where, or wherefore, she could not remember for hours. She wandered hastily from room to room, touching every thing there which had been his--her manner was flighty, half idiotic; the suddenness of the blow found her unprepared. At last the terrified servant beheld a cold, grey look steal over her face, the hectic flush disappeared, memory had returned, and desolation sat triumphant above all; and nothing could equal that desolation of heart--she did not imagine, for an instant, that Miles believed her guilty. It will be remembered that she was unconscious of Lord Randolph's residence in their hotel; she had hurried home, trembling, it is true, to inform Tremenhere of her meeting with him, and this was the only clue she had to his cruel conduct and desertion. She read his letter over and over; her first supernatural fears pa.s.sed away, and she felt convinced either that he was mad, or changed in heart, so changed that the parting was pleasurably done by him. After viewing all his recent conduct, she dismissed the idea of madness, his coldness, and absence of manner for some time, since, in fact, her own mysterious search after D'Estrees, which had given him fresh cause for suspicion, arose before her, and her eyes seemed to open on the truth. She looked back to many things; his meetings with Lady Dora, first in the holly field at home, that had puzzled her, then at Uplands, so sedulously concealed from her--all arose, and without jealousy of her cousin, she felt, and more firmly in that it was an unworn, up-springing thought of an instant, that Miles _had_ once loved Dora, and possibly marrying her for pique, subsequent disgust had ensued. "Oh! if he really loved me, he could not have sought to prove me false so often," she said, "neither now have left me for so slight a cause, without even seeking an explanation, as my accidental meeting with Lord Randolph. He never truly loved me." And with this fixed thought, a cold desolation crept over her soul. Minnie had yet to learn all the madness of jealousy, therefore she was incompetent to judge him. She was not long left in any uncertainty about her desertion; her servant informed her that Mr. Tremenhere's friend had authorized the landlord to apply to him for all expenses, when madame quitted the hotel, as some unfortunate differences had occasioned a separation. This had been gratuitous pain inflicted in total indifference to her feelings on this man's part. Tremenhere had bid him say that he had quitted Paris.

Minnie, in all her keen suffering, had but one friend, Mary; our good deeds seldom are lost in the waves of life's ocean--they return again, to break at our feet. Minnie felt all this girl's kindness, but she had grown so cold at heart in a few days, that all failed to warm her to life. Of the duel they heard nothing; those kind of things are of more ordinary occurrence in France than among ourselves, and from whom could they hear it? Mary had written several letters to Miles's friend, their only clue, to beseech Tremenhere to listen to reason. After some days deep anxiety, they were returned, with a request in his name, that none more might be sent; he was leaving France, search after him would be useless. At length a letter arrived from himself; the characters were trembling, for he was scarcely able to write them. In this he spoke little of wrongs, merely by the tone of it, implying Mary to be as guilty as his own wife. There was no regret, nothing to excite hope. He spoke deliberately of never again seeing her; he was resolved; he had no desire to do so; he had long been unhappy; now the tie was severed, he felt content. Of her pecuniary wants he had taken care, _however she might be circ.u.mstanced_. He named a banker in whose hands a sufficiency for her support would be placed quarterly, and then all care for her ended. With this letter Minnie's last hope died; it was indeed a hopeless one. Had she seen him, pale, haggard, and suffering, as he sat up in the bed to write it, she would have felt that he was less to blame than she deemed him. He scarcely knew what he wrote, still he felt anxious to settle all for her comfort, in case Lord Randolph should forsake her; for the idea was a fixed one in his mind, that though they might not meet publicly for a while, eventually, finding him no longer to be duped, they would fly together.

Nothing could induce Minnie to touch a farthing of the money Miles had allotted her; forsaken by him, he was as a stranger to her. Had she known he still loved her--had she known all, she would have followed to the farthest end of the earth, to find and plead to him. As it was, her heart sickened; she had been deceiving herself--deceived by him. Her pride arose, and, enwraping herself in it, she sat down, and forbore even to name him. One thing she wrung from Mary in sacred promise: this was--that neither Dorcas nor Skaife should be informed of the whole truth.

"Let me bear my misery alone," she said. "Tell them, for I cannot write now, that he and I have parted: that there was incompatibility of temper--any thing you will; but do not--pray, do not, say he has forsaken me! Let them think it has been mutual consent, but do not blame him; they all hate him enough already," and the heart whispered even still, "poor Miles!"

CHAPTER X.

It was not, however, for some time that Minnie allowed Mary to write even this; for she still hoped at times, in her heart, that Miles would return. But when months pa.s.sed, and she ascertained, beyond a doubt, from a visit Mary made to his artist friend, that he had quitted for Florence, then she hoped no more, and nothing remained but to act.

Dorcas was most uneasy at her silence, and then Mary wrote, and afterwards she summoned courage to do so herself, though every word written was penned in the bitterness of worse than death; for we may die happy in hope, and the love of those dear ones around us, smoothing the pillow as we depart in peace and faith to happy sh.o.r.es, beyond life's troubled sea. Minnie's grief had nothing of this. She was on a wreck in a dark stormy night--a wild sea foaming over her head--a dark sky, and impenetrable darkness above and around; but nevertheless she spoke of contentment, and a wish to be left in quiet. "We deemed it better to part than live in estrangement of heart," she wrote, "and I am resigned.

If you love me, let the subject drop; nothing can change our fate.

Leave me in quiet awhile, I shall remain some time longer abroad."

But this letter did not tranquillize Dorcas, to whom it was written. She carefully abstained from speaking of its contents to any one but Mr.

Skaife, and he, like herself, was too deeply interested in Minnie, not to be the confidant of all. Dorcas wrote most anxiously to her, and Skaife promised, as soon as his duties would admit of it, to go to Paris, and endeavour to reconcile them. He guessed a portion of the truth; but, alas, nor he, nor Dorcas knew a t.i.the of it!

Minnie, we have said, resolutely refused to touch her husband's allowance. He had gone to Florence (as far he might be, in his spirit-broken state,) contented in the thought that she was provided for, and in following his art, now a toil undertaken to banish care--he strove to obliterate her memory. Minnie's pride forbade her accepting existence at the expense of Mary; when all her means had become exhausted--the slender ones her purse and jewels afforded, her pride arose in proportion to her poverty. It was not false pride, but the honest, upright determination, to burthen no one. "I will leave Paris,"

she said to herself, "and go where no one may hear of me."

This could not be accomplished without some difficulty; nevertheless, at last she succeeded, and one day, when Mary sought her in the humble room she had been residing in, she was gone. A letter reached her faithful friend, telling her that cares such as hers were better borne alone; even _her_ sympathy pained her. She would go where only her own heart should know her sorrow, and breathe it to her. She bade her not fear for her; she was safe, and would shortly give her proof of it by letter; but she implored her to breathe to no one that she had fled. Mary, however, in kindness of heart, wrote immediately to Mr. Skaife; the secret was too a heavy a one for her own conscience to support in peace. This intelligence caused the most bitter sorrow to him and Dorcas, to whom alone it was told; and he hastened to seek some one to take charge of his parish duties awhile, at her earnest prayer, and his own heart's promptings, to follow Minnie whithersoever she might be gone.

It sometimes, but rarely happens in life, that where we only expected to find a merely common acquaintance, we meet a warm and sincere friend--one who, through years of sorrow, never forsakes us--one who forgets self, to help us onward on life's weary track with our burthens--who, when all have forsaken save himself, clings to us still, and whose best, and only reward sought, is, when a gleam of suns.h.i.+ne flits across our dreary way. To such a one, honour and blessing--gifts, which his own good conscience will bring him, when, at the end of life's journey, he makes up his account, and reckons with his Creator. Such a copy of an original, was Skaife. But there was a machine working which he could not stay or controul; it would spin its wool, and weave its woof, before man might overcome it.

Tremenhere was in Florence; but yet he heard of Minnie whilst she was in Paris. So blinded was he by his pa.s.sions, that even her poverty--her refusal tacitly to touch his allowance, were snares in his eyes, to lure him back to deception. Again, if at times his heart softened, 'twas but for a moment--he grew cold again, and pitiless. Living too, as he lived, steeled his heart to gentler scenes or thoughts; he avoided all society, and, shut up in his studio, labouring to banish the bosom's emotions, became sullen, morose, and vindictive.

Months pa.s.sed since their separation, and in the delicate, frail woman, living in almost privation in Ma.r.s.eilles, toiling at her needle for her daily bread, who might have known Minnie Dalzell? With the little money remaining to her, she crossed to England, to prevent discovery and pursuit; here remaining hidden a short time, she then returned on her footsteps, and hastened to Ma.r.s.eilles. She knew Miles was in Italy, and her yearning heart led her to the port, whence she might some day, perhaps, be called upon to follow his path. Bowed and saddened she was by sorrow, still her heart's conscious uprightness, and honest pride, upheld her; if she suffered, no one knew it; if sometimes she ate her bread in tears, and only _that_, for a day's nourishment, who saw her?

No mere _person_, but One who sees and reckons to us our patience and confidence in him however he may try us, and Him, Minnie never forgot.

Even as the trembling fingers, pale and attenuated, broke the hardened crust, the eyes, once violet in their depth and richness, now paler, clearer, more serene in their sadness, looked up and blessed the Giver of it in their tearful grat.i.tude. In all this patient sorrow came an almost overwhelming, unhoped-for joy; she held a living child on her bosom, small, frail little creature; its tones were as a bird's, so soft and sad, and through the little thin fingers the light shone, as you held them up, and only then did a ruddy colour, like pale ruby, show in them, proving they were not merely wax, an imitation of life. "I shall not have you long to comfort me, my boy," she whispered, when the sobered first joy gave place to reason; "but you will go to a better place, and plead for your mother, darling, and oh! do not forget him--your father. I would you might have seen him _here_, my child, to know him in heaven; but I trust in spirit meetings, spirit sight will show him to you, and we may all three rejoice, reconciled in peace and everlasting joy, which nothing human can attain to!"

He was christened Miles, and though the pale, fair mother grew paler each day, and toiled more, as the embroidery, in which she excelled, became more sought after, still the boy thrived, and as she laid him upon her lap, like a model of rare beauty, her lip smiled in placid thankfulness and joy, as she counted the dimples which day by day seemed to deepen in the now rosy cheeks and fingers. Hers was not a heart to keep its joy to itself; she wrote to Mary. True she did not give her address, but she wrote to bid her rejoice with her; her child was born and lived. A deep hope sustained her for some time. If Miles ever had truly loved her, he must think of the expected tie which bound them closer than ever. He would remember how he had spoken with almost boyish delight of the hoped-for period, and he would seek her, and come. Alas! he did remember it; but in bitterness of spirit, and laughed in scorn over those boyish hopes, of which he had been the dupe.

Mary replied, in haste and deep anxiety, to the Post-Office, as directed; she spoke of Dorcas's trouble, Skaife's arrival and anxious search for her, but not one word of Miles! and then her heart sunk in utter despondency. "Not even now!" she uttered, as the big tears fell on her boy's sleeping face; "oh, he must hate me much!" Then succeeded a fear lest Mary should seek her, or Skaife, or Dorcas; she would fly again.

Among her employers was one lady who had taken a deep interest in her; she had a daughter about Minnie's age, and married to a Maltese merchant; she was about to become a mother herself, and, being called upon to join her husband in Malta, her mother implored Minnie, who was thought a young widow, to accompany her as nurse to the expected child.

The offer was a tempting one; thus she could fly, fly all, and in change of scene, more than place, still, busy thought. A large offer was proposed to her to wean her own child when another should claim her care, but this she resolutely refused. "You will be too delicate to nurse both!" exclaimed the lady.

"I shall gain strength for all, Madame," she replied, with confidence.

"I am stronger than I seem," and she thought of all she had mentally borne and wrestled successfully with, and mere physical labour could not daunt her strong heart.