It was the evening after that in which the conversations recorded in our last chapter were held;—evening in the quiet suburb of H———. The desertion and silence of the metropolis in September had extended to its neighbouring hamlets;—a village in the heart of the country could scarcely have seemed more still; the lamps were lighted, many of the shops already closed, a few of the sober couples and retired spinsters of the place might, here and there, be seen slowly wandering homeward after their evening walk: two or three dogs, in spite of the prohibitions of the magistrates placarded on the walls,—(manifestoes which threatened with death the dogs, and predicted more than ordinary madness to the public,)—were playing in the main road, disturbed from time to time as the slow coach, plying between the city and the suburb, crawled along the thoroughfare, or as the brisk mails whirled rapidly by, announced by the cloudy dust and the guard’s lively horn. Gradually even these evidences of life ceased—the saunterers disappeared, the mails had passed, the dogs gave place to the later and more stealthy perambulations of their feline successors “who love the moon.” At unfrequent intervals, the more important shops—the linen-drapers’, the chemists’, and the gin-palace—still poured out across the shadowy road their streams of light from windows yet unclosed: but with these exceptions, the business of the place stood still.
At this time there emerged from a milliner’s house (shop, to outward appearance, it was not, evincing its gentility and its degree above the Capelocracy, to use a certain classical neologism, by a brass plate on an oak door, whereon was graven, “Miss Semper, Milliner and Dressmaker, from Madame Devy,”)—at this time, I say, and from this house there emerged the light and graceful form of a young female. She held in her left hand a little basket, of the contents of which (for it was empty) she had apparently just disposed; and, as she stepped across the road, the lamplight fell on a face in the first bloom of youth, and characterised by an expression of childlike innocence and candour. It was a face regularly and exquisitely lovely, yet something there was in the aspect that saddened you; you knew not why, for it was not sad itself; on the contrary, the lips smiled and the eyes sparkled. As she now glided along the shadowy street with a light, quick step, a man, who had hitherto been concealed by the portico of an attorney’s house, advanced stealthily, and followed her at a little distance. Unconscious that she was dogged, and seemingly fearless of all danger, the girl went lightly on, swinging her basket playfully to and fro, and chaunting, in a low but musical tone, some verses that seemed rather to belong to the nursery than to that age which the fair singer had attained.
As she came to an angle which the main street formed with a lane, narrow and partially lighted, a policeman, stationed there, looked hard at her, and then touched his hat with an air of respect, in which there seemed also a little of compassion.
“Good night to you,” said the girl, passing him, and with a frank, gay tone.
“Shall I attend you home, Miss?” said the man.
“What for? I am very well!” answered the young woman, with an accent and look of innocent surprise.
Just at this time the man, who had hitherto followed her, gained the spot, and turned down the lane.
“Yes,” replied the policeman; “but it is getting dark, Miss.”
“So it is every night when I walk home, unless there’s a moon.—Good-bye.—The moon,” she repeated to herself, as she walked on, “I used to be afraid of the moon when I was a little child;” and then, after a pause, she murmured, in a low chaunt:
“‘The moon she is a wandering ghost,
That walks in penance nightly;
How sad she is, that wandering moon,
For all she shines so brightly!
“‘I watched her eyes when I was young,
Until they turned my brain,
And now I often weep to think
‘Twill ne’er be right again.’”
As the murmur of these words died at a distance down the lane in which the girl had disappeared, the policeman, who had paused to listen, shook his head mournfully, and said, while he moved on,—
“Poor thing! they should not let her always go about by herself; and yet, who would harm her?”
Meanwhile the girl proceeded along the lane, which was skirted by small, but not mean houses, till it terminated in a cross-stile that admitted into a church yard. Here hung the last lamp in the path, and a few dim stars broke palely over the long grass, and scattered gravestones, without piercing the deep shadow which the church threw over a large portion of the sacred ground. Just as she passed the stile, the man, whom we have before noticed, and who had been leaning, as if waiting for some one, against the pales, approached, and said gently,—
“Ah, Miss! it is a lone place for one so beautiful as you are to be alone. You ought never to be on foot.”
The girl stopped, and looked full, but without any alarm in her eyes, into the man’s face.
“Go away!” she said, with a half-peevish, half-kindly tone of command. “I don’t know you.”
“But I have been sent to speak to you by one who does know you, Miss—one who loves you to distraction—he has seen you before at Mrs. West’s. He is so grieved to think you should walk—you ought, he says, to have every luxury—that he has sent his carriage for you. It is on the other side of the yard. Do come now;” and he laid his hand, though very lightly, on her arm.
“At Mrs. West’s!” she said; and, for the first time, her voice and look showed fear. “Go away directly! How dare you touch me!”
“But, my dear Miss, you have no idea how my employer loves you, and how rich he is. See, he has sent you all this money; it is gold—real gold. You may have what you like, if you will but come. Now, don’t be silly, Miss.” The girl made no answer, but, with a sudden spring, passed the man, and ran lightly and rapidly along the path, in an opposite direction from that to which the tempter had pointed, when inviting her to the carriage. The man, surprised, but not baffled, reached her in an instant, and caught hold of her dress.
“Stay! you must come—you must!” he said, threateningly; and, loosening his grasp on her shawl, he threw his arm round her waist.
“Don’t!” cried the girl, pleadingly, and apparently subdued, turning her fair, soft face upon her pursuer, and clasping her hands. “Be quiet! Fanny is silly! No one is ever rude to poor Fanny!”
“And no one will be rude to you, Miss,” said the man, apparently touched; “but I dare not go without you. You don’t know what you refuse. Come;” and he attempted gently to draw her back.
“No, no!” said the girl, changing from supplication to anger, and raising her voice into a loud shriek, “No! I will—”
“Nay, then,” interrupted the man, looking round anxiously, and, with a quick and dexterous movement he threw a large handkerchief over her face, and, as he held it fast to her lips with one hand, he lifted her from the ground. Still violently struggling, the girl contrived to remove the handkerchief, and once more her shriek of terror rang through the violated sanctuary.
At that instant a loud deep voice was heard, “Who calls?” And a tall figure seemed to rise, as from the grave itself, and emerge from the shadow of the church. A moment more, and a strong gripe was laid on the shoulder of the ravisher. “What is this? On God’s ground, too! Release her, wretch!”
The man, trembling, half with superstitious, half with bodily fear, let go his captive, who fell at once at the knees of her deliverer. “Don’t you hurt me too,” she said, as the tears rolled down her eyes. “I am a good girl—and my grandfather’s blind.”
The stranger bent down and raised her; then looking round for the assailant with an eye whose dark fire shone through the gloom, he perceived the coward stealing off. He disdained to pursue.
“My poor child,” said he, with that voice which the strong assume to the weak—the man to some wounded infant—the voice of tender superiority and compassion, “there is no cause for fear now. Be soothed. Do you live near? Shall I see you home?”
“Thank you! That’s kind. Pray do!” And, with an infantine confidence she took his hand, as a child does that of a grown-up person;—so they walked on together.
“And,” said the stranger, “do you know that man? Has he insulted you before?”
“No—don’t talk of him: ce me fait mal!” And she put her hand to her forehead.
The French was spoken with so French an accent, that, in some curiosity, the stranger cast his eye over her plain dress.
“You speak French well.”
“Do I? I wish I knew more words—I only recollect a few. When I am very happy or very sad they come into my head. But I am happy now. I like your voice—I like you—Oh! I have dropped my basket!”
“Shall I go back for it, or shall I buy you another?”
“Another!—Oh, no! come back for it. How kind you are!—Ah! I see it!” and she broke away and ran forward to pick it up.
When she had recovered it, she laughed—she spoke to it—she kissed it.
Her companion smiled as he said: “Some sweetheart has given you that basket—it seems but a common basket too.”
“I have had it—oh, ever since—since—I don’t know how long! It came with me from France—it was full of little toys. They are gone—I am so sorry!”
“How old are you?”
“I don’t know.”
“My pretty one,” said the stranger, with deep pity in his rich voice, “your mother should not let you go out alone at this hour.”
“Mother!—mother!” repeated the girl, in a tone of surprise.
“Have you no mother?”
“No! I had a father once. But he died, they say. I did not see him die. I sometimes cry when I think that I shall never, never see him again! But,” she said, changing her accent from melancholy almost to joy, “he is to have a grave here like the other girl’s fathers—a fine stone upon it—and all to be done with my money!”
“Your money, my child?”
“Yes; the money I make. I sell my work and take the money to my grandfather; but I lay by a little every week for a gravestone for my father.”
“Will the gravestone be placed in that churchyard?” They were now in another lane; and, as he spoke, the stranger checked her, and bending down to look into her face, he murmured to himself, “Is it possible?—it must be—it must!”
“Yes! I love that churchyard—my brother told me to put flowers there; and grandfather and I sit there in the summer, without speaking. But I don’t talk much, I like singing better:—
“‘All things that good and harmless are
Are taught, they say, to sing
The maiden resting at her work,
The bird upon the wing;
The little ones at church, in prayer;
The angels in the sky
The angels less when babes are born
Than when the aged die.’”
And unconscious of the latent moral, dark or cheering, according as we estimate the value of this life, couched in the concluding rhyme, Fanny turned round to the stranger, and said, “Why should the angels be glad when the aged die?”
“That they are released from a false, unjust, and miserable world, in which the first man was a rebel, and the second a murderer!” muttered the stranger between his teeth, which he gnashed as he spoke.
The girl did not understand him: she shook her head gently, and made no reply. A few moments, and she paused before a small house.
“This is my home.”
“It is so,” said her companion, examining the exterior of the house with an earnest gaze; “and your name is Fanny.”
“Yes—every one knows Fanny. Come in;” and the girl opened the door with a latch-key.
The stranger bowed his stately height as he crossed the low threshold and followed his guide into a little parlour. Before a table on which burned dimly, and with unheeded wick, a single candle, sat a man of advanced age; and as he turned his face to the door, the stranger saw that he was blind.
The girl bounded to his chair, passed her arms round the old man’s neck, and kissed his forehead; then nestling herself at his feet, and leaning her clasped hands caressingly on his knee, she said,—
“Grandpapa, I have brought you somebody you must love. He has been so kind to Fanny.”
“And neither of you can remember me!” said the guest.
The old man, whose dull face seemed to indicate dotage, half raised himself at the sound of the stranger’s voice. “Who is that?” said he, with a feeble and querulous voice. “Who wants me?”
“I am the friend of your lost son. I am he who, ten years go, brought Fanny to your roof, and gave her to your care—your son’s last charge. And you blessed your son, and forgave him, and vowed to be a father to his Fanny.” The old man, who had now slowly risen to his feet, trembled violently, and stretched out his hands.
“Come near—near—let me put my hands on your head. I cannot see you; but Fanny talks of you, and prays for you; and Fanny—she has been an angel to me!”
The stranger approached and half knelt as the old man spread his hands over his head, muttering inaudibly. Meanwhile Fanny, pale as death—her lips apart—an eager, painful expression on her face—looked inquiringly on the dark, marked countenance of the visitor, and creeping towards him inch by inch, fearfully touched his dress—his arms—his countenance.
“Brother,” she said at last, doubtingly and timidly, “Brother, I thought I could never forget you! But you are not like my brother; you are older;—you are—you are!—no! no! you are not my brother!”
“I am much changed, Fanny; and you too!”
He smiled as he spoke; and the smile—sweet and pitying—thoroughly changed the character of his face, which was ordinarily stern, grave, and proud.
“I know you now!” exclaimed Fanny, in a tone of wild joy. “And you come back from that grave! My flowers have brought you back at last! I knew they would! Brother! Brother!”
And she threw herself on his breast and burst into passionate tears. Then, suddenly drawing herself back, she laid her finger on his arm, and looked up at him beseechingly.
“Pray, now, is he really dead? He, my father!—he, too, was lost like you. Can’t he come back again as you have done?”
“Do you grieve for him still, then? Poor girl!” said the stranger, evasively, and seating himself. Fanny continued to listen for an answer to her touching question; but finding that none was given, she stole away to a corner of the room, and leaned her face on her hands, and seemed to think—till at last, as she so sat, the tears began to flow down her cheeks, and she wept, but silently and unnoticed.
“But, sir,” said the guest, after a short pause, “how is this? Fanny tells me she supports you by her work. Are you so poor, then? Yet I left you your son’s bequest; and you, too, I understood, though not rich, were not in want!”
“There was a curse on my gold,” said the old man, sternly. “It was stolen from us.”
There was another pause. Simon broke it.
“And you, young man—how has it fared with you? You have prospered, I hope.”
“I am as I have been for years—alone in the world, without kindred and without friends. But, thanks to Heaven, I am not a beggar!”
“No kindred and no friends!” repeated the old man. “No father—no brother—no wife—no sister!”
“None! No one to care whether I live or die,” answered the stranger, with a mixture of pride and sadness in his voice. “But, as the song has it—
“‘I care for nobody—no, not I,
For nobody cares for me!’”
There was a certain pathos in the mockery with which he repeated the homely lines, although, as he did, he gathered himself up, as if conscious of a certain consolation and reliance on the resources not dependent on others which he had found in his own strong limbs and his own stout heart.
At that moment he felt a soft touch upon his hand, and he saw Fanny looking at him through the tears that still flowed.
“You have no one to care for you? Don’t say so! Come and live with us, brother; we’ll care for you. I have never forgotten the flowers—never! Do come! Fanny shall love you. Fanny can work for three!”
“And they call her an idiot!” mumbled the old man, with a vacant smile on his lips.
“My sister! You shall be my sister! Forlorn one—whom even Nature has fooled and betrayed! Sister!—we, both orphans! Sister!” exclaimed that dark, stern man, passionately, and with a broken voice; and he opened his arms, and Fanny, without a blush or a thought of shame, threw herself on his breast. He kissed her forehead with a kiss that was, indeed, pure and holy as a brother’s: and Fanny felt that he had left upon her cheek a tear that was not her own.
“Well,” he said, with an altered voice, and taking the old man’s hand, “what say you? Shall I take up my lodging with you? I have a little money; I can protect and aid you both. I shall be often away—in London or else where—and will not intrude too much on you. But you blind, and she—(here he broke off the sentence abruptly and went on)—you should not be left alone. And this neighbourhood, that burial-place, are dear to me. I, too, Fanny, have lost a parent; and that grave—”
He paused, and then added, in a trembling voice, “And you have placed flowers over that grave?”
“Stay with us,” said the blind man; “not for our sake, but your own. The world is a bad place. I have been long sick of the world. Yes! come and live near the burial-ground—the nearer you are to the grave, the safer you are;—and you have a little money, you say!”
“I will come to-morrow, then. I must return now. Tomorrow, Fanny, we shall meet again.”
“Must you go?” said Fanny, tenderly. “But you will come again; you know I used to think every one died when he left me. I am wiser now. Yet still, when you do leave me, it is true that you die for Fanny!”
At this moment, as the three persons were grouped, each had assumed a posture of form, an expression of face, which a painter of fitting sentiment and skill would have loved to study. The visitor had gained the door; and as he stood there, his noble height—the magnificent strength and health of his manhood in its full prime—contrasted alike the almost spectral debility of extreme age and the graceful delicacy of Fanny—half girl, half child. There was something foreign in his air—and the half military habit, relieved by the red riband of the Bourbon knighthood. His complexion was dark as that of a Moor, and his raven hair curled close to the stately head. The soldier-moustache—thick, but glossy as silk-shaded the firm lip; and the pointed beard, assumed by the exiled Carlists, heightened the effect of the strong and haughty features and the expression of the martial countenance.
But as Fanny’s voice died on his ear, he half averted that proud face; and the dark eyes—almost Oriental in their brilliancy and depth of shade—seemed soft and humid. And there stood Fanny, in a posture of such unconscious sadness—such childlike innocence; her arms drooping—her face wistfully turned to his—and a half smile upon the lips, that made still more touching the tears not yet dried upon her cheeks. While thin, frail, shadowy, with white hair and furrowed cheeks, the old man fixed his sightless orbs on space; and his face, usually only animated from the lethargy of advancing dotage by a certain querulous cynicism, now grew suddenly earnest, and even thoughtful, as Fanny spoke of Death!
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