"Alas! and have you not conquered, Alfred?"
"Sweet! do I not say that I am content to forfeit all honors, triumphs, applauses--all that was so dear to me before--and only in the fond faith that I had conquered? You are mine--you tell me so with your dear lips--I have you in my fond embrace--ah! do not talk to me again of fame."
"I were untrue to you as to myself, dear Alfred, did I not. No! with your talents, to forego their uses--to deliver yourself up to love wholly, were as criminal as it would be unwise."
"You shall be my inspiration then, dear Margaret. These lips shall send me to the forum--these eyes shall reward me with smiles when I return.
Your applause shall be to me a dearer triumph than all the clamors of the populace."
"Let us return home--it is late."
"Not so!--and why should we go? What is sleep to us but loss? What the dull hours, spent after the ordinary fashion, among ordinary people.
Could any scene be more beautiful than this--ah! can any feeling be more sweet? Is it not so to you, dearest? tell me--nay, do not tell me--if you love as I do, you can not leave me--not now--not thus--while such is the beauty of earth and heaven--while such are the rich joys cl.u.s.tering in our hearts. Nay, while, in that hallowing moonlight, I gaze upon thy dark eyes, and streaming hair, thy fair, beautiful cheeks, and those dear rosy lips!"
"Oh! Alfred, do not speak so--do not clasp me thus. Let us go. It is late--very late, and what will they say?"
"Let them say! Are we not blessed? Can all their words take from us these blessings--these sacred, sweet, moments--such joys, such delights?
Let them dream of such, with their dull souls if they can. No! no!
Margaret--we are one! and thus one, our world is as free from their control as it is superior to their dreams and hopes. Here is our heaven, Margaret--ah! how long shall it be ours! at what moment may we lose it, by death, by storm, by what various mischance! What profligacy to fly before the time! No! no! but a little while longer--but a little while!"
And there they lingered! He, fond, artful, persuasive; she, trembling with the dangerous sweetness of wild, unbidden emotions. Ah! why did she not go? Why was the strength withheld which would have carried out her safer purpose? The moon rose until she hung in the zenith, seeming to linger there in a sad, sweet watch, like themselves--the rivulet ran along, still prattling through the groves; the breeze, which had been a soft murmur among the trees at the first rising of the moon, now blew a shrill whistle among the craggy hills; but they no longer heard the prattle of the rivulet--even the louder strains of the breeze were unnoticed, and it was only when they were about to depart, that poor Margaret discovered that the moon had all the while been looking down upon them.
CHAPTER XXVII.
THE BIRTH OF THE AGONY.
It was now generally understood in Charlemont that Margaret Cooper had made a conquest of the handsome stranger. We have omitted--as a matter not congenial to our taste--the small by-play which had been carried on by the other damsels of the village to effect the same object. There had been setting of caps, without number, ay, and pulling them too, an the truth were known among the fair Stellas and Clarissas, the Daphnes and Dorises, of Charlemont, but, though Stevens was sufficiently considerate of the claims of each, so far as politeness demanded it, and contrived to say pleasant things, pour pa.s.ser le temps, with all of them, it was very soon apparent to the most sanguine, that the imperial beauties and imperious mind of Margaret Cooper had secured the conquest for herself.
As a matter of course, the personal and intellectual attractions of Stevens underwent no little disparagement as soon as this fact was known. It was now universally understood that he was no such great things, after all; and our fair friend the widow Thackeray, who was not without her pretensions to wit and beauty, was bold enough to say that Mr. Stevens was certainly too fat in the face, and she rather thought him stupid. Such an opinion gave courage to the rest, and pert Miss Bella Tompkins, a romp of first-rate excellence, had the audacity to say that he squinted!--and this opinion was very natural, since neither of his eyes had ever rested with satisfaction on her pouting charms.
It may be supposed that the discontent of the fair bevy, and its unfavorable judgment of himself, did not reach the ears of Alfred Stevens, and would scarcely have disturbed them if it did. Margaret Cooper was more fortunate than himself in this respect. She could not altogether be insensible to the random remarks which sour envy and dark-eyed jealousy continued to let fall in her hearing; but her scorn for the speakers, and her satisfaction with herself, secured her from all annoyance from this cause. Such, at least, had been the case in the first days of her conquest. Such was not exactly the case now. She had no more scorn of others. She was no longer proud, no longer strong. Her eyes no longer flashed with haughty defiance on the train which, though envious, were yet compelled to follow. She could no longer speak in those superior tones, the language equally of a proud intellect, and a spirit whose sensibilities had neither been touched by love nor enfeebled by anxiety and apprehension. A sad change had come over her heart and all her features in the progress of a few days. Her courage had departed. Her step was no longer firm; her eye no longer uplifted like that of the mountain-eagle, to which, in the first darings of her youthful muse, she had boldly likened herself. Her look was downcast, her voice subdued; she was now not less timid than the feeblest damsel of the village in that doubtful period of life when, pa.s.sing from childhood to girlhood, the virgin falters, as it were, with bashful thoughts, upon the threshold of a new and perilous condition. The intercourse of Margaret Cooper with her lover had had the most serious effect upon her manners and her looks. But the change upon her spirit was no less striking to all.
"I"m sure if I did love any man," was the opinion of one of the damsels, "I"d die sooner than show it to him, as she shows it to Alfred Stevens.
It"s a guess what he must think of it."
"And no hard guess neither," said another; "I reckon there"s no reason why he should pick out Margaret Cooper except that he saw that it was no such easy matter any where else."
"Well! there can be no mistake about it with them; for now they"re always together--and Betty, her own maid, thinks--but it"s better not to say!"
And the prudent antique pursed up her mouth in a language that said everything.
"What!--what does she say?" demanded a dozen voices.
"Well! I won"t tell you that. I won"t tell you all; but she does say, among other things, that the sooner John Cross marries them, the better for all parties."
"Is it possible!"
"Can it be!"
"Bless me! but I always thought something wrong."
"And Betty, her own maid, told you? Well, who should know, if she don"t?"
"And this, too, after all her airs!"
"Her great smartness, her learning, and verse-making! I never knew any good come from books yet."
"And never will, Jane," said another, with an equivocal expression, with which Jane was made content; and, after a full half-hour"s confabulation, in the primitive style, the parties separated--each, in her way, to give as much circulation to Betty"s inuendoes as the importance of the affair deserved.
Scandal travels along the highways, seen by all but the victim. Days and nights pa.s.sed; and in the solitude of lonely paths, by the hillside or the rivulet, Margaret Cooper still wandered with her lover. She heard not the poisonous breath which was already busy with her virgin fame.
She had no doubts, whatever might be the event, that the heart of Alfred Stevens could leave her without that aliment which, in these blissful moments, seemed to be her very breath of life. But she felt many fears, many misgivings, she knew not why. A doubt, a cloud of anxiety, hung brooding on the atmosphere. In a heart which is unsophisticated, the consciousness, however vague, that all is not right, is enough to produce this cloud; but, with the gradual progress of that heart to the indulgence of the more active pa.s.sions, this consciousness necessarily increases and the conflict then begins between the invading pa.s.sion and the guardian principle. We have seen enough to know what must be the result of such a conflict with a nature such as hers, under the education which she had received. It did not end in the expulsion of her lover. It did not end in the discontinuance of those long and frequent rambles amid silence, and solitude, and shadow. She had not courage for this; and the poor, vain mother, flattered with the idea that her son-in-law would be a preacher, beheld nothing wrong in their nightly wanderings, and suffered her daughter, in such saintly society, to go forth without restraint or rebuke.
There was one person in the village who was not satisfied that Margaret Cooper should fall a victim, either to the cunning of another, or to her own pa.s.sionate vanity. This was our old friend Calvert. He was rather, inclined to be interested in the damsel, in spite of the ill treatment of his protege, if it were only in consequence of the feelings with which she had inspired him. It has been seen that, in the affair of the duel, he was led to regard the stranger with an eye of suspicion. This feeling had been further heightened by the statements of Ned Hinkley, which, however loose and inconclusive, were yet of a kind to show that there was some mystery about Stevens--that he desired concealment in some respects--a fact very strongly inferred from his non-employment of the village postoffice, and the supposition--taken for true--that he employed that of some distant town. Ned Hinkley had almost arrived at certainty in this respect; and some small particulars which seemed to bear on this conviction, which he had recently gathered, taken in connection with the village scandal in reference to the parties, determined the old man to take some steps in the matter to forewarn the maiden, or at least her mother, of the danger of yielding too much confidence to one of whom so little was or could be known.
It was a pleasant afternoon, and Calvert was sitting beneath his roof-tree, musing over this very matter, when he caught a glimpse of the persons of whom he thought, ascending one of the distant hills, apparently on their way to the lake. He rose up instantly, and, seizing his staff, hurried off to see the mother of the damsel. The matter was one of the nicest delicacy--not to be undertaken lightly--not to be urged incautiously. Nothing, indeed, but a strong sense of duty could have determined him upon a proceeding likely to appear invidious, and which might be so readily construed, by a foolish woman, into an impertinence. Though a man naturally of quick, warm feelings, Calvert had been early taught to think cautiously--indeed, the modern phrenologist would have said that, in the excess of this prudent organ lay the grand weakness of his moral nature. This delayed him in the contemplated performance much longer than his sense of its necessity seemed to justify. Having now resolved, however, and secure in the propriety of his object, he did not scruple any longer.
A few minutes sufficed to bring him to the cottage of the old lady, and her voice in very friendly tenor commanded him to enter. Without useless circ.u.mlocution, yet without bluntness, the old man broached the subject; and, without urging any of the isolated facts of which he was possessed, and by which his suspicions were awakened, he dwelt simply upon the dangers which might result from such a degree of confidence as was given to the stranger. The long, lonely rambles in the woods, by night as well as day, were commented on, justly, but in an indulgent spirit; and the risks of a young and unsuspecting maiden, under such circ.u.mstances, were shown with sufficient distinctness for the comprehension of the mother, had she been disposed to hear. But never was good old man, engaged in the thankless office of bestowing good advice, so completely confounded as he was by the sort of acknowledgments which his interference obtained. A keen observer might have seen the gathering storm while he was speaking; and, at every sentence, there was a low, running commentary, bubbling up from the throat of the opinionated dame, somewhat like rumbling thunder, which amply denoted the rising tempest.
It was a sort of religious effort which kept the old lady quiet till Calvert had fairly reached a conclusion. Then, rising from her seat, she approached him, smoothed back her ap.r.o.n, perked out her chin, and, fixing her keen gray eyes firmly upon his own, with her nose elongated to such a degree as almost to suggest the possibility of a pointed collision between that member and the corresponding one of his own face, she demanded--
"Have you done--have you got through?"
"Yes, Mrs. Cooper, this is all I came to say. It is the suggestion of prudence--the caution of a friend--your daughter is young, very young, and--"
"I thank you! I thank you! My daughter is young, very young; but she is no fool, Mr. Calvert--let me tell you that! Margaret Cooper is no fool.
If you don"t know that, I do. I know her. She"s able to take care of herself as well as the best of us."
"I am glad you think so, Mrs. Cooper, but the best of us find it a difficult matter to steer clear of danger, and error and misfortune; and the wisest, my dear madam, are only too apt to fall when they place their chief reliance on their wisdom."
"Indeed! that"s a new doctrine to me, and I reckon to everybody else. If it"s true, what"s the use of all your schooling, I want to know?"
"Precious little, Mrs. Cooper, if--"
"Ah! precious little; and let me tell you, Mr. Calvert, I think it"s mighty strange that you should think Margaret Cooper in more need of your advice, than Jane Colter, or Betsy Barnes, or Susan Mason, or Rebecca Forbes, or even the widow Thackeray."
"I should give the same advice to them under the same circ.u.mstances, Mrs. Cooper."
"Should you, indeed! Then I beg you will go and give it to them, for if they are not in the same circ.u.mstances now, they"d give each of them an eye to be so. Ay, wouldn"t they! Yes! don"t I know, Mr. Calvert, that it"s all owing to envy that you come here talking about Brother Stevens."
"But I do not speak of Mr. Stevens, Mrs. Cooper; were it any other young man with whom your daughter had such intimacy I should speak in the same manner."
"Would you, indeed? Tell that to the potatoes. Don"t I know better.