Mary did not return the question; she did not ask "What have _you_ been doing?" but as she looked up into her lover"s face, what was it that made it impossible to return the smile, the glance, with which he awaited the reply? What was it that made her turn away her eyes with a pang--almost a shudder at her heart? Alas! what new impression did she receive from looking on that face, which had been to her the beloved dream, the haunting vision of her youth.
Was it come to this. Had absence changed her heart? Had it become strange, untrue, towards her early love? Did she turn her eyes away from her lover"s face because his cheek was haggard, his brow sunken, and his eye lost the brightness of those days when
"The sunshine of her life was in those eyes."
Ah, no! she felt that this was not the case. Had she but read signs of grief, of sickness, written there, and her heart would have gone forth to soothe and sympathize with all the truth and fervour of the past.
But no, it was none of these which had laid their signet there. Alas for her enlightened eyes! she felt it was not sorrow--not sickness--but sin; that no cloud had settled on his brow which she could have dared the fond attempt to pierce; and agony to think that it should have come to this; that she should be seated at his side, and feel it were not possible that she could lay her weary head upon that lover"s arm, place her hand in his, with the love and confidence with which she had even yearned towards another.
But this had been the vague and pa.s.sing reflection of a second. With scarcely perceptible pause she had softly replied:
"I have done little, Eugene, which would count for much in your varied and busy existence. The most important feature in my own consideration has been an excursion to Italy, which I took last summer with my brother."
Mary"s voice trembled nervously as she uttered these last words, for she felt that now had come an opportunity she must not neglect, for leading on to the critical subject on which she had to speak: and, as if to support her desperate purpose, unclasped the little trinket-case she had all this time still held concealed in the palm of her delicate hand.
"To Italy! oh, indeed;" was Eugene"s reply. "I was very nearly going there at the same time; it was just a chance that I did not. My father"s illness, a constant tie upon my movements, prevented me at the last moment; how delightful it would have been if we had met."
Mary made no reply, but looked down still with that peculiar expression which could not but strike Eugene as ominous of something of an important and peculiar nature.
"And you were charmed, I suppose;" he proceeded, perusing her countenance with increasing interest and attention; "so much so that I fear you would scarcely have considered my society as an addition to your enjoyment; you have learnt to live too well without me, I am afraid, Mary."
That low and flattering tone of other days thrilled Mary"s heart, and flushed her cheek with emotions as of old; but gently removing the hand which for an instant she pa.s.sively yielded to his pressure, she did not raise her eyes as once she would have done, in tender rebuke at the unjust a.s.sumption--she did not say how wearisome and dark had life become without him--how void, wasted and incomplete!--but hurriedly, as if she feared the working of the olden spell, and the consequent melting away of her sterner resolution, she started forward upon the anxious theme weighing on her heart.
"I met with a strange adventure at Tivoli, Eugene; it was about that I wished most particularly to speak to you. One morning, as I was walking out early, I found this ring upon the ground;" and as she spoke she produced the signet from the case, and held it towards him. "You may imagine how surprised I was to see your initials, and your crest; I scarcely knew indeed what to think, till walking on a little further I overtook--Mr. Temple!"
Her listener, who had at first taken the ring wonderingly from her hand; as she proceeded, raised it to the light, and then abruptly, as if for the purpose of closer examination, he started up and approached the candle.
He uttered not a word, but had his face not been turned away, it might have been seen to have changed to an ashy hue.
"I was surprised," Mary proceeded, "for though the initials were thus accounted for, the crest being yours seemed too unlikely a coincidence; indeed I had previously cherished a vague but wild idea that it might possibly belong to your brother, and that his long-wished for recovery was at hand."
She paused, but no comment on her words, no reply, but an almost fiercely impatient interrogative: "Well?" as he turned his countenance, but not his eyes, round upon her, proceeded from his lips.
"Well, you see I was disappointed," her mild voice resumed more firmly, now that she had launched upon the critical theme beyond recall. "At least," she added, with a wistful earnest glance, "I found, as I said before, that it had been dropped by Mr. Temple. Oh, Eugene! how came it in his possession--that ring, that impression which I remember to have seen upon a letter--that fatal letter which seemed to have been the beginning of so much sorrow and annoyance. Oh! what is this mysterious connection subsisting between you and Mr. Temple? tell me--tell me truly--faithfully--what is it that makes this signet with your arms, your crest, his also?"
Eugene Trevor burst into a forced and insulting laugh.
"Good Heavens, Mary! why not ask that question of Temple himself? how in the world am I to tell whether it might have been begged, borrowed, or stolen by the clerical impostor? Stolen most likely--as I can pretty plainly perceive," fixing on her face a keen and cynical look of scrutiny; "he has managed to steal something else besides. Yes," he continued, "I begin to understand now the secret of the cold looks and measured words with which, after so long a separation, I am received by you, Mary. I see what this excursion to Italy has done for me. It is _I_ who ought to ask questions, I think. You saw a great deal of Temple, I conclude, after the first adventure?"
Though Eugene endeavoured to a.s.sume a tone of irritated suspicion natural to a man whose jealousy was not unreasonably awakened, there was a look of dark and eager anxiety in his countenance which could not be concealed.
"Yes," Mary continued in a tolerably firm voice, though she had turned a little pale at her lover"s implied accusation, "circ.u.mstances certainly did throw us together--circ.u.mstances neither of his seeking or my own."
A fierce fiery expression shot from Eugene"s eye.
"Oh, they did!" he exclaimed, taking refuge in the pa.s.sionate burst of rage in which his feelings found vent. "I thought so; and this is his most honourable, most virtuous mode of proceeding, insinuating himself into your society, inveigling your affections by his heroic sanct.i.ty, and poisoning your ear by base and interested insinuations against myself--if he wishes to circulate his malicious lies, why not speak them out plainly like a man--not send you to attack me in this manner with that accursed ring?" dashing the signet forcibly to the ground.
"Eugene!" interposed Mary, "these reflections on the most honourable and upright of men are unfounded and unjust. There was nothing in the nature of our intercourse with which the most jealous could find fault. He, Mr.
Temple, was in a manner forced into joining my brother and myself during a short excursion, by an old friend, Mr. Wynne, with whom he was travelling, and at last parted from us abruptly. As to the rest it is I alone on whom your displeasure need fall; it was by my anxious importunity alone--which he tried in vain to evade--that I drew from him all that I learnt on a subject on which it has become necessary to the peace and quiet of my spirit, that I should be more clearly enlightened.
He told me that his lips were sealed upon the points on which I questioned him; but that some mystery does exist--some mystery respecting your brother, Eugene, some mystery in which you yourself, and indeed he Mr. Temple, are strangely, closely confused--is most certain.
And then he gave me back that ring, and referred me to you for a true and faithful relation of all I so anxiously desired to ascertain; or for your sake, as well as my own, to bid you farewell for ever. Oh, Eugene!
disperse then, I implore you, this dark, bewildering cloud, for I cannot, cannot walk on any more groping in this darkness. Think of me what you please--wrong my motives if you will, but only show me the truth whatever it may be; or, Eugene," she added, faintly, her voice melted into a tone of mingled compa.s.sion and concern, "I must indeed put an end at once to my ceaseless perplexity, by bidding you farewell for ever."
Eugene Trevor was calm now, though still livid with the pa.s.sion into which he had excited himself. He sat down, close to Mary"s side, and there was a dogged air of resolution expressed in his countenance.
"I am willing to tell anything that you may wish to ask," he said sarcastically, "to tear off any part of this delightful veil of mystery in which you have been pleased to invest my deeds and actions, for the benefit of your romantic imagination. So pray begin your catechism."
"Your brother?" was the faint and faltering interrogatory, which came from Mary"s lips.
Eugene Trevor"s a.s.sumed calmness vanished; he started up, and approached the fire-place, murmuring hoa.r.s.ely:
"Well, what of him?"
"Where is he? Who is he? How is it that he does not return or appear in England--in the world? What has he to do with Mr. Temple? For that some mysterious link does exist between those two; I have for sometime had suspicions which I can no longer quell, or put aside as imaginary and vain--by night as well as by day I have been haunted by wild, strange dreams that Mr. Temple and your brother are the same."
She paused aghast, for she had risen and approached Eugene in her excitement, and now stood gazing as Adah might have gazed upon the face of her husband Cain, when for the first time his countenance was revealed to her in all its undisguised hatred and wrathfulness of expression.
"Eugene!" she murmured, her voice melting into a tone of mingled surprize, compa.s.sion and concern. "Eugene!" and she laid her hand soothingly on his arm.
He turned his eyes, flashing defiance upon her.
"Well," he cried, "and if they were, pray, what of that?"
"If--if" she cried, returning his gaze unshrinkingly, "then--then your brother, Eugene, should not _now_--never should have been a banished exile from his home and heritage. They have wronged him basely, who ever, on the plea of madness, deprived such a man of honour, hope and happiness. Farewell indeed, Eugene, if this _could_ be the case.
Farewell, at least, till you have repaired your grievous error, and restored Eustace Trevor to all which has been wrongfully, deceitfully taken from him."
She turned away, but Eugene Trevor seized her hand.
"Stop, Mary," he said in a low voice of subdued and concentrated rage.
"Stop, if you please, and hear _me_. You may remember, you said, a little time ago, farewell, _if_ I did not reveal to you all you desired to know. I have told you nothing yet, though you seem indeed too ready to conclude every thing of the blackest and most preposterous description against me. But although you are so eager for any excuse to rid yourself of me, for ever; though the heart you once swore would scarcely have been torn from me, were I proved to be the greatest villain upon earth, has shown itself a very woman"s in its weakness, its feebleness, its inconstancy. Yes, Mary, villain as you may wish to consider me, _I_ preserve at least the virtue of _constancy_. I love you as much as ever, Mary. I will not give you up. What," he exclaimed, fixing his eyes upon her pale and startled countenance, and advancing towards her as she sunk down upon a sofa, "do you own yourself, false and faithless, enough to wish that I should do so? Do you now love this Eustace, this Temple, whatever he may please to call himself?"
"Eugene!" gasped Mary"s blanched lips.
"Answer me, Mary, or rather prove it. I see indeed that our marriage has been deferred too long; promise me, _swear_, that it shall take place secretly; there is nothing now that should impede it. I can manage my father now, that that woman will be out of the way. You know, Mary--you cannot wonder that I should have considered her presence as an objection to your entrance into my father"s house; the obstacle will now be removed."
But Mary shrank back with shuddering repugnance at the suggestion thus presented to her delicate imagination. _She_ invited to take the place of Mabel Marryott--_she_ to have room made for her within her lover"s home, by the removal of such a being.
"Mary, you are not--you cannot own yourself so faithless and so false as to love that other man."
"No--Eugene--no. What right have you to entertain such a suspicion? but you--you have not told me what I required."
"But I _will_ tell you, Mary--I will tell you everything. I will redeem--I will atone for all that I may have done--I will lay my fate in your hands--I will yield my future conduct, my every action, to your guidance and direction. As your husband, I shall be content to give up all, whatsoever your wishes may cost me. But I will wait no longer; say you will be my wife, Mary: and I swear to fulfil whatever you may impose upon me."
He had pa.s.sed his arm with a kind of reckless excitement round her waist, and now held her tightly towards him, so that her heart beat wildly against his own, though she shrank trembling from the close embrace, and still he repeated, with a voice which sounded to her ear more like hatred than affection:
"Say--promise me, you will marry me in a week, Mary, publicly or in secret, as you will; you are your own mistress, no one can prevent you.
Speak, say that one word, Mary, and you shall hear everything as truly as if I stood before the judgment-seat of G.o.d."