Rain began to fall, and the drops pattered upon the foliage with a mournful noise, as if everything around us wept. Eva"s thin dress was soon soaked with the cold flood. The water streamed from her hair over her face. She bruised her feet against the stones of the road, and repeatedly stumbled and fell upon her knees; but she rose again with the energy of despair, and pushed forwards. It was agonising to behold her.
I scarcely dared look at her, lest I should see her fall dead before my eyes. At last--we were moving in silence, fatigued and discouraged--Mrs Meredith pushed us suddenly aside, sprang forward and plunged into the bushes. We followed her, and, upon raising the torches--alas! she was on her knees beside the body of William, who was stretched motionless upon the ground, his eyes glazed and his brow covered with blood which flowed from a wound in the left temple.
""Doctor?" said Eva to me. That one word expressed--"Does William live?"
"I stooped and felt the pulse of William Meredith; I placed my hand on his heart and remained silent. Eva still gazed at me; but, when my silence was prolonged, I saw her bend, waver, and then, without word or cry, fall senseless upon her husband"s corpse.
"But, ladies," said Dr Barnaby, turning to his audience, "the sun shines again; you can go out now. Let us leave this sad story where it is."
Madame de Moncar approached the old physician. "Doctor," said she, "I implore you to continue; only look at us, and you will not doubt the interest with which we listen."
There were no more smiles of mockery upon the young faces that surrounded the village doctor. In some of their eyes he might even distinguish the glistening of tears. He resumed his narrative.
"Mrs Meredith was carried home, and remained for several hours senseless upon her bed. I felt it at once a duty and a cruelty to use every effort to recall her to life. I dreaded the agonising scenes that would follow this state of immobility. I remained beside the poor woman, bathing her temples with fresh water, and awaiting with anxiety the sad and yet the happy moment of returning consciousness. I was mistaken in my antic.i.p.ations, for I had never witnessed great grief. Eva half opened her eyes and immediately closed them again; no tear escaped from beneath their lids. She remained cold, motionless, silent; and, but for the heart which again throbbed beneath my hand, I should have deemed her dead. Sad is it to behold a sorrow which one feels is beyond consolation! Silence, I thought, seemed like a want of pity for this unfortunate creature: on the other hand, verbal condolence was a mockery of so mighty a grief. I had found no words to calm her uneasiness; could I hope to be more eloquent in the hour of her great suffering? I took the safest course, that of profound silence. I will remain here, I thought, and minister to the physical sufferings, as is my duty; but I will be mute and pa.s.sive, even as a faithful dog would lie down at her feet. My mind once made up, I felt calmer; I let her live a life which resembled death. After a few hours, however, I put a spoonful of a potion to her lips. Eva slowly averted her head. In a few moments I again offered her the drug.
""Drink, madam," I said, gently touching her lips with the spoon. They remained closed.
""Madam, your child!" I persisted in a low voice.
"Eva opened her eyes, raised herself with effort upon her elbow, swallowed the medicine, and fell back upon her pillow.
""I must wait," she murmured, "till another life is detached from mine!"
"Thenceforward Mrs Meredith spoke no more, but she mechanically followed all my prescriptions. Stretched upon her bed of suffering, she seemed constantly to sleep; but at whatever moment I said to her, even in my lowest whisper, "Drink this," she instantly obeyed; thus proving to me that the soul kept its weary watch in that motionless body, without a single instant of oblivion and repose.
"There were none beside myself to attend to the interment of William.
Nothing positive was ever known as to the cause of his death. The sum he was to bring from the town was not found upon him; perhaps he had been robbed and murdered; perhaps the money, which was in notes, had fallen from his pocket when he was thrown from his horse, and, as it was some time before any thought of seeking it, the heavy rain and trampled mud might account for its disappearance. A fruitless investigation was made and soon dropped. I endeavoured to learn from Eva Meredith if her family, or that of her husband, should not be written to. I had difficulty in obtaining an answer. At last she gave me to understand that I had merely to inform their agent, who would do whatever was needful. I hoped that, at least from England, some communication would arrive, decisive of this poor creature"s future lot. But no; day followed day, and none seemed to know that the widow of William Meredith lived in utter isolation, in a poor French village. To endeavour to bring back Eva to the sense of her existence, I urged her to leave her bed. Upon the morrow I found her up, dressed in black; but she was the ghost of the beautiful Eva Meredith. Her hair was parted in bands upon her pale forehead, and she sat near a window, motionless as she had lain in bed.
"I pa.s.sed long silent evenings with her, a book in my hand for apparent occupation. Each day, on my arrival, I addressed to her a few words of sympathy. She replied by a thankful look; then we remained silent. I waited an opportunity to open a conversation; but my awkwardness and my respect for her grief prevented my finding one, or suffered it to escape when it occurred. Little by little I grew accustomed to this mute intercourse; and, besides, what could I have said to her? My chief object was to prevent her feeling quite alone in the world; and, obscure as was the prop remaining, it still was something. I went to see her merely that my presence might say, "I am here."
"It was a singular epoch in my life, and had a great influence on my future existence. Had I not shown so much regret at the threatened destruction of the white cottage, I would hurry to the conclusion of this narrative. But you have insisted upon knowing why that building is hallowed to me, and I must tell you therefore what I have thought and felt beneath its humble roof. Forgive me, ladies, if my words are grave.
It is good for youth to be sometimes a little saddened; it has so much time before it to laugh and to forget.
"The son of a rich peasant, I was sent to Paris to complete my studies.
During four years pa.s.sed in that great city, I retained the awkwardness of my manners, the simplicity of my language, but I rapidly lost the ingenuousness of my sentiments. I returned to these mountains, almost learned, but almost incredulous in all those points of faith which enable a man to pa.s.s his life contentedly beneath a thatched roof, in the society of his wife and children, without caring to look beyond the cross above the village cemetery.
"Whilst contemplating the love of William and of Eva, I had reverted to my former simple peasant-nature. I began to dream of a virtuous, affectionate wife, diligent and frugal, embellishing my house by her care and order. I saw myself proud of the gentle severity of her features, revealing to all the chaste and faithful spouse. Very different were these reveries from those that haunted me at Paris after joyous evenings spent with my comrades. Suddenly, horrible calamity descended like a thunderbolt upon Eva Meredith. This time I was slower to appreciate the lesson I daily received. Eva sat constantly at the window, her sad gaze fixed upon the heavens. The att.i.tude, common in persons of meditative mood, attracted my attention but little. Her persistence in it at last struck me. My book open upon my knees, I looked at Mrs Meredith; and well a.s.sured she would not detect my gaze, I examined her attentively. She still gazed at the sky--my eyes followed the direction of hers. "Ah," I said to myself with a half smile, "she thinks to rejoin him _there_!" Then I resumed my book, thinking how fortunate it was for the weakness of women that such thoughts came to the relief of their sorrows.
"I have already told you that my student"s life had put evil thoughts into my head. Every day, however, I saw Eva in the same att.i.tude, and every day my reflections were recalled to the same subject. Little by little I came to think her dream a good one, and to regret I could not credit its reality. The soul, heaven, eternal life, all that the old priest had formerly taught me, glided through my imagination as I sat at eventide before the open window. "The doctrine of the old _cure_," I said to myself, "was more comforting than the cold realities science has revealed to me." Then I looked at Eva, who still looked to heaven, whilst the bells of the village church sounded sweetly in the distance, and the rays of the setting sun made the steeple cross glitter against the sky. I often returned to sit opposite the poor widow, persevering in her grief as in her holy hopes.
""What!" I thought, "can so much love address itself to a few particles of dust, already mingled with the mould; are all these sighs wasted on empty air? William departed in the freshness of his age, his affections yet vivid, his heart in its early bloom. She loved him but a year, one little year--and is all over for her? Above our heads is there nothing but void? Love--that sentiment so strong within us--is it but a flame placed in the obscure prison of our body, where it shines, burns, and is finally extinguished by the fall of the frail wall surrounding it? Is a little dust all that remains of our loves, and hopes, and pa.s.sions--of all that moves, agitates, and exalts us?"
"There was deep silence in the recesses of my soul. I had ceased to think. I was as if slumbering between what I no longer denied, and what I did not yet believe. At last, one night, when Eva joined her hands to pray, beneath the most beautiful starlit sky possible to behold, I know not how it was, but I found my hands also clasped, and my lips opened to murmur a prayer. Then, by a happy chance, and for the first time, Eva Meredith looked round, as if a secret instinct had whispered her that my soul harmonised with hers.
""Thanks," said she, holding out her hand, "keep him in your memory, and pray for him sometimes."
""Oh, madam!" I exclaimed, "may we all meet again in a better world, whether our lives have been long or short, happy or full of trial."
""His immortal soul looks down upon us!" she replied in a grave voice, whilst her gaze, at once sad and bright, reverted to the star-spangled heavens.
"Since that evening, when performing the duties of my profession, I have often witnessed death; but never without speaking to the sorrowing survivors a few consoling words on a better life than this one; and those words were words of conviction.
"At last, a month after these incidents, Eva Meredith gave birth to a son. When they brought her her child,--"William!" exclaimed the poor widow; and tears, soothing tears too long denied to her grief, escaped in torrents from her eyes. The child bore that much-loved name of William, and a little cradle was placed close to the mother"s bed. Then Eva"s gaze, long directed to heaven, returned earthwards. She looked to her child now, as she had previously looked to her G.o.d. She bent over him to seek his father"s features. Providence had permitted an exact resemblance between William and the son he was fated not to see. A great change occurred around us. Eva, who had consented to live until her child"s existence was detached from hers, was now, I could plainly see, willing to live on, because she felt that this little being needed the protection of her love. She pa.s.sed the days and evenings seated beside his cradle; and when I went to see her, oh! then she questioned me as to what she should do for him, she explained what he had suffered, and asked what could be done to save him from pain. For her child she feared the heat of a ray of sun, the chill of the lightest breeze. Bending over him, she shielded him with her body, and warmed him with her kisses. One day, I almost thought I saw her smile at him. But she never would sing, whilst rocking his cradle, to lull him to sleep; she called one of her women, and said, "Sing to my son that he may sleep." Then she listened, letting her tears flow softly upon little William"s brow. Poor child! he was handsome, gentle, easy to rear. But, as if his mother"s sorrow had affected him even before his birth, the child was melancholy: he seldom cried, but he never smiled: he was quiet; and at that age quiet seems to denote suffering. I fancied that all the tears shed over the cradle froze that poor little soul. I would fain have seen William"s arms twined caressingly round his mother"s neck. I would have had him return the kisses lavished upon him. "But what am I thinking about?" I then said to myself; "is it reasonable to expect that a little creature, not yet a year upon the earth, should understand that it is sent hither to love and console this woman?"
"It was, I a.s.sure you, a touching sight to behold this young mother, pale, feeble, and who had once renounced existence, clinging again to life for the sake of a little child which could not even say "Thanks, dear mother!" What a marvel is the human heart! Of how small a thing it makes much! Give it but a grain of sand, and it elevates a mountain; at its latest throb show it but an atom to love, and again its pulses revive; it stops for good only when all is void around it, and when even the shadow of its affections has vanished from the earth!
"Time rolled on, and I received a letter from an uncle, my sole surviving relative. My uncle, a member of the faculty of Montpellier, summoned me to his side, to complete in that learned town my initiation into the secrets of my art. This letter, in form an invitation, was in fact an order. I had to set out. One morning, my heart big when I thought of the isolation in which I left the widow and the orphan, I repaired to the white cottage to take leave of Eva Meredith. I know not whether an additional shade of sadness came over her features when I told her I was about to make a long absence. Since the death of William Meredith such profound melancholy dwelt upon her countenance that a smile would have been the sole perceptible variation: sadness was always there.
""You leave us?" she exclaimed; "your care is so useful to my child!"
"The poor lonely woman forgot to regret the departure of her last friend; the mother lamented the loss of the physician useful to her son.
I did not complain. To be useful is the sweet recompense of the devoted.
""Adieu!" she said, holding out her hand. "Wherever you go, may G.o.d bless you; and should it be His will to afflict you, may He at least afford you the sympathy of a heart compa.s.sionate as your own."
"I bowed over the hand of Eva Meredith; and I departed, deeply moved.
"The child was in the garden in front of the house, lying upon the gra.s.s, in the sun. I took him in my arms and kissed him repeatedly; I looked at him long, attentively, sadly, and a tear started to my eyes.
"Oh, no, no! I must be mistaken!" I murmured, and I hurried from the white cottage."
"Good heavens, doctor!" simultaneously exclaimed all Dr Barnaby"s audience, "what did you apprehend?"
"Suffer me to finish my story my own way," replied the village doctor; "everything shall be told in its turn. I relate these events in the order in which they occurred.
"On my arrival at Montpellier, I was exceedingly well received by my uncle; who declared, however, that he could neither lodge nor feed me, nor lend me money, and that as a stranger, without a name, I must not hope for a patient in a town so full of celebrated physicians.
""Then I will return to my village, uncle," replied I.
""By no means!" was his answer. "I have got you a lucrative and respectable situation. An old Englishman, rich, gouty, and restless, wishes to have a doctor to live with him, an intelligent young man who will take charge of his health under the superintendence of an older physician. I have proposed you--you have been accepted; let us go to him."
"We betook ourselves immediately to the residence of Lord James Kysington, a large and handsome house, full of servants, where, after waiting some time, first in the anteroom, and then in the parlours, we were at last ushered into the presence of the n.o.ble invalid. Seated in a large arm-chair was an old man of cold and severe aspect, whose white hair contrasted oddly with his eyebrows, still of a jet black. He was tall and thin, as far as I could judge through the folds of a large cloth coat, made like a dressing-gown. His hands disappeared under his cuffs, and his feet were wrapped in the skin of a white bear. A number of medicine vials were upon a table beside him.
""My lord, this is my nephew, Dr Barnaby."
"Lord Kysington bowed--that is to say, he looked at me, and made a scarcely perceptible movement with his head.
""He is well versed in his profession, and I doubt not that his care will be most beneficial to your lordship."
"A second movement of the head was the sole reply vouchsafed.
""Moreover," continued my relation, "having had a tolerably good education, he can read to your lordship, or write under your dictation."
""I shall be obliged to him," replied Lord Kysington, breaking silence at last, and then closing his eyes, either from fatigue, or as a hint that the conversation was to drop. I glanced around me. Near the window sat a lady, very elegantly dressed, who continued her embroidery without once raising her eyes, as if we were not worthy her notice. Upon the carpet at her feet a little boy amused himself with toys. The lady, although young, did not at first strike me as pretty--because she had black hair and eyes; and to be pretty, according to my notion, was to be fair, like Eva Meredith; and, moreover, in my inexperience, I held beauty impossible without a certain air of goodness. It was long before I could admit the beauty of this woman, whose brow was haughty, her look disdainful, and her mouth unsmiling. Like Lord Kysington, she was tall, thin, rather pale. In character they were too much alike to suit each other well. Formal and taciturn, they lived together without affection, almost without converse. The child, too, had been taught silence; he walked on tiptoe, and at the least noise a severe look from his mother or from Lord Kysington changed him into a statue.
"It was too late to return to my village; but it is never too late to regret what one has loved and lost. My heart ached when I thought of my cottage, my valley, my liberty.
"What I learned concerning the cheerless family I had entered was as follows:--Lord James Kysington had come to Montpellier for his health, deteriorated by the climate of India. Second son of the Duke of Kysington, and a lord only by courtesy, he owed to talent and not to inheritance his fortune and his political position in the House of Commons. Lady Mary was the wife of his youngest brother; and Lord James, free to dispose of his fortune, had named her son his heir.
"Towards me his lordship was most punctiliously polite. A bow thanked me for every service I rendered him. I read aloud for hours together, uninterrupted either by the sombre old man, whom I put to sleep, or by the young woman, who did not listen to me, or by the child, who trembled in his uncle"s presence. I had never led so melancholy a life, and yet, as you know, ladies, the little white cottage had long ceased to be gay; but the silence of misfortune implies reflections that words are insufficient to express. One feels the life of the soul under the stillness of the body. In my new abode it was the silence of a void.