CHAP. XIV.

Angelo returned home; his head and heart filled with the wildest anarchy of sensation—passion, remorse, delight, and wretchedness; he now began to see, too plainly, the error he had been guilty of, in trusting himself so frequently in the society of a fascinating object; but felt, alas! that it was now impossible to recede; and though his vivid imagination presented to him images of horror around, he felt that he must inevitably rush among them; for the long-smothered passion, that now flamed in defiance of reason and honor in his breast, had too furiously burst forth to be restrained; he had fled—hastily fled, and so far, for the moment, had struggled successfully against the dangerous voice of delusion, from the lovely and too captivating Paulina. But with dismay, and bitter regret, he acknowledged, that he could never more be capable of such resolution. The remainder of the day, and the whole night, he passed in misery and self-accusation, but above all in thinking of his love. The images of the injured Gabrielle and his unconscious child stood before him in melancholy and reproachful seeming, but above all towered that of Paulina; now that he had discovered she loved him, to aim at victory over himself was vain, and though he felt his error, the seducing conviction of her tenderness, so innocently avowed, relaxed his energy, and incapacitated him even from the attempt.

On the following morning, according to promise, he hastened, with trembling eagerness once more to behold her; she was not on the accustomed spot—he waited with agonizing impatience—but she did not come—he wandered to a considerable distance—his straining eyes sought her in every direction—all was vain—and, in a state of mind raging with grief and disappointment, he was compelled to abandon all hope of seeing her for the day, and return homewards.

The idea which tortured him most was, that the tender and artless girl, affected at his seeming coldness of the preceding day, in hastening from her, could not find courage to encounter him again, and in the anguish that this thought inspired, he accused himself of unnecessary cruelty and insensibility towards her, and too great severity towards himself. In consequence of this impression, the weakness of his heart obtained a triumph over his better reason, and he determined, when next he beheld her, by yielding with less reserve to the sweet influence of her love, that he would endeavour to retrieve her happiness. When the gloomy day, which he had passed without feasting his eyes upon her beauty, had expired, and the sleepless and perturbed night had likewise passed away, he repaired at an earlier hour than usual to the hill, and soon had the now unspeakable happiness of beholding her on whom his mind was fixed. He saw, and flew to meet—but how was his happiness converted into sorrow and alarm, when he observed that beauteous countenance suffused in tears.

“Heaven, my beloved Paulina!” he exclaimed, seizing her hand, “why these tears?”

“Alas!” answered Paulina, with redoubled grief, “the day, the hour is fixed; I cannot escape, my father is now determined.”

“To marry you, Paulina?”

“Yes, yes, to the hateful Castro Nardi; never, never now, can I bring my mind to consent; sooner would I die; oh, if I had never seen you!”

Angelo trembled; “No, dear Paulina, it shall not be, trust me; but tell me the day that it is intended to——”

Paulina fixed her eyes of heavenly blue upon the face of Angelo, with an expression of anguish and despair, and exclaimed, “To-morrow!”

Angelo started back; “To-morrow, Paulina!” he cried; “then no time is to be lost; lead me instantly to your father, and I will speak to him.”

“Will you; will you, indeed?” cried Paulina, clapping her hands and smiling through her tears, “Come, then, let us hasten; perhaps to you he may relent.”

The warm, precipitate Angelo put forth his hand; Paulina seized it, and flew with, rather than led him to a retired spot, where, situated on the borders of a thick wood, and almost hidden by trees, rose a lowly hut, but seeming the abode neither of comfort nor content—attendants often in the cottage of the poor. Here Paulina stopping, looked at Angelo with a timid blush, and, pointing to the cottage, said, “There I live; can such a one as you deign to enter that place?”

“Can you ask me such a question?” said Angelo, reproachfully; and Paulina, without waiting for more, hurried on, and raising the latch, she entered the cottage, whither Angelo followed, unhesitatingly.

At the further end of the room, employed in mending a fishing net, sat the father of the fair Paulina, whom age and ugliness rendered less forbidding than the stern ferocity of aspect which fully conveyed the idea, that such a man could remain for ever inflexible to the pleadings of youth and beauty, and insensible to the feelings of humanity. An aged female, his counterpart in expression of countenance, was busied over the fire; as the door opened, the eyes of both momentarily glanced towards it, and though Paulina came accompanied by a stranger, the man did not arise, neither did the female relax her employment.

“Father,” began Paulina, while Angelo wondered in secret how so celestial a creature could call such a being parent, “I have brought you here a kind Signore, who does not wish that you should marry me to Castro Nardi; and who promises, if you will give up your cruel intention, that he——”

“Ho, ho!” cried the fisherman, Mezzotetto, interrupting his daughter with a hideous grin, “this, then, is the Signore that has turned your brain, and promised you that he would make me alter my will; well, then, Signore,” added he, with insolent contempt, looking towards Angelo, and still continuing his employment, “hear, now, what I am going to say; for when I’ve told you my mind, I shall not speak another word, though you stood here till night. This girl, whom you are so obliging as to interest yourself about, is not to be sold, like other poor girls, to any Signore that will bid for her; she was not brought up with that intention,[A] and you must look among my neighbours for another. Now, then, Signore, this girl is my daughter, and therefore my property; she shall marry my old friend Castro Nardi—and more than that, she shall marry him to-morrow. You have heard my mind; neither all your gold will move me to change a tittle of it, nor all your fair speeches to say another word.”

Angelo was indignant at the insolence and abruptness of the fisherman, while Paulina appeared covered with confusion at such language being addressed to him, and knew not where to hide her head; but indignant as was Angelo, when he looked at the lovely girl, he suppressed his rage, and condescended, for her sake, to address her father. This he did in a gentle and persuasive accent, representing to him the cruelty of the sacrifice he was about to make; and, notwithstanding what he had observed, offering, upon condition that he would abandon his purpose, to make him any compensation he would require.

It was in vain, however, that Angelo thus descended; the fisherman answered not a word; but when he found that, still entertaining hope of effecting a change, he made use of different arguments, and various inducements, he suddenly rose from his chair, and opening the door of the hovel, looked at Angelo with a significant nod, and pointed towards it. The indignation of Angelo now rose to a height; he looked fiercely at the rude ruffian before him, and his arm was raised to strike.—Paulina flew towards him, and seizing his uplifted arm, whispered at the same moment, “Save me!”

This recalled his self-possession; contempt took the place of rage in his breast; he looked tenderly and expressively at Paulina, and with a glance of scorn at the savage Mezzotetto, he quitted in silence the cottage.

Soon, however, the remembrance of the insolence he had met with was displaced by considerations more momentous, and of deeper interest. If he did not devise some prompt means of saving Paulina, on the morrow she would be immolated at the shrine of grossest barbarism, by the most unprecedented and savage obstinacy; every exertion would then be vain. “No, no;” said he, quickening his pace, in the attempt to justify himself for the keen solicitude he felt; “nature and common humanity forbid that such a sacrifice should be permitted; it becomes a duty to endeavour to prevent it, and I will use my best efforts.” As he proceeded he considered the means of putting his designs in execution: a thousand various plans suggested themselves to his heated fancy, and in turn were eagerly embraced and rejected.

At length, after deeply pondering, he decided that he would return about night-fall to the cottage, seek some means of seeing Paulina, and not leave the spot till he had succeeded; then, if she still stated her father to remain inflexible, withdraw her at once from a power he so much abused, and place her in some secure asylum. But withdrawing a young girl from her parents, and placing her in another asylum, becoming responsible for her future fate, entailing new duties on himself, and new difficulties! How afterwards to dispose of her? These reflections entered not the giddy mind of Angelo, or if they did, he repressed, and would not allow himself to attend to them. One difficulty which presented itself, and which gave him most consideration to surmount, was where, if it should be necessary immediately to withdraw her, he might for the present place her.

Suddenly he recollected that a man, who had formerly been his servant, but who was now married and lived in the suburbs, near Pausilyppo, would with alacrity perform any thing he should require, and in his house he determined, till a more eligible situation could be discovered, to place her. Thus far arranged, his mind became somewhat lightened; for, on the impropriety, rashness, and danger, exclusive of other considerations, of involving himself in an affair of this nature, he would not for a moment think. Anxiously passed the hours with him till dusk came on, he left his home, no longer pleasing to him, because of the reproaches it conveyed to his heart, and wrapped in the concealment of a loose cloak, directed his steps towards the hut of the fisherman.

By the time he arrived, it had become dark; he approached the lowly hovel, and through the crevice of the shutter espied a light within;—drawing still nearer, he could perceive what was passing; he applied his eye to a small aperture, and beheld the fair Paulina, with her father and mother, seated round a table, in jovial supper, and apparent good fellowship; the mother was laughing heartily; the sternness of the father’s features had considerably relaxed, and the ever-beautiful Paulina wore upon her’s a triumphant smile.

“How is this?” said Angelo to himself, pausing in dismay, when the idea suggested itself that the lovely Paulina had consented to become the wife of Castro Nardi, and thus had re-established the harmony which appeared to reign among them: he trembled at the thought, for he felt, if so, that his interference would be undesired; and however in the morning he had pretended to himself, that duty and humanity alone called him to active exertion, in this case he now felt that if that duty existed no longer, he should be miserable, for that he had a motive still more powerful to impel him. While he still continued gazing, but without being able to distinguish their conversation, he beheld Paulina rise from the table, and approaching the door, pause close to it, and seem to listen as for some sound without.

This movement revived his hopes: he quitted instantly the window, and advancing towards the door, ventured gently to tap against it.—Immediately an answering tap from within convinced him he had been heard;—his heart bounded—and he remained immoveable against the door, listening for every breath, and at every slight movement supposing Paulina would appear. At length, sick at heart with the delay, once more he looked through the casement, the lamp was extinguished, and the only light which remained was emitted from the wood fire, which still continued to blaze on the hearth. Neither the father nor mother of Paulina were longer visible, but in a few moments he beheld herself, like the goddess of night, stealing along on tip-toe, covered with a large mantle of grey cloth, and a long veil, which, for the present however, depended from the back of her head, and shewed in full perfection the alabaster forehead, round which luxuriantly twined the amber ringlets, and wantoned over her graceful shoulders, in rich elastic waves of gold.

Angelo gazed with rapture and delight, yet scarce could he gaze, from impatience to behold her near him. Paulina advanced, carefully undrew the slender bolt, gently raised the latch, and in a moment was in his eager arms.

“Hush!” she cried, withdrawing herself, “you must not speak while we are here;” and, seizing his arm, she led him rapidly along, till they had advanced a considerable way. “Now then,” said Paulina, suddenly stopping, “now then you must determine; my father and mother are both asleep—I seized the opportunity, and boldly ventured past their bed, knowing from your signal that you were without. Say, say then at once,” she presently added, clasping one of his hands between both her’s, “do you wish to save the poor Paulina? If you do, I shall be too happy—if you do not, death or the bitterest misery must be my portion, for return home I never will to be the wife of Castro Nardi!”

Angelo pressed the weeping beauty to his breast; again, in the assumed form of humanity, spoke the powerful voice of passion, “Yes, yes, fair creature,” he ardently exclaimed, “I will save—I will protect you;” when, jealous doubt for a moment intervening, he added, “but tell me, Paulina, how was it, that with the horror of this dreaded marriage in perspective, I could behold you a short time ago gaily sporting and laughing with your parents at supper?”

“What,” cried Paulina, hastily, “were you there so early? and did you not readily conceive my motives for such conduct? I wanted to make my father believe, that having no longer any hope of his changing his resolution, I was desirous to obey him as cheerfully as I could. I feared, by appearing still disposed to resist, he might have used hard measures with me, confined and watched me till the very moment arrived for my marriage with Castro Nardi. When they found me seeming so patient and dutiful, they had no suspicion, but praised me to the skies, and were kinder to me than ever.—I know it was very wrong to deceive my parents, but——”

“Enough, enough, dear Paulina, you have, I confess, taken a weight off my mind, by the avowal of your innocent stratagem, so well imagined, and under all circumstances so perfectly excuseable!”

“Ah, then! could you believe that I was really happy? could you suppose, for a moment, that I would agree to marry the handsomest Cavalier in all Italy, after seeing you? much less the odious old Castro Nardi, who is besides as wicked as he is ugly!”

The words so artlessly expressed, “after seeing you,” shot through the heart of Angelo; he drew the hand of Paulina through his arm, and pausing a moment, looked tenderly at her, and in a tremulous voice, said, “Paulina, sweet girl, I fear you love me.”—

“Ah, I do indeed; but why do you fear it?”

“Why should I?” said Angelo, to himself, “And do you really love me, Paulina?,” he cried.

“Oh, I loved you,” cried Paulina, with animation, “from the first moment that I saw you; and when I learnt that you was my Lord il Conte D’Albini, I was afraid, indeed, to continue to love you, and I tried all I could to overcome my passion; but, instead of that, all my trying only made me love you the more!”

Angelo was almost wild at this seducing confession; the very artlessness of which rendered it doubly dangerous; he forgot in a moment his self-possession; his virtue! reason! honor! all, all was lost, in the overpowering delusion of the moment; he pressed Paulina in his arms, and now felt, beyond the power of sophistry to prevent, how much, and how completely he was, and had been throughout, the slave of the most consuming passion! All further hesitations, all further struggles, were now from the question; he seized the hand of the bewitching girl, and led her rapidly along, till they reached the abode where, for the present, he desired to place her. Arrived, by the help of certain arguments that speak in a language ever most convincing to vulgar minds, the possessors of the house, who were besides under extensive obligations to Angelo, received, without a single question, and without the slightest demur, the lovely Paulina beneath their roof; for indifferent were they to the fate of youth and innocence, careless respecting its sacrifice or preservation, further than their own interest might be concerned.

Here, then, in a tumult of love and agitation, the rash imprudent Angelo left, reluctantly, his beauteous charge, after giving every order for her accommodation, and tenderly promising that he would see her early on the following day. He had now entered too dreadfully deep in the path of error, to think even of retracting; his whole thoughts were of Paulina.—She agitated his heart with the strongest emotions of passion;—his brain she filled with eternal anarchy;—he visited her daily;—he could enjoy no happiness when out of her presence;—the hours he passed not with her, hung heavy with disgust;—and perpetual fears tormented him, lest the beloved of his heart should be discovered in her present asylum, so ineligible, so unworthy of her, by her father, or perhaps by Castro Nardi; but, above all, lest Gabrielle, that injured Gabrielle, of whom he dreaded to think, should learn his apostacy, and seek in person to convince herself of the truth.

These were the ideas that racked and disquieted him, and were some alloy to the guilty pleasures he enjoyed. One morning Paulina informed him, that on the preceding evening she had observed two men walking to and fro, beneath her window, one of whom, she was almost certain, was her father. Angelo, alarmed, felt all his fears on the point of being verified; his mind became filled with a thousand different plans for the security of his cherished prize; he would have moved her instantly to another habitation, but remembered that all places might be equally insecure beyond the moment.

How much, however, were his apprehensions increased, when on the following morning she told him, with a countenance of alarm, that so late as after his departure the night before, standing as usual at the window to catch a last glance of his person, she beheld a female of a commanding figure, and wrapped in a loose mantle, issue as it were from the house, (though of that she could not be certain, as the situation of her window prevented her from having a view of the door,) and follow him at a slow pace as long as he remained in sight, still keeping a short distance from him.

This intelligence struck him with dismay far exceeding what he had yet felt, and it was not diminished when he suddenly remembered, that on returning home last night, Gabrielle was not as usual sitting up for him; but on enquiry he had learned, that she had retired early to her own apartment. Instantly this vague association of circumstances struck him with the idea that she must have watched his steps, traced him to the house, remained till she saw him leave it, and then, following him home, have returned secretly to her own apartment. He immediately concluded, therefore, that he was betrayed to her by the very persons with whom Paulina was placed, and whom, although he had not confided to them aught, might, if they chose, inform her of sufficient to excite her jealousy and suspicion.

These reflections filled him with confusion and perturbation; he perceived the necessity, so deemed by him, of taking instantly some certain measures to preserve Paulina from the dreadful consequences of discovery. To his terrified imagination it now appeared that she was beset by danger, and that not a moment must be lost to withdraw her from its power. Paulina, who appeared to read in his varying countenance the distraction of his mind, affectionately pressing his hand to her bosom, said, “Ah, dearest Angelo, would we were in another land; any where that I might behold you happy, and at ease.”

Angelo, who had been revolving in his mind the best plan to follow, was roused by this sentiment—he looked at Paulina; a dreadful idea glanced through his brain—he trembled to pursue it, more still to indulge it; yet, involuntarily, in an eager voice, he exclaimed, “Could you, could you be happy with me in another land, Paulina?”

“Happy!” returned Paulina, with an air of reproach, and fixing on him, with the softest tenderness, her dark blue eyes, “Now surely, Angelo, you have asked that question in sport, for you cannot doubt that I could be happy with you on the top of the wildest rock—in a cave—in a savage forest—any where.”

“Oh, say no more—say no more,” cried Angelo, pressing his hand to his forehead, “say no more, unless you would distract me, and make me more a wretch than I am!—Did I bid you be silent? Could I? Oh, repeat again what you have so sweetly said.”

“Nay, dearest Angelo, look not so wildly, and I will repeat, that I could be happy with you any where; without you, no where.”

“’Tis done,” cried Angelo, starting up and gazing upon her; “this, this is the work of fate; such transcendant beauty as your’s should never have been thrown in the path of one whose duties forbade him to be enslaved by it;—but—but the die is now cast;” and, pressing her in his arms, “mine you are by choice, and mine now, in despite of every consideration, you shall continue to be; not fate itself shall have power to break those ties it hath so closely entwined.—— I leave thee, Paulina, for a short time; I leave thee—heaven be thy guard meanwhile.”

Like every determination, however rash, wild, or imprudent, which entered the erring mind of Angelo, he dwelt on this with a spirit of infuriate ardor and adherence, which, till put in force, allowed him repose neither night nor day. To quit Italy with a girl whom scarcely he could be said to know, but whose uncommon personal beauty had fascinated his senses and enslaved his reason,—who was devoid of the divine charm which alone adds interest to beauty—mind;—and who possessed, to compensate, nothing but a graceful naiveté of manner, or expression; all this appeared no longer a plan of folly and of danger, or replete with injury or baseness to others; his violent and uncontrollable passion carried all before it, and superseded every consideration of reason, honor, or duty.

“It is in vain, it is in vain,” he would say to himself; “I respect, I venerate the virtues of Gabrielle, but I adore to distraction the too beauteous Paulina. Loving another, then, I can no longer make her happy; to remain with her, while my whole soul is another’s, would be an insult to the undivided tenderness she still bears me, but which I, alas! unhappy that I am, can no longer with equal ardor return. I leave her then;”—when suddenly the thought of his child intervening, whom, next to Paulina, he most tenderly doated on, gave a fresh turn to his thoughts; and the cruel idea of robbing him from Gabrielle, to make him the innocent partner of his intended flight, for the moment suggested itself and was paused on: “but, no, no;” he would suddenly exclaim, “that would be too barbarous—she shall retain the beloved boy; he—he may console her for the unavoidable dereliction of which his father is guilty.” Then, urged by a reproaching conscience not to inflict upon the unconscious Gabrielle an unnecessary pang, he would reluctantly consider, for a moment, the feasibility of his still continuing with her, and whether it might not be possible to retain, secure and unmolested, the fair object of his love, without departing from Italy; but soon this idea he rejected, on the plea of future discovery, if it were not already certain; then should he have to encounter bitter, because merited reproaches and wretchedness at home; restraint and perpetual apprehension when abroad. He recurred, then, with eagerness to the first suggestion—the sad and cruel alternative of departure.

Once decided on this point, home became dreadful to him, from the poignant yet silent reproaches which it made him; intoxicated with the beauty of Paulina, resolved, yet involuntarily hesitating to strike the dreadful blow upon the head of the wretched Gabrielle, his blood in an unceasing ferment with passion, anxiety, and remorse, he became impatient to fix at once the cruel moment of departure—for the consciousness of intended crime was still more dreadful than the commission of it; he desired to escape objects and scenes which rung in his ears the perpetual larum of his guilt; and, with the fury of madness, he desired to leap down the frightful precipice, without pausing on the verge to contemplate it.

The fatal step was taken; suddenly and secretly, with Paulina he quitted Naples;—he deserted the unhappy Gabrielle! he deserted his child! he yielded to the seductions of an ignoble passion; and, while he stamped himself a wretch, hurled misery and destruction on the head of others.