Chapter XIX

The day after the excursion to Woolwich, Charles Huyton had left London for a short time. Perhaps had he been still in town, Isabel Barham would not have so readily engaged to attend the ceremony. For the last two years it had been the secret object of her life to make herself Mr. Huyton’s wife; yet she was often obliged to confess with regret, that she seemed no nearer to it than before. She managed well, too, with much prudence and discretion and perhaps had not the heart she besieged been pre-engaged, she might have been successful. But such a pursuit could not elevate the tone of her mind, improve her good feelings, or increase her susceptibility to generous emotions. There was no heart in it; it was simply a mercantile transaction.

The unconscious worship which Gwyneth bestowed on an idea, embodied to her fancy in the person of Mr. Ufford, was a far more ennobling sensation. She was admiring, sincerely admiring virtue and worth; and though deluding herself in supposing that these were inherent in an extraordinary degree in her idol’s character, she was perfectly unselfish and true in her feelings. When her time came to be undeceived, she would not, at least, have to confess that she had been mean and mercenary, that she deserved to be disappointed, and had no right to complain. Not so Isabel Barham; she was entangling herself, in her own endeavors to catch another; for if she escaped with feelings uninjured by love, she had, at least, a mind debased

Mr. Huyton came back to London rather earlier than had been expected; and soon after walked up from his lodgings to Eaton-place, where, as we have already noticed, he spent much of his time. Mr. Barham was within, and after some discussion of political questions, in which he had of late been trying to interest Charles Huyton, the elder gentleman observed casually—

“Miss Barham and her sister are gone down to Woolwich!”

“Indeed, again! not to the Erratic, I suppose,” said Charles, carelessly.

“Not exactly; but connected with the steamer, I believe their engagement is.”

“There must have been some strong attraction there, to draw the young ladies out so early.”

“Why, yes. I understand that one of Miss Barham’s young friends was to be married this morning to an officer at Woolwich; and as a graceful compliment to one whom she esteems as rightly occupying her proper station in society, my daughter consented to attend as bridesmaid.”

“Who is the bride?” inquired Charles, with quickness; a strange, wild thrill of anger, pain, and bitter jealousy shooting across his heart: something forewarned him whose name he should hear; it was with difficulty he could control himself.

“A young lady you know, I believe; the daughter of the Vicar of Hurstdene: a most respectable man he is, and one whose connection with our family entitles him to more consideration from us, than it is exactly requisite to show to others in the same station.”

“Ah!” cried Mr. Huyton, suddenly starting up. “I am sorry I have forgotten—I have an engagement—I must hurry away, or I shall be too late!”

“Shall we see you again to-day? my daughters will be sorry to miss you,” said Mr. Barham, looking with a sort of speculative

“I don’t know! perhaps, if I can—; may be I shall leave town,” was the incoherent reply, in a low, changed, husky voice.

“You are ill, I fear,” said the other, frightened, and laying a hand on his arm; “let me ring for something.”

“No! no! only hurried, my dear sir,” said Charles, with a painful smile. “Good-day.”

He hastened away. There was war in his heart; anger, jealousy, outraged feeling, hopeless love; sickening pain, a burning desire of revenge; a vindictive determination to do—he knew not what; any thing, every thing, however miserable to himself, so that he might return agony for agony; that he might make those suffer who had injured him. Unconscious of external objects, he gained his own apartments, and there locked in and safe from interruption, for hours he gave way to his fiery passions. Words could hardly describe the convulsive vehemence of the feelings that tore and shook his soul. The old Greek fables of men possessed by the furies, seemed realized in him. He was mad with rage; frantic with disappointed love; frenzied by a wild jealousy—cruel, insatiable, dark, pitiless as the grave itself. Whatever of hope he had hitherto entertained now rose to his mind, but to torture him more; his very plans and expectations, built on the uncertainty of his rival’s profession, and his chances of supplanting him during a prolonged absence, now recurred to his memory as a mockery and a torment. Lost! all lost! every chance, every hope, every deep-laid scheme, swept away before the flood of his hated rival’s success. Baffled, outwitted, triumphed over, scorned; such, no doubt, he was. The sailor had understood his projects, seen through his offers of friendship, and now laughed at them, having made sure of his bride.

And was there nothing left for him yet; no hope! no revenge?

He could wound her through another; and he would. No matter what it cost him, no one should say he was the mourning lover, victim to an unrequited affection. No! he would dash aside his love for her, forget it, trample on it if needs must; but he would have revenge. If there was one sentiment in the mind of Hilary, one affection which could rival her attachment to her husband, he knew it was her love for her brother; nay, he believed that it was the strongest, the deepest of the two. It had been planted by nature, nursed by tenderness and sympathy through every year of her life; it was one with which no contemporary love could interfere, with which no past friendship could compare, which no future regard could in the least degree replace.

The happiness of her brother was Hilary’s greatest joy; his disappointment and sorrow would be her most bitter grief. And this he had in his power, or, at least, he might have if he chose. He had made himself master of Maurice’s secret, he had seen and understood his passion for Dora, and he believed that to defeat him there, would indeed be a bitter blow.

He could do this! he was convinced that he had only to speak, and Mr. Barham would most gladly close with his offer; and as to Dora, he thought too lightly of her affections to suppose them invariable. Opposition he might meet with at first, but this would not daunt him; the support of her father he might rely on, and time and perseverance would do the rest. He did not doubt of ultimate success!

As to the result to himself, the securing a wife whom he neither loved nor esteemed, he did not stop to calculate that; he saw nothing in his mental visions but the feelings of others; he considered nothing but the suffering he was preparing for those who had offended him. By a strange misappreciation of

His plans determined on, his mind made up, and his spirits calmed by resolution and despair, he returned to Eaton-place to dine with the Barhams; and for the first time since the commencement of his long intimacy with the family, he made a most marked difference in his treatment of the two sisters. His manners to Dora were expressive of a desire to please, such as he had never betrayed before, and such as excited some surprise and disappointment in Isabel’s mind, which required both spirit and good breeding to conceal.

How Dora herself received this change of manner might be gathered from Isabel’s speech to her as they stood in the drawing-room afterward.

“Well, Dora, I really think you are the greatest and most relentless flirt I ever saw.”

“Am I?” said the younger sister, languidly throwing herself on a sofa, and turning away her face; “what have I been doing now?”

“Flirting to a degree beyond good manners with Mr. Huyton,” said Miss Barham, looking at her own deepening carnation in a pier-glass opposite to her.

“I was only paying him in kind,” replied Dora, undauntedly; “if he meant nothing, nor did I; if he was in earnest, I have no objection.”

“You don’t mean to say that if Charles Huyton were to propose to you, you would accept him?” said Isabel, turning full on her sister.

“Would not you, Isabel?” was Dora’s reply.

“Well,” said Dora, starting up, “I mean what I say; I was not flirting with Mr. Huyton more than he was with me.”

“And if he were to ask you to marry him, you know you would say no, as you did to Lord Dunsmore!”

“No, I would accept him on the spot,” cried Dora, giving way to a desperate fit of pique and mortified feeling. “You need not look so scornful, Isabel; I mean what I say.”

“Luckily you are not likely to be put to the test,” replied Miss Barham. “But we must go and dress, or the countess will be here before we are ready to go with her.”

Dora, however, did not follow her sister’s example; but when the other quitted the room, she remained reclining on the sofa. Her head ached, her heart ached still more; affection wounded, vanity and pride alike outraged; sorrow, real sorrow, a sense of injustice in herself, and of having been all through in the wrong, made her bosom throb, and flushed her cheek, and really rendered her quite unfit for society.

She was still sitting languidly thinking, when her father and his guest entered the room.

“What is the matter with you, Dora?” said the former, in a voice of unusual kindness; “what makes you look so pensive?”

“I am very tired, papa.”

“And where is Isabel?”

“Dressing to go out.”

“And you,” said Charles, approaching her, and standing beside her sofa with looks of devotion, “are you going?”

“No, I am tired.”

“That expedition to Woolwich was too much for you,” observed her father.

“I believe it was,” said she, with tears, half sorrow, half anger, starting to her eyes.

“Ah, we will have no more such freaks, little Dora,” said Mr. Barham, “will we, Mr. Huyton? we must take more care of you, my child, in future.”

Mr. Huyton drew a chair close beside the end of the sofa, and leaning over toward her, was in the act of whispering some gentle sentiment in her ear, when Isabel entered.

“What, Dora, you not dressed! and Lady Fitzurse has been announced as waiting for us.”

“Never mind Dora, my love,” said Mr. Barham; “she is not going out to-night; she is over-tired, and had much better stay at home. I shall remain with her. How well you look, Isabel.”

So Miss Barham was forced to depart alone, and with rather a rebellious heart, at leaving Dora and Mr. Huyton in such strange proximity. There is sometimes an intuitive perception of what is about to happen, which, against our will, seizes on the heart and forewarns us of evil or disappointment. Isabel, in spite of every wish to the contrary, felt at that moment that Charles Huyton was lost to her: and Dora, with a tumult of emotion she could not attempt to understand, perceived that his intentions were more serious than she had supposed.

Anger against Maurice for being more conscientious than herself; regret for her own share in the past; gratified female vanity; a desire of retaliation, disguised under a pretense of repentance, all urged her on at this moment; and she allowed the advances of her new lover with a graceful and encouraging simplicity, which at once surprised him, and pleased her father.

“Mr. Barham,” said the visitor, after awhile, “I am going into the library to look for that book you promised me; I know exactly where to find it, I believe.”

He went, and the father taking immediate advantage of his absence, with no small degree of gratified pride and ambition, which he mistook entirely for parental affection, proceeded forthwith

Dora listened in profound silence, with rosy cheeks and downcast eyes, and fingers nervously playing with the tassel of the sofa cushion; but, in spite of her external quietness, there was the fiercest war in her heart. Love, anger, remorse, ambition, fear, doubt, vanity, all struggled there. To refuse at once, and without a reason, a suitor whom but just now she had visibly encouraged, was, she fancied, impossible; to assign the real cause of the reluctance, she could not but feel was more so still; better, she thought, it would be to temporize, to adopt half measures, to conceal what she dared not own, to brave what she could hardly endure to contemplate; to secure peace and tranquillity for the present at least, come what would of the future. To say yes, now, was not to bind herself irrevocably; to accept Mr. Huyton as a suitor, by no means made it inevitable that she should become his wife; circumstances might occur, unforeseen, incalculable, to release her from an engagement; and meantime, perhaps Maurice would regret his conduct, would wish he had not refused the promise she had offered to make, would—she hardly knew what she wished or expected, except the single desire to alarm him and arouse his jealousy, by making him fear to lose her.

With these ideas floating in her mind, she at length brought herself to the point of speaking, and when her father closed his harangue, she looked up and said:

“Please, papa, tell Mr. Huyton I am much honored and happy, and—and all that sort of thing.”

“You need not agitate yourself so, my dear little Dora,” said he, smiling graciously, for Dora ended by a fit of tears; “there is no occasion to be unhappy, I am sure; you do quite right to

“As you please, sir,” said Dora, faintly; rebellious recollections were rising in her heart; and she had a struggle at that moment not to shriek out a negative.

“I shall go and speak to Mr. Huyton,” said the father, quite unconscious of his daughter’s agitation.

She was left alone, and burying her face in the cushions, she gave way to the bitterest tears.

She was insensible to outward objects; memory had gone back to the sunny days at Hurstdene, or tortured her with the happy hours so recently spent on board the Erratic; she sobbed and trembled violently, then thought again of the past, and thought was followed by fresh agitation. In this state she was lying when her hand was touched by some one, and starting up, she saw Charles Huyton beside her.

She felt guilty, and hurriedly tried to hide her emotion and drive away her tears; could she have seen into his heart, she would have discovered that these accompaniments to their betrothal were but too suitable and fitting. She did glance at his face, and saw how little his eyes wore the expression she thought that love should wear. They were gloomy, sad, full rather of harsh resolve than joyful hopes. An idea struck her suddenly. This abrupt proposal, this unhappy appearance, whence did they spring? Had he loved her long, did he really love her now? Was not Hilary the real object of his affections? Had this new resolve any thing to do with her marriage? It rushed through her mind that it was despair, not love, which prompted him, and that though she might now accept his hand, he would himself, when the moment of pique was over, be the first to regret this step, and, perhaps, would not only be ready to cancel the engagement, but would be glad to resign her to another.

So the farce of that engagement was played out. He made love, and she listened and assented; and when Mr. Barham rejoined them they had exchanged promises of love and faith, while the heart of each, in secret, entirely belied these spoken words.

It had been settled that the family party from Hurstdene should return home on the Monday after Hilary’s marriage; and the girls having taken leave of their friends, the young ladies of Eaton-place did not expect to meet them again. Captain Hepburn had privately urged on Hilary the advantage of inducing Gwyneth to remain some time longer with her sister in London, and Sybil was extremely anxious to detain her; but no persuasion or argument had the slightest effect upon Gwyneth herself, who, having her own reasons for wishing to return, was not to be induced to change her determination by any thing which could be urged by the others. She said very little in reply to the suggestions or wishes of the family, but calmly and passively persisted in her own way; and, much to Hilary’s disappointment, they all returned together as they had gone. The same evening saw Gwyneth once more strolling on the green terrace with Mr. Ufford by her side, detailing to him all the events which had occurred in London, and hearing in return most pleasant assurances of how much they had been missed, and how glad he was to have them home again. Gwyneth was very glad then that she had not staid in London.

Hilary would not have minded being left to do all the necessary arrangements, consequent on resettling at home, without

“Poor Mr. Ufford!” said she to Hilary, when the curate having taken leave, she had time to rejoin her sister, “he is in great distress!”

“Indeed,” said the elder sister, “what is the matter?”

“He has had such bad news from Italy; his little niece is certainly dying, and her father, his eldest brother, seems very nearly as bad. He has a great mind to go to them.”

“He should talk to my father about that, not to you, Gwyneth,” said Hilary, gravely; “but why does he not? I am sure he had much better, if Lord Dunsmore wishes it.”

“I told him if he could get help in the parish I was sure papa would agree most readily,” continued Gwyneth; “and I think he means to propose it. There is some idea of a college friend of his taking the curacy, if papa approves, just to allow him time to go abroad.”

The next morning Mr. Ufford called again, and this time he mentioned to the Vicar his half-formed scheme of going to Italy. Of course Mr. Duncan could make no objection, but entered kindly and warmly into the young man’s anxieties.

It required a great deal of talking, however, before Mr. Ufford could decide on any plan. He came to the Vicar with only a great mind to act, and he left him, having arrived no nearer to forming a definite intention, or seeming to Hilary to have any serious idea of acting as he talked! She felt a little annoyed at his indecision; it would form an indisputable excuse for many visits, and much dawdling, and a reason for putting off some useful plans regarding village improvements, and deferring some alterations and amendments in the church, which had been projected, and for which Lord Dunsmore himself had contributed funds. She longed to put a little energy or decision into his mind and actions; she wished she could make him resolve

The sort of expectations to which his conduct gave rise in the village was more than once significantly hinted to Mrs. Hepburn, when receiving the congratulations and good wishes of the many attached parishioners who had known her from a child. The fear perpetually expressed that her marriage would remove her from the neighborhood, as Miss Sybil’s had done, was pretty generally followed by a more or less broadly-worded hint that Miss Gwyneth’s choice would be a better one for them, and that they hoped one of their young ladies at least would never leave them; for young as Miss Gwyneth was, she was quite womanly in her way and look, and was as well fitted to be mistress at the Vicarage as young Mrs. Hepburn herself. And a remark which closed one of these commentaries the first time they met her taught her what accurate and penetrating notice those apparently indifferent spectators took of their superior’s ways and proceedings.

“But bless you, miss,” said one old woman, “it would have been far better for us had you taken the young ’Squire at ‘the Ferns,’ instead of this captain from foreign parts. And they do say he will be fit to hang himself, whensoever he comes to hear of your being married to another.”

Hilary tried to look unconcerned, and to speak on some other subject.

News travels fast, and it soon became known to the village gossips that Mr. Huyton did not intend to commit suicide on the occasion of Hilary’s marriage.

But the first intelligence which reached the Vicarage of his plans came directly from himself, in a letter to Mr. Duncan, which the writer knew well must be read by Hilary herself.

“Dear Mr. Duncan,

“Although I am just on the point of leaving England for some weeks on most important business, I must steal a few

“With kind regards to your family circle,

“Believe me ever,

“Yours faithfully,

“Charles Huyton.”

It was well for Mr. Duncan’s peace and comfort, that loss of sight had prevented his cognizance of many things which must else have come to his knowledge: it was well, too, that he could not see his daughter’s face as she read this letter. The bitter irony of those words was concealed from him, but she felt it to her heart.

“Going to marry Dora!” said Mr. Duncan; “I am surprised. I thought he would have taken Isabel.”

She was silent; she could not speak; the effort to read through these words in an unbroken voice had been almost

Mr. Duncan thought a little, and presently observed—

“Well, I am glad he has resolved to marry at last; and to have your young friend settled at ‘the Ferns’ will be pleasant for you, Hilary, as long as you stay in the neighborhood. You must write him an answer by-and-by, and we will tell him of your marriage, my child.”

“Do you want me just now, my dear father?” said she, compelling herself to speak; “if not—”

“No—no, not at all at present; let Nest come to me in half-an-hour.”

Hilary escaped to her own room, carrying the cruel letter with her.

Engaged to Dora Barham! incredible! monstrous! could he ask her? could she accept him? it seemed impossible: where was Dora’s love for Maurice? where Charles Huyton’s knowledge of that love? Till this moment she had not known how much she had depended on her constancy; how completely she had built her hopes for her brother’s happiness on some fortunate turn to their affairs. Well she knew how deep, how true, how tender were her brother’s feelings, how entirely he had surrendered his heart to this hapless affection; and though aware that no engagement had passed between them, it seemed to her that their recent intercourse in London had increased their mutual attachment. Oh! what could Dora mean then by thus abruptly abandoning him! What would Maurice feel when he learned her inconstancy! If she had been sincere to him, if her sentiments had been real, where was her faith to Mr. Huyton! by what name could an engagement with him be designated? and if she had been all this time trifling with Maurice! if she had been gratifying her own vanity at the expense of his happiness—but that was impossible! Dora was volatile, thoughtless, imprudent, but she was not deceitful, she was not heartless, she was not wicked. Hilary could not endure to think ill of her; there must be something unexplained;

But for Mr. Huyton himself, what excuse could be urged! Maurice had been his chosen friend; a hundred times had he made professions of regard, or declarations of esteem for him; and he knew, or, at least, he was strongly suspicious of this esteemed friend’s attachment to Dora Barham! It was not a violent affection which misled him, and blinded his eyes; Hilary believed him at the best, indifferent, regarding Dora; he had always rather despised her intellect, and slighted her charms; no! love for her was not his excuse: there was no love in that cruel letter which Hilary now held in her hands. As her eyes slowly perused the words again, her fancy presented to her mind the terrible expression of his face when he had first heard of her own engagement. It seemed to ring in her ear once more, the bitter tone in which he had exclaimed, “You will wish rather that a demon had crossed your path than that you had thwarted me;” and as she remembered this, she felt that it was revenge he sought; a revenge for his slighted affection, which she could not choose but feel deeply.

The happiness of Maurice and Dora was sacrificed, perhaps, to her own; it was her hasty marriage which had brought this impending grief on her darling brother!

“Oh, Maurice! Maurice!” sobbed she, as she buried her face in her hands, “why am I to be a source of misery and disappointment to you? Oh! brother, you who have never done any thing but comfort and love me, are your hopes now to be blighted for my sake? Why did you love so truly and so well? Why did you surrender that generous heart to one who dared not own the affection she had created! Was it a crime to love, that she should blush to be claimed by you! Oh! weak, foolish Dora, your idle, childish terrors have caused all this.”

Very bitter the blow was, and rendered more so by the insulting

Oh! how she longed at that moment for the comfort of her husband’s sympathy and love; how her heart ached to pour out its fears and sorrows to him, knowing that there they would be understood and borne with, and perhaps reasoned away, but this intense longing must be checked, put aside, kept under, or it would soon grow up into an overpowering cloud, darkening her hopes, numbing her feelings, paralyzing her actions, and obscuring from her the bright sunshine of trust and cheerful faith.

She turned her thoughts once more to Maurice and Dora; but what could she do for them? Nothing but pray for them; and sinking on her knees she did pray, long and earnestly, that if sorrow must come on her beloved brother it might be borne with patience, and so bring a blessing with it; and for the others, too, she prayed, that the angry feelings might be softened, and the unkind intention converted into a better mood; that the weak might be strengthened, the erring restored; that they might both be saved from sinful weakness and sinful passions; and that if their own willful ways brought suffering on them, that suffering might be sanctified to a happy result.

Little thought the angry and vindictive man for whom she prayed, of the only return she made to his unkindness; and little deemed he that if his cruel letter had given her pain, it had also afforded her the occasion of exercising faith, meekness, and charity; that her soul rose the stronger for the blow which he had hoped would prostrate it.

She forgave him the injury he had, perchance, intended; and to forgive from the heart is alone the blessed gift of that Spirit whose presence brings peace and consolation.