Читать книгу Ishmael; Or, In the Depths - Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth - Страница 15

Amid the sylvan solitude

Of unshorn grass and waving wood

And waters glancing bright and fast,

A softened voice was in her ear,

Sweet as those lulling sounds and fine

The hunter lifts his head to hear,

Now far and faint, now full and near—

The murmur of the wood swept pine.

A manly form was ever nigh,

A bold, free hunter, with an eye

Whose dark, keen glance had power to wake

Both fear and love—to awe and charm.

Faded the world that they had known,

A poor vain shadow, cold and waste,

In the warm present bliss alone

Seemed they of actual life to taste.

—Whittier.

It was in the month of June they were married; when the sun shone with his brightest splendor; when the sky was of the clearest blue, when the grass was of the freshest green, the woods in their rudest foliage, the flowers in their richest bloom, and all nature in her most luxuriant life! Yes, June was their honeymoon; the forest shades their bridal halls, and birds and flowers and leaves and rills their train of attendants. For weeks they lived a kind of fairy life, wandering together through the depths of the valley forest, discovering through the illumination of their love new beauties and glories in the earth and sky; new sympathies with every form of life. Were ever suns so bright, skies so clear, and woods so green as theirs in this month of beauty, love, and joy!

"It seems to me that I must have been deaf and blind and stupid in the days before I knew you, Herman! for then the sun seemed only to shine, and now I feel that he smiles as well as shines; then the trees only seemed to bend under a passing breeze, now I know they stoop to caress us; then the flowers seemed only to be crowded, now I know they draw together to kiss; then indeed I loved nature, but now I know that she also is alive and loves me!" said Nora, one day, as they sat upon a bank of wild thyme under the spreading branches of an old oak tree that stood alone in a little opening of the forest.

"You darling of nature! you might have known that all along!" exclaimed Herman, enthusiastically pressing her to his heart.

"Oh, how good you are to love me so much! you—so high, so learned, so wealthy; you who have seen so many fine ladies—to come down to me, a poor, ignorant, weaver-girl!" said Nora humbly—for true love in many a woman is ever most humble and most idolatrous, abasing itself and idolizing its object.

"Come down to you, my angel and my queen! to you, whose beauty is so heavenly and so royal that it seems to me everyone should worship and adore you! how could I come down to you! Ah, Nora, it seems to me that it is you who have stooped to me! There are kings on this earth, my beloved, who might be proud to place such regal beauty on their thrones beside them! For, oh! you are as beautiful, my Nora, as any woman of old, for whom heroes lost worlds!"

"Do you think so? do you really think so? I am so glad for your sake! I wish I were ten times as beautiful! and high-born, and learned, and accomplished, and wealthy, and everything else that is good, for your sake! Herman, I would be willing to pass through a fiery furnace if by doing so I could come out like refined gold, for your sake!"

"Hush, hush, sweet love! that fiery furnace of which you speak is the Scriptural symbol for fearful trial and intense suffering! far be it from you! for I would rather my whole body were consumed to ashes than one shining tress of your raven hair should be singed!"

"But, Herman! one of the books you read to me said: 'All that is good must be toiled for; all that is best must be suffered for'; and I am willing to do or bear anything in the world that would make me more worthy of you!"

"My darling, you are worthy of a monarch, and much too good for me!"

"How kind you are to say so! but for all that I know I am only a poor, humble, ignorant girl, quite unfit to be your wife! And, oh! sometimes it makes me very sad to think so!" said Nora, with a deep sigh.

"Then do not think so, my own! why should you? You are beautiful; you are good; you are lovely and beloved, and you ought to be happy!" exclaimed Herman.

"Oh, I am happy! very happy now! For whatever I do or say, right or wrong, is good in your eyes, and pleases you because you love me so much. God bless you! God love you! God save you, whatever becomes of your poor Nora!" she said, with a still heavier sigh.

At this moment a soft summer cloud floated between them and the blazing meridian sun, veiling its glory.

"Why, what is the matter, love? What has come over you?" inquired Herman, gently caressing her.

"I do not know; nothing more than that perhaps," answered Nora, pointing to the cloud that was now passing over the sun.

"'Nothing more than that.' Well, that has now passed, so smile forth again, my sun!" said Herman gayly.

"Ah, dear Herman, if this happy life could only last! this life in which we wander or repose in these beautiful summer woods, among rills and flowers and birds! Oh, it is like the Arcadia of which you read to me in your books, Herman! Ah, if it would only last!"

"Why should it not, love?"

"Because it cannot. Winter will come with its wind and snow and ice. The woods will be bare, the grass dry, the flowers all withered, the streams frozen, and the birds gone away, and we—" Here her voice sank into silence, but Herman took up the word:

"Well, and we, beloved! we shall pass to something much better! We are not partridges or squirrels to live in the woods and fields all winter! We shall go to our own luxurious home! You will be my loved and honored and happy wife; the mistress of an elegant house, a fine estate, and many negroes. You will have superb furniture, beautiful dresses, splendid jewels, servants to attend you, carriages, horses, pleasure boats, and everything else that heart could wish, or money buy, or love find to make you happy! Think! Oh, think of all the joys that are in store for you!"

"Not for me! Oh, not for me those splendors and luxuries and joys that you speak of! They are too good for me; I shall never possess them; I know it, Herman; and I knew it even in that hour of heavenly bliss when you first told me you loved me! I knew it even when we stood before the minister to be married, and I know it still! This short summer of love will be all the joy I shall ever have."

"In the name of Heaven, Nora, what do you mean? Is it possible that you can imagine I shall ever be false to you?" passionately demanded the young man, who was deeply impressed at last by the sad earnestness of her manner.

"No! no! no! I never imagine anything unworthy of your gentle and noble nature," said Nora, with fervent emphasis as she pressed closer to his side.

"Then why, why, do you torture yourself and me with these dark previsions?"

"I do not know. Forgive me, Herman," softly sighed Nora, laying her cheek against his own.

He stole his arm around her waist, and as he drew her to his heart, murmured:

"Why should you not enjoy all the wealth, rank, and love to which you are entitled as my wife?"

"Ah! dear Herman, I cannot tell why. I only know that I never shall! Bear with me, dear Herman, while I say this; After I had learned to love you; after I had grieved myself almost to death for your absence; when you returned and asked me to be your wife, I seemed suddenly to have passed from darkness into radiant light! But in the midst of it all I seemed to hear a voice in my heart, saying: 'Poor Moth! you are basking in a consuming fire; you will presently fall to the ground a burnt, blackened, tortured, and writhing thing.' And, Herman, when I thought of the great difference between us; of your old family, high rank, and vast wealth; and of your magnificent house, and your stately lady mother and fine lady sisters, I knew that though you had married me, I never could be owned as your wife—"

"Nora, if it were possible for me to be angry with you, I should be so!" interrupted Herman vehemently; "'you never could be owned as my wife!' I tell you that you can be—and that you shall be, and very soon! It was only to avoid a rupture with my mother that I married you privately at all. Have I not surrounded you with every legal security? Have I not armed you even against myself? Do you not know that even if it were possible for me to turn rascal, and become so mean, and miserable, and dishonored as to desert you, you could still demand your rights as a wife, and compel me to yield them!"

"As if I would! Oh, Herman, as if I would depend upon anything but your dear love to give me all I need! Armed against you, am I? I do not choose to be so! It is enough for me to know that I am your wife. I do not care to be able to prove it; for, Herman, were it possible for you to forsake me, I should not insist upon my 'rights'—I should die. Therefore, why should I be armed with legal proofs against you, my Herman, my life, my soul, my self? I will not continue so!" And with a generous abandonment she drew from her bosom the marriage certificate, tore it to pieces, and scattered it abroad, saying: "There now! I had kept it as a love token, close to my heart, little knowing it was a cold-blooded, cautious, legal proof, else it should have gone before, where it has gone now, to the winds! There now, Herman, I am your own wife, your own Nora, quite unarmed and defenseless before you; trusting only to your faith for my happiness; knowing that you will never willingly forsake me; but feeling that if you do, I should not pursue you, but die!"

"Dear trusting girl! would you indeed deprive yourself of all defenses thus? But, my Nora, did you suppose when I took you to my bosom that I had intrusted your peace and safety and honor only to a scrap of perishable paper? No, Nora, no! Infidelity to you is forever impossible to me; but death is always possible to all persons; and so, though I could never forsake you, I might die and leave you; and to guard against the consequences of such a contingency I surrounded you with every legal security. The minister that married us resides in this county; the witness that attended us lives with you. So that if to-morrow I should die, you could claim, as my widow, your half of my personal property and your life-interest in my estate. And if to-morrow you should become impatient of your condition as a secreted wife, and wish to enter upon all the honors of Bradenell Hall, you have the power to do so!"

"As if I would! As if it was for that I loved you! oh, Herman!"

"I know you would not, love! And I know it was not for that you loved me! I have perfect confidence in your disinterestedness. And I hope you have as much in mine."

"I have, Herman. I have!"

"Then, to go back to the first question, why did you wound me by saying, that though I had married you, you knew you never could be owned as my wife?"

"I spoke from a deep conviction! Oh, Herman, I know you will never willingly forsake me; but I feel you will never acknowledge me!"

"Then you must think me a villain!" said Herman bitterly.

"No, no, no; I think, if you must have my thoughts, you are the gentlest, truest, and noblest among men."

"You cannot get away from the point; if you think I could desert you, you must think I am a villain!"

"Oh, no, no! besides, I did not say you would desert me! I said you would never own me!"

"It is in effect the same thing."

"Herman, understand me: when I say, from the deep conviction I feel, that you will never own me, I also say that you will be blameless."

"Those two things are incompatible, Nora! But why do you persist in asserting that you will never be owned?"

"Ah, dear me, because it is true!"

"But why do you think it is true?"

"Because when I try to imagine our future, I see only my own humble hut, with its spinning-wheel and loom. And I feel I shall never live in Brudenell Hall!"

"Nora, hear me: this is near the first of July; in six months, that is before the first of January, whether I live or die, as my wife or as my widow, you shall rule at Brudenell Hall!"

Nora smiled, a strange, sad smile.

"Listen, dearest," he continued; "my mother leaves Brudenell in December. She thinks the two young ladies, my sisters, should have more society; so she has purchased a fine house in a fashionable quarter of Washington City. The workmen are now busy decorating and furnishing it. She takes possession of it early in December. Then, my Nora, when my mother and sisters are clear of Brudenell Hall, and settled in their town-house, I will bring you home and write and announce our marriage. Thus there can be no noise. People cannot quarrel very long or fiercely through the post. And finally time and reflection will reconcile my mother to the inevitable, and we shall be all once more united and happy."

"Herman dear," said Nora softly, "indeed my heart is toward your mother; I could love and revere and serve her as dutifully as if I were her daughter, if she would only deign to let me. And, at any rate, whether she will or not, I cannot help loving and honoring her, because she is your mother and loves you. And, oh, Herman, if she could look into my heart and see how truly I love you, her son, how gladly I would suffer to make you happy, and how willing I should be to live in utter poverty and obscurity, if it would be for your good, I do think she would love me a little for your sake!"

"Heaven grant it, my darling!"

"But be sure of this, dear Herman. No matter how she may think it good to treat me, I can never be angry with her. I must always love her and seek her favor, for she is your mother."