Beulah Part 62

"Your sincere friend,

"ALICE ASBURY."

Tears sprang into her eyes as she opened the desk and discovered an elegant pen and pencil and every convenience connected with writing.

Turning away, she saw beside the fire a large, deep easy-chair, cushioned with purple morocco, and knew it was exactly like one she had often seen in Dr. Asbury's library. On the back was pinned a narrow slip of paper, and she read, in the doctor's scrawling, quaint writing:

"Child, don't be too proud to use it."

She was not. Throwing herself into the luxurious chair, she broke the seal of a letter received that day from Pauline Mortimor. Once before, soon after her marriage, a few lines of gay greeting had come, and then many months had elapsed. As she unfolded the sheet she saw, with sorrow, that in several places it was blotted with tears; and the contents, written in a paroxysm of pa.s.sion, disclosed a state of wretchedness which Beulah little suspected. Pauline's impulsive, fitful nature was clearly indexed in the letter, and, after a brief apology for her long silence, she wrote as follows:

"Oh, Beulah, I am so miserable; so very, very wretched Beulah, Ernest does not love me! You will scarcely believe me, Oh, I hardly know how to believe it myself! Uncle Guy was right; I do not suit Ernest. But I loved him so very, very dearly, and thought him so devoted to me. Fool that I was! my eyes are opened at last. Beulah, it nearly drives me wild to think that I am bound to him for life, an unloved wife. Not a year has pa.s.sed since our marriage, yet already he has tired of my 'pretty face.' Oh, Beulah, if I could only come to you, and put my arms round your neck, and lay my poor, weary head down on your shoulder, then I could tell you all--"

[Here several sentences were illegible from tears, and she could only read what followed.]

"Since yesterday morning Ernest has not spoken to me. While I write he is sitting in the next room, reading, as cold, indifferent, and calm as if I were not perfectly wretched. He is tyrannical; and because I do not humor all his whims, and have some will of my own, he treats me with insulting indifference. He is angry now because I resented some of his father's impertinent speeches about my dress.

This is not the first nor the second time that we have quarreled. He has an old-maid sister who is forever meddling about my affairs and sneering at my domestic arrangements; and because I finally told her I believed I was mistress of my own house Ernest has never forgiven me. Ellen (the sister I loved and went to school with) has married and moved to a distant part of the State. The other members of his family are bigoted, proud, and parsimonious, and they have chiefly made the breach between us. Oh, Beulah, if I could only undo the past, and be Pauline Chilton once more! Oh, if I could be free and happy again! But there is no prospect of that. I am his wife, as he told me yesterday, and suppose I must drag out a miserable existence. Yet I will not be trampled on by his family! His sister spends much of her time with us; reads to Ernest, talks to him about things that she glories in telling me I don't understand the first word of. Beulah, I was anxious to study and make myself a companion for him; but, try as I may, Lucy contrives always to fret and thwart me. Two days ago she nearly drove me beside myself with her sneers and allusions to my great mental inferiority to Ernest (as if I were not often enough painfully reminded of the fact without any of her a.s.sistance!). I know I should not have said it, but I was too angry to think of propriety, and told her that her presence in my home was very disagreeable. Oh, if you could have seen her insulting smile, as she answered that her 'n.o.ble brother needed her, and she felt it a duty to remain with him.' Beulah, I love my husband; I would do anything on earth to make him happy if we were left to ourselves, but as to submitting to Lucy's arrogance and sneers, I will not!

Ernest requires me to apologize to his father and sister, and I told him I would not! I would die first! He does not love me or he would shield me from such trials. He thinks his sister is perfection, and I tell you I do absolutely detest her. Now, Beulah, there is no one else to whom I would mention my unhappiness. Mother does not suspect it, and never shall, even when she visits me. Uncle Guy predicted it, and I would not have him know it for the universe. But I can trust you; I feel that you will sympathize with me, and I want you to counsel me. Oh, tell me what I ought to do to rid myself of this tormenting sister-in-law and father-in-law, and, I may say, all Ernest's kin. Sometimes, when I think of the future, I absolutely shudder; for if matters go on this way much longer I shall learn to hate my husband too. He knew my disposition before he married me, and has no right to treat me as he does. If it were only Ernest I could bring myself to 'obey' him, for I love him very devotedly; but as to being dictated to by all his relatives, I never will! Beulah, burn this blurred letter; don't let anybody know how drearily I am situated. I am too proud to have my misery published. To know that people pitied me would kill me. I never can be happy again, but perhaps you can help me to be less miserable. Do write to me! Oh, how I wish you could come to me! I charge you, Beulah, don't let Uncle Guy know that I am not happy. Good-by. Oh, if ever you marry, be sure your husband has no old-maid sisters and no officious kin! I am crying so that I can barely see the lines. Good-by, dear Beulah."

"PAULINE."

Beulah leaned forward and dropped the letter into the glowing ma.s.s of coals. It shriveled, blazed, and vanished, and, with a heavy sigh, she sat pondering the painful contents. What advice could she possibly give that would remedy the trouble? She was aware that the young wife must indeed have been "very wretched" before she could consent to disclose her domestic feuds to another. Under happier auspices she felt that Pauline would have made a devoted, gentle wife, but feared it was now too late to mold her character in conformity with her husband's wishes. "So much for a union of uncongenial natures," thought Beulah, as she prepared to answer the unlucky letter. As guardedly as possible she alluded to Mr. Mortimor and his family, and urged Pauline to talk to her husband gently but firmly, and a.s.sure him that the continued interference of his family was unendurable. If her remonstrances proved futile, to do what she considered due to herself as mistress of her own establishment, and try not to notice the annoyances of others. Beulah felt and acknowledged her inability to advise the young wife in the difficult position in which she was placed, and closed by a.s.suring her that only her own good sense, guided by sincere love for her husband, could rightly direct her course. She was warmly attached to Pauline, and it was with a troubled heart that she addressed her reply.

CHAPTER XXIX.

The Grahams were all at home again, and Eugene and his bride had been for several weeks fairly settled in their elegant new house.

Beulah had seen none of the family since their return, for her time was nearly all occupied, and as soon as released from school she gladly hurried out to her little home. One evening as she left the academy Mr. Graham's spirited horses dashed up to the gate, and the coachman handed her a note. It was from Mrs. Graham.

"MISS BENTON:

"Cornelia is quite indisposed, and begs that you will call and see her this afternoon. As it threatens rain, I send the carriage.

"S. GRAHAM."

Beulah crumpled the note between her fingers, and hesitated. The coachman perceived her irresolution, and hastened to say:

"You needn't be afraid of the horses, miss. Miss Nett' rides so much they are tamed down."

"I am not at all afraid of the horses. Has Cornelia been sick since her return from the North?"

"Why, miss, she came home worse than ever. She has not been downstairs since. She is sick all the time now."

Beulah hesitated no longer. Mrs. Graham met her at the door, and greeted her more cordially than she had done on any previous occasion. She looked anxious and weary, and said, as she led the way to her daughter's apartment:

"We are quite uneasy about Cornelia; you will find her sadly altered." She ushered Beulah into the room, then immediately withdrew.

Cornelia was propped up by cushions and pillows in her easy-chair; her head was thrown back, and her gaze appeared to be riveted on a painting which hung opposite. Beulah stood beside her a moment, unnoticed, and saw with painful surprise the ravages which disease had made in the once beautiful face and queenly form. The black, shining hair was cut short, and cl.u.s.tered in thick, wavy locks about the wan brow, now corrugated as by some spasm of pain. The cheeks were hollow and ghastly pale; the eyes sunken, but unnaturally large and brilliant; and the colorless lips compressed as though to bear habitual suffering. Her wasted hands, grasping the arms of the chair, might have served as a model for a statue of death, so thin, pale, almost transparent. Beulah softly touched one of them, and said:

"Cornelia, you wished to see me."

The invalid looked at her intently, and smiled.

"I thought you would come. Ah, Beulah, do you recognize this wreck as your former friend?"

"I was not prepared to find you so changed; for until this afternoon I was not aware your trip had been so fruitless. Do you suffer much?"

"Suffer! Yes; almost all the time. But it is not the bodily torture that troubles me so much--I could bear that in silence. It is my mind, Beulah; my mind."

She pointed to a chair; Beulah drew it near her, and Cornelia continued:

"I thought I should die suddenly; but it is to be otherwise The torture is slow, lingering. I shall never leave this house again, except to go to my final home. Beulah, I have wanted to see you very much; I thought you would hear of my illness and come. How calm and pale you are! Give me your hand. Ah, cool and pleasant; mine parched with fever. And you have a little home of your own, I hear. How have things gone with you since we parted? Are you happy?"

"My little home is pleasant, and my wants are few," replied Beulah.

"Have you seen Eugene recently?"

"Not since his marriage."

A bitter laugh escaped Cornelia's lips, as she writhed an instant, and then said:

"I knew how it would be. I shall not live to see the end, but you will. Ha, Beulah! already he has discovered his mistake. I did not expect it so soon; I fancied Antoinette had more policy. She has dropped the mask. He sees himself wedded to a woman completely devoid of truth; he knows her now as she is--as I tried to show him she was before it was too late; and, Beulah, as I expected, he has grown reckless--desperate. Ah, if you could have witnessed a scene at the St. Nicholas, in New York, not long since, you would have wept over him. He found his bride heartless; saw that she preferred the society of other gentlemen to his; that she lived only for the adulation of the crowd; and one evening, on coming home to the hotel, found she had gone to the opera with a party she knew he detested. Beulah, it sickens me when I think of his fierce railings, and anguish, and scorn. He drank in mad defiance, and when she returned greeted her with imprecations that would have bowed any other woman, in utter humiliation, into the dust. She laughed derisively, told him he might amuse himself as he chose, she would not heed his wishes as regarded her own movements. Luckily, my parents knew nothing of it; they little suspected, nor do they now know, why I was taken so alarmingly ill before dawn. I am glad I am to go so soon. I could not endure to witness his misery and disgrace."

She closed her eyes and groaned.

"What induced her to marry him?" asked Beulah.

"Only her own false heart knows. But I have always believed she was chiefly influenced by a desire to escape from the strict discipline to which her father subjected her at home. Her mother was anything but a model of propriety; and her mother's sister, who was Dr.

Hartwell's wife, was not more exemplary. My uncle endeavored to curb Antoinette's dangerous fondness for display and dissipation, and she fancied that, as Eugene's wife, she could freely plunge into gayeties which were sparingly allowed her at home. I know she does not love Eugene; she never did; and, a.s.suredly, his future is dark enough. I believe, if she could reform him she would not; his excesses sanction, or at least in some degree palliate, hers. Oh, Beulah, I see no hope for him!"

"Have you talked to him kindly, Cornelia? Have you faithfully exerted your influence to check him in his route to ruin?"

"Talked to him? Aye; entreated, remonstrated, upbraided, used every argument at my command. But I might as well talk to the winds and hope to hush their fury. I shall not stay to see his end; I shall soon be silent and beyond all suffering. Death is welcome, very welcome."

Her breathing was quick and difficult, and two crimson spots burned on her sallow cheeks. Her whole face told of years of bitterness, and a grim defiance of death, which sent a shudder through Beulah, as she listened to the panting breath. Cornelia saturated her handkerchief with some delicate perfume from a crystal vase, and, pa.s.sing it over her face, continued:

"They tell me it is time I should be confirmed; talk vaguely of seeing preachers, and taking the sacrament, and preparing myself, as if I could be frightened into religion and the church. My mother seems just to have waked up to a knowledge of my spiritual condition, as she calls it. Ah, Beulah, it is all dark before me; black, black as midnight! I am going down to an eternal night; down to annihilation. Yes, Beulah; soon I shall descend into what Schiller's Moor calls the 'nameless yonder.' Before long I shall have done with mystery; shall be sunk into unbroken rest." A ghastly smile parted her lips as she spoke.

"Cornelia, do you fear death?"

"No; not exactly. I am glad I am so soon to be rid of my vexed, joyless life; but you know it is all a dark mystery; and sometimes, when I recollect how I felt in my childhood, I shrink from the final dissolution. I have no hopes of a blissful future, such as cheer some people in their last hour. Of what comes after death I know and believe nothing. Occasionally I shiver at the thought of annihilation; but if, after all, revelation is true, I have something worse than annihilation to fear. You know the history of my skepticism; it is the history of hundreds in this age. The inconsistencies of professing Christians disgusted me. Perhaps I was wrong to reject the doctrines because of their abuse; but it is too late now for me to consider that. I narrowly watched the conduct of some of the members of the various churches, and, as I live, Beulah, I have never seen but one who practiced the precepts of Christ. I concluded she would have been just what she was without religious aids. One of my mother's intimate friends was an ostentatious, pharisaical Christian; gave alms, headed charity lists; was remarkably punctual in her attendance at church, and apparently very devout; yet I accidentally found out that she treated a poor seamstress (whom she hired for a paltry sum) in a manner that shocked my ideas of consistency, of common humanity. The girl was miserably poor, and had aged parents and brothers and sisters dependent on her exertions; but her Christian employer paid her the lowest possible price, and trampled on her feelings as though she had been a brute. Oh, the hollowness of the religion I saw practiced! I sneered at everything connected with churches, and heard no more sermons, which seemed only to make hypocrites and pharisees of the congregation. I have never known but one exception.

Mrs. Asbury is a consistent Christian. I have watched her, under various circ.u.mstances; I have tempted her, in divers ways, to test her, and to-day, skeptic as I am, I admire and revere that n.o.ble woman. If all Christians set an example as pure and bright as hers, there were less infidelity and atheism in the land. If I had known even half a dozen such I might have had a faith to cheer me in the hour of my struggle. She used to talk gently to me in days past, but I would not heed her. She often comes to see me now; and though I do not believe the words of comfort that fall from her lips, still they soothe me; and I love to have her sit near me, that I may look at her sweet, holy face, so full of winning purity. Beulah, a year ago we talked of these things. I was then, as now, hopeless of creeds, of truth, but you were sure you would find the truth. I looked at you eagerly when you came in, knowing I could read the result in your countenance. Ah, there is no peace written there! Where is your truth? Show it to me."

She twined her thin, hot fingers round Beulah's cold hand, and spoke in a weary tone. The orphan's features twitched an instant, and her old troubled look came back, as she said:

"I wish I could help you, Cornelia. It must be terrible, indeed, to stand on the brink of the grave and have no belief in anything. I would give more than I possess to be able to a.s.sist you, but I cannot; I have no truth to offer you; I have yet discovered nothing for myself. I am not so sanguine as I was a year ago, but I still hope that I shall succeed."