Prophecies of Robert Nixon, Mother Shipton, and Martha, the Gypsy Part 8

Mr. Harding was a subscriber to the Mendicity Society, an inst.i.tution which proposes to check begging by the novel mode of giving nothing to the poor: moreover, he was a magistrate-moreover, he had no change; and he somewhat sternly desired the woman to go about her business.

All availed him nothing; she still followed him, and reiterated the piteous cry, 'Pray remember poor Martha, the gipsy.'

At length, irritated by the perseverance of the woman-for even subordinates in government hate to be solicited importunately-Mr.

Harding, contrary to his usual custom, and contrary to the customary usages of modern society, turned hastily round, and fulminated an oath against the supplicating vagrant.

'Curse!' said Martha; 'have I lived to this? Hark ye, man-poor, weak, haughty man! Mark me, sir-look at me!'

He did look at her; and beheld a countenance on fire with rage. A pair of eyes blacker than jet, and brighter than diamonds, glared like stars upon him; her black hair dishevelled, hung over her olive cheeks; and a row of teeth whiter than the driven snow displaying themselves from between a pair of coral lips, in a dreadful smile, a ghastly sneer of contempt which mingled in her pa.s.sion. Harding was riveted to the spot; and, affected partly by the powerful fascination of her superhuman countenance, and partly by the dread of a disturbance in the street, he paused to listen to her.

'Mark me, sir,' said Martha; 'you and I shall meet again. Thrice shall you see me before you die. My visitings will be dreadful; but the third will be the last!'

There was a solemnity in this declaration which struck to his very heart, coming too as it did only from a vagrant outcast. Pa.s.sengers were approaching; and wishing, he knew not why, to soothe the ire of the angry woman, he mechanically drew from his pocket some silver, which he tendered to her.

'There, my good woman-there,' said he, stretching forth his hand.

'Good woman!' retorted the hag, 'Money now? I-I that have been cursed!

'tis all too late, proud gentleman-the deed is done, the curse be now on you.' Saying which, she huddled her ragged red cloak about her shoulders, and hurried from his sight, into the deep and dreary recesses of St. Giles's.

Harding experienced, as she vanished from his eye, a most extraordinary sensation: he felt grieved that he had spoken so harshly to the poor creature, and returned his shillings to his pocket with regret. Of course, fear of the fulfilment of her predictions did not mingle with any of his feelings on the occasion; and he proceeded to his office in Somerset-place, and performed all the arduous official duties of reading the opposition newspapers, discussing the leading politics of the day with the head of another department, and signing his name three times, before four o'clock.

Martha the gipsy, however, although he had 'p.o.o.phoohed' her out of his memory, would ever and anon flash across his mind; her figure was indelibly stamped upon his recollection; and though, of course, as I before said, a man of his firmness and intellect could care nothing, one way or another, for the maledictions of an ignorant, illiterate gipsy, still his feelings-whence arising I know not-prompted him to call a hackney-coach, and proceed _en voiture_ to his house rather than run the risk of again encountering the metropolitan sibyl, under whose forcible denunciation he was actually labouring.

There is a period in each day of the lives of married people, at which, I am given to understand, a more than ordinarily unreserved communication of facts and feelings takes place; when all the world is shut out, and the two beings, who are in truth 'but only one,' commune together freely and fully upon the occurrences of the past day. At this period, the else sacred secrets of the drawing-room coterie, and the _tellable_ jokes of the after-dinner convivialist, are mutually interchanged by the fond pair, who, by the barbarous customs of uncivilized Britain, have been separated during part of the preceding evening.

Then it is, that the husband informs his anxious consort how he has forwarded his worldly views with such a man-how he has carried his point in such a quarter-what he thinks of the talents of one, of the character of another; while the communicative wife gives _her_ views of the same subjects, founded upon what she has gathered from the individuals composing the female cabinet, and explains why she thinks he must have been deceived upon this point, or misled upon that. And thus, in recounting, in arguing, in discussing, and descanting, the blended interests of the happy pair are strengthened, their best hopes nourished, and perhaps eventually realized.

A few friends at dinner, and some refreshers in the evening, had prevented Harding from saying a word to his beloved Eliza about the gipsy; and perhaps, till the 'witching time' which I have attempted to define, he would not have mentioned the circ.u.mstance, even had they been alone. Most certainly he did not think the less of the horrible vision; and when the company had dispersed, and the affectionate couple had retired to rest, he stated the circ.u.mstance exactly as it had occurred, and received from his fair lady just such an answer as a prudent, intelligent, and discreet woman of sense would give to such a communication. She vindicated his original determination not to be imposed upon-wondered at his subsequent willingness to give to such an undeserving object, particularly while he had three or four soup tickets in his pocket-was somewhat surprised that he had not consigned the bold intruder to the hands of the beadle-and, ridiculing the impression which the hag's appearance seemed to have made upon her husband's mind, narrated a tour performed by herself and some friends to Norwood, when she was a girl, and when one of those very women had told her fortune, not one word of which ever came true-and, in a discussion of some length, animadverting strongly upon the weakness and impiety of putting faith in the sayings of such idle creatures, she fell fast asleep.

Not so Harding: he was restless and worried, and felt that he would give the world to be able to recall the curse which he had rashly uttered against the poor woman. Helpless as she was and in distress, why did his pa.s.sion conquer his judgment? Why did he add to the bitterness of refusal the sting of malediction? However, it was useless to regret that which was past-and, wearied and mortified with his reflection, he at length followed his better half into that profound slumber, which the length and subject of his harangue had so comfortably ensured her.

The morning came, and brightly beamed the sun-that is, as brightly as it ever beams in London. The office-hour arrived; and Mr. Harding proceeded, _not_ by Charlotte-street, to Somerset-house, such was his dread of seeing the ominous woman. It is impossible to describe the effect produced upon him by the apprehension of encountering her: if he heard a female voice behind him in the street, he trembled, and feared to look round, lest he should behold Martha. In turning a corner he proceeded carefully and cautiously, lest he should come upon her unexpectedly; in short, wherever he went, whatever he did, his actions, his movements, his very words, were controlled and constrained by the horror of beholding her again.

The malediction she had uttered rang incessantly in his ears; nay, such possession had it taken of him, that he had written the words down, and sealed the doc.u.ment which contained them. 'Thrice you shall see me before you die. My visitings will be dreadful, but the third will be the last.'

'Calais' was not more deeply imprinted on our Queen's heart, than these lines upon that of Mr. Harding; but he was ashamed of the strength of his feelings, and placed the paper wherein he had recorded them at the very bottom of his desk.

Meanwhile Frederick Langdale was unremitting in his attentions to Maria; but, as is too often the case, the bright sunshine of their loves was clouded. Her health, always delicate, now appeared more so, and at times her anxious parents felt a solicitude upon her account, new to them; for decided symptoms of consumption had shown themselves, which the faculty, although they spoke of them lightly to the fond mother and to the gentle patient, treated with such care and caution, as gave alarm to those who could see the progress of the fatal disease, which was unnoticed by Maria herself, who antic.i.p.ated parties, and pleasure, and gaieties, in the coming spring, which the doctors thought it but too probable she might never enjoy.

That Mr. Langdale's 'punctilio,' or Mrs. Langdale's excessive desire for apparent juvenility, should have induced the postponement of Maria's marriage, was, indeed, a melancholy circ.u.mstance. The agitation, the surprise, the hope deferred, which weighed upon the sweet girl's mind, and that doubting dread of something unexpected, which lovers always feel, bore down her spirits, and injured her health; whereas, had the marriage been celebrated, the relief she would have experienced from all her apprehensions, added to the tour of France and Italy, which the happy couple were to make immediately after their union, would have restored her health, while it ensured her happiness. This, however, was not to be.

It was now three months since poor Mr. Harding's rencontre with Martha; and habit, and time, and constant avocation, had conspired to free his mind from the dread she at first inspired. Again he smiled and joked, again he enjoyed society, and again dared to take the nearest road to Somerset House; nay, he had so far recovered from the unaccountable terror he had originally felt, that he went to his desk, and selecting the paper wherein he had set down the awful denunciation of the hag, deliberately tore it into bits, and witnessed its destruction in the fire, with something like real satisfaction, and a determination never more to think upon so silly an affair.

Frederick Langdale was, as usual, with his betrothed, and Mrs. Harding enjoying the egotism of the lovers, (for, as I said before, lovers think their conversation the most charming in the world, because they talk of nothing but themselves) when his curricle was driven to the door to convey him to Tattersall's, where his father had commissioned him to look at a horse, or horses, which he intended to purchase; for Frederick was, of all things in the world, the best possible judge of a horse.

To this sweeping dictum, p.r.o.nounced by the young gentleman himself, Mr.

Harding, however, was not willing to a.s.sent; and therefore, in order to have the full advantage of two heads, which, as the proverb says, are better than one, the worthy father-in-law elect, proposed accompanying the youth to the auctioneer's yard at Hyde-Park Corner, it being one of those few privileged days when the labourers in our public offices make holiday. The proposal was hailed with delight by the young man, who, in order to show due deference to Mr. Harding, gave him the reins, and bowing their adieus to the ladies at the window, away they went, the splendid cattle of Mr. Langdale prancing and curvetting, fire flaming from their eyes, and smoke breathing from their nostrils.

The charioteer, however, soon found that the horses were somewhat beyond his strength, even putting his skill wholly out of the question, and in turning into Russell-street, proposed surrendering the reins to Frederick. By some misunderstanding of words in the alarm which Harding felt, Frederick did not take the reins which he (perfectly confounded) tendered to him in great agitation. They slipped over the dashing iron between the horse, who thus freed from restraint, reared wildly in the air, and plunging forward, dashed the vehicle against a post, and precipitated Frederick and Harding on the curbstone; the off-horse kicked desperately as the carriage became entangled and impeded, and struck Frederick a desperate blow on the head. Harding, whose right arm and collar-bone were broken, raised himself on his left hand, and saw Frederick weltering in his blood, apparently lifeless before him. The infuriated animals again plunged forward with the shattered remnant of the carriage, and as this object was removed from his sight, the wretched father-in-law beheld, looking upon the scene with a fixed and unruffled countenance-MARTHA, THE GIPSY.

It was doubtful whether the appearance of this horrible vision, coupled as it was with the verification of her prophecy, had not a more dreadful effect upon Mr. Harding, than the sad reality before him. He trembled, sickened, fainted, and fell senseless on the ground.

a.s.sistance was promptly procured, and the wounded sufferers were carefully removed to their respective dwellings. Frederick Langdale's sufferings were much greater than those of his companion, and, in addition to severe fractures of two of his limbs, the wound upon his head presented a most terrible appearance, and excited the greatest alarm in his medical attendants.

Mr. Harding, whose temperate course of life was greatly advantageous to his case, had suffered comparatively little: a simple fracture of the arm, and dislocation of the collar-bone (which was the extent of his misfortune,) were, by skilful treatment and implicit obedience to professional commands, soon p.r.o.nounced in a state of improvement; but a wound had been inflicted which no doctor could heal. The conviction that the woman, whose anger he had incurred, had, if not the power of producing evil, at least the power to foretell it, and that he had twice again to see her before the fulfilment of her prophecy, struck deep into his mind; and although he felt himself more at ease when he had communicated to Mrs. Harding the fact of having seen the gipsy at the moment of the accident, it was impossible for him to rally from the shock which his nerves had received. It was in vain he had tried to shake off the perpetual apprehension of again beholding her.

Frederick Langdale remained for some time in a very precarious state.

All visitors were excluded from his room, and a wretched s.p.a.ce of two months pa.s.sed, during which his affectionate Maria had never been allowed to see him, nor to write to, nor to hear from him. While her const.i.tution was gradually giving way to the constant operation of solicitude and sorrow.

Mr. Harding meanwhile recovered rapidly, but his spirits did not keep pace with his mending health; the dread he felt of quitting his house, the tremor excited in his breast by a knocking at the door, or the approach of a footstep, lest the intruder should be the basilisk Martha, were not to be described; and the appearance of his poor Maria did not tend to cheer the gloom which hung over him.

When at length Frederick was sufficiently recovered to receive visitors, Maria was not sufficiently well to visit him: she was too rapidly sinking into an early grave, and even the physician himself appeared desirous of preparing her parents for the worst, while she, full of the symptomatic prospectiveness of disease, still talked antic.i.p.atingly of future happiness, when Frederick would be sufficiently re-established to visit her.

At length, however, the doctors suggested a change of air-a suggestion instantly attended to, but, alas! too late; the weakness of the poor girl was such, that upon a trial of her strength it was found inexpedient to attempt her removal.

In this terrible state, separated from him whose all she was, did the exemplary patient linger, and life seemed flickering in her flushing cheek; and her eye was sunken, and her parched lip quivered with pain.

It was at length agreed, that on the following day Frederick Langdale might be permitted to visit her;-his varied fractures were reduced, and the wound on the head had a.s.sumed a favourable appearance. The carriage was ordered to convey him to the Hardings at one, and the physicians advised by all means that Maria should be apprized of and prepared for the meeting the day previous to its taking place. Those who are parents, and those alone, will be able to understand the tender solicitude, the wary caution with which both her father and mother proceeded in a disclosure, so important as the medical men thought to her recovery-so careful that the coming joy should be imparted gradually to their suffering child, and that all the mischiefs resulting from an abrupt announcement should be avoided.

They sat down by her-spoke of Frederick-Maria joined in the conversation-raised herself in her bed-by degrees, hope was excited that she might soon again see him-this hope was gradually improved into certainty-the period at which it might occur spoken of-that period again progressively diminished: the anxious girl caught the whole truth-she knew it-she was conscious that she would behold him on the morrow-she burst into a flood of tears and sank down upon her pillow.

At that moment the bright sun, which was shining in all its splendour, beamed into the room, and fell strongly upon her flushed countenance.

'Draw down the blind, my love,' said Mrs. Harding to her husband.

Harding rose and proceeded to the window.

A shriek of horror burst from him-'She is there!' exclaimed the agitated man.

'Who?' cried his astonished wife.

'She-she-the horrid she!'

Mrs. Harding ran to the window and beheld, standing on the opposite side of the street, with her eyes fixed attentively on the house-MARTHA, THE GIPSY.

'Draw down the blind, my love, and come away; pray come away,' said Mrs.

Harding.

Harding drew down the blind.

'What evil is at hand? What misery is impending?' sobbed Harding.

A loud scream from his wife, who had returned to the bedside, was the horrid answer to his painful question.

Maria was dead!

Twice of the thrice he had seen this dreadful fiend in human shape; each visitation was (as she had foretold) to surpa.s.s the preceding ones in its importance of horror.-What could surpa.s.s this?

There, before the afflicted parents, lay their innocent child stretched in the still sleep of death; neither of them believed it true-it seemed like a dreadful dream. Harding was bewildered, and turned from the corpse of his beloved to the window he had just left.-Martha was gone-and he heard her singing a wild and joyous air at the other end of the street.