The Missing Bride Part 51

Upon the second Sabbath--being the day before the county court should sit--a subst.i.tute filled the pulpit of Mr. Willc.o.xen, and his congregation rea.s.sembled to hear an edifying discourse from the text: "I myself have seen the unG.o.dly in great power, and flourishing like a green bay-tree. I went by, and lo! he was gone; I sought him, but his place was nowhere to be found."

This sermon bore rather hard (by pointed allusions) upon the great elevation and sudden downfall of the celebrated minister, and, in consequence, delighted one portion of the audience and enraged the other. The last-mentioned charged the new preacher with envy, hatred and malice, and all uncharitableness, besides the wish to rise on the ruin of his unfortunate predecessor, and they went home in high indignation, resolved not to set foot within the parish church again until the honorable acquittal of their own beloved pastor should put all his enemies, persecutors and slanderers to shame.

The excitement spread and gained force and fire with s.p.a.ce. The press took it up, and went to war as the people had done. And as far as the name of Thurston Willc.o.xen had been wafted by the breath of fame, it was now blown by the "Blatant Beast." Ay, and farther, too! for those who had never even heard of his great talents, his learning, his eloquence, his zeal and his charity, were made familiar with his imputed crime and shuddered while they denounced. And this was natural and well, so far as it went to prove that great excellence is so much less rare than great evil, as to excite less attention. The news of this signal event spread like wildfire all over the country, from Maine to Louisiana, and from Missouri to Florida, producing everywhere great excitement, but falling in three places with the crushing force of a thunderbolt.

First by Marian's fireside.

In a private parlor of a quiet hotel, in one of the Eastern cities, sat the lady, now nearly thirty years of age, yet still in the bloom of her womanly beauty.

She had lately arrived from Europe, charged with one of those benevolent missions which it was the business and the consolation of her life to fulfill.

It was late in the afternoon, and the low descending sun threw its golden gleam across the round table at which she sat, busily engaged with reading reports, making notes, and writing letters connected with the affair upon which she had come.

Seven years had not changed Marian much--a little less vivid, perhaps, the bloom on cheeks and lips, a shade paler the angel brow, a shade darker the rich and l.u.s.trous auburn tresses, softer and calmer, fuller of thought and love the clear blue eyes--sweeter her tones, and gentler all her motions--that was all. Her dress was insignificant in material, make and color, yet the wearer unconsciously imparted a cla.s.sic and regal grace to every fold and fall of the drapery. No splendor of apparel could have given such effect to her individual beauty as this quiet costume; I would I were an artist that I might reproduce her image as she was--the glorious face and head, the queenly form, in its plain but graceful robe of I know not what--gray serge, perhaps.

Her whole presence--her countenance, manner and tone revealed the richness, strength and serenity of a faithful, loving, self-denying, G.o.d-reliant soul--of one who could recall the past, endure the present, and antic.i.p.ate the future without regret, complaint or fear.

Sometimes the lady's soft eyes would lift themselves from her work to rest with tenderness upon the form of a little child, so small and still that you would not have noticed her presence but in following the lady's loving glance. She sat in a tiny rocking chair, nursing a little white rabbit on her lap. She was not a beautiful child--she was too diminutive and pale, with hazy blue eyes and faded yellow hair; yet her little face was so demure and sweet, so meek and loving, that it would haunt and soften you more than that of a beautiful child could. The child had been orphaned from her birth, and when but a few days old had been received into the "Children's Home."

Marian never had a favorite among her children, but this little waif was so completely orphaned, so desolate and dest.i.tute, and withal so puny, fragile and lifeless that Marian took her to her own heart day and night, imparting from her own fine vital temperament the warmth and vigor that nourished the perishing little human blossom to life and health. If ever a mother's heart lived in a maiden's bosom, it was in Marian's. As she had cherished Miriam, she now cherished Angel, and she was as fondly loved by the one as she had been by the other. And so for five years past Angel had been Marian's inseparable companion. She sat with her little lesson, or her sewing, or her pet rabbit, at Marian's feet while she worked; held her hand when she walked out, sat by her side at the table or in the carriage, and slept nestled in her arms at night. She was the one earthly blossom that bloomed in Marian's solitary path.

Angel now sat with her rabbit on her knees, waiting demurely till Marian should have time to notice her.

And the lady still worked on, stopping once in a while to smile upon the child. There was a file of the evening papers lying near at hand upon the table where she wrote, but Marian had not yet had time to look at them. Soon, however, she had occasion to refer to one of them for the names of the members of the Committee on Public Lands. In casting her eyes over the paper, her glance suddenly lighted upon a paragraph that sent all the blood from her cheeks to her heart. She dropped the paper, sank back in her chair, and covered her blanched face with both hands, and strove for self-control.

Angel softly put down the rabbit and gently stole to her side and looked up with her little face full of wondering sympathy.

Presently Marian began pa.s.sing her hands slowly over her forehead, with a sort of unconscious self-mesmerism, and then she dropped them wearily upon her lap, and Angel saw how pallid was her face, how ashen and tremulous her lip, how quivering her hands. But after a few seconds Marian stooped and picked the paper up and read the long, wonder-mongering affair, in which all that had been and all that had seemed, as well as many things could neither be nor seem, were related at length, or conjectured, or suggested. It began by announcing the arrest of the Rev. Thurston Willc.o.xen upon the charge of murder, and then went back to the beginning and related the whole story, from the first disappearance of Marian Mayfield to the late discoveries that had led to the apprehension of the supposed murderer, with many additions and improvements gathered in the rolling of the ball of falsehood. Among the rest, that the body of the unhappy young lady had been washed ash.o.r.e several miles below the scene of her dreadful fate, and had been charitably interred by some poor fisherman. The article concluded by describing the calm demeanor of the accused and the contemptuous manner in which he treated a charge so grave, scorning even to deny it.

"Oh, I do not wonder at the horror and consternation this matter has caused. When the deed was attempted, more than the intended death wound didn't overcome me! And nothing, nothing in the universe but the evidence of my own senses could have convinced me of his purposed guilt!

And still I cannot realize it! He must have been insane! But he treats the discovery of his intended and supposed crime with scorn and contempt! Alas! alas! is this the end of years of suffering and probation? Is this the fruit of that long remorse, from which I had hoped so much for his redemption--a remorse without repentance, and barren of reformation! Yet I must save him."

She arose and rang the bell, and gave orders to have two seats secured for her in the coach that would leave in the morning for Baltimore. And then she began to walk up and down the floor, to try and walk off the excitement that was fast gaining upon her.

Before this night and this discovery, not for the world would Marian have made her existence known to him, far less would she have sought his presence. Nay, deeming such a meeting improper as it was impossible, her mind had never contemplated it for an instant. She had watched his course, sent anonymous donations to his charities, hoped much from his repentance and good works, but never hoped in any regard to herself. But now it was absolutely necessary that she should make her existence known to him. She would go to him! She must save him! She should see him, and speak to him--him whom she had never hoped to meet again in life! She would see him again in three days! The thought was too exciting even for her strong heart and frame and calm, self-governing nature! And in defiance of reason and of will, her long-buried youthful love, her pure, earnest, single-hearted love, burst its secret sepulchre, and rejoiced through all her nature. The darkness of the past was, for the time, forgotten. Memory recalled no picture of unkindness, injustice or inconstancy. Even the scene upon the beach was faded, gone, lost! But the light of the past glowed around her--their seaside strolls and woodland wanderings--

"The still, green places where they met, The moonlit branches dewy wet, The greeting and the parting word, The smile, the embrace, the tone that made An Eden of the forest shade--"

kindling a pure rapture from memory, and a wild longing from hope, that her full heart could scarce contain.

But soon came on another current of thought and feeling opposed to the first--doubt and fear of the meeting. For herself she felt that she could forget all the sorrows of the past; aye! and with fervent glowing soul, and flushed cheeks, and tearful eyes, and clasped hands, she adored the Father in Heaven that He had put no limit to forgiveness--no!

in that blessed path of light all s.p.a.ce was open to the human will, and the heart might forgive infinitely--and to its own measureless extent.

But how would Thurston meet her? He had suffered such tortures from remorse that doubtless he would rejoice "with exceeding great joy" to find that the deed attempted in some fit of madness had really not been effected. But his sufferings had sprung from remorse of conscience, not from remorse of love. No! except as his deliverer, he would probably not be pleased to see her. As soon as this thought had seized her mind, then, indeed, all the bitterer scenes in the past started up to life, and broke down the defenses reared by love, and faith, and hope, and let in the tide of anguish and despair that rolled over her soul, shaking it as it had not been shaken for many years. And her head fell upon her bosom, and her hands were clasped convulsively, as she walked up and down the floor--striving with herself--striving to subdue the rebel pa.s.sions of her heart--striving to attain her wonted calmness, and strength, and self-possession, and at last praying earnestly: "Oh, Father! the rains descend, and the floods come, and the winds blow and beat upon my soul; let not its strength fall as if built upon the sand."

And so she walked up and down, striving and praying; nor was the struggle in vain--once more she "conquered a peace" in her own bosom.

She turned her eyes upon little Angel. The infant was drooping over one arm of her rocking-chair like a fading lily, but her soft, hazy eyes, full of vague sympathy, followed the lady wherever she went.

Marian's heart smote her for her temporary forgetfulness of the child's wants. It was now twilight, and Marian rang for lights, and Angel's milk and bread, which were soon brought.

And then with her usual quiet tenderness she undressed the little one, heard her prayers, took her up, and as she rocked, sang a sweet, low evening hymn, that soothed the child to sleep and her own heart to perfect rest. And early the next morning Marian and little Angel set out by the first coach for Baltimore, on their way to St. Mary's County.

The Convent of Bethlehem was not only the sanctuary of professed nuns, the school for girls, the nursery of orphans, but it was also the temporary home of those Sisters of Mercy who go forth into the world only on errands of Christian love and charity, and return to their convent often only to die, worn out by toil among scenes and sufferers near which few but themselves would venture. And as they pa.s.s hence to Heaven, their ranks are still filled up from the world--not always by the weary and disappointed. Often young Catholic girls voluntarily leave the untried world that is smiling fair before them to enter upon a life of poverty, self-denial and merciful ministrations; so even in this century the order of the Sisters of Mercy is kept up.

Among the most active and zealous of the order of Bethlehem was the Sister Theresa, the youngest of the band. Youthful as she was, however, this Sister's heart was no sweet sacrifice of "a flower offered in the bud;" on the contrary, I am afraid that Sister Theresa had trifled with, and pinched, and bruised, and trampled the poor budding heart, until she thought it good for nothing upon earth before she offered it to Heaven.

I fear it was nothing higher than that strange revulsion of feeling, world-weariness, disappointment, disgust, remorse, fanaticism--either, any, or all of these, call it what you will, that in past ages and Catholic countries have filled monasteries with the whilom, gay, worldly and ambitious; that has sent many a woman in the prime of her beauty and many a man at the acme of his power into a convent; that transformed the mighty Emperor Charles V. into a cowled and shrouded monk; the reckless swashbuckler, Ignatius Loyola, into a holy saint, and the beautiful Louise de la Valliere into an ascetic nun; which finally metamorphosed the gayest, maddest, merriest elf that ever danced in the moonlight into--Sister Theresa.

Poor Jacquelina! for, of course, you can have no doubt that it is of her we are speaking--she perpetrated her last lugubrious joke on the day that she was to have made her vows, for when asked what patron saint she would select by taking that saint's name in religion, she answered--St.

Theresa, because St. Theresa would understand her case the best, having been, like herself, a scamp and a rattle-brain before she took it into her head to astonish her friends by becoming a saint. Poor Jacko said this with the solemnest face and the most serious earnestness; but, with such a reputation as she had had for pertness, of course n.o.body would believe but that she was making fun of the "Blessed Theresa," and so she was put upon further probation, with the injunction to say the seven penitential Psalms seven times a day, until she was in a holier frame of mind; which she did, though under protest that she didn't think the words composed by David to express his remorse for his own enormous sin exactly suited her case. Sister Theresa, if the least steady and devout, was certainly the most active and zealous and courageous among them all.

She yawned horribly over the long litanies and long sermons; but if ever there was a work of mercy requiring extraordinary labor, privation, exposure and danger, Sister Theresa was the one to face, in the cause, lightning and tempest, plague, pestilence and famine, battle and murder, and sudden death! Happy was she? or content? No; she was moody, hysterical and devotional by turns--sometimes a zeal for good works would possess her; sometimes the old fun and quaintness would break out, and sometimes an overwhelming fit of remorse--each depending upon the accidental cause that would chance to arouse the moods.

Humane creatures are like climates--some of a temperate atmosphere, taking even life-long sorrow serenely--never forgetting, and never exaggerating its cause--never very wretched, if never quite happy.

Others of a more torrid nature have long, sunny seasons of bird-like cheerfulness and happy forgetfulness, until some slight cause, striking "the electric chain wherewith we are darkly bound," shall startle up memory--and grief, intensely realized, shall rise to anguish, and a storm shall pa.s.s through the soul, shaking it almost to dissolution, and the poor subject thinks, if she can think, that her heart must go to pieces this time! But the storm pa.s.ses, and nature, instead of being destroyed, is refreshed and ready for the sunshine and the song-birds again. The elastic heart throws off its weight, the spirits revive, and life goes on joyously in harmony with nature.

So it was with Jacquelina, with this sad difference, that as her trouble was more than sorrow--for it was remorse--it was never quite thrown off.

It was not that her conscience reproached her for the fate of Dr.

Grimshaw, which was brought on by his own wrongdoing, but Marian's fate--that a wild, wanton frolic of her own should have caused the early death of one so young, and beautiful, and good as Marian! that was the thought that nearly drove poor Jacquelina mad with remorse, whenever she realized it. Dr. Grimshaw was forgiven, and--forgotten; but the thought of Marian was the "undying worm," that preyed upon her heart. And so, year after year, despite the arguments and persuasions of nearest friends, and the constancy of poor Cloudy, Jacquelina tearfully turned from love, friendship, wealth and ease, and renewed her vows of poverty, celibacy, obedience, and the service of the poor, sick and ignorant, in the hope of expiating her offense, soothing the voice of conscience, and gaining peace. Jacquelina would have made her vows perpetual by taking the black veil, but her Superior constantly dissuaded her from it. She was young, and life, with its possibilities, was all before her; she must wait many years before she took the step that could not be retracted without perjury. And so each year she renewed her vow a twelvemonth. The seventh year of her religious life was drawing to its close, and she had notified her superior of her wish now, after so many years of probation, to take the black veil, and make her vows perpetual.

And the Abbess had, at length, listened favorably to her expressed wishes.

But a few days after this, as the good old Mother, Martha, the portress, sat dozing over her rosary, behind the hall grating, the outer door was thrown open, and a young man, in a midshipman's undress uniform, entered rather brusquely, and came up to the grating. Touching his hat precisely as if the old lady had been his superior officer, he said, hastily:

"Madam, if you please, I wish to see Mrs. ----; you know who I mean, I presume? my cousin, Jacquelina."

The portress knew well enough, for she had seen Cloudy there several times before, but she replied:

"You mean, young gentleman, that pious daughter, called in the world Mrs. Grimshaw, but in religion Sister Theresa?"

"Fal lal!--that is--I beg your pardon, Mother, but I wish to see the lady immediately. Can I do so?"

"The dear sister Theresa is at present making her retreat, preparatory to taking the black veil."

"The what!" exclaimed Cloudy, with as much horror as if it had been the "black dose" she was going to take.

"The black veil--and so she cannot be seen."

"Madam, I have a very pressing form of invitation here, which people are not very apt to disregard. Did you ever hear of a subpoena, dear Mother?"

The good woman never had, but she thought it evidently something "uncanny," for she said, "I will send for the Abbess;" and she beckoned to a nun within, and sent her on the errand--and soon the Abbess appeared, and Cloudy made known the object of his visit.

"Go into the parlor, sir, and Sister Theresa will attend you," said that lady.

And Cloudy turned to a side door on his right hand, and went into the little receiving-room, three sides of which were like other rooms, but the fourth side was a grating instead of a wall. Behind this grating appeared Jacquelina--so white and thin with confinement, fasting and vigil, and so disguised by her nun's dress as to be unrecognizable to any but a lover's eyes: with her was the Abbess.

Cloudy went up to the grating. Jacquelina put her hand through, and spoke a kind greeting; but Cloudy glanced at the Abbess, looked reproachfully at Jacquelina, and then turning to the former, said:

"Madam, I wish to say a few words in confidence to my cousin here. Can I be permitted to do so?"