The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb Volume I Part 5

CHAPTER VIII

They had but four rooms in the cottage. Margaret slept in the biggest room up stairs, and her grandaughter in a kind of closet adjoining, where she could be within hearing, if her grandmother should call her in the night.

The girl was often disturbed in that manner--two or three times in a night she has been forced to leave her bed, to fetch her grandmother's cordials, or do some little service for her--but she knew that Margaret's ailings were _real_ and pressing, and Rosamund never complained--never suspected, that her grandmother's requisitions had any thing unreasonable in them.

The night she parted with Miss Clare, she had helped Margaret to bed, as usual--and, after saying her prayers, as the custom was, kneeling by the old lady's bed-side, kissed her grandmother, and wished her a good night--Margaret blessed her, and charged her to go to bed directly. It was her customary injunction, and Rosamund had never dreamed of disobeying.

So she retired to her little room. The night was warm and clear--the moon very bright--her window commanded a view of _scenes_ she had been tracing in the day-time with Miss Clare.

All the events of the day past, the occurrences of their walk, arose in her mind. She fancied she should like to retrace those scenes--but it was now nine o'clock, a late hour in the village.

Still she fancied it would be very charming--and then her grandmother's injunction came powerfully to her recollection--she sighed, and turned from the window--and walked up and down her little room.

Ever, when she looked at the window, the wish returned. It was not so _very late_. The neighbours were yet about, pa.s.sing under the window to their homes--she thought, and thought again, till her sensations became vivid, even to painfulness--her bosom was aching to give them vent.

The village clock struck ten!--the neighbours ceased to pa.s.s under the window. Rosamund, stealing down stairs, fastened the latch behind her, and left the cottage.

One, that knew her, met her, and observed her with some surprize.

Another recollects having wished her a good night. Rosamund never returned to the cottage!

An old man, that lay sick in a small house adjoining to Margaret's, testified the next morning, that he had plainly heard the old creature calling for her grandaughter. All the night long she made her moan, and ceased not to call upon the name of Rosamund. But no Rosamund was there--the voice died away, but not till near day-break.

When the neighbours came to search in the morning, Margaret was missing!

She had _straggled_ out of bed, and made her way into Rosamund's room--worn out with fatigue and fright, when she found the girl not there, she had laid herself down to die--and, it is thought, she died _praying_--for she was discovered in a kneeling posture, her arms and face extended on the pillow, where Rosamund had slept the night before--a smile was on her face in death.

CHAPTER IX

Fain would I draw a veil over the transactions of that night--but I cannot--grief, and burning shame, forbid me to be silent--black deeds are about to be made public, which reflect a stain upon our common nature.

Rosamund, enthusiastic and improvident, wandered unprotected to a distance from her guardian doors--through lonely glens, and wood walks, where she had rambled many a _day_ in safety--till she arrived at a shady copse, out of the hearing of any human habitation.

_Matravis_ met her.--"Flown with insolence and wine," returning home late at night, he pa.s.sed that way!

Matravis was a very ugly man. Sallow-complexioned! and, if hearts can wear that colour, his heart was sallow-complexioned also.

A young man with _gray_ deliberation! cold and systematic in all his plans; and all his plans were evil. His very l.u.s.t was systematic.

He would brood over his bad purposes for such a dreary length of time, that it might have been expected, some solitary check of conscience must have intervened to save him from commission. But that _Light from Heaven_ was extinct in his dark bosom.

Nothing that is great, nothing that is amiable, existed for this unhappy man. He feared, he envied, he suspected; but he never loved. The sublime and beautiful in nature, the excellent and becoming in morals, were things placed beyond the capacity of his sensations. He loved not poetry--nor ever took a lonely walk to meditate--never beheld virtue, which he did not try to disbelieve, or female beauty and innocence, which he did not l.u.s.t to contaminate.

A sneer was perpetually upon his face, and malice _grinning_ at his heart. He would say the most ill-natured things, with the least remorse, of any man I ever knew. This gained him the reputation of a wit--other _traits_ got him the reputation of a villain.

And this man formerly paid his court to Elinor Clare!--with what success I leave my readers to determine.--It was not in Elinor's nature to despise any living thing--but in the estimation of this man, to be rejected was to be _despised_--and Matravis _never forgave_.

He had long turned his eyes upon Rosamund Gray. To steal from the bosom of her friends the jewel they prized so much, the little ewe lamb they held so dear, was a scheme of delicate revenge, and Matravis had a two-fold motive for accomplishing this young maid's ruin.

Often had he met her in her favorite solitudes, but found her ever cold and inaccessible. Of late the girl had avoided straying far from her own home, in the fear of meeting him--but she had never told her fears to Allan.

Matravis had, till now, been content to be a villain within the limits of the law--but, on the present occasion, hot fumes of wine, co-operating with his deep desire of revenge, and the insolence of an unhoped for meeting, overcame his customary prudence, and Matravis rose, at once, to an audacity of glorious mischief.

Late at night he met her, a lonely, unprotected virgin--no friend at hand--no place near of refuge.

Rosamund Gray, my soul is exceeding sorrowful for thee--I loath to tell the hateful circ.u.mstances of thy wrongs. Night and silence were the only witnesses of this young maid's disgrace--Matravis fled.

Rosamund, polluted and disgraced, wandered, an abandoned thing, about the fields and meadows till day-break. Not caring to return to the cottage, she sat herself down before the gate of Miss Clare's house--in a stupor of grief.

Elinor was just rising, and had opened the windows of her chamber, when she perceived her desolate young friend.--She ran to embrace her--she brought her into the house--she took her to her bosom--she kissed her--she spake to her; but Rosamund could not speak.

Tidings came from the cottage. Margaret's death was an event, which could not be kept concealed from Rosamund. When the sweet maid heard of it, she languished, and fell sick--she never held up her head after that time.

If Rosamund had been a _sister_, she could not have been kindlier treated, than by her two friends.

Allan had prospects in life--might, in time, have married into any of the first families in Hertfordshire--but Rosamund Gray, humbled though she was, and put to shame, had yet a charm for _him_--and he would have been content to share his fortunes with her yet, if Rosamund would have lived to be his companion.

But this was not to be--and the girl soon after died. She expired in the arms of Elinor--quiet, gentle, as she lived--thankful, that she died not among strangers--and expressing by signs, rather than words, a grat.i.tude for the most trifling services, the common offices of humanity. She died uncomplaining; and this young maid, this untaught Rosamund, might have given a lesson to the grave philosopher in death.

CHAPTER X

I was but a boy when these events took place. All the village remember the story, and tell of Rosamund Gray, and old blind Margaret.

I parted from Allan Clare on that disastrous night, and set out for Edinburgh the next morning, before the facts were commonly known--I heard not of them--and it was four months before I received a letter from Allan.

"His heart" he told me "was gone from him--for his sister had died of a phrensy fever!"--not a word of Rosamund in the letter--I was left to collect her story from sources which may one day be explained.

I soon after quitted Scotland, on the death of my father, and returned to my native village. Allan had left the place, and I could gain no information, whether he were dead or living.

I pa.s.sed the _cottage_. I did not dare to look that way, or to enquire _who_ lived there.--A little dog, that had been Rosamund's, was yelping in my path. I laughed aloud like one mad, whose mind had suddenly gone from him--I stared vacantly around me, like one alienated from common perceptions.

But I was young at that time, and the impression became gradually weakened, as I mingled in the business of life. It is now _ten years_ since these events took place, and I sometimes think of them as unreal.

Allan Clare was a dear friend to me--but there are times, when Allan and his sister, Margaret and her grandaughter, appear like personages of a dream--an idle dream.

CHAPTER XI

Strange things have happened unto me--I seem scarce awake--but I will recollect my thoughts, and try to give an account of what has befallen me in the few last weeks.