IF I MAY trust the flattering eye of sleep,
My dreams presage some joyful news at hand;
My bosom’s lord sits lightly in his throne;
And, all this day, an unaccustom’d spirit
Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts.
Romeo and Juliet.
CHRISTIAN MELVILLE is seated alone by her fireside, engaged in her usual occupations, and full of her wonted thoughts; but her present anxiety about Mary has taught her to linger less in the past, and to look oftener forward to the future than she has been accustomed to do heretofore, since sorrow made that once bright prospect a blank to her. Nay, Christian, in her happier hours, has grown a dreamer of dreams, and all her architectural fancies terminate in the one grand object, the happiness of Mary. She sees the imminent danger she runs of having to relinquish her one remaining treasure, and that into the keeping of one she distrusts so much as Forsyth. Christian cannot tell how it is that she has such an unaccountable, unconquerable aversion to him. True, his name is the same as that of Halbert’s tempter; and association is the root, doubtless, of all her prejudice — as prejudice everybody calls it — and Christian tries, as she has tried a hundred times, to overcome her repugnance, and to recollect the good traits of character that have been told her of him, and to school her mind into willingness to receive him as Mary’s choice; and she breathes, from the depths of her heart, the fervent petition for guidance and deliverance so often repeated for her innocent Mary — her child, her sister — and then her thoughts speed away, and Halbert rises up before her mental vision. What can be his fate? Long and wearily does she ponder, and bitter fancies often make her groan in spirit as one burdened. Is he still a living man? — still to be hoped and prayed for; or, is Halbert now beyond all human hope and intercession? Her heart grows sick and faint as she thinks of the possibility of this; but she almost instantly rejects it; and again her soul rises to her Lord in earnest ejaculations. Oh! but for this power of prayer, but for this well-ascertained certainty, that there is One who hears the prayers of his people, how should Christian Melville have lived throughout these three long anxious years; how should she have endured the unbroken monotony of every uneventful day, with such a load upon her mind, and such fancies coming and going in her heart; how possibly subdued the longings of her anxious love through all this time of waiting and suspense? But her prayer has never ceased; like the smoke of the ancient sacrifice, it has ascended continually through the distant heaven: the voice of her supplications and intercedings have risen up without ceasing; and surely the Hearer of prayer will not shut his ears to these.
There is some commotion going on below, the sound of which comes up to Christian in a confused murmur, in which she can only distinguish old Ailie’s voice. At first she takes no notice of it; then she begins to wonder what it can be, so strange are such sounds in this quiet and methodical house, though still she does not rise to inquire what it is. Christian is engrossed too much with her own thoughts; and as the sounds grow more indistinct, she bends her head again, and permits herself to be carried away once more in the current of her musings. But the step of old Ailie is coming up the stairs much more rapidly than that old footstep was wont to come; and as Christian looks up again in astonishment, Ailie rushes into the room, spins round it for a moment with uplifted hands, sobbing and laughing mingled, in joyful confusion, and then dropping on the floor, breathless and exhausted with her extraordinary pirouetting, throws her apron over her head, and weeps and laughs, and utters broken ejaculations till Christian, hastening across the room in great alarm to interrogate her, afraid that the old woman’s brain is affected, “What is the matter, Ailie?” Christian asks. “Tell me, what is the matter?”
“Oh, Miss Christian!” and poor Ailie’s wail of sobbing mixed with broken laughter sounded almost unearthly in Christian’s ear. “Oh, Miss Christian! said I not, that the bairn of sae monie prayers suld not be lost at last?”
“Ailie! Ailie! what do you mean? Have you heard anything of Halbert?” and Christian trembled like a leaf, and could scarce speak her question for emotion. “Ailie! I entreat you to speak to — to answer me.”
And Christian wrung her hands in an agony of hope and fear, unwitting what to think or make of all this almost hysterical emotion of the old faithful servant, or of her enigmatical words. “Look up, dear Christian; look up!” Ailie needs not answer. Who is this that stands on the threshold of this well-remembered room, with a flush of joy on his cheek, and a shade of shame and fearfulness just tempering the glow of happiness in his eyes?
“Halbert!”
“Christian!”
The brother and sister so fearfully and so long separated, and during these years unwitting of each other’s existence even, are thus restored to each other once more.
A long story has Halbert to tell, when Christian has recovered from her first dream of confused joy, a three year long story, beginning with that fearful night, the source of all his sorrows and his sufferings. Christian’s heart is bent down in silent shuddering horror as he tells her of how he fell; how he was seduced, as by the craftiness of an Ahithophel, into doubt, into scoffing, into avowed unbelief, and finally led by his seducer — who all the previous time had seemed pure and spotless as an angel of light — into the haunts of his profligate associates, so vicious, so degrading, that the blush mantles on Halbert’s cheek at the bare remembrance of that one night. He tells her how among them he was led to acknowledge the change which Forsyth had wrought upon his opinions, and how he had been welcomed as one delivered from the bondage of priestly dreams and delusions; how he was taken with them when they left Forsyth’s house — the host himself the prime leader and chief of all — and saw scenes of evil which he shuddered still to think of; and how in the terrible revulsion of his feelings which followed his first knowledge of the habits of these men, whose no-creed he had adopted, and whose principles he had openly confessed the night before, sudden and awful conviction laid hold upon him — conviction of the nature of sin; of his sin in chief — and an apprehension of the hopelessness of pardon being extended to him; and how, turning reckless in his despair, he had resolved to flee to some place where he was unknown, uncaring what became of himself. He told her then of his long agony, of his fearful struggle with despair, which engrossed his soul, and how at last he was prompted by an inward influence to the use of the means of grace once more; and how, when at length he dared to open his Bible again, a text of comfort and of hopefulness looked him in the face; that he had said to himself, over and over again, “It is impossible!” till hope had died in his heart: but here this true word contradicted at once the terrible utterance of his self-abandonment. “All things,” it was written, “are possible with God and Halbert told her, how the first tears that had moistened his eyes since his great fall sprang up in them that very day. — He told her of the scene so fair, where this mighty utterance of the Almighty went to his soul, and where he found peace; in the words of the gifted American —
“Oh, I could not choose but go
Into the woodlands hoar.
“Into the blithe and breathing air,
Into the solemn wood,
Solemn and silent everywhere!
Nature with folded arms seem’d there,
Kneeling at her evening prayer!
Like one in prayer I stood.
“Before me rose an avenue
Of tall and sombrous pines;
Abroad their fanlike branches grew,
And where the sunshine darted through,
Spread a vapour soft and blue.
In long and sloping lines.
“And falling on my weary brain,
Like a fast falling shower,
The dreams of youth came back again;
Low lispings of the summer rain,
Dropping on the ripen’d grain,
As once upon the flower.”
He told her of his happy progress, from that first dawning of hope to the full joy of steadfast faith. He ran over the history of the past year, in which from day to day he had looked forward to this meeting; and he told with what joy he had slowly added coin to coin, until he had saved a sufficient sum to carry him home. Then, when he had finished, the sister and brother mingled their thanksgivings and happiness together, and Christian’s heart swelled full and overbrimming: she could have seated herself upon the floor, like Ailie, and poured out her joy as artlessly. But it is Halbert’s turn now to ask questions. When will little Mary be home? how long she stays. Halbert wearies to see his little sister, but he is bidden remember that she is not little now, and Christian sighs, and the dark cloud, that she fears is hanging over Mary’s fate, throws somewhat of its premonitory gloom upon her heart and face. Halbert, unnoticing this, is going about the room, almost like a boy, looking lovingly at its well-remembered corners, and at the chairs and tables, at the books, and last his eye falls on a card lying in a little basket, and he starts as if he had encountered a serpent, and his eye flashes as he suddenly cries out, almost sternly, as he lifts it and reads the name.
“Christian, what is this — what means this? Mr. Walter Forsyth a visitor of yours; it cannot be. Tell me, Christian, what does it mean?”
“It is Mr. Forsyth’s card,” said Christian gravely; “an acquaintance, I am afraid I must say a friend of ours. Indeed, Halbert, now that you are home with us again, this is my only grief. I fear we shall have to give our little Mary into his keeping, and he is not worthy of her.”
Halbert is calmed by his long trial, but his natural impetuosity is not entirely overcome, and he starts up in sudden excitement and disorder. “Walter Forsyth the husband of my sister Mary! Walter Forsyth, the infidel, the profligate; better, Christian, better a thousand times, that we should lay her head in the grave, great trial as that would be, and much agony as it would cause us all, than permit her to unite herself with such a reptile.”
“Halbert,” said Christian, “the name misleads you; this cannot be the man — the Forsyth who wrought you so much unhappiness and harm, and has caused us all such great grief and sorrow; he must be much older, and altogether a different person. This one is not even a scoffer, at least so far as I have seen.”
“Christian,” cried Halbert vehemently, “I feel assured it is the same. Do not tell me what he pretends to be, if he has any end to serve he can be anything, and put on the seeming of an angel of light even. I tell you, Christian, that I am sure, quite sure, that it is he. I met him as I came here, and I shuddered as I saw him, and even felt myself shrinking back lest his clothes should touch me; but little did I suspect that he was about to bring more grief upon us. Does Mary, do you think, care for him?”
Christian could not but tell him her fears; but she said also that Mary had always avoided speaking to her on the subject. What could they do? What should be done to save Mary? Halbert, in his impatience, would have gone to seek her out at once, and have pointed out to her the character of her lover; but Christian only mournfully shook her head, such a plan was most likely to do harm and not good.
“You must be calm, Halbert,” she said, “this impetuosity will be injurious — we must save Mary by gentler means, she is far too like yourself to be told in this outspoken manner — the shock would kill her.”
But old Ailie is stealing the door of the room open timidly, to break in on the first hour of Christian’s joy, and when she entered she did it with a look of sober cheerfulness, widely different from her late joyful frenzy.
“Miss Mary came in a while since,” she said, “and ran straight up to her own room, without speaking, or waiting till I telled her of Mr. Halbert’s home coming, and she looked pale and ill like; would you not go up, Miss Christian, and see?”
The Melvilles are Ailie’s own children, and she has a mother’s care of them in all their troubles, bodily or mental. So at her bidding Christian rose and went softly to Mary’s room: the door was closed, but she opened it gently, and standing hidden by the curtains of Mary’s bed, was witness to the wild burst of passionate sorrow and disappointed affection in which Mary’s breaking heart gushed forth, when she found herself once more alone. Herself unseen, Christian saw the scalding tears welling out from her gentle sister’s dim and swollen eyes, she saw the convulsive motions of her lithe and graceful figure, as she rocked herself to and fro, as if to ease or still the burning grief within: and she heard her broken murmurs.
“Had he but died before I knew this, I would have mourned for him all my life, even as Christian mourns, but now — but now! — such as he is” — and her burst of sobbing checked the voice of her sorrow. A moment after she started up and dashed the tears from her eyes, with some vehemence. “Should I not rather thank God that I have been saved from uniting myself with a godless man — with my poor brother’s seducer?” and she sank on her knees by the bedside. Poor Mary’s grief was too great for silent supplications, and Christian stood entranced, as that prayer, broken by many a gush of weeping, rose through the stillness of the quiet room. She had never, she thought, heard such eloquence before of supplicating sorrow, had never seen the omnipotence of truth and faith till then; gradually they seemed to subdue and overcome the wildness of that first grief, gradually attuned that sweet young sobbing, struggling voice, to sweetest resignation, and ere Christian echoed the solemn “Amen,” Mary had given thanks for her deliverance, though still natural tears, not to be repressed, broke in on her thanksgiving, and silent weeping followed her ended prayer. But when she bent her head upon her hands again, Christian’s kind arm was around her, Christian’s tears were mingled with her own, Christian’s lips were pressed to her wet cheek in tender sympathy, and the voice of Christian, like a comforter, whispered, “I know all, Mary, I know all; may God strengthen you, my dear sister — you have done nobly, and as you should have done; may God bless you, dearest Mary.”
And Mary’s head, as in her old childish sorrows, nestles on Christian’s bosom, and Mary’s heart is relieved of half its heavy and bitter load. Poor Mary! the days of childhood have indeed come back again, and, as the violence of the struggle wears away, she weeps herself to sleep, for sorrow has worn out the strength of her delicate frame, already exhausted by the varied and contending emotions of the day, and now the tears slide slowly from beneath her closed eyelids even in her sleep.
But Halbert is at the door anxiously begging for admittance, and Christian leads him in to look at little Mary’s sleep. It was a child’s face, the last time he looked upon it, a happy girlish face, where mirth and quick intelligence rivalled each other in bringing out its expressive power; he sees it now, a woman’s, worn with the first and sorest struggle that its loving nature could sustain, and a kind of reverence mingled with his warm affection as he bent over his sleeping sister; he had yielded to temptations, oh, how much weaker, since his heart was not enlisted on the tempter’s side; he had made shipwreck of his faith and of his peace, for years, fascinated by attractions a thousand times less potent than those which this girl, her slight figure still trembling with her late emotions, still weeping in her sleep, had withstood and overcome; and Halbert bent his head, humility mingling with his rejoicing. Had he only been as steadfast as Mary, how much sorrow and suffering would they all have been saved.
They have left the room awhile with quiet footsteps, and there is much gladness in those two hearts, though trembling still mingles with their joy; for, if Christian fears the effect of this terrible shock on Mary’s health, at least she is delivered; there is great happiness in that certainty, she has found out Forsyth’s true character, though it passes all their guessing and conjectures to tell how.
And now Halbert is asking about his father, and James and Robert, and expressing his fears as to how they will receive him, the truant son. His brothers will be rejoiced; but Christian shakes her head half doubtful, half smiling, when Halbert, “and my father” — she cannot say, but an hour or two more will bring that to the proof.
“Do you know, Christian, I feel myself like one of the broken men of the old ballads, and I am in doubt, in perplexity, and fear, about this meeting.”
“If you are broken, if your ship has been cast ashore, we will get it mended again,” said Christian, with more of humour and light heartedness than she had either felt or used for many a day. “But no more of that, Halbert, just now. Tell me, will you go to see James to-night?”
“No, I can’t; it would be unseemly besides.” Halbert will not leave his sister the first night of his return, and Christian feels relieved; after a pause, he continues:
“How do you like Elizabeth now, Christian; are James and she happy together?”
“I have no doubt they are,” said Christian, evasively; “why should they not be?”
“But you don’t like her.”
“I never said so, Halbert.”
“Well, that’s true enough; but I inferred it.”
“Nay, you must make no inferences. Elizabeth can be very pleasant and lovable; if she is not always so, it is but because she does not choose to exercise her powers of pleasing.”
“So she can be lovable when she likes. But it was she, was it not, that introduced Mary to Forsyth?” said Halbert, his brow darkening.
“You must forgive her that, Halbert; she was not aware of his character when she received him as her cousins friend,” and Christian looked distressed and uneasy, and continued; “and Halbert, you must not cherish a vindictive feeling even against Forsyth, bad as he is, and great as is the mischief he did you; promise me that, Halbert, promise me, now.”
“Well, I do promise you; I could not, if I would; and I now pity him much more than hate him.”
They sat together conversing, till the shadows began to lengthen, when Christian, compelled by domestic cares and preparations for the evening, left her new found brother for a time.