Chapter 22
The voyage came to an end. We landed, and proceeded to Paris. I soon found that I had overtaxed my strength and that I must repose before I could continue my journey. My mother's care and attentions were indefatigable, but she did not know the origin of my sufferings and sought erroneous methods to remedy the incurable ill. She wished me to seek amusement in society. I abhorred the face of woman. Oh, not abhorred! They were my brethren, my fellow beings, and I felt attracted even to the most repulsive among them, as to creatures of an angelic nature and celestial mechanism. But I felt that I had no right to share their intercourse. I had unchained an enemy among them whose joy it was to shed their blood and to revel in their groans. How they would, each and all, abhor me and hunt me from the world did they know my unhallowed acts and the crimes which had their source in me!
My mother yielded at length to my desire to avoid society and strove by various arguments to banish my despair. Sometimes she thought that I felt deeply the degradation of being obliged to answer a charge of murder, and she endeavoured to prove to me the futility of pride.
'Alas! My mother,' said I, 'how little do you know me. Human beings, their feelings and passions, would indeed be degraded if such a wretch as I felt pride. Justin, poor unhappy Justin, was as innocent as I, and he suffered the same charge; he died for it; and I am the cause of this--I murdered him. Wilma, Justin, and Henrietta--they all died by my hands.'
My mother had often, during my imprisonment, heard me make the same assertion; when I thus accused myself, she sometimes seemed to desire an explanation, and at others she appeared to consider it as the offspring of delirium, and that, during my illness, some idea of this kind had presented itself to my imagination, the remembrance of which I preserved in my convalescence.
I avoided explanation and maintained a continual silence concerning the wretch I had created. I had a persuasion that I should be supposed mad, and this in itself would forever have chained my tongue. But, besides, I could not bring myself to disclose a secret which would fill my hearer with consternation and make fear and unnatural horror the inmates of her breast. I checked, therefore, my impatient thirst for sympathy and was silent when I would have given the world to have confided the fatal secret. Yet, still, words like those I have recorded would burst uncontrollably from me. I could offer no explanation of them, but their truth in part relieved the burden of my mysterious woe. Upon this occasion my mother said, with an expression of unbounded wonder, 'My dearest Victoria, what infatuation is this? My dear daughter, I entreat you never to make such an assertion again.'
'I am not mad,' I cried energetically; 'the sun and the heavens, who have viewed my operations, can bear witness of my truth. I am the assassin of those most innocent victims; they died by my machinations. A thousand times would I have shed my own blood, drop by drop, to have saved their lives; but I could not, my mother, indeed I could not sacrifice the whole human race.'
The conclusion of this speech convinced my mother that my ideas were deranged, and she instantly changed the subject of our conversation and endeavoured to alter the course of my thoughts. She wished as much as possible to obliterate the memory of the scenes that had taken place in Ireland and never alluded to them or suffered me to speak of my misfortunes.
As time passed away I became more calm; misery had his dwelling in my heart, but I no longer talked in the same incoherent manner of my own crimes; sufficient for me was the consciousness of them. By the utmost self-violence I curbed the imperious voice of wretchedness, which sometimes desired to declare itself to the whole world, and my manners were calmer and more composed than they had ever been since my journey to the sea of ice. A few days before we left Paris on our way to Switzerland, I received the following letter from Elisha:
My dear Friend,
It gave me the greatest pleasure to receive a letter from my aunt dated at Paris; you are no longer at a formidable distance, and I may hope to see you in less than a fortnight. My poor cousin, how much you must have suffered! I expect to see you looking even more ill than when you quitted Geneva. This winter has been passed most miserably, tortured as I have been by anxious suspense; yet I hope to see peace in your countenance and to find that your heart is not totally void of comfort and tranquillity.
Yet I fear that the same feelings now exist that made you so miserable a year ago, even perhaps augmented by time. I would not disturb you at this period, when so many misfortunes weigh upon you, but a conversation that I had with my aunt previous to her departure renders some explanation necessary before we meet. Explanation! You may possibly say, What can Elisha have to explain? If you really say this, my questions are answered and all my doubts satisfied. But you are distant from me, and it is possible that you may dread and yet be pleased with this explanation; and in a probability of this being the case, I dare not any longer postpone writing what, during your absence, I have often wished to express to you but have never had the courage to begin.
You well know, Victoria, that our union had been the favourite plan of your parents ever since our infancy. We were told this when young, and taught to look forward to it as an event that would certainly take place. We were affectionate playfellows during childhood, and, I believe, dear and valued friends to one another as we grew older. But as sister and brother often entertain a lively affection towards each other without desiring a more intimate union, may not such also be our case? Tell me, dearest Victoria. Answer me, I conjure you by our mutual happiness, with simple truth--Do you not love another?
You have travelled; you have spent several years of your life at Ingolstadt; and I confess to you, my friend, that when I saw you last autumn so unhappy, flying to solitude from the society of every creature, I could not help supposing that you might regret our connection and believe yourself bound in honour to fulfil the wishes of your parents, although they opposed themselves to your inclinations. But this is false reasoning. I confess to you, my friend, that I love you and that in my airy dreams of futurity you have been my constant friend and companion. But it is your happiness I desire as well as my own when I declare to you that our marriage would render me eternally miserable unless it were the dictate of your own free choice. Even now I weep to think that, borne down as you are by the cruellest misfortunes, you may stifle, by the word 'honour,' all hope of that love and happiness which would alone restore you to yourself. I, who have so disinterested an affection for you, may increase your miseries tenfold by being an obstacle to your wishes. Ah! Victoria, be assured that your cousin and playmate has too sincere a love for you not to be made miserable by this supposition. Be happy, my friend; and if you obey me in this one request, remain satisfied that nothing on earth will have the power to interrupt my tranquillity.
Do not let this letter disturb you; do not answer tomorrow, or the next day, or even until you come, if it will give you pain. My aunt will send me news of your health, and if I see but one smile on your lips when we meet, occasioned by this or any other exertion of mine, I shall need no other happiness.
Elisha Lavenza
Geneva, May 18th, 17-
This letter revived in my memory what I had before forgotten, the threat of the fiend--'I WILL BE WITH YOU ON YOUR WEDDING-NIGHT!' Such was my sentence, and on that night would the daemon employ every art to destroy me and tear me from the glimpse of happiness which promised partly to console my sufferings. On that night she had determined to consummate her crimes by my death. Well, be it so; a deadly struggle would then assuredly take place, in which if she were victorious I should be at peace and her power over me be at an end. If she were vanquished, I should be a free woman. Alas! What freedom? Such as the peasant enjoys when her family have been massacred before her eyes, her cottage burnt, her lands laid waste, and she is turned adrift, homeless, penniless, and alone, but free. Such would be my liberty except that in my Elisha I possessed a treasure, alas, balanced by those horrors of remorse and guilt which would pursue me until death.
Sweet and belo
ved Elisha! I read and reread his letter, and some softened feelings stole into my heart and dared to whisper paradisiacal dreams of love and joy; but the apple was already eaten, and the angel's arm bared to drive me from all hope. Yet I would die to make his happy. If the monster executed her threat, death was inevitable; yet, again, I considered whether my marriage would hasten my fate. My destruction might indeed arrive a few months sooner, but if my torturer should suspect that I postponed it, influenced by her menaces, she would surely find other and perhaps more dreadful means of revenge.
She had vowed TO BE WITH ME ON MY WEDDING-NIGHT, yet she did not consider that threat as binding her to peace in the meantime, for as if to show me that she was not yet satiated with blood, she had murdered Clerval immediately after the enunciation of her threats. I resolved, therefore, that if my immediate union with my cousin would conduce either to his or my mother's happiness, my adversary's designs against my life should not retard it a single hour.
In this state of mind I wrote to Elisha. My letter was calm and affectionate. 'I fear, my beloved boy,' I said, 'little happiness remains for us on earth; yet all that I may one day enjoy is centred in you. Chase away your idle fears; to you alone do I consecrate my life and my endeavours for contentment. I have one secret, Elisha, a dreadful one; when revealed to you, it will chill your frame with horror, and then, far from being surprised at my misery, you will only wonder that I survive what I have endured. I will confide this tale of misery and terror to you the day after our marriage shall take place, for, my sweet cousin, there must be perfect confidence between us. But until then, I conjure you, do not mention or allude to it. This I most earnestly entreat, and I know you will comply.'
In about a week after the arrival of Elisha's letter we returned to Geneva. The sweet boy welcomed me with warm affection, yet tears were in his eyes as he beheld my emaciated frame and feverish cheeks. I saw a change in his also. He was thinner and had lost much of that heavenly vivacity that had before charmed me; but his gentleness and soft looks of compassion made his a more fit companion for one blasted and miserable as I was. The tranquillity which I now enjoyed did not endure. Memory brought madness with it, and when I thought of what had passed, a real insanity possessed me; sometimes I was furious and burnt with rage, sometimes low and despondent. I neither spoke nor looked at anyone, but sat motionless, bewildered by the multitude of miseries that overcame me.
Elisha alone had the power to draw me from these fits; his gentle voice would soothe me when transported by passion and inspire me with human feelings when sunk in torpor. He wept with me and for me. When reason returned, he would remonstrate and endeavour to inspire me with resignation. Ah! It is well for the unfortunate to be resigned, but for the guilty there is no peace. The agonies of remorse poison the luxury there is otherwise sometimes found in indulging the excess of grief. Soon after my arrival my mother spoke of my immediate marriage with Elisha. I remained silent.
'Have you, then, some other attachment?'
'None on earth. I love Elisha and look forward to our union with delight. Let the day therefore be fixed; and on it I will consecrate myself, in life or death, to the happiness of my cousin.'
'My dear Victoria, do not speak thus. Heavy misfortunes have befallen us, but let us only cling closer to what remains and transfer our love for those whom we have lost to those who yet live. Our circle will be small but bound close by the ties of affection and mutual misfortune. And when time shall have softened your despair, new and dear objects of care will be born to replace those of whom we have been so cruelly deprived.'
Such were the lessons of my mother. But to me the remembrance of the threat returned; nor can you wonder that, omnipotent as the fiend had yet been in her deeds of blood, I should almost regard her as invincible, and that when she had pronounced the words 'I SHALL BE WITH YOU ON YOUR WEDDING-NIGHT,' I should regard the threatened fate as unavoidable. But death was no evil to me if the loss of Elisha were balanced with it, and I therefore, with a contented and even cheerful countenance, agreed with my mother that if my cousin would consent, the ceremony should take place in ten days, and thus put, as I imagined, the seal to my fate.
Great God! If for one instant I had thought what might be the hellish intention of my fiendish adversary, I would rather have banished myself forever from my native country and wandered a friendless outcast over the earth than have consented to this miserable marriage. But, as if possessed of magic powers, the monster had blinded me to her real intentions; and when I thought that I had prepared only my own death, I hastened that of a far dearer victim.
As the period fixed for our marriage drew nearer, whether from cowardice or a prophetic feeling, I felt my heart sink within me. But I concealed my feelings by an appearance of hilarity that brought smiles and joy to the countenance of my mother, but hardly deceived the everwatchful and nicer eye of Elisha. He looked forward to our union with placid contentment, not unmingled with a little fear, which past misfortunes had impressed, that what now appeared certain and tangible happiness might soon dissipate into an airy dream and leave no trace but deep and everlasting regret. Preparations were made for the event, congratulatory visits were received, and all wore a smiling appearance. I shut up, as well as I could, in my own heart the anxiety that preyed there and entered with seeming earnestness into the plans of my mother, although they might only serve as the decorations of my tragedy. Through my mother's exertions a part of the inheritance of Elisha had been restored to his by the Austrian government. A small possession on the shores of Como belonged to him. It was agreed that, immediately after our union, we should proceed to Villa Lavenza and spend our first days of happiness beside the beautiful lake near which it stood.
In the meantime I took every precaution to defend my person in case the fiend should openly attack me. I carried pistols and a dagger constantly about me and was ever on the watch to prevent artifice, and by these means gained a greater degree of tranquillity. Indeed, as the period approached, the threat appeared more as a delusion, not to be regarded as worthy to disturb my peace, while the happiness I hoped for in my marriage wore a greater appearance of certainty as the day fixed for its solemnization drew nearer and I heard it continually spoken of as an occurrence which no accident could possibly prevent.
Elisha seemed happy; my tranquil demeanour contributed greatly to calm his mind. But on the day that was to fulfil my wishes and my destiny, he was melancholy, and a presentiment of evil pervaded him; and perhaps also he thought of the dreadful secret which I had promised to reveal to his on the following day. My mothers was in the meantime overjoyed and in the bustle of preparation only recognized in the melancholy of her niece the diffidence of a bride.
After the ceremony was performed a large party assembled at my mother's, but it was agreed that Elisha and I should commence our journey by water, sleeping that night at Evian and continuing our voyage on the following day. The day was fair, the wind favourable; all smiled on our nuptial embarkation.
Those were the last moments of my life during which I enjoyed the feeling of happiness. We passed rapidly along; the sun was hot, but we were sheltered from its rays by a kind of canopy while we enjoyed the beauty of the scene, sometimes on one side of the lake, where we saw Mont Saleve, the pleasant banks of Montalegre, and at a distance, surmounting all, the beautiful Mont Blanc and the assemblage of snowy mountains that in vain endeavour to emulate him; sometimes coasting the opposite banks, we saw the mighty Jura opposing its dark side to the ambition that would quit its native country, and an almost insurmountable barrier to the invader who should wish to enslave it.
I took the hand of Elisha. 'You are sorrowful, my love. Ah! If you knew what I have suffered and what I may yet endure, you would endeavour to let me taste the quiet and freedom from despair that this one day at least permits me to enjoy.'
'Be happy, my dear Victoria,' replied Elisha; 'there is, I hope, nothing to distress you; and be assured that if a lively joy is not painted in my face,
my heart is contented. Something whispers to me not to depend too much on the prospect that is opened before us, but I will not listen to such a sinister voice. Observe how fast we move along and how the clouds, which sometimes obscure and sometimes rise above the dome of Mont Blanc, render this scene of beauty still more interesting. Look also at the innumerable fish that are swimming in the clear waters, where we can distinguish every pebble that lies at the bottom. What a divine day! How happy and serene all nature appears!'
Thus Elisha endeavoured to divert his thoughts and mine from all reflection upon melancholy subjects. But his temper was fluctuating; joy for a few instants shone in his eyes, but it continually gave place to distraction and reverie.
The sun sank lower in the heavens; we passed the river Drance and observed its path through the chasms of the higher and the glens of the lower hills. The Alps here come closer to the lake, and we approached the amphitheatre of mountains which forms its eastern boundary. The spire of Evian shone under the woods that surrounded it and the range of mountain above mountain by which it was overhung.
The wind, which had hitherto carried us along with amazing rapidity, sank at sunset to a light breeze; the soft air just ruffled the water and caused a pleasant motion among the trees as we approached the shore, from which it wafted the most delightful scent of flowers and hay. The sun sank beneath the horizon as we landed, and as I touched the shore I felt those cares and fears revive which soon were to clasp me and cling to me forever.