CHAPTER VIII. PERCIVAL VISITS LUCRETIA.
Having once ascertained the house in which Helen lived, it was nodifficult matter for St. John to learn the name of the guardian whomBeck had supposed to be her mother. No common delight mingled withPercival's amaze when in that name he recognized one borne by his ownkinswoman. Very little indeed of the family history was known to him.Neither his father nor his mother ever willingly conversed of the fallenheiress,--it was a subject which the children had felt to be proscribed;but in the neighbourhood, Percival had of course heard some mention ofLucretia as the haughty and accomplished Miss Clavering, who had, to theastonishment of all, stooped to a mesalliance with her uncle's Frenchlibrarian. That her loss of the St. John property, the succession ofPercival's father, were unexpected by the villagers and squires around,and perhaps set down to the caprice of Sir Miles, or to an intellectimpaired by apoplectic attacks, it was not likely that he should haveheard. The rich have the polish of their education, and the poor thatinstinctive tact, so wonderful amongst the agricultural peasantry, toprevent such unmannerly disclosures or unwelcome hints; and both by richand poor, the Vernon St. Johns were too popular and respected for wantonallusions to subjects calculated to pain them. All, therefore, thatPercival knew of his relation was that she had resided from infancy withSir Miles; that after their uncle's death she had married an inferior inrank, of the name of Dalibard, and settled abroad; that she was a personof peculiar manners, and, he had heard somewhere, of rare gifts. Hehad been unable to learn the name of the young lady staying with MadameDalibard; he had learned only that she went by some other name, andwas not the daughter of the lady who rented the house. Certainly it waspossible that this last might not be his kinswoman, after all. Thename, though strange to English ears, and not common in France, was nosufficient warrant for Percival's high spirits at the thought thathe had now won legitimate and regular access to the house; still, itallowed him to call, it furnished a fair excuse for a visit.
How long he was at his toilet that day, poor boy! How sedulously,with comb and brush, he sought to smooth into straight precision thatluxuriant labyrinth of jetty curls, which had never cost him a thoughtbefore! Gil Blas says that the toilet is a pleasure to the young, thougha labour to the old; Percival St. John's toilet was no pleasure to himthat anxious morning.
At last he tore himself, dissatisfied and desperate, from the glass,caught his hat and his whip, threw himself on his horse, and rode, atfirst very fast, and at last very slowly, to the old, decayed, shabby,neglected house that lay hid, like the poverty of fallen pride, amidstthe trim villas and smart cottages of fair and flourishing Brompton.
The same servant who had opened the gate to Ardworth appeared to hissummons, and after eying him for some moments with a listless, stupidstare, said: "You'll be after some mistake!" and turned away.
"Stop, stop!" cried Percival, trying to intrude himself through thegate; but the servant blocked up the entrance sturdily. "It is nomistake at all, my good lady. I have come to see Madame Dalibard, my--myrelation!"
"Your relation!" and again the woman stared at Percival with a lookthrough the dull vacancy of which some distrust was dimly perceptible."Bide a bit there, and give us your name."
Percival gave his card to the servant with his sweetest and mostpersuasive smile. She took it with one hand, and with the other turnedthe key in the gate, leaving Percival outside. It was five minutesbefore she returned; and she then, with the same prim, smilelessexpression of countenance, opened the gate and motioned him to follow.
The kind-hearted boy sighed as he cast a glance at the desolate andpoverty-stricken appearance of the house, and thought within himself:"Ah, pray Heaven she may be my relation; and then I shall have the rightto find her and that sweet girl a very different home!" The old womanthrew open the drawing-room door, and Percival was in the presence ofhis deadliest foe! The armchair was turned towards the entrance, andfrom amidst the coverings that hid the form, the remarkable countenanceof Madame Dalibard emerged, sharp and earnest, directly fronting theintruder.
"So," she said slowly, and, as it were, devouring him with her keen,steadfast eyes,--"so you are Percival St. John! Welcome! I did notknow that we should ever meet. I have not sought you, you seek me!Strange--yes, strange--that the young and the rich should seek thesuffering and the poor!"
Surprised and embarrassed by this singular greeting, Percivalhalted abruptly in the middle of the room; and there was somethinginexpressibly winning in his shy, yet graceful confusion. It seemed,with silent eloquence, to apologize and to deprecate. And when, in hissilvery voice, scarcely yet tuned to the fulness of manhood, he saidfeelingly, "Forgive me, madam, but my mother is not in England," theexcuse evinced such delicacy of idea, so exquisite a sense of highbreeding, that the calm assurance of worldly ease could not have moreattested the chivalry of the native gentleman.
"I have nothing to forgive, Mr. St. John," said Lucretia, with asoftened manner. "Pardon me rather that my infirmities do not allow meto rise to receive you. This seat,--here,--next to me. You have a stronglikeness to your father."
Percival received this last remark as a compliment, and bowed. Then, ashe lifted his ingenuous brow, he took for the first time a steady viewof his new-found relation. The peculiarities of Lucretia's countenancein youth had naturally deepened with middle age. The contour, alwaystoo sharp and pronounced, was now strong and bony as a man's; the linebetween the eyebrows was hollowed into a furrow. The eye retained itsold uneasy, sinister, sidelong glance, or at rare moments (as whenPercival entered), its searching penetration and assured command; butthe eyelids themselves, red and injected, as with grief or vigil, gavesomething haggard and wild, whether to glance or gaze. Despite theparalysis of the frame, the face, though pale and thin, showed no bodilydecay. A vigour surpassing the strength of woman might still be seen inthe play of the bold muscles, the firmness of the contracted lips. Whatphysicians call "vitality," and trace at once (if experienced) on thephysiognomy as the prognostic of long life, undulated restlessly inevery aspect of the face, every movement of those thin, nervous hands,which, contrasting the rest of that motionless form, never seemed to beat rest. The teeth were still white and regular, as in youth; and whenthey shone out in speaking, gave a strange, unnatural freshness to aface otherwise so worn.
As Percival gazed, and, while gazing, saw those wandering eyes bentdown, and yet felt they watched him, a thrill almost of fear shotthrough his heart. Nevertheless, so much more impressionable was he tocharitable and trustful than to suspicious and timid emotions that whenMadame Dalibard, suddenly looking up and shaking her head gently, said,"You see but a sad wreck, young kinsman," all those instincts, whichNature itself seemed to dictate for self-preservation, vanished intoheavenly tenderness and pity.
"Ah!" he said, rising, and pressing one of those deadly hands in bothhis own, while tears rose to his eyes,--"Ah! since you call me kinsman,I have all a kinsman's privileges. You must have the best advice, themost skilful surgeons. Oh, you will recover; you must not despond."
Lucretia's lips moved uneasily. This kindness took her by surprise.She turned desperately away from the human gleam that shot across thesevenfold gloom of her soul. "Do not think of me," she said, with aforced smile; "it is my peculiarity not to like allusion to myself,though this time I provoked it. Speak to me of the old cedar-trees atLaughton,--do they stand still? You are the master of Laughton now! Itis a noble heritage!"
Then St. John, thinking to please her, talked of the old manor-house,described the improvements made by his father, spoke gayly of thosewhich he himself contemplated; and as he ran on, Lucretia's brow, amoment ruffled, grew smooth and smoother, and the gloom settled backupon her soul.
All at once she interrupted him. "How did you discover me? Was itthrough Mr. Varney? I bade him not mention me: yet how else could youlearn?" As she spoke, there was an anxious trouble in her tone, whichincreased while she observed that St. John looked confused.
"Why," he began hesitatingly, and bru
shing his hat with his hand,"why--perhaps you may have heard from the--that is--I think there isa young ----. Ah, it is you, it is you! I see you once again!" Andspringing up, he was at the side of Helen, who at that instant hadentered the room, and now, her eyes downcast, her cheeks blushing, herbreast gently heaving, heard, but answered not that passionate burst ofjoy.
Startled, Madame Dalibard (her hands firmly grasping the sides of herchair) contemplated the two. She had heard nothing, guessed nothingof their former meeting. All that had passed before between them wasunknown to her. Yet there was evidence unmistakable, conclusive: theson of her despoiler loved the daughter of her rival; and--if the virginheart speaks by the outward sign--those downcast eyes, those blushingcheeks, that heaving breast, told that he did not love in vain!
Before her lurid and murderous gaze, as if to defy her, the twoinheritors of a revenge unglutted by the grave stood, unitedmysteriously together. Up, from the vast ocean of her hate, rose thatpoor isle of love; there, unconscious of the horror around them, thevictims found their footing! How beautiful at that hour their youth;their very ignorance of their own emotions; their innocent gladness;their sweet trouble! The fell gazer drew a long breath of fiendlikecomplacency and glee, and her hands opened wide, and then slowly closed,as if she felt them in her grasp.