Now, however, what were his feelings?--now that his situation was changed in every particular,--that in fortune, and in station, he had fallen at once from the situation in which she had promised him her hand; and when he felt that he had no right to claim from Marian de Vaux the execution of a promise which she had made under different circ.u.mstances, and to which he believed that all her friends would, of course, be opposed, as soon as his real position became known? He felt that he had no right either to ask or to expect it; and the darkest image that presented itself to his mind was, the loss of her he loved, for ever. Nor did this image come before him vague and undefined, as a thing of remote possibility,--though even then the apprehension would have been terrible enough,--but, in his present state of despondency, it appeared as an undoubted and inevitable certainty--as a thing that must and would take place. He felt as if Marian were _already_ lost to him for ever, and the bright bubble of his happiness irreparably broken. He fancied, also,--he could not help imagining, that something like contempt would mingle in the pity that she felt for him. She was herself so pure,--delicacy, modesty, and virtue so characterized her every movement, and her every word,--that he tortured himself with believing that a part of the reprobation and scorn with which she must think of his mother, would fall upon himself. "She will look upon me as the child of vice," he thought; "she will see in me the offspring of guilt and shame, and will easily make up her mind to the separation. She is always so reasonable, and so willing to do what she considers right, at any sacrifice, that her mind will soon be tutored to forget Edward de Vaux. Were she of that warm, ardent, deep-feeling nature that casts fate and happiness upon one die, I might hope that she would still cling to me: but it is in vain thinking of it--I have no reason to hope it. She will follow the dictates of common sense and prudence, and abandon an alliance which all her friends would now oppose."

Poor Marian! thus did her unhappy lover contrive to wring his own heart even with her very virtues. After thinking for at least an hour in gloomy silence, a faint hope crossed his mind, that he might have mistaken the import of the letter--that his apprehensions might have deceived him. Experience, gained from the consequences of our faults, almost always, sooner or later, gives us a vague, unsatisfactory consciousness that such things exist in our bosom; and Edward de Vaux did know that he was given to torment himself needlessly. He therefore read the letter over again, and read it carefully; but, on doing so, his first impression was but the more confirmed.

"Yet it might be false," he thought; "the whole tale might be false, or might refer to something else, and be the mere blunder of some ignorant and presumptuous person." But then the remembrance of his father's words returned, and all that had before seemed strange regarding his mother came up before his mind; and he once more gave himself up to despair.

What was to be done, became the next question. There was just a sufficient portion of doubt mingled with his feelings to hold him tortured in suspense, without being enough to approach the limit of hope. This state, of course, he could have borne no longer under any circ.u.mstances; but his situation in regard to Marian rendered it absolutely necessary that he should put an end to all doubt upon the business. And yet it was terrible, most terrible, to feel that it must be his own hand which tore away the veil that concealed the obstacles to his marriage--that it must be his own hand that cast away his happiness for ever. The thought might cross his mind of letting things take their course--of choosing to disbelieve the letter--of treating it with contempt, and of proceeding with Marian to the altar, to secure the blessing of her hand, at least, before the rest was s.n.a.t.c.hed from him. But if it did cross his mind, it was but as the image of a thing that might be with some men, but could never be with him. It occupied not a moment's consideration--it left no trace behind it. To investigate the matter instantly, and to the bottom, became his determination; and, having done so, to make the result known to those interested, and at once place himself fearlessly in the situation which he had alone a right to fill. He did get that there might be circ.u.mstances in the story which he was about to hear which might render it necessary to conceal it from the public ear, in consideration for the feelings of his father, or of others. But to Marian, at least, the facts must be told; she was too deeply implicated in it all to be left in ignorance of what touched her whole future happiness; and De Vaux resolved that not only should she be told, but that no lips but his own should tell it, as he well knew how a few explicative words, or a well-turned round of phrases, may pervert a plain tale from its true meaning. "I will trust none," he thought; "and, whatever the truth may be, from my lips alone shall she first hear it."

The course to be pursued in his investigation became the next question. Two were pointed out in the letter itself; but from the first, that of applying to his father, he shrank with irresistible repugnance. It was not alone that De Vaux, as is common--we might almost say universal--among men, possessed more physical than moral courage; that he feared the fierce and angry mood of his father, irritated as he had been by late opposition, and loved not to venture upon a discussion with him, which would rouse every dark and stormy pa.s.sion into fiery activity; but he feared himself also: he feared that anguish and anger, and the haughty irritation with which he was sure to be encountered, might make him forget himself, and say words that no after-sorrow could recall. There might still be a doubt, too, upon even the very subject of his fears, and he felt that were those fears unfounded, his father might justly look upon it as little better than a gross personal insult, were he asked if he had pa.s.sed his illegitimate son upon the world as legitimate, and promoted his union with the heiress of a large fortune, under the pretence of his being heir to an honourable name and great possessions.

De Vaux might believe that such conduct was not impossible; he might also think that his father was not actuated in so doing by the mean and sordid views which, at first sight, seem the only motives a.s.signable for such behaviour. Various circ.u.mstances might have occurred, in earlier years, to make his father acknowledge an unreal marriage with his mother; considerations for her feelings, or for his own respectability, might be among the rest. Once having said so, and spoken of himself as of a legitimate child, Edward de Vaux knew well that his father's proud and reserved nature might have made him ever after silent upon the subject, till explanation became almost impossible; and the deceit he had practised or permitted might have been rather the result of haughty reserve than of cunning artifice.

De Vaux felt that, however, ere he presumed to insinuate to his father a bare suspicion of his having committed such an act, he must have much better information and clearer proof to justify the charge. When such evidence was once obtained, he might communicate the discovery he had made to Lord Dewry by letter, and thus avoid that painful collision which a personal discussion of the matter must induce; or, if he found that the evidence was faulty or inconclusive; that there was motive for suspicion against the person who tendered it, or that the whole was an interested calumny, he might lay it before his father, as an affair which required him to investigate the a.s.sertions, and punish the authors of them.

The determination, therefore, was taken to visit the gipsy himself; and the only consideration that remained was, whether to go alone, or to ask Manners to accompany him. From the latter idea he shrank, as, in that case, he must have exposed to his friend doubts and apprehensions which were bitterly humiliating, and might even compromise the secrets of others, to whom his friend was a stranger, in a manner which he had no right to do. The letter, also, bade him come alone; and, on reading it over once more, everything tended to make him give credence both to the sincerity of the writer and the accuracy of the facts. He had a faint remembrance, too, of having heard the name of Pharold mentioned by his aunt, as connected with the early days of her family; and the fact of the writer having referred him, in the first instance, to his own father, tended to show that there existed no design against himself personally. Besides, De Vaux was not a man to entertain fears of any kind for his own safety; and, as he clearly saw that Manners was totally ignorant of the contents of the letter which he had brought him, he determined to go alone, and investigate the matter thoroughly.

His next question to his own heart was, "and, in the meantime, what shall be my conduct towards Marian? How shall I behave while I expect and believe that a few more hours will alter our situation towards each other for ever, and render that conduct wrong which was perfectly consistent with our engagement towards each other? If I change my manner, she may think my affection cooled, and feel herself unkindly treated. But then," he thought again, bitterly enough, "but then that will but serve to smooth the way to the change which is ultimately to take place; and perhaps it had better be reached by some such intermediate step." The next moment, again, his wavering thoughts turned to the other side, and he demanded whether he had any right to give her one instant's pain more than necessary. The reply was ready:--"No, no! that were cruel and unkind indeed; and should I do so, and my fears prove false, my behaviour would necessarily, from all the circ.u.mstances of the case, remain unexplained--a dark blot upon my affection towards her. Yet, hereafter, if she should learn that such tidings have been in my possession,--that such doubts have been justly working in my mind,--will she not think it wrong, and even deceitful, of me to treat her as my promised bride, when I know that she never can be such?"

What was to be done? De Vaux, according to the old scholastic term, had got himself between the horns of a dilemma; and we must pause for one moment, in order to inquire how far he was art and part in putting himself into that situation. It is wonderful, most wonderful, how people deceive themselves in this world, and how they go on arguing with themselves on both sides of the question for an hour together, affecting to be puzzled, and asking themselves what is to be done, when, from the very first, they have determined, in secret counsel, what to do; and all this logic and disquisition has solely been for the purpose of bewildering _reason_, or _duty_, or _conscience_, or any other of those personified qualities of the soul, which the great parliament of man's pa.s.sions choose to look upon as _the public_, _the spectators_.

Now, at that point of De Vaux's cogitations wherein he thought, and rejected the idea, of admitting Manners to his confidence in the matter before him, as is fully displayed three or four pages back, a fancy struck him, which instantly changed into a secret resolution, not to make Manners his confidant in the business, but to open his whole heart to Marian de Vaux; and although it needed scarcely any argument to prove that she, whose fate was the most strictly bound up with his own, whose affection he certainly possessed, and whose good sense he never doubted, was the person, of all others, in whom he ought to confide; yet, some idle cant that he had read in some foolish book, or heard from some foolish people, about the absurdity of trusting a woman; some silly sneer or insignificant jest, magnified into a bugbear through the mist of memory, had power enough to make him hide his own determination from himself; and, in the first instance, go the roundabout path we have traced, in order to prove that he had no other resource but to tell her the whole affair, ere he boldly admitted his resolution even to his own heart, and brought forward the true and upright motives on which it was founded. So weak is human nature!

As soon as this was done, the matter was no longer difficult; all embarra.s.sment in regard to his conduct was removed, and he felt that what was kindest and what was most affectionate, was also the most just and the most reasonable. Whatever was the truth of the a.s.sertions contained in the letter he had received, and to whatever facts it alluded, it pointed princ.i.p.ally at his union with Marian, and the disparity of fortune and rank which the writer affirmed to exist between them. She, therefore, was a person princ.i.p.ally concerned; and on her ultimate decision their fate must rest. De Vaux feared not that any loss of fortune could affect Marian's regard: he could not have loved her had he supposed it would; but he did fear that the stigma, which he believed might rest upon his birth, and which he himself felt as so deeply humiliating, might make a difference in her feelings; and, when backed by the counsel and arguments of some of her maternal relations, might make her resolves unfavourable to his hopes. But still, in telling her all, from the beginning, in concealing nothing, in acting at once affectionately and candidly, he felt that he was establishing the best claim to continued affection and esteem: he felt, too, that, if there had been deceit on any part, such conduct would be the best proof to all that he was as free as day from any partic.i.p.ation in it, and that, whatever were the result, his honour and his name would be clear.

His determination, therefore, was backed by every motive, but still it required great delicacy in executing it. It was necessary not to shock or to pain her--he loved too much to do so--and yet to be perfectly explicit. It was requisite to tell her all, and to leave her fully convinced of his unalterable love; yet perfectly free to form her own decision on her future conduct. The hour, too, and the manner, were matters for consideration, and he resolved not to delay, but let the communication be made immediately, and as a matter of importance. It would require time, however; and, as it was already late, he was obliged to make up his mind that the visit to the gipsy must take place on the following morning: he only paused, then, to recover his composure completely, and to think of the best method of telling Marian the whole, in such a manner as to give her the least pain, yet show his confidence and affection the most clearly.

He accordingly sat still, and laid it out like the plan of a battle; but in this he was very wrong; as, by so doing, he naturally presented Marian to his fancy in the light of the enemy. The consequences were, that his own private little demon instantly saw his advantage, and, whispering in De Vaux's ear, made his irritable and irritated spirit believe that Marian would act in a thousand different ways, which he could not blame, yet did not like. The fiend, who well knows how to seize probabilities, took hold of every particular point in Marian's character which could give him any thing to cling to; and De Vaux saw, in the gla.s.s of fancy, her beautiful countenance looking upon him as calmly and as reasonably as ever, without a shade of agitation pa.s.sing over its placid sweetness during the whole time that he, with difficulty, and hesitation, and agony of spirit, and humiliation of heart, was telling her all his anxieties and apprehensions. He saw, in the same magic gla.s.s, the very spot of the room where she would stand, and the fine easy line of her figure, all displaying perfect composure and graceful ease; and he heard the soft, sweet modulations of her voice, calm, gentle, but unaltered; and at length he thought, "I know perfectly what she will say when she hears it: she will declare that I am too hasty in my conclusions; that I must see the gipsy, or whatever he may be, and hear the whole of what he has to say; for that the matter is too important to be judged of hastily, and that when we know the whole, and have had time to consider, we can decide: or she will speak of consulting my aunt, or her great uncle Lord Westerham, or any other of those cold, disinterested people who can give proper advice upon the subject: and yet I do my aunt injustice; for though of a decided nature, she is not of a cold-hearted one."

Thus, then, did he torment himself for some minutes, taking as much pains to make himself miserable as if there were not quite enough pain in this world without our seeking it. Nor did he stop here; but went on in the same train till he had almost wrought himself out of the determination of telling Marian at all, though he ultimately came back to his first resolution. It is not to be concealed that all this hesitation, and a great deal of this anguish, proceeded from his having fallen into the common error of giving the reins over to imagination, and believing that he had placed them safely in the hands of reason. Had he acted wisely, he would not have sat down to fancy any thing upon the subject at all, but he would have risen up, on the contrary, as soon as his resolution was taken, and, seeking out her he loved, would have told her all his doubts and fears, without thinking at all previously either of what he would say or what she would say.

Nature, left alone to work her own way, in a thousand instances out of a thousand and one does it gracefully; but if one calls in to counsel her all the host of man's pa.s.sions, prejudices, faults, and foibles--though judgment may be present too--yet, nine times out often, the mult.i.tude of counsellors, in this case, produces any thing but safety. Neither is there ever any use of long consideration in circ.u.mstances like those we have mentioned. What we will do always requires thought; how we will do it, seldom, if ever. Trust to your own heart, if you have a good one; and if it be bad, the sooner you hurry it through the business the better. It is equally vain thinking what we will say ourselves, for we are sure never to say it; and still more fruitless to fancy what other people will say, for we know nothing about it.

De Vaux, however, was in some respects a curious compound of very different principles. With all his errors and with all his faults, he had a great deal of candour; and, however keen he might be in investigating and lashing the motives of other people, he was not half so strict an inquisitor into their failings as he was into his own. As a consequence of this, though the knowledge often lay dormant, he did know, as we have often before hinted, with extraordinary accuracy, all the turnings and windings, the intricacies and the absurdities of his own nature; and as soon as the rush of pa.s.sions was over, his conscience--like the power of the law restored after a popular tumult--would mount the tribunal, and sit in judgment on his own heart. Often, too--like the same power exerting itself to repress anarchy--his better judgment would rise up against the crowd of wild images presented by an irritable fancy, and after a short struggle would regain its power.

Thus, in the present instance he felt, after a while, that he was but antic.i.p.ating more misery when he had already sufficient to endure; and, doing in the end what he ought to have done at first, he started up, and went to seek Marian, in order to give her the opportunity of letting her own conduct speak for itself.

CHAPTER IX.

De Vaux had calmed himself as much as he possibly could; and as he was not blessed with a face possessing that general expression of jocund felicity which is usually denominated a smiling countenance, whatever degree of gravity and care was left in his look at present excited no particular notice in the drawing-room, whither his steps were first directed. The party there a.s.sembled now consisted of Mrs. Falkland and her daughter, with Colonel Manners; and the latter alone saw that the agitation which he had beheld the gipsy's letter produce in his friend had ended in permanent distress.

"Where is Marian?" said De Vaux, as he entered, not very much disappointed, perhaps, to find that she was not with the rest of the family; "where is Marian?--do you know, Isadore?"

"I left her drawing in the little saloon at the other end of the house," replied Isadore; "but that was a full hour ago, Edward; and if she expected a gay knight or wandering troubadour to come and sooth her, either with his _gaie science_ or his _bien dire_, she may have left her solitude by this time in disappointment."

De Vaux smiled somewhat bitterly, as he felt how much more painfully he had been employed than he would have been in the occupations to which Isadore referred; and, again leaving the drawing-room, he sped along the same pa.s.sages which, with a light and bounding heart, he had often trod in search of her upon some joyous errand whom he now sought with feelings of care, anxiety, and sorrow. Marian was still where her cousin Isadore had left her; and though, perhaps, she did think that De Vaux might have found her out sooner, when he had no ostensible motive for being absent from the side of her he loved, yet, like a wise girl, she received him with as sweet a smile as if no such slight reproach had ever crossed her fancy. The next moment she rejoiced that she had done so; for the expression of anguish in her lover's eyes did not escape her, and she felt at once that, for whatever other occupation De Vaux had yielded the pleasure of her society, it was for no agreeable one.

"Look at this drawing, Edward," she said, as he came in: "do you not think that I have made my hermit look very melancholy sitting on that rock?"

"Not so melancholy as my thoughts, dear Marian," replied De Vaux, gazing over her shoulder, apparently at the drawing, but in truth hardly seeing a line that the paper contained; "not so melancholy as my thoughts."

"And what has occurred to make them so, Edward?" she asked, turning round to read the answer in his face before his lips could reply.

"Surely, I have a right to know, if any one has, what it is that makes you unhappy."

"You have, dear Marian, you have," he replied; "and I have sought you out here to make you share in all I feel, though the task be a painful one. But come here, and sit with me on the sofa by the window, and I will tell you all." And, taking her by the hand, he led her on towards one of the windows that looked out over the park; for, however strange it may be, there are undoubtedly particular positions and particular situations in which one can tell a disagreeable story more easily than in others.

Marian was alarmed, and she was agitated, too, within; for she suffered not her agitation to appear upon the surface when she could help it; and, as is very natural, she anxiously strove to arrive at some leading fact as quick as possible. "Something must have occurred very lately, Edward," she said, "for you were very gay and cheerful during our ride this morning. Have you heard any thing from your father to distress you?"

"No, dearest girl," he answered, "I have heard nothing from him; but I have heard from some one else much that distresses me: but I had better show you what I have received, which will explain the matter more briefly than I could do."

So saying, he placed the gipsy's letter in her hand. Marian took it, and read it through; but, as she knew none of the circ.u.mstances which tended in the mind of De Vaux to corroborate the doubts insinuated by the letter, she viewed its contents in a different light; and, returning it with a smile, she asked, "And is that all that has made you uneasy, Edward? But it is evidently all nonsense, my dear cousin.

If that foolish man, who teased me so much two years ago, were not out of the country, I should think it was a plan of his to annoy you; but depend upon it, that this is the trick of some one who wishes to disturb our happiness. What have we to do with gipsies, Edward? and how could gipsies know any thing about you and me, unless they were instructed by somebody else? And if any person in our own rank had real information, they would of course bring it forward themselves, and not send it through a set of gipsies."

"You argue well, Marian," answered De Vaux, "and I would fain believe that you argue rightly; but I am sorry to tell you that several things have previously occurred, which tend to confirm the a.s.sertions contained in this."

Marian turned a little pale from anxiety for him she loved. "Tell me all, Edward," she said, "tell me all; I am sure you will conceal nothing from me."

"Nothing that I know, indeed, Marian," he answered: "I came with the purpose of opening my whole thoughts to you; for you have every right, that either true love or our mutual situation can give you, to know every thing that I know. Well, then, my beloved, the fact which most completely tends to corroborate the a.s.sertions in this letter, occurred in a conversation between myself and my father yesterday morning. It was when he was angry in regard to his unfortunate quarrel with Manners and my opposition of the view he had taken: and he said sternly, and bitterly enough, that though the estates were entailed, I could be deprived of them by a word."

"Indeed!" said Marian, thoughtfully, "indeed!" but the next moment she added, "No, no, Edward, it must have been said in a moment of pa.s.sion, without reason, and without truth. Depend upon it, your father and my uncle would never have spoken about our marriage to me, and to all my mother's family, as he has often done, calling you somewhat particularly the heir of his t.i.tles and estates, if you were neither, as that letter says."

"But yet the letter and his words confirm each other," said De Vaux: "they both tell the same tale, dear Marian. Many a true word is spoken in a moment of pa.s.sion, that a man has concealed for years, and would give worlds afterward to recall. Besides, I think I have heard the name of this Pharold before: have you not heard my aunt speak of some gipsy boy that my grandfather wished to educate?"

"Oh, no, not my aunt," answered Marian. "All that happened when she was very young, quite a child, I believe. It was poor Mrs. d.i.c.kinson, the old housekeeper, who used to tell us stories about that gipsy when we were children; and his name was Pharold, I think. She spoke of him as of a fine creature, but very wild."

"You see, dear Marian," said De Vaux, with a gloomy smile, "everything tends to the same result. My father's words confirm the story of the gipsy, and what we know of the gipsy would show that he had some acquaintance with the history of our family."

Marian mused: "It is very strange, Edward," she said at length, "and I suppose there must, indeed, be some foundation for all this. But yet I cannot understand it: if the estates are entailed, what is there on earth that can prevent your inheriting them? If the t.i.tle goes to the sons, you must have it; and if it had gone to the daughters, I must have had it, you know, which would have been all the same thing. If you do believe this story, as I am afraid you do, tell me how it can be."

Edward de Vaux paused; for he had never calculated upon going further, or being more explicit than he had been. He had thought it would be enough to explain that he was likely to lose the lands and honours of Dewry, and that Marian would naturally draw her own conclusion, and perceive the only cause which could produce such a result. Her question, therefore, embarra.s.sed him, for he would willingly have sealed his lips upon his mother's shame; and, though he had felt himself bound to tell her all he was likely to lose, without concealment, yet he hesitated at revealing the most painful part of his own suspicions, till those suspicions had been rendered certainties.

Marian saw him hesitate, and raising her beautiful eyes to his face, she said, "Edward, you have promised to tell me all, and you must make it all you think, as well as all you know."

It was not to be resisted. "Well, beloved, well!" he said, "I will, though it is very, very terrible to do so; and, in truth, I hardly know how to do it. Marian, did you ever see my mother?"

"No, Edward, never that I know of," she replied: "why do you ask?"

"Did you ever hear my aunt speak of her?" continued De Vaux, without replying to her question.

"Let me think," said Marian. "I believe I have: but no, I cannot remember that I ever did, now I reflect upon it: no, I never did."

"Nor my father either?" asked De Vaux.

"No, never; certainly never," answered Marian.

"Well, then--" said De Vaux, and he paused abruptly, fixing his eyes upon her face. Instantly a colour of the deepest crimson rushed up over the whole countenance of Marian de Vaux, dying cheek, and neck, and forehead with the blush of generous shame--the shame that every pure, virtuous, inexperienced woman feels when the idea of vice in her own s.e.x is suddenly brought before her.

Edward de Vaux turned deadly pale, as he both perceived that Marian had now caught his meaning, and comprehended most painfully the feelings in which that bright blush arose. The shame that Marian felt for the degradation of her s.e.x touched the most agonized spot in De Vaux's heart. All that hatred for vice, and scorn for the vicious, and the pity which comes near contempt, could produce in a woman's bosom, seemed to De Vaux expressed by that blush, and pointed, more or less directly, towards himself; and, as I have said, he turned very pale.