Airy Fairy Lilian

CHAPTER XXVIII

 
"Lys.– How now, my love? Why is your cheek so pale?
How chance the roses there do fade so fast?
Her.– Belike, for want of rain, which I could well
Between them from the tempest of mine eyes."
 

– Midsummer Night's Dream.

Up in her chamber sits Cecilia, speechless, spell-bound, fighting with a misery too great for tears. Upon her knee lies an open letter from which an enclosure has slipped and fallen to the ground. And on this last her eyes, scorched and distended, are fixed hopelessly.

The letter itself is from Colonel Trant: it was posted yesterday, and received by her late last night, though were you now to tell her a whole year has elapsed since first she read its fatal contents, I do not think she would evince much doubt or surprise. It was evidently hastily penned, the characters being rough and uneven, and runs as follows:

"Austen Holm. Friday.

"My dear Girl, – The attempt to break bad news to any one has always seemed to me so vain, and so unsatisfactory a proceeding, and one so likely to render even heavier the blow it means to soften, that here I refrain from it altogether. Yet I would entreat you when reading what I now enclose not to quite believe in its truth until further proofs be procured. I shall remain at my present address for three days longer: if I do not by then hear from you, I shall come to The Cottage. Whatever happens, I know you will remember it is my only happiness to serve you, and that I am ever your faithful friend,

"George Trant."

When Cecilia had read so far, she raised the enclosure, though without any very great misgivings, and, seeing it was from some unknown friend of Trant's, at present in Russia, skimmed lightly through the earlier portion of it, until at length a paragraph chained her attention and killed at a stroke all life and joy and happy love within her.

"By the bye," ran this fatal page, "did you not know a man named Arlington? – tall, rather stout, and dark; you used to think him dead. He is not, however, as I fell against him yesterday by chance and learned his name and all about him. He didn't seem half such a dissipated card as you described him, so I hope traveling has improved his morals. I asked him if he knew any one called Trant, and he said, 'Yes, several.' I had only a minute or two to speak to him, and, as he never drew breath himself during that time, I had not much scope for questioning. He appears possessed of many advantages, – pretty wife at home, no end of money, nice place, unlimited swagger. Bad form all through, but genial. You will see him shortly in the old land, as he is starting for England almost immediately."

And so on, and on, and on. But Cecilia, then or afterward, never read another line.

Her first thought was certainly not of Cyril. It was abject, cowering fear, – a horror of any return to the old loathed life, – a crushing dread lest any chance should fling her again into her husband's power. Then she drew her breath a little hard, and thought of Trant, and then of Cyril; and then she told herself, with a strange sense of relief, that at least one can die.

But this last thought passed away as did the others, and she knew that death seldom comes to those who seek it; and to command it, – who should dare do that? Hope dies hard in some breasts! In Cecilia's the little fond flame barely flickered, so quickly did it fade away and vanish altogether before the fierce blast that had assailed it. Not for one moment did she doubt the truth of the statement lying before her. She was too happy, too certain; she should have remembered that some are born to misfortune as the sparks fly upward. "She had lived, she had loved," and here was the end of it all!

All night long she had not slept. She had indeed lain upon her bed, her pillow had known the impress of her head, but through every minute of the lonely, silent awesome hours of gloom, her great eyes had been wide open, watching for the dawn.

At last it came. A glorious dawn; a very flush of happy youth; the sweeter that it bespoke a warm and early spring. At first it showed pale pink with expectation, then rosy with glad hope. From out the east faint rays of gold rushed tremulously, and, entering the casement, cast around Cecilia's head a tender halo.

When happiness lies within our grasp, when all that earth can give us (alas! how little!) is within our keeping, how good is the coming of another day, – a long, perfect day, in which to revel, and laugh, and sing, as though care were a thing unknown! But when trouble falls upon us, and this same terrible care is our only portion, with what horror, what heart-sinking, do we turn our faces from the light and wish with all the fervor of a vain wish that it were night!

The holy dawn brought but anguish to Cecilia. She did not turn with impatience from its smiling beauty, but heavy tears gathered slowly, and grew within her sorrowful gray eyes, until at length (large as was their home) they burst their bounds and ran quickly down her cheeks, as though glad to escape from what should never have been their resting-place. Swiftly, silently, ran the little pearly drops, ashamed of having dimmed the lustre of those lovely eyes that only yester morning were so glad with smiles.

Sitting now in her bedroom, forlorn and desolate, with the cruel words that have traveled all the way across a continent to slay her peace throbbing through her brain, she hears Cyril's well-known step upon the gravel outside, and, springing to her feet as though stabbed, shrinks backward until the wall yields her a support. A second later, ashamed of her own weakness, she straightens herself, smooths back her ruffled hair from her forehead, and, with a heavy sigh and colorless face, walks down-stairs to him who from henceforth must be no more counted as a lover. Slowly, with lingering steps that betray a broken heart, she draws nigh to him.

Seeing her, he comes quickly forward to greet her, still glad with the joy that has been his during all his walk through the budding woods, a smile upon his lips. But the smile soon dies. The new blankness, the terrible change, he sees in the beloved face sobers him immediately. It is vivid enough even at a first glance to fill him with apprehension: hastening to her as though eager to succor her from any harm that may be threatening, he would have taken her in his arms, but she, with a little quick shudder, putting up her hands, prevents him.

"No," she says, in a low changed tone; "not again!"

"Something terrible has happened," Cyril says, with conviction, "or you would not so repulse me. Darling, what is it?"

"I don't know how to tell you," replies she, her tone cold with the curious calmness of despair.

"It cannot be so very bad," nervously; "nothing can signify greatly, unless it separates you from me."

A mournful bitter laugh breaks from Cecilia, a laugh that ends swiftly, tunelessly, as it began.

"How nearly you have touched upon the truth!" she says, miserably; and then, in a clear, hard voice, "My husband is alive."

A dead silence. No sound to disturb the utter stillness, save the sighing of the early spring wind, the faint twitter of the birds among the budding branches as already they seek to tune their slender throats to the warblings of love, and the lowing of the brown-eyed oxen in the fields far, far below them.

Then Cyril says, with slow emphasis:

"I don't believe it. It's a lie! It is impossible!"

"It is true. I feel it so. Something told me my happiness was too great to last, and now it has come to an end. Alas! alas! how short a time it has continued with me! Oh, Cyril!" – smiting her hands together passionately, – "what shall I do? what shall I do? If he finds me he will kill me, as he often threatened. How shall I escape?"

"It is untrue," repeats Cyril, doggedly, hardly noting her terror and despair. His determined disbelief restores her to calmness.

"Do you think I would believe except on certain grounds?" she says. "Colonel Trant wrote me the evil tidings."

"Trant is interested; he might be glad to delay our marriage," he says, with a want of generosity unworthy of him.

"No, no, no. You wrong him. And how should he seek to delay a marriage that was yet far distant?"

"Not so very distant. I have yet to tell you" – with a strange smile – "my chief reason for being here to-day: to ask you to receive my mother to-morrow, who is coming to welcome you as a daughter. How well Fate planned this tragedy! to have our crowning misfortune fall straight into the lap of our newly-born content! Cecilia," – vehemently, – "there must still be a grain of hope somewhere. Do not let us quite despair. I cannot so tamely accept the death to all life's joys that must follow on belief."

"You shall see for yourself," replies she, handing to him the letter that all this time has lain crumbled beneath her nerveless fingers.

When he has read it, he drops it with a groan, and covers his face with his hands. To him, too, the evidence seems clear and convincing.

"I told you to avoid me. I warned you," she says, presently, with a wan smile. "I am born to ill-luck; I bring it even to all those who come near me – especially, it seems, to the few who are unhappy enough to love me. Go, Cyril, while there is yet time."

"There is not time," desperately: "it is already too late." He moves away from her, and in deep agitation paces up and down the secluded garden-path; while she, standing alone with drooping head and dry miserable eyes, scarcely cares to watch his movements, so dead within her have all youth and energy grown.

"Cecilia," he says, suddenly, stopping before her, and speaking in a low tone, that, though perfectly clear, still betrays inward hesitation, while his eyes carefully avoid hers, "listen to me. What is he to you, this man that they say is still alive, that you should give up your whole life for him? He deserted you, scorned you, left you for another woman. For two long years you have believed him dead. Why should you now think him living? Let him be dead still and buried in your memory; there are other lands," – slowly, and still with averted eyes, – "other homes: why should we not make one for ourselves? Cecilia," – coming up to her, white but earnest, and holding out his arms to her, – "come with me, and let us find our happiness in each other!"

Cecilia, after one swift glance at him, moves back hastily.

"How dare you use such words to me?" she says, in a horror-stricken voice; "how dare you tempt me? you, you who said you loved me!" Then the little burst of passion dies; her head droops still lower upon her breast; her hands coming together fall loosely before her in an attitude descriptive of the deepest despondency. "I believed in you," she says, "I trusted you. I did not think you would have been the one to inflict the bitterest pang of all." She breathes these last words in accents of the saddest reproach.

"Nor will I!" cries he, with keen contrition, kneeling down before her, and hiding his face in a fold of her gown. "Never again, my darling, my life! I forgot, – I forgot you are as high above all other women as the sun is above the earth. Cecilia, forgive me."

"Nay, there is nothing to forgive," she says. "But, Cyril," – unsteadily, – "you will go abroad at once, for a little while, until I have time to decide where in the future I shall hide my head."

"Must I?"

"You must."

"And you, – where will you go?"

"It matters very little. You will have had time to forget me before ever I trust myself to see you again."

"Then I shall never see you again," replies he, mournfully, "if you wait for that. 'My true love hath my heart, and I have hers.' How can I forget you while it beats warm within my breast?"

"Be it so," she answers, with a sigh: "it is a foolish fancy, yet it gladdens me. I would not be altogether displaced from your mind."

So she lays her hand upon his head as he still kneels before her, and gently smooths and caresses it with her light loving fingers. He trembles a little, and a heavy dry sob breaks from him. This parting is as the bitterness of death. To them it is death, because it is forever.

He brings the dear hand down to his lips, and kisses it softly, tenderly.

"Dearest," she murmurs, brokenly, "be comforted."

"What comfort can I find, when I am losing you?"

"You can think of me."

"That would only increase my sorrow."

"Is it so with you? For me I am thankful, very thankful, for the great joy that has been mine for months, the knowledge that you loved me. Even now, when desolation has come upon us, the one bright spot in all my misery is the thought that at least I may remember you, and call to mind your words, your face, your voice, without sin."

"If ever you need me," he says, when a few minutes have elapsed, "you have only to write, 'Cyril, I want you,' and though the whole world should lie between us, I shall surely come. O my best beloved! how shall I live without you?"

"Don't, – do not speak like that," entreats she, faintly. "It is too hard already: do not make it worse." Then, recovering herself by a supreme effort, she says, "Let us part now, here, while we have courage. I think the few arrangements we can make have been made, and George Trant will write, if – if there is anything to write about."

They are standing with their hands locked together reading each other's faces for the last time.

"To-morrow you will leave Chetwoode?" she says, regarding him fixedly.

"To-morrow! I could almost wish there was no to-morrow for either you or me," replies he.

"Cyril," she says, with sudden fear, "you will take care of yourself, you will not go into any danger? Darling," – with a sob, – "you will always remember that some day, when this is quite forgotten, I shall want to see again the face of my dearest friend."

"I shall come back to you," he says quietly. He is so quiet that she tells herself now is a fitting time to break away from him; she forces herself to take the first step that shall part them remorselessly.

"Good-bye," she says, in faltering tones.

"Good-bye," returns he, mechanically. With the slow reluctant tears that spring from a broken heart running down her pale cheeks, she presses her lips fervently to his hands, and moves slowly away. When she has gone a few steps, frightened at the terrible silence that seems to have enwrapped him, benumbing his very senses, she turns to regard him once more.

He has never stirred; he scarcely seems to breathe, so motionless is his attitude; as though some spell were on him, he stands silently gazing after her, his eyes full of dumb agony. There is something so utterly lonely in the whole scene that Cecilia bursts into tears. Her sobs rouse him.

"Cecilia!" he cries, in a voice of mingled passion and despair that thrills through her. Once more he holds out to her his arms. She runs to him, and flings herself for the time into his embrace. He strains her passionately to his heart. Her sobs break upon the silent air. Once again their white lips form the word "farewell." There is a last embrace, a last lingering kiss.

All is over.

CHAPTER XXIX

 
"The flower that smiles to-day
To-morrow dies;
All that we wish to stay
Tempts and then flies.
What is this world's delight?
Lightning that mocks the night,
Brief even as bright." – Shelley.
 

At Chetwoode they are all assembled in the drawing-room, – except Archibald, who is still confined to his room, – waiting for dinner: Cyril alone is absent.

"What can be keeping him?" says his mother, at last, losing patience as she pictures him dallying with his betrothed at The Cottage while the soup is spoiling and the cook is gradually verging toward hysterics. She suffers an aggrieved expression to grow within her eyes as she speaks from the depths of the softest arm-chair the room contains, in which it is her custom to ensconce herself.

"Nothing very dreadful, I dare say," replies Florence, in tones a degree less even than usual, her appetite having got the better of her self-control.

Almost as she says the words the door is thrown open, and Cyril enters. He is in morning costume, his hair is a little rough, his face pale, his lips bloodless. Walking straight up to his mother, without looking either to the right or to the left, he says, in a low constrained voice that betrays a desperate effort to be calm:

"Be satisfied, mother: you have won the day. Your wish is fulfilled: I shall never marry Mrs. Arlington: you need not have made such a difficulty about giving your consent this morning, as now it is useless."

"Cyril, what has happened?" says Lady Chetwoode, rising to her feet alarmed, a distinct pallor overspreading her features. She puts out one jeweled hand as though to draw him nearer to her, but for the first time in all his life he shrinks from her gentle touch, and moving backward, stands in the middle of the room. Lilian, going up to him, compels him with loving violence to turn toward her.

"Why don't you speak?" she asks, sharply. "Have you and Cecilia quarreled?"

"No: it is no lovers' quarrel," with an odd change of expression: "we have had little time for quarreling, she and I: our days for love-making were so short, so sweet!"

There is a pause: then in a clear harsh voice, in which no faintest particle of feeling can be traced, he goes on: "Her husband is alive; he is coming home. After all," – with a short unlovely laugh, sad through its very bitterness, – "we worried ourselves unnecessarily, as she was not, what we so feared, a widow."

"Cyril!" exclaims Lilian; she is trembling visibly, and gazes at him as though fearing he may have lost his senses.

"I would not have troubled you about this matter," continues Cyril, not heeding the interruption, and addressing the room generally, without permitting himself to look at any one, "but that it is a fact that must be known sooner or later; I thought the sooner the better, as it will end your anxiety and convince you that this mesalliance you so dreaded," – with a sneer, – "can never take place."

Guy, who has come close to him, here lays his hand upon his arm.

"Do not speak to us as though we could not feel for you," he says, gently, pain and remorse struggling in his tone, "believe me – "

But Cyril thrusts him back.

"I want neither sympathy nor kind words now," he says, fiercely: "you failed me when I most required them, when they might have made her happy. I have spoken on this subject now once for all. From this moment let no one dare broach it to me again."

Guy is silent, repentant. No one speaks; the tears are running down Lilian's cheeks.

"May not I?" she asks, in a distressed whisper. "Oh, my dear! do not shut yourself up alone with your grief. Have I not been your friend? Have not I, too, loved her? poor darling! Cyril, let me speak to you of her sometimes."

"Not yet; not now," replies he, in the softest tone he has yet used, a gleam of anguish flashing across his face. "Yes, you were always true to her, my good little Lilian!" Then, sinking his voice, "I am leaving home, perhaps for years; do not forsake her. Try to console, to comfort – " He breaks down hopelessly; raising her hand to his lips, he kisses it fervently, and a second later has left the room.

For quite two minutes after the door had closed upon him, no one stirs, no one utters a word. Guy is still standing with downcast eyes upon the spot that witnessed his repulse. Lilian is crying. Lady Chetwoode is also dissolved in tears. It is this particular moment Florence chooses to make the first remark that has passed her lips since Cyril's abrupt entrance.

"Could anything be more fortunate?" she says, in a measured, congratulatory way. "Could anything have happened more opportunely? Here is this objectionable marriage irretrievably prevented without any trouble on our parts. I really think we owe a debt of gratitude to this very unpleasant husband."

"Florence," cries Lady Chetwoode, with vehement reproach, stung to the quick, "how can you see cause for rejoicing in the poor boy's misery! Do you not think of him?" After which she subsides again, with an audible sob, into her cambric. But Lilian is not so easily satisfied.

"How dare you speak so?" she says, turning upon Florence with wet eyes that flash fire through their tears. "You are a cold and heartless woman. How should you understand what he is feeling, – poor, poor Cyril!" This ebullition of wrath seems to do her good. Kneeling down by her auntie, she places her arms round her, and has another honest comfortable cry upon her bosom.

Florence draws herself up to her full height, which is not inconsiderable, and follows her movements with slow, supercilious wonder. She half closes her white lids, and lets her mouth take a slightly disdainful curve, – not too great a curve, but just enough to be becoming and show the proper disgust she feels at the terrible exhibition of ill-breeding that has just taken place.

But as neither Lilian nor Lady Chetwoode can see her, and as Guy has turned to the fire and is staring into its depths with an expression of stern disapproval upon his handsome face, she presently finds she is posing to no effect, and gives it up.

Letting a rather vindictive look cover her features, she sweeps out of the drawing-room up to her own chamber, and gets rid of her bad temper so satisfactorily that after ten minutes her maid gives warning, and is ready to curse the day she was born.

The next morning, long before any one is up, Cyril takes his departure by the early train, and for many days his home knows him no more.

* * * * * * *

A mighty compassion for Cecilia fills the hearts of all at Chetwoode – all, that is, except Miss Beauchamp, who privately considers it extremely low and wretched form, to possess a heart at all.

Lady Chetwoode, eager and anxious to atone for past unkind thought, goes down to The Cottage in person and insists on seeing its sad tenant, – when so tender and sympathetic is she, that, the ice being broken and pride vanquished, the younger woman gives way, and, laying her head upon the gentle bosom near her, has a hearty cry there, that eases even while it pains her. I have frequently noticed that when one person falls to weeping in the arms of another, that other person maintains a tendresse for her for a considerable time afterward. Cecilia's lucky rain of tears on this occasion softens her companion wonderfully, so that Lady Chetwoode, who only came to pity, goes away admiring.

There is an indescribable charm about Cecilia, impossible to resist. Perhaps it is her beauty, perhaps her exquisite womanliness, combined with the dignity that sits so sweetly on her. Lady Chetwoode succumbs to it, and by degrees grows not only sympathetic toward her, but really attached to her society, – "now, when it is too late," as poor Cecilia tells herself, with a bitter pang. Yet the friendship of Cyril's mother is dear to her, and helps to lighten the dreary days that must elapse before the news of her husband's return to life is circumstantially confirmed. They have all entreated her to make The Cottage still her home, until such unwelcome news arrives.

Colonel Trant's friend has again written from Russia, but without being able to add another link to the chain of evidence. "He had not seen Arlington since. He had changed his quarters, so they had missed, and he had had no opportunity of cross-examining him as to his antecedents; but he himself had small doubt he was the man they had so often discussed together. He heard he had gone south, through Turkey, meaning to make his voyage home by sea; he had mentioned something about preferring that mode of traveling to any other. He could, of course, easily ascertain the exact time he meant to return to England, and would let Trant know without delay," etc.

All this is eminently unsatisfactory, and suspense preying upon Cecilia commits terrible ravages upon both face and form. Her large eyes look at one full of a settled melancholy; her cheeks grow more hollow daily; her once elastic step has grown slow and fearful, as though she dreads to overtake misfortune. Every morning and evening, as the post hour draws nigh, she suffers mental agony, through her excessive fear of what a letter may reveal to her, sharper than any mere physical pain.

Cyril has gone abroad; twice Lilian has received a line from him, but of his movements or his feelings they know nothing. Cecilia has managed to get both these curt letters into her possession, and no doubt treasures them, and weeps over them, poor soul, as a saint might over a relic.

Archibald, now almost recovered, has left them reluctantly for change of air, in happy ignorance of the sad events that have been starting up among them since his accident, as all those aware of the circumstances naturally shrink from speaking of them, and show a united desire to prevent the unhappy story from spreading further.

So day succeeds day, until at length matters come to a crisis, and hopes and fears are at an end.