Part 53 (2/2)

”The world knows it as well as I do; and although one alone ever dared to deny it, and branded the tale with the epithet of base scandal, she came at last to see its truth; and her broken heart was the last of his triumphs!”

”You speak of the Countess,--his wife?”

He grasped my hand within one of his own, and pressed the other across his eyes, unable to speak, through emotion. Nor were my feelings less moved. What a terrible revelation was this! Misfortune upon misfortune, and De Gabriac the cause of all!

For a moment I thought of declaring myself to be his old pupil, and the child who had called that dear Comtesse ”mother;” but the morbid shame with which I remembered what I then was, stopped me, and I was silent.

”You know, of course, whither she went from this, and what became of her?” asked I, anxiously.

”Yes. I had two letters from her,--at long intervals, though; the last, when about to sail for Halifax--”

”For Halifax!--gone to America?”

”Even so. She said that the Old World had been long unkind to her, and that she would try the New! and then as their only friend in Hamburg was dead--”

”They were at Hamburg!--you did not say that?” said I.

”Yes, to be sure. Monsieur Raper, who was a worthy, good man, and a smart scholar besides, had obtained the place of correspondence clerk in a rich mercantile house in that city, where he lived with credit, till the death of the head of the firm. After that, I believe the house ceased business, or broke up. At all events, Raper was thrown on the world again, and resolved to emigrate. I suppose if Monsieur Geysiger had lived--”

”Geysiger!--is that the name you said?”

”Ay; Adam Geysiger,--the great house of Geysiger, Mersman, and Dorth, of Hamburg, the first merchants of that city.”

Though he continued to talk on, I heard no more; my thoughts become confused, and my head felt turning with the intense effort to collect myself. Geysiger? thought I; the very house where I had been at Hamburg,--where I had overheard the project of a plan against myself!

Could it be, that through all my disguise of name and condition, that they knew me? With what increase of terror did this discovery come upon me! If they have, indeed, recognized me, it may be that some scheme is laid against my life. I could not tell how or whence this suspicion came; but, doubtless, some chance word let drop before me in my infancy, and dormant since in my mind, now rushed forth to my recollection with all the power of a fact!

I questioned the old man about this Geysiger,--where he had lived, whom he had married, and so on; but he only knew that his wife had been an actress. I did not ask for more. The ident.i.ty was at once established.

I next tried to find out if any relations of friends.h.i.+p or intimacy had subsisted between the Comtesse and Madame de Geysiger; but, on the contrary, he told me they had not met nor known each other when she wrote to him; and her stay after that in Hamburg was very brief. I wearied him with asking to repeat for me several circ.u.mstances of these strange revelations; nor was it till I saw him fatigued and half exhausted that I could prevail on myself to cease. I had now loitered here to the last limit of my time; and, with an affectionate leave of my kind old master, I left Reichenau to make my way with all speed to England.

CHAPTER x.x.xVI. THE ORDEAL

My first care on arriving in England was to resign my post as an ”Agent secret.” This was not, however, so easily accomplished as I thought; for the Royalists had more than once before discovered that those in their employment had been seduced into the service of their enemies, whose rewards were greater, and who had a large field of patronage at their disposal. Unable to prevent these desertions by the inducements of profit, they had resorted to a system of secret intimidation and menace which unquestionably had its influence over many.

I have not s.p.a.ce here to dwell on a theme, some of whose details might, however, prove amusing, ill.u.s.trating as they did the mysterious working of that Jesuit element which labored so zealously and so long in the cause of the Restoration. There is a little work still extant, called ”L'Espionage et ses Dangers,” by Jules Lacoste, published at Bruxelles, in 1802, which gives, if not a perfectly authentic, at least a very graphic, description of this curious system. The writer distinctly alleges that five of his colleagues met their deaths by poison, on mere suspicion of their disloyalty, and gives the names of several whose impaired faculties and shattered health showed that they had narrowly, but perhaps not more fortunately, escaped a similar fate.

For my own part I must own that such perils were not mine. It is true, I was asked to reconsider my determination. It was at first hinted vaguely, and then positively a.s.sured me, that my long and faithful services were on the eve of a high and substantial recognition. I was even told that my own wishes would be consulted as to the nature of my reward, since I was not to be treated like one of the mere herd. When all these temptations were found to fail, I was left, as it were, to reflect on the matter, while in reality a still more ingenious and artful scheme was drawn around me; the Abbe being employed as its chief agent. Affecting, in a measure, to coincide with and even encourage my determination, he invited me constantly to his lodgings, and by degrees insinuated himself into my confidence. At least he learned that it was in pure disgust of the career itself that I desired to forsake it, and not with any prospect of other advancement in life. He sought eagerly to discover the secret subject which engaged my thoughts, for I could not succeed in concealing my deep pre-occupation; but he cautiously abstained from ever obtruding even a word of question or inquiry. Nor did his ardor stop here; he studied my tastes, my pa.s.sions, and my disposition, as subjects for successful temptation. I was young, high-couraged, and enthusiastic; and yet he found me indifferent to pleasure, and indisposed to society and its amus.e.m.e.nts. He knew me to be poor, and yet saw clearly that wealth did not dazzle me. I was humble and unknown; yet no recognition of the high and great could stir my heart nor awaken my ambitions. He was too well read in human nature to accept these as signs of an apathetic and callous disposition: he recognized them rather as evidences of a temperament given up to some one and engrossing theme.

I own that in my utter dest.i.tution there was a pleasing flattery to me in this pursuit; and I could not but feel gratified at the zeal with which he seemed to devote himself to comprehend me. He exposed me to the various subjects of temptation which so successfully a.s.sail youth; but he perceived that not one could touch the secret cord of my nature.

To some I was averse; I was indifferent to others. He took me into society,--that circle of his intimates, which really in conversational excellence surpa.s.sed anything I had ever met before; and although I enjoyed it at the time, I could refrain from frequenting it without a regret.

”You are a puzzle to me, Bernard,” said he, addressing me by my former ”sobriquet,” which he always used in private; ”I want to see you take interest in something, and show that humanity is not dead within you; but nothing seems to touch, nothing to attract you; and yet it was not thus that Sister Ursule first represented you to me. She spoke of you as one that could be warmed by the zeal of a great cause, and whose faculties would expand when once engaged in it. If the monarchy be too mean for your ambition, what say you to the church?”

I pleaded my unworthiness, but he stopped me, saying:

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