Volume I Part 37 (1/2)
Constance, we may suppose, accidentally wandered by the end of the building, where, in the huge b.u.t.tress of chimneys, a narrow crevice admitted light into the chamber occupied by the fugitive. At times, perhaps unconsciously, her eye wandered from the moon to this dreary abode; where it lingered longest is more than we dare tell. She drew nigh to the dark margin of the pond. The white swans were sleeping in the sedge. At her approach they fluttered clumsily to their element; there, the symbols of elegance and grace, like wreaths of sea-foam on its surface, they glided on, apparently without an impulse or an effort.
She was gazing on them when a rustle amongst the willows on her left arrested her attention. Soon the mysterious and almost omnipresent form of Tyrone stood before her.
”I must away, maiden--Constance!” His voice was mournful as the last faint sound of the evening bell upon the waters.
”Why art thou here?” She said this in a tone of mingled anxiety and surprise.
”Here? Too long have I lingered in these woods and around thy dwelling, Constance. But I must begone--for ever!”
”For ever?” cried the perplexed girl, forgetful of all but the dread thought of that for ever!
”Ay, for ever? Why should I stay?”
This question, alas! she could not answer, but stood gazing on the dark water, and on the silver waves which the bright swans had rippled over the pool. Though she saw them not, yet the scene mingled itself insensibly with the feelings then swelling in her bosom; and these recurrent circ.u.mstances, in subsequent periods of her existence, never failed to bring the same dark tide of thought over the soul with vivid and agonising distinctness.
”Maiden, beware!”
Constance turned towards him:--the moonlight fell on his brow: the dark curls swept n.o.bly out from their broad shadows twining luxuriantly about his cheek. His eyes were fixed on her, with an eagerness and an anguish in their expression the most absorbing and intense.
”I have loved thee. Ay, if it be love to live whole nights on the memory of a glance,--on a smile,--on the indelible impress of thy form.
Here,--here! But no living thing that I have loved;--no being that e'er looked on me with kindliness and favour, that has not been marked out for destruction. Oh, that those eyes had ne'er looked upon me! Thou wert happy, and I have lingered on thy footstep till I have dragged thee to the same gulph where all hope--all joy that e'er stole in upon my dark path, must perish.”
”Oh! do not foretaste thy misery thus,” cried Constance. ”The cruel sufferings thou hast undergone make thee apprehensive of evil. But how can _thy_ fate control my destiny?”
”How, I know not,” said Tyrone, ”save that it shall bring the same clouds, in unmitigated darkness, about thy path. Dost thou love me? Nay, start not. Stay not!” cried he, making way for the maiden to pa.s.s. But Constance seemed unable to move,--terrified and speechless.
”Perchance, thou knowest it not, but thou wouldest love me as a woman loves;--ay, beyond even the verge and extremity of hope! Even now the poison rankles in thy bosom. Hark!--'tis the doom yon glorious intelligences denounced from that glittering vault, when they proclaimed my birth!”
He repeated the prediction as aforetime, with a deep, solemn intonation:--the maiden's blood seemed to curdle with horror. A pause of bewildering and mysterious terror followed. One brief minute in the lapse of time,--but an age in the records of thought! Constance, fearful of looking on the dark billows of the spirit, sought to avert her glance.
”Thou art an exile, and misfortune prompted me to thy succour; thou hast won my pity, stranger.”
”Beshrew me, 'tis a wary and subtle deceiver, this same casuist love.
Believe him not!” said he, in a burst and agony of soul that made Constance tremble. ”He would lead thee veiled to the very brink of the precipice, then s.n.a.t.c.h the shelter from thine eyes and bid thee leap!
Nay, 'tis not pride,--'tis the doom, the curse of my birthright that is upon me. Maiden! I will but strike to thine heart, and then--poor soul!”
He shuddered; his voice grew tremulous and convulsed. ”The stricken one shall fall. Hark! the hounds are again upon my track!” The well-practised ear of the hunted fugitive could discern the approach of footsteps long before they were audible to an ordinary listener:--his eye and ear seemed on the stretch;--his head bent forward in the same direction;--he breathed not. Even Constance seemed to suspend the current of her own thoughts at this interruption.
”They are approaching. In all likelihood 'tis a posse from the sheriff.”
Again he listened. ”They are armed. Nay, then, Tyrone thou must to cover: thou canst not flee. Point not to the hiding-place I have left.
If, as I suspect, they bring a warrant of search, thy father's life may be in jeopardy.”
”Where,--oh, where?” said Constance, forgetful of all consequences, in her anxiety for her father's fate and that of the ill.u.s.trious stranger.
”In thy chamber, lady.”
She drew back in dismay.
”Nay,” continued he, guessing at the cause of her alarm. ”They will not care to scrutinise for me there with much exactness; and, by the faith of my fathers, I will not wrong thee!”