Part 48 (1/2)
When with her, I thought not of myself. I had scarcely a separate or independent existence, since my senses were occupied by her, and my mind was full of those ideas which her discourse communicated. To meditate on her looks and words, and to pursue the means suggested by my own thoughts, or by her, conducive, in any way, to her good, was all my business.
”What a fate,” said I, at the conclusion of one of our interviews, ”has been yours! But, thank Heaven, the storm has disappeared before the age of sensibility has gone past, and without drying up every source of happiness. You are still young; all your powers unimpaired; rich in the compa.s.sion and esteem of the world; wholly independent of the claims and caprices of others; amply supplied with that means of usefulness, called money; wise in that experience which only adversity can give.
Past evils and sufferings, if incurred and endured without guilt, if called to view without remorse, make up the materials of present joy.
They cheer our most dreary hours with the widespread accents of 'well done,' and they heighten our pleasures into somewhat of celestial brilliancy, by furnis.h.i.+ng a deep, a ruefully-deep, contrast.
”From this moment, I will cease to weep for you. I will call you the happiest of women. I will share with you your happiness by witnessing it; but that shall not content me. I must some way contribute to it.
Tell me how I shall serve you. What can I do to make you happier? Poor am I in every thing but zeal, but still I may do something. What--pray tell me, what can I do?”
She looked at me with sweet and solemn significance. What it was exactly I could not divine, yet I was strangely affected by it. It was but a glance, instantly withdrawn. She made me no answer.
”You must not be silent; you _must_ tell me what I can do for you.
Hitherto I have done nothing. All the service is on your side. Your conversation has been my study, a delightful study, but the profit has only been mine. Tell me how I can be grateful: my voice and manner, I believe, seldom belie my feelings.” At this time, I had almost done what a second thought made me suspect to be unauthorized. Yet I cannot tell why. My heart had nothing in it but reverence and admiration. Was she not the subst.i.tute of my lost mamma? Would I not have clasped that beloved shade? Yet the two beings were not just the same, or I should not, as now, have checked myself, and only pressed her hand to my lips.
”Tell me,” repeated I, ”what can I do to serve you? I read to you a little now, and you are pleased with my reading. I copy for you when you want the time. I guide the reins for you when you choose to ride. Humble offices, indeed, though, perhaps, all that a raw youth like me can do for you; but I can be still more a.s.siduous. I can read several hours in the day, instead of one. I can write ten times as much as now.
”Are you not my lost mamma come back again? And yet, not _exactly_ her, I think. Something different; something better, I believe, if that be possible. At any rate, methinks I would be wholly yours. I shall be impatient and uneasy till every act, every thought, every minute, someway does you good.
”How!” said I, (her eye, still averted, seemed to hold back the tear with difficulty, and she made a motion as if to rise,) ”have I grieved you? Have I been importunate? Forgive me if I have offended you.”
Her eyes now overflowed without restraint. She articulated, with difficulty, ”Tears are too prompt with me of late; but they did not upbraid you. Pain has often caused them to flow, but now it--is--_pleasure_.”
”What a heart must yours be!” I resumed. ”When susceptible of such pleasures, what pangs must formerly have rent it!--But you are not displeased, you say, with my importunate zeal. You will accept me as your own in every thing. Direct me; prescribe to me. There must be _something_ in which I can be of still more use to you; some way in which I can be wholly yours----”
”_Wholly mine!_” she repeated, in a smothered voice, and rising. ”Leave me, Arthur. It is too late for you to be here. It was wrong to stay so late.”
”I have been wrong; but how too late? I entered but this moment. It is twilight still; is it not?”
”No: it is almost twelve. You have been here a long four hours; short ones I would rather say,--but indeed you must go.”
”What made me so thoughtless of the time? But I will go, yet not till you forgive me.” I approached her with a confidence and for a purpose at which, upon reflection, I am not a little surprised; but the being called Mervyn is not the same in her company and in that of another.
What is the difference, and whence comes it? Her words and looks engross me. My mind wants room for any other object. But why inquire whence the difference? The superiority of her merits and attractions to all those whom I knew would surely account for my fervour. Indifference, if I felt it, would be the only just occasion of wonder.
The hour was, indeed, too late, and I hastened home. Stevens was waiting my return with some anxiety. I apologized for my delay, and recounted to him what had just pa.s.sed. He listened with more than usual interest.
When I had finished,--
”Mervyn,” said he, ”you seem not be aware of your present situation.
From what you now tell me, and from what you have formerly told me, one thing seems very plain to me.”
”Pr'ythee, what is it?”
”Eliza Hadwin:--do you wish--could you bear--to see her the wife of another?”
”Five years hence I will answer you. Then my answer may be, 'No; I wish her only to be mine.' Till then, I wish her only to be my pupil, my ward, my sister.”
”But these are remote considerations; they are bars to marriage, but not to love. Would it not molest and disquiet you to observe in her a pa.s.sion for another?”
”It would, but only on her own account; not on mine. At a suitable age it is very likely I may love her, because it is likely, if she holds on in her present career, she will then be worthy; but at present, though I would die to insure her happiness, I have no wish to insure it by marriage with her.”