Falkner: a Novel
Copyright© 2025 by Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin) Shelley
Chapter 15
Three or four days passed in great tranquillity; and Lady Cecil rejoiced that the great medicine acted so well on the rankling malady of her brother’s soul. It was the leafy month of June, and nature was as beautiful as these lovely beings themselves, who enjoyed her sweets with enthusiastic and new-sprung delight. They sailed on the sunny sea—or lingered by the summer brooks, and among the rich woodlands—ignorant why all appeared robed in a brightness which before they had never observed. Elizabeth had little thought beyond the present hour—except to wish for the time when Falkner was to join them. Neville rebelled somewhat against the new law he obeyed, but it was a slothful rebellion—till on the day he was awakened from his dream of peace.
One morning, Elizabeth, on entering the breakfast-room, found Lady Cecil leaning discontentedly by the window, resting her cheek on her hand, and her brow overcast.
“He is gone,” she exclaimed; “it is too provoking! Gerard is gone! A letter came, and I could not detain him—it will take him probably to the other end of the kingdom—and who knows when we shall see him again!”
They sat down to breakfast, but Lady Cecil was full of discontent. “It is not only that he is gone,” she continued, “but the cause of his going is full of pain and care—and, unfortunately, you cannot sympathize with me, for I have not obtained his consent to confide his hapless story to you. Would that I might!—you would feel for him—for us all.”
“He has been unhappy since childhood,” observed Elizabeth.
“He has, it is true; but how did you learn that? has he ever told you anything?”
“I saw him, many years ago, at Baden. How wild, how sullen he was—unlike his present self! for then there was a violence and a savageness in his gloom, which has vanished.”
“Poor boy!” said Lady Cecil; “I remember well—and it is a pleasure to think that I am, to a great degree, the cause of the change. He had no friend at that time—none to love—to listen to him, and foster hopes which, however vain, diminish his torments, and are all the cure he can obtain, till he forgets them. But what can this mean?” she continued, starting up; “what can bring him back? It is Gerard returned!”
She threw open the glass door, and went out to meet him as he rode up the avenue—he threw himself from his horse, and advanced, exclaiming, “Is my father here?”
“Sir Boyvill? No; is he coming?”
“Oh yes! we shall see him soon. I met a servant with a letter sent express—the post was too slow—he will be here soon; he left London last night—you know with what speed he travels.”
“But why this sudden visit?”
“Can you not guess? He received a letter from the same person—containing the same account; he knew I was here—he comes to balk my purpose, to forbid, to storm, to reproach; to do all that he has done a thousand times before, with the same success.”
Neville looked flushed and disturbed; his face, usually “more in sorrow than in anger,” now expressed the latter emotion, mingled with scorn and resolution; he gave the letter he had received to Lady Cecil. “I am wrong, perhaps, in returning at his bidding, since I do not mean ultimately to obey—yet he charges me on my duty to hear him once again; so I am come to hear—to listen to the old war of his vanity with what he calls my pride—his vindictiveness with my sense of duty—his vituperation of her I worship—and I must bear this!”
Lady Cecil read the letter, and Neville pressed Elizabeth’s hand, and besought her excuse, while she, much bewildered, was desirous to leave the room. At this moment the noise of a carriage was heard on the gravel. “He is here,” said Neville; “see him first, Sophia, tell him how resolved I am—how right in my resolves. Try to prevent a struggle, as disgraceful as vain; and most so to my father, since he must suffer defeat.”
With a look of much distress, Lady Cecil left the room to receive her new guest; while Elizabeth stole out by another door into the grove, and mused under the shady covert on what had passed. She felt curious, yet saddened. Concord, affection, and sympathy are so delightful, that all that disturbs the harmony is eminently distasteful. Family contentions are worst of all. Yet she would not prejudge Neville. He felt, in its full bitterness, the pain of disobeying his parent; and whatever motive led to such a mode of action, it hung like an eclipse over his life. What it might be she could not guess; but it was no ignoble, self-centred passion. Hope and joy were sacrificed to it. She remembered him as she first saw him, a boy driven to wildness by a sense of injury; she remembered him when reason and his better nature had subdued the selfish portion of his feeling—grown kind as a woman—active, friendly, and sympathizing, as few men are; she recollected him by Falkner’s sick couch, and when he took leave of her, auguring that they should meet in a happier hour. That hour had not yet come, and she confessed to herself that she longed to know the cause of his unhappiness; and wondered whether, by counsel or sympathy, she could bring any cure.
She was plunged in revery, walking slowly beneath the forest trees, when she heard a quick step brushing the dead leaves and fern, and Neville joined her. “I have escaped,” he cried, “and left poor Sophy to bear the scoldings of an unjust and angry man. I could not stay—it was not cowardice—but I have recollections joined to such contests, that make my heart sick. Besides, I should reply—and I would not willingly forget that he is my father.”
“It must be indeed painful,” said Elizabeth, “to quarrel with, to disobey a parent.”
“Yet there are motives that might, that must excuse it. Do you remember the character of Hamlet, Miss Falkner?”
“Perfectly—it is the imbodying of the most refined, the most genuine, and yet the most harrowing feelings and situation, that the imagination ever conceived.”
“I have read that play,” said Neville, “till each word seems instinct with a message direct to my heart—as if my own emotions gave a conscious soul to every line. Hamlet was called upon to avenge a father—in execution of his task he did not spare a dearer, a far more sacred name—if he used no daggers with his mother, he spoke them; nor winced, though she writhed beneath his hand. Mine is a lighter, yet a holier duty. I would vindicate a mother—without judging my father—without any accusation against him, I would establish her innocence. Is this blameable? What would you do, Miss Falkner, if your father were accused of a crime?”
“My father and a crime! Impossible!” exclaimed Elizabeth; for, strange to say, all the self-accusations of Falkner fell empty on her ear. It was a virtue in him to be conscience-stricken for an error; of any real guilt she would have pledged her life that he was free.
“Yes—impossible!” cried Neville—”doubtless it is so; but did you hear his name stigmatized—shame attend your very kindred to him—what would you do?—defend him—prove his innocence—would you not?”
“A life were well sacrificed to such a duty.”
“And to that very duty mine is devoted. In childhood I rebelled against the accusation with vain, but earnest indignation; now I am calmer because I am more resolved; but I will yield to no impediment—be stopped by no difficulty—not even by my father’s blind commands. My mother! dear name—dearer for the ills attached to it—my angel mother shall find an unfaltering champion in her son.
“You must not be angry,” he continued, in reply to her look of wonder, “that I mention circumstances which it is customary to slur over and conceal. It is shame for me to speak—for you to hear—my mother’s name. That very thought gives a keener edge to my purpose. God knows what miserable truth is hidden by the veils which vanity, revenge, and selfishness have drawn around my mother’s fate; but that truth—though it be a bleeding one—shall be disclosed, and her innocence be made as clear as the sun now shining above us.
“It is dreadful, very dreadful, to be told—to be persuaded that the idol of one’s thoughts is corrupt and vile. It is no new story, it is true—wives have been false to their husbands ere now, and some have found excuses, and sometimes been justified; it is the manner makes the thing. That my mother should have left her happy home—which, under her guardian eye, was paradise—have deserted me, her child, whom she so fondly loved—and who, even in that unconscious age, adored her—and her poor little girl, who died neglected—that year after year she has never inquired after us—nor sent nor sought a word—while following a stranger’s fortune through the world! That she whose nightly sleep was broken by her tender cares—whose voice so often lulled me, and whose every thought and act was pure as an angel’s—that she, tempted by the arch fiend, strayed from hell for her destruction, should leave us all to misery, and her own name to obloquy. No! no! The earth is yet sheltered by heaven, and sweet and good things abide in it—and she was, and is, among them sweetest and best!”
Neville was carried away by his feelings—while Elizabeth, overpowered by his vehemence—astonished by the wild, strange tale he disclosed, listened in silence, yet an eloquent silence—for her eyes filled with tears—and her heart burned in her bosom with a desire to show how entirely she shared his deep emotion.
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