Chapter 23

Falkner had parted with his dear adopted child under a strong excitement of fear concerning her health. The change of air and scene restored her so speedily, that his anxieties were of short duration. He was, however, in no hurry to rejoin her, as he was taught to consider a temporary separation from him as important to her convalescence.

For the first time, after many years, Falkner was alone. True, he was so in Greece; but there he had an object. In Greece, also, it is true that he had dwelt on the past, writing even a narrative of his actions, and that remorse sat heavy at his heart, while he pursued this task. Yet he went to Greece to assist in a glorious cause, and to redeem his name from the obloquy his confession would throw on it, by his gallantry and death. There was something animating in these reflections. Then also disease had not attacked him, nor pain made him its prey—his sensations were healthful—and if his reflections were melancholy and self-condemning, yet they were attended by grandeur, and even by sublimity, the result of the danger that surrounded him, and the courage with which he met it.

Now he was left alone—broken in health—dashed in spirit; consenting to live—wishing to live for Elizabeth’s sake—yet haunted still by one pale ghost, and the knowledge that his bosom contained a secret which, if divulged, would acquire for him universal detestation. He did not fear discovery; but little do they know the human heart who are not aware of the throes of shame and anguish that attend the knowledge that we are in reality a cheat, that we disguise our own real selves, and that truth is our worst enemy. Left to himself, Falkner thought of these things with bitterness; he loathed the burden that sat upon his soul; he longed to cast it off; yet, when he thought of Elizabeth; her devoted affection and earnest entreaties, he was again a coward; how could he consent to give her up, and plant a dagger in her heart!

There was but one cure to the irritation that his spirit endured, which was—to take refuge in her society; and he was about to join her, when a letter came, speaking of Gerard Neville—the same wild boy they had seen at Baden—the kind friend of Marseilles, still melancholy, still stricken by adversity; but endowed with a thousand qualities to attract love and admiration: full of sentiment and poetry—kind and tender as woman—resolute and independent as a man. Elizabeth said little, remembering Falkner’s previous restriction upon his name—but she considered it her duty to mention him to her benefactor; and that being her duty to him, it became another to her new friend to assert his excellence, lest by some chance Falkner had mistaken, and attributed qualities that did not belong to him.

Falkner’s thoughts became busy on this with new ideas. It was at once pleasing and painful to hear of the virtues of Gerard Neville. The pleasure was derived from the better portion of human nature—the pain from the worst; a lurking envy, and dislike to excellence derived in any degree from one he hated, and with such sentiment he regarded the father of Gerard. Still he was the son of the angel he worshipped and had destroyed; she had loved her child to adoration, and to know that he grew up all she would have wished would console her wandering, unappeased spirit. He remembered his likeness to her, and that softened him even more. Yet he thought of the past—and what he had done; and the very idea of her son lamenting for ever his lost mother filled him with renewed and racking remorse.

That Elizabeth should now for the third time be thrown in his way, was strange, and his first impulse was to recall her. It was well that Gerard should be noble-minded, endowed with talent, a rare and exalted being—but that she should be brought into near contact with him was evil: between Falkner and Gerard Neville there existed a gulf unfathomable, horrific, deadly; and any friendship between him and his adopted child must cause disunion between her and Falkner. He had suffered much, but this last blow, a cause for disuniting them, would tax his fortitude too much.

Yet thus it was to be taxed. He received a letter from Lady Cecil, of which Elizabeth was ignorant. Its ostensible object was to give good tidings of her fair guest’s health, and to renew her invitation to him. But there was a covert meaning which Falkner detected. Lady Cecil, though too young to be an inveterate matchmaker, yet conceived and cherished the idea of the marriage of Neville and Elizabeth. In common parlance, Gerard might look higher; but so also might Elizabeth, apparently the only daughter and heiress of a man of good birth and easy fortune. But this went for little with Lady Cecil; Gerard’s peculiar disposition—his devotion to his dead mother—his distaste to all society—the coldness he had hitherto manifested to feminine attractions, made the choice of a wife difficult for him. Elizabeth’s heroic and congenial character; her total inexperience in the world, and readiness to sympathize with sentiments which, to the ordinary class of women, would appear extravagant and foolish; all this suited them for each other. Lady Cecil saw them together, and felt that intimacy would produce love. She was delighted; but thinking it right that the father should have a voice, she wrote to Falkner, scarcely alluding to these things, but with a delicate tact that enabled her to convey her meaning, and Falkner, jumping at once to the conclusion, saw that his child was lost to him for ever.

There arose from this idea a convulsion of feeling, that shook him as an earthquake shakes the firm land, making the most stable edifices totter. A chill horror ran through his veins, a cold dew broke out on his forehead; it was unnatural—it was fatal—it must bring on all their heads tenfold ruin.