CHAPTER FIFTEEN

EXHIBITING AN INTERVIEW, WHICH, IT IS TO BE HOPED, WILL INTEREST THE CURIOSITY OF THE READER.

The mind of the delicate Aurelia was strangely agitated by the intelligence which she received with her pocket-book from Dolly. Confounded as she was by the nature of her situation, she at once perceived that she could not, with any regard to the dictates of gratitude, refuse complying with the request of Sir Launcelot; but, in the first hurry of her emotion, she directed Dolly to beg, in her name, that she might be excused for wearing a mask at the interview which he desired, as she had particular reasons, which concerned her peace, for retaining that disguise. Our adventurer submitted to this preliminary with a good grace, as he had nothing in view but the injunction of his order, and the duties of humanity; and he was admitted without further preamble.

When he entered the room, he could not help being struck with the presence of Aurelia. Her stature was improved since he had seen her; her shape was exquisitely formed; and she received him with an air of dignity, which impressed him with a very sublime idea of her person and character. She was no less affected at the sight of our adventurer, who, though cased in armour, appeared with his head uncovered; and the exercise of travelling had thrown such a glow of health and vivacity on his features, which were naturally elegant and expressive, that we will venture to say, there was not in all England a couple that excelled this amiable pair in personal beauty and accomplishments. Aurelia shone with all the fabled graces of nymph or goddess; and to Sir Launcelot might be applied what the divine poet Ariosto says of the Prince Zerbino:

     Natura il fece e poi ruppe la stampa
     When Nature stamp’d him, she the die destroy’d.

Our adventurer having made his obeisance to this supposed Miss Meadows, told her, with an air of pleasantry, that although he thought himself highly honoured in being admitted to her presence, and allowed to pay his respects to her, as superior beings are adored, unseen; yet his pleasure would receive a very considerable addition, if she would be pleased to withdraw that invidious veil, that he might have a glimpse of the divinity which it concealed. Aurelia immediately took off her mask, saying with a faltering accent, “I cannot be so ungrateful as to deny such a small favour to a gentleman who has laid me under the most important obligations.”

The unexpected apparition of Miss Aurelia Darnel, beaming with all the emanations of ripened beauty, blushing with all the graces of the most lovely confusion, could not but produce a violent effect upon the mind of Sir Launcelot Greaves. He was, indeed, overwhelmed with a mingled transport of astonishment, admiration, affection, and awe. The colour vanished from his cheeks, and he stood gazing upon her, in silence, with the most emphatic expression of countenance.

Aurelia was infected by his disorder. She began to tremble, and the roses fluctuated on her face. “I cannot forget,” said she, “that I owe my life to the courage and humanity of Sir Launcelot Greaves, and that he at the same time rescued from the most dreadful death a dear and venerable parent.”—“Would to Heaven she still survived!” cried our adventurer, with great emotion. “She was the friend of my youth, the kind patroness of my felicity! My guardian angel forsook me when she expired! Her last injunctions are deep engraver on my heart!”

While he pronounced these words, she lifted her handkerchief to her fair eyes, and, after some pause, proceeded in a tremulous tone, “I hope, sir, —I hope you have—I should be sorry—Pardon me, sir, I cannot reflect upon such an interesting subject unmoved”—Here she fetched a deep sigh, that was accompanied by a flood of tears; while the knight continued to bend his eyes upon her with the utmost eagerness of attention.

Having recollected herself a little, she endeavoured to shift the conversation: “You have been abroad since I had the pleasure to see you —I hope you were agreeably amused in your travels.”—“No, madam,” said our hero, drooping his head; “I have been unfortunate.” When she, with the most enchanting sweetness of benevolence, expressed her concern to hear he had been unhappy, and her hope that his misfortunes were not past remedy; he lifted up his eyes, and fixing them upon her again, with a look of tender dejection, “Cut off,” said he, “from the possession of what my soul held most dear, I wished for death, and was visited by distraction. I have been abandoned by my reason—my youth is for ever blasted.”

The tender heart of Aurelia could bear no more—her knees began to totter, the lustre vanished from her eyes, and she fainted in the arms of her attendant. Sir Launcelot, aroused by this circumstance, assisted Dolly in seating her mistress on a couch, where she soon recovered, and saw the knight on his knees before her. “I am still happy,” said he, “in being able to move your compassion, though I have been held unworthy of your esteem.”—“Do me justice,” she replied; “my best esteem has been always inseparably connected with the character of Sir Launcelot Greaves.”—“Is it possible?” cried our hero; “then surely I have no reason to complain. If I have moved your compassion, and possess your esteem, I am but one degree short of supreme happiness—that, however, is a gigantic step. O Miss Darnel! when I remember that dear, that melancholy moment.”—So saying he gently touched her hand, in order to press it to his lips, and perceived on her finger the very individual ring which he had presented in her mother’s presence, as an interchanged testimony of plighted faith. Starting at the well-known object, the sight of which conjured up a strange confusion of ideas, “This,” said he, “was once the pledge of something still more cordial than esteem.” Aurelia, blushing at this remark, while her eyes lightened with unusual vivacity, replied, in a severer tone, “Sir, you best know how it lost its original signification.”—“By Heaven! I do not, madam!” exclaimed our adventurer. “With me it was ever held a sacred idea throned within my heart, cherished with such fervency of regard, with such reverence of affection, as the devout anchorite more unreasonably pays to those sainted reliques that constitute the object of his adoration.”—“And, like those reliques,” answered Miss Darnel, “I have been insensible of my votary’s devotion. A saint I must have been, or something more, to know the sentiments of your heart by inspiration.”

“Did I forbear,” said he, “to express, to repeat, to enforce the dictates of the purest passion that ever warmed the human breast, until I was denied access, and formally discarded by that cruel dismission?”—“I must beg your pardon, sir,” cried Aurelia, interrupting him hastily, “I know not what you mean.”—“That fatal sentence,” said he, “if not pronounced by your own lips, at least written by your own fair hand, which drove me out an exile for ever from the paradise of your affection.”—“I would not,” she replied, “do Sir Launcelot Greaves the injury to suppose him capable of imposition; but you talk of things to which I am an utter stranger. I have a right, sir, to demand of your honour, that you will not impute to me your breaking off a connexion, which—I would—rather wish—had never”——“Heaven and earth! what do I hear?” cried our impatient knight; “have I not the baleful letter to produce? What else but Miss Darnel’s explicit and express declaration could have destroyed the sweetest hope that ever cheered my soul; could have obliged me to resign all claim to that felicity for which alone I wished to live; could have filled my bosom with unutterable sorrow and despair; could have even divested me of reason, and driven me from the society of men, a poor, forlorn, wandering lunatic, such as you see me now prostrate at your feet; all the blossoms of my youth withered, all the honours of my family decayed?”

Aurelia looking wishfully at her lover, “Sir,” said she, “you overwhelm me with amazement and anxiety! you are imposed upon, if you have received any such letter. You are deceived, if you thought Aurelia Darnel could be so insensible, ungrateful, and—inconstant.”

This last word she pronounced with some hesitation, and a downcast look, while her face underwent a total suffusion, and the knight’s heart began to palpitate with all the violence of emotion. He eagerly imprinted a kiss upon her hand, exclaiming, in interrupted phrase, “Can it be possible?—Heaven grant—Sure this is no illusion!—O madam!—shall I call you my Aurelia? My heart is bursting with a thousand fond thoughts and presages. You shall see that dire paper which has been the source of all my woes—it is the constant companion of my travels—last night I nourished my chagrin with the perusal of its horrid contents.”

Aurelia expressed great impatience to view the cruel forgery, for such she assured him it must be. But he could not gratify her desire, till the arrival of his servant with the portmanteau. In the meantime, tea was called. The lovers were seated. He looked and languished; she flushed and faltered. All was doubt and delirium, fondness and flutter. Their mutual disorder communicated itself to the kind-hearted sympathising Dolly, who had been witness to the interview, and deeply affected at the disclosure of the scene. Unspeakable was her surprise, when she found her mistress, Miss Meadows, was no other than the celebrated Aurelia Darnel, whose eulogium she had heard so eloquently pronounced by her sweetheart, Mr. Thomas Clarke; a discovery which still more endeared her lady to her affection. She had wept plentifully at the progress of their mutual explanation, and was now so disconcerted, that she scarce knew the meaning of the orders she had received. She set the kettle on the table, and placed the tea-board on the fire. Her confusion, by attracting the notice of her mistress, helped to relieve her from her own embarrassing situation. She, with her own delicate hands, rectified the mistake of Dolly, who still continued to sob, and said, “Yau may think, my Leady Darnel, as haw I’aive yeaten hool-cheese; but it y’an’t soa. I’se think, vor mai peart, as how I’aive bean bewitched.”

Sir Launcelot could not help smiling at the simplicity of Dolly, whose goodness of heart and attachment Aurelia did not fail to extol, as soon as her back was turned. It was in consequence of this commendation, that, the next time she entered the room, our adventurer, for the first time, considered her face, and seemed to be struck with her features. He asked her some questions, which she could not answer to his satisfaction; applauded her regard for her lady, and assured her of his friendship and protection. He now begged to know the cause that obliged his Aurelia to travel at such a rate, and in such an equipage; and she informed him of those particulars which we have already communicated to our reader.

Sir Launcelot glowed with resentment, when he understood how his dear Aurelia had been oppressed by her perfidious and cruel guardian. He bit his nether lip, rolled his eyes around, started from his seat, and striding across the room, “I remember,” said he, “the dying words of her who now is a saint in heaven: ‘That violent man, my brother-in-law, who is Aurelia’s sole guardian, will thwart her wishes with every obstacle that brutal resentment and implacable malice can contrive.’ What followed, it would ill become me to repeat. But she concluded with these words: ‘The rest we must leave to the dispensations of Providence.’ Was it not Providence that sent me hither to guard and protect the injured Aurelia?” Then turning to Miss Darnel, whose eyes streamed with tears, he added, “Yes, divine creature! Heaven, careful of your safety, and in compassion to my sufferings, hath guided me hither, in this mysterious manner, that I might defend you from violence, and enjoy this transition from madness to deliberation, from despair to felicity.”

So saying, he approached this amiable mourner, this fragrant flower of beauty, glittering with the dew-drops of the morning; this sweetest, and gentlest, loveliest ornament of human nature. He gazed upon her with looks of love ineffable; he sat down by her; he pressed her soft hand in his; he began to fear that all he saw was the flattering vision of a distempered brain; he looked and sighed, and, turning up his eyes to heaven, breathed, in broken murmurs, the chaste raptures of his soul. The tenderness of this communication was too painful to be long endured. Aurelia industriously interposed other subjects of discourse, that his attention might not be dangerously overcharged, and the afternoon passed insensibly away.

Though he had determined, in his own mind, never more to quit this idol of his soul, they had not yet concerted any plan of conduct, when their happiness was all at once interrupted by a repetition of cries, denoting horror; and a servant coming in, said he believed some rogues were murdering a traveller on the highway. The supposition of such distress operated like gunpowder on the disposition of our adventurer, who, without considering the situation of Aurelia, and indeed without seeing, or being capable to think on her or any other subject for the time being, ran directly to the stable, and, mounting the first horse which he found saddled, issued out in the twilight, having no other weapon but his sword.

He rode full speed to the spot whence the cries seemed to proceed; but they sounded more remote as he advanced. Nevertheless, he followed them to a considerable distance from the road, over fields, ditches, and hedges; and at last came so near, that he could plainly distinguish the voice of his own squire, Timothy Crabshaw, bellowing for mercy, with hideous vociferation. Stimulated by this recognition, he redoubled his career in the dark, till at length his horse plunged into a hole, the nature of which he could not comprehend; but he found it impracticable to disengage him. It was with some difficulty that he himself clambered over a ruined wall, and regained the open ground. Here he groped about, in the utmost impatience of anxiety, ignorant of the place, mad with vexation for the fate of his unfortunate squire, and between whiles invaded with a pang of concern for Aurelia, left among strangers, unguarded, and alarmed.

In the midst of this emotion, he bethought himself of hallooing aloud, that, in case he should be in the neighbourhood of any inhabited place, he might be heard and assisted. He accordingly practised this expedient, which was not altogether without effect; for he was immediately answered by an old friend, no other than his own steed Bronzomarte, who, hearing his master’s voice, neighed strenuously at a small distance. The knight, being well acquainted with the sound, heard it with astonishment, and, advancing in the right direction, found his noble charger fastened to a tree. He forthwith untied and mounted him; then, laying the reins upon his neck, allowed him to choose his own path, in which he began to travel with equal steadiness and expedition. They had not proceeded far, when the knight’s ears were again saluted by the cries of Crabshaw; which Bronzomarte no sooner heard, than he pricked up his ears, neighed, and quickened his pace, as if he had been sensible of the squire’s distress, and hastened to his relief. Sir Launcelot, notwithstanding his own disquiet, could not help observing and admiring this generous sensibility of his horse. He began to think himself some hero of romance, mounted upon a winged steed, inspired with reason, directed by some humane enchanter, who pitied virtue in distress. All circumstances considered, it is no wonder that the commotion in the mind of our adventurer produced some such delirium. All night he continued the chase; the voice, which was repeated at intervals, still retreating before him, till the morning began to appear in the east, when, by divers piteous groans, he was directed to the corner of a wood, where he beheld his miserable squire stretched upon the grass, and Gilbert feeding by him altogether unconcerned, the helmet and the lance suspended at the saddle-bow, and the portmanteau safely fixed upon the crupper.

The knight, riding up to Crabshaw, with equal surprise and concern, asked what had brought him there? and Timothy, after some pause, during which he surveyed his master with a rueful aspect, answered, “The devil.”—“One would imagine, indeed, you had some such conveyance,” said Sir Launcelot. “I have followed your cries since last evening, I know not how nor whither, and never could come up with you till this moment. But, say, what damage have you sustained, that you lie in that wretched posture, and groan so dismally?” “I can’t guess,” replied the squire, “if it bean’t that mai hoole carcase is drilled into oilet hools, and my flesh pinched into a jelly.”—“How! wherefore!” cried the knight; “who were the miscreants that treated you in such a barbarous manner? Do you know the ruffians?”—“I know nothing at all,” answered the peevish squire, “but that I was tormented by vive houndred and vifty thousand legions of devils, and there’s an end oon’t.”—“Well, you must have a little patience, Crabshaw—there’s a salve for every sore.”—“Yaw mought as well tell ma, for every zow there’s a zirreverence.”—“For a man in your condition, methinks you talk very much at your ease—try if you can get up and mount Gilbert, that you may be conveyed to some place where you can have proper assistance.—So—well done—cheerly!”

Timothy actually made an effort to rise, but fell down again, and uttered a dismal yell. Then his master exhorted him to take advantage of a park wall, by which he lay, and raise himself gradually upon it. Crabshaw, eyeing him askance, said, by way of reproach, for his not alighting and assisting him in person, “Thatch your house with t—d, and you’ll have more teachers than reachers.”—Having pronounced this inelegant adage, he made shift to stand upon his legs; and now, the knight lending a hand, was mounted upon Gilbert, though not without a world of ohs! and ahs! and other ejaculations of pain and impatience.

As they jogged on together, our adventurer endeavoured to learn the particulars of the disaster which had befallen the squire; but all the information he could obtain, amounted to a very imperfect sketch of the adventure. By dint of a thousand interrogations, he understood, that Crabshaw had been, in the preceding evening, encountered by three persons on horseback, with Venetian masks on their faces, which he mistook for their natural features, and was terrified accordingly. That they not only presented pistols to his breast, and led his horse out of the highway; but pricked him with goads, and pinched him, from time to time, till he screamed with the torture. That he was led through unfrequented places across the country, sometimes at an easy trot, sometimes at full gallop, and tormented all night by those hideous demons, who vanished at daybreak, and left him lying on the spot where he was found by his master.

This was a mystery which our hero could by no means unriddle. It was the more unaccountable, as the squire had not been robbed of his money, horses, and baggage. He was even disposed to believe that Crabshaw’s brain was disordered, and the whole account he had given no more than a mere chimera. This opinion, however, he could no longer retain, when he arrived at an inn on the post-road, and found, upon examination, that Timothy’s lower extremities were covered with blood, and all the rest of his body speckled with livid marks of contusion. But he was still more chagrined when the landlord informed him, that he was thirty miles distant from the place where he had left Aurelia, and that his way lay through cross-roads, which were almost impassable at that season of the year. Alarmed at this intelligence, he gave directions that his squire should be immediately conveyed to bed in a comfortable chamber, as he complained more and more; and, indeed, was seized with a fever, occasioned by the fatigue, the pain, and terror he had undergone. A neighbouring apothecary being called, and giving it as his opinion that he could not for some days be in a condition to travel, his master deposited a sum of money in his hands, desiring he might be properly attended till he should hear further. Then mounting Bronzomarte, he set out with a guide for the place he had left, not without a thousand fears and perplexities, arising from the reflection of having left the jewel of his heart with such precipitation.