_ BOOK ELEVENTH CHAPTER VII
Peschiera had not been so inactive as he had appeared to Harley and the reader. On the contrary, he had prepared the way for his ultimate design, with all the craft and the unscrupulous resolution which belonged to his nature. His object was to compel Riccabocca into assenting to the count's marriage with Violante, or, failing that, to ruin all chance of his kinsman's restoration. Quietly and secretly he had sought out, amongst the most needy and unprincipled of his own countrymen, those whom he could suborn to depose to Riccabocca's participation in plots and conspiracies against the Austrian dominion. These his former connection with the Carbonari enabled him to track to their refuge in London; and his knowledge of the characters he had to deal with fitted him well for the villanous task he undertook. He had, therefore, already selected out of these desperadoes a sufficient number either to serve as witnesses against his kinsman, or to aid him in any more audacious scheme which circumstance might suggest to his adoption. Meanwhile, he had (as Harley had suspected he would) set spies upon Randal's movements; and the day before that young traitor confided to him Violante's retreat, he had at least got scent of her father's.
The discovery that Violante was under a roof so honoured, and seemingly so safe, as Lord Lansmere's, did not discourage this bold and desperate adventurer. We have seen him set forth to reconnoitre the house at Knightsbridge. He had examined it well, and discovered the quarter which he judged favourable to a coup-de-main, should that become necessary.
Lord Lansmere's house and grounds were surrounded by a wall, the entrance being to the high-road, and by a porter's lodge. At the rear there lay fields crossed by a lane or byroad. To these fields a small door in the wall, which was used by the gardeners in passing to and from their work, gave communication. This door was usually kept locked; but the lock was of the rude and simple description common to such entrances, and easily opened by a skeleton key. So far there was no obstacle which Peschiera's experience in conspiracy and gallantry did not disdain as trivial. But the count was not disposed to abrupt and violent means in the first instance. He had a confidence in his personal gifts, in his address, in his previous triumphs over the sex, which made him naturally desire to hazard the effect of a personal interview; and on this he resolved with his wonted audacity. Randal's description of Violante's personal appearance, and such suggestions as to her character and the motives most likely to influence her actions as that young lynx-eyed observer could bestow, were all that the count required of present aid from his accomplice.
Meanwhile we return to Violante herself. We see her now seated in the gardens at Knightsbridge, side by side with Helen. The place was retired, and out of sight from the windows of the house.
VIOLANTE.--"But why will you not tell me more of that early time? You are less communicative even than Leonard."
HELEN (looking down, and hesitatingly).--"Indeed there is nothing to tell you that you do not know; and it is so long since, and things are so changed now."
The tone of the last words was mournful, and the words ended with a sigh.
VIOLANTE (with enthusiasm).--"How I envy you that past which you treat so lightly! To have been something, even in childhood, to the formation of a noble nature; to have borne on those slight shoulders half the load of a man's grand labour; and now to see Genius moving calm in its clear career; and to say inly, 'Of that genius I am a part!'"
HELEN (sadly and humbly).--"A part! Oh, no! A part? I don't understand you."
VIOLANTE.--"Take the child Beatrice from Dante's life, and should we have a Dante? What is a poet's genius but the voice of its emotions? All things in life and in Nature influence genius; but what influences it the most are its own sorrows and affections."
Helen looks softly into Violante's eloquent face, and draws nearer to her in tender silence.
VIOLANTE (suddenly).--"Yes, Helen, yes,--I know by my own heart how to read yours. Such memories are ineffaceable. Few guess what strange self-weavers of our own destinies we women are in our veriest childhood!" She sunk her voice into a whisper: "How could Leonard fail to be dear to you,--dear as you to him,--dearer than all others?"
HELEN (shrinking back, and greatly disturbed).--"Hush, hush! you must not speak to me thus; it is wicked,--I cannot bear it. I would not have it be so; it must not be,--it cannot!"
She clasped her hands over her eyes for a moment, and then lifted her face, and the face was very sad, but very calm.
VIOLANTE (twining her arm round Helen's waist).--"How have I wounded you,--how offended? Forgive me, but why is this wicked? Why must it not be? Is it because he is below you in birth?"
HELEN.--"No, no,--I never thought of that. And what am I? Don't ask me,--I cannot answer. You are wrong, quite wrong as to me. I can only look on Leonard as--as a brother. But--but, you can speak to him more freely than I can. I would not have him waste his heart on me, nor yet think me unkind and distant, as I seem. I know not what I say. But--but--break to him--indirectly--gently--that duty in both forbids us both to--to be more than friends--than--"
"Helen, Helen!" cried Violante, in her warm, generous passion, "your heart betrays you in every word you say. You weep; lean on me, whisper to me; why--why is this? Do you fear that your guardian would not consent? He not consent? He who--"
HELEN.--"Cease--cease--cease!"
VIOLANTE.--"What! You can fear Harley--Lord L'Estrange? Fie; you do not know him."
HELEN (rising suddenly).--"Violante, hold; I am engaged to another."
Violante rose also, and stood still, as if turned to stone; pale as death, till the blood came, at first slowly, then with suddenness from her heart, and one deep glow suffused her whole countenance. She caught Helen's hand firmly, and said in a hollow voice,
"Another! Engaged to another! One word, Helen,--not to him--not to--Harley--to--"
"I cannot say,--I must not. I have promised," cried poor Helen, and as Violante let fall her hand, she hurried away. Violante sat down mechanically; she felt as if stunned by a mortal blow. She closed her eyes and breathed hard. A deadly faintness seized her; and when it passed away, it seemed to her as if she were no longer the same being, nor the world around her the same world,--as if she were but one sense of intense, hopeless misery, and as if the universe were but one inanimate void. So strangely immaterial are we really--we human beings, with flesh and blood--that if you suddenly abstract from us but single, impalpable, airy thought, which our souls have cherished, you seem to curdle the air, to extinguish the sun, to snap every link that connects us to matter, and to benumb everything into death, except woe.
And this warm, young, southern nature but a moment before was so full of joy and life, and vigorous, lofty hope. It never till now had known its own intensity and depth. The virgin had never lifted the veil from her own soul of woman.
What, till then, had Harley L'Estrange been to Violante? An ideal, a dream of some imagined excellence, a type of poetry in the midst of the common world. It had not been Harley the man,--it had been Harley the Phantom. She had never said to herself, "He is identified with my love, my hopes, my home, my future." How could she? Of such he himself had never spoken; an internal voice, indeed, had vaguely, yet irresistibly, whispered to her that, despite his light words, his feelings towards her were grave and deep. O false voice! how it had deceived her! Her quick convictions seized the all that Helen had left unsaid. And now suddenly she felt what it is to love, and what it is to despair. So she sat, crushed and solitary, neither murmuring nor weeping, only now and then passing her hand across her brow, as if to clear away some cloud that would not be dispersed; or heaving a deep sigh, as if to throw off some load that no time henceforth could remove. There are certain moments in life in which we say to ourselves, "All is over; no matter what else changes, that which I have made my all is gone evermore--evermore!" And our own thought rings back in our ears, "Evermore--evermore!" _