Part 9 (1/2)
The stricken one raised her head, and looked into her face; but it was, alas! too apparent that she saw her not; for the eye, though smiling, was still vacant. Again her lips moved, and she spoke so as to be understood towards the door through which she had entered.
”Yes,” she exclaimed, in the same low, placid voice, ”yes, he is beautiful! Is he not beautiful? Fatal beauty!--fatal beauty! It is a fatal thing--it is a fatal thing!--but he is very, very beautiful!”
”Jane,” said Maria, taking her hand from Agnes's, ”Jane, speak to Maria, dear. Am not I, too, your own Maria? that loves you not less than--my darling, darling child--they do not live that love you better than your own Maria;--in pity, darling, in pity speak to me!”
The only reply was a smile, that rose into the murmuring music of a low laugh; but this soon ceased, her countenance became troubled, and her finely-pencilled brows knit, as if with an inward sense of physical pain. William, her father, her mother, each successively addressed her, but to no purpose. Though a slight change had taken place, they could not succeed in awakening her reason to a perception of the circ.u.mstances in which she was placed. They only saw that the unity of her thought, or of the image whose beauty veiled the faculties of her mind was broken, and that some other memory, painful in its nature, had come in to disturb the serenity of her unreal happiness; but this, which ought to have given them hope, only alarmed them the more. The father, while these tender and affecting experiments were tried, sat beside her, his eyes laboring under a weight of deep and indescribable calamity, and turning from her face to the faces of those who attempted to recall her reason, with a mute vehemence of sorrow which called up from the depths of their sister's misery a feeling of compa.s.sion for the old man whom she had so devotedly loved.
”My father's heart is breaking,” said William, groaning aloud, and covering his face with his hands. ”Father, your face frightens me more than Jane's;--don't, father, don't. She is young,--it will pa.s.s away--and father dear where is your reliance upon her--upon her aid!”
”Dear Henry,” said his wife, ”you should be our support. It is the business of your life to comfort and sustain the afflicted.”
”Papa,” said Agnes, ”come with me for a few minutes, until you recover the shock which--which----”
She stopped, and dropping her head upon the knees of her smiling and apparently happy sister, wept aloud.
”Agnes--Agnes,” said William, (they were all in tears except her father) ”Agnes, I am ashamed of you;”--yet his own cheeks were wet, and his voice faltered. ”Father, come with me for awhile. You will when alone for a few minutes, bethink you of your duty--for it is your duty to bear this not only as becomes a Christian man, but a Christian minister, who is bound to give us example as well as precept.”
”I know it, William, I know it;--and you shall witness my fort.i.tude, my patience, my resignation under this--this-----. I will retire. But is she not--alas! I should say, was she not my youngest and my dearest! You admit yourselves she was the best.”
”Father, come,” said William.
”Dear father--dear papa, go with him,” said Agnes.
”My father,” said Maria, ”as he said to _her_, will be himself.”
”I will go,” said the old man; ”I know how to be firm; I will reflect; I will pray; I will weep. I must, I must----”
He pressed the beautiful creature to his bosom, kissed her lips, and as he hung over her, his tears fell in torrents upon her cheeks.
Oh! what a charm must be in sympathy, and in the tears which it sheds over the afflicted, when those of the grey-haired father could soothe his daughter's soul into that sorrow which is so often a relief to the miserable and disconsolate!
When Jane first felt his tears upon her cheeks, she started slightly, and the smile departed from her countenance. As he pressed her to his heart she struggled a little, and putting her arms out, she turned up her eyes upon his face, and after a long struggle between memory and insanity, at length whispered out ”papa!”
”You are with me, darling,” he exclaimed; ”and I am with you, too: and here we are all about you,--your mother, and Agnes, and all.”
”Yes, yes,” she replied; ”but papa,--and where is my mamma?”
”I am here, my own love; here I am. Jane, collect yourself, my treasure.
You are overcome with sorrow. The parting from Charles...o...b..rne has been too much for you.”
”Perhaps it was wrong to mention his name,” whispered William. ”May it not occasion a relapse, mother?”
”No,” she replied. ”I want to touch her heart, and get her to weep if possible.”
Her daughter's fingers were again involved in the tangles of her beautiful ringlets, and once more was the sweet but vacant smile returning to her lips.
”May G.o.d relieve her and us,” said Maria; ”the darling child is relapsing!”
Agnes felt so utterly overcome, that she stooped, and throwing her arms around her neck wept aloud, with her cheek laid to Jane's.