Volume Iii Part 18 (1/2)
'They have made themselves, and that their fitness now Doth unmake him!'”
By melancholy degrees everything that had most contributed to her happiness, became her torment. The conversation of Miss Peters was inexpressibly irksome to her, particularly when they found themselves in confidential _tete-a-tete_, for then she could not help suspecting that her friend was longing to ask her some questions respecting the singularity of her lover's manner ... the flattering notice of the well-pleased Lady Elizabeth, the sisterly affection manifested by the amiable Lady Stephenson, and, more than all the rest, the happy, bustling, business-like manner of her aunt Compton, who never for a moment seemed to forget that they were all preparing for a wedding.
So complete was this pre-occupation, that it was many days before the old lady perceived that her Agnes, in the midst of all this joyful preparation, looked neither well nor happy; nay, even when at last the sad eye and pale cheek of her darling attracted her attention, she persuaded herself for many days more that love-making was too sentimental a process to permit those engaged in it to be gay. She knew that the sighing of lovers was proverbial, and though she did not remember to have read any thing upon the subject exactly resembling what she remarked in Agnes, and, to say truth, in Colonel Hubert also, she did not, for she could not, doubt that everything was going on just as it should do, though her own want of practical experience rendered her incapable of fully understanding it.
But if Agnes was wretched, Colonel Hubert was infinitely more so; for all the misery that she darkly feared, without knowing either its nature or for how long it was likely to continue, came to him with the tremendous certainty of a misfortune that had already fallen upon him, and from which escape seemed less possible from day to day. She knew not what to think of him, and great, no doubt, was the unhappiness produced by such uncertainty, but greater still was the suffering produced by looking in her innocent face, and knowing, as well as Colonel Hubert did, why it grew daily paler. Not seldom, indeed, was he tortured by the apprehension that the line of conduct he had pursued in recalling Frederick Stephenson, was by no means so unquestionably right in its self-sacrificing severity as he had intended it should be. Had he not endangered the tranquillity of Agnes, while guarding with jealous care his own proud sense of honour? If an unhappy concurrence of circ.u.mstances had involved him in difficulties that rendered his conduct liable to suspicion, ought he not to have endured the worst degree of contempt that this could bring upon him, rather than have suffered her peace to be the sacrifice?
Night and day these doubts tormented him. For hours he wandered through the roads on the opposite side of the river, where, comparatively speaking, he was sure no Clifton idlers could encounter him, and reviewing his own conduct in a thousand ways, found none that would make him satisfied with himself. At length, in the mere restlessness of misery, he determined to tell Agnes all.
”She shall know his love--his generous uncalculating love, while I stood by, and reasoned on the inconvenience her aunt Barnaby's vulgarity might bring. She shall know all ... though it will make her hate me!”
Such was the resolution with which he crossed the ferry after wandering a whole morning in Leigh Wood; and climbing the step-path too rapidly to give himself leisure to meditate temperately on the measure he had determined to pursue, he hurried forward to the dwelling of Miss Compton, and was already in her drawing-room before he had at all decided in what manner he should contrive to get Agnes alone.
In this, however, fortune favoured him; for Miss Compton having some point on which she desired to communicate with Lady Elizabeth, had ordered the carriage, and invited Agnes to pay a visit to Lady Stephenson; but the poor girl had no heart to sustain a conversation with a friend from whom she most earnestly desired to conceal all her thoughts--so she declined the invitation, alleging her wish to write a letter to Empton.
As much alone, and, if possible, more melancholy still, than when, a few short weeks before, he made his memorable visit in Half Moon Street, Colonel Hubert found Agnes listlessly lying upon a sofa, her eyes closed, but their lashes too recently wetted by tears to make him fancy her asleep. She was in an inner room, to which he entered through the open door that led from the larger drawing-room, and he was close beside her before she was aware of his approach.
It was with a dreadful pang that he contemplated the change anxiety had wrought on her delicate features since the evening she first appeared to him in all the bright light-hearted joy of her new happiness under the protection of her aunt. Love, honour, grat.i.tude, tenderness, and remorse, all rushed to his bosom, and so completely overpowered the philosophy by which he had hitherto restrained his feelings, that he dropped on his knees beside her, and seizing the hand that languidly hung by her side, covered it with pa.s.sionate kisses.
An iron chain is not a stronger restraint than timid delicacy to such a nature as that of Agnes, and therefore she did NOT throw herself on the bosom of Colonel Hubert, and thus obliterate by one moment of unrestrained feeling all the doubts and fears that had so long tormented them both ... she only opened her beautiful eyes upon him, which seemed to say, ”Is then the dark cloud pa.s.sed that has divided us?... Hubert, may I be happy again?”
The unhappy Hubert, however, dared not answer this appeal, though he read it, and felt it at the very bottom of his heart; and what under happier circ.u.mstances would have tempted him to kneel beside her for ever, now made him spring to his feet as if terrified at the danger that he ran.
”Agnes!” he said, ”you must no longer be left ignorant of my misery ...
you may, you must have seen something of it, but not all ... you have not seen, you have not guessed what, the struggle has been between a pa.s.sion as fervent as ever warmed the heart of man and a sense of honour ... too late awakened perhaps ... which has made it a duty to suspend all pleadings for an avowed return till ... till....”
”Till!...” repeated Agnes, agitated but full of hope, that the moment was indeed come when the dark and mysterious cloud which had dimmed all her prospects should be dispelled.
”Hear my confession, Agnes, and pity me at least, if you find it impossible to excuse me.... Do you remember the first time that I ever saw you?... It was at a shop at Clifton.”
Agnes bowed.
”Do you remember the friend who was with me?”
Agnes bowed again, and this time she coloured too. Colonel Hubert sighed profoundly, but presently went on with the confession he had braced his nerves to make.
”That friend, Agnes, the generous, n.o.ble-hearted Frederick Stephenson, saw, even in that brief interview, the beauty, the grace, the delicacy which it took me days to develop ... in short, he loved you, Agnes, before, almost before I had ever looked at you.... I was his dearest friend. He hid no thought from me, and with all the frankness of his delightful character he confessed his honourable attachment.... And how was it, think you, that I answered him?”
Agnes raised her eyes to his face with a very anxious look, but spoke not a word, and Colonel Hubert, with a heightened colour that mounted to his temples, went on.
”I told him, Miss Willoughby, that a young lady chaperoned by a person with the manners and appearance of your aunt Barnaby was not a fitting wife for him....”
The eyes of Agnes fell, and her cheeks too were now dyed with crimson.
Colonel Hubert saw it and felt it all, but he went on.