ARIEL was downstairs in the shadowy hall, half asleep, half awake, waiting to see the visitors clear of the house. Without speaking to us, without looking at us, she led the way down the dark garden walk, and locked the gate behind us. "Good-night, Ariel," I called out to her over the paling. Nothing answered me but the tramp of her heavy footsteps returning to the house, and the dull thump, a moment afterward, of the closing door.
The footman had thoughtfully lighted the carriage lamps. Carrying one of them to serve as a lantern, he lighted us over the wilds of the brick desert, and landed us safely on the path by the high-road.
"Well!" said my mother-in-law, when we were comfortably seated in the carriage again. "You have seen Miserrimus Dexter, and I hope you are satisfied. I will do him the justice to declare that Inever, in all my experience, saw him more completely crazy than he was to-night. What do _you_ say?""I don't presume to dispute your opinion," I answered. "But, speaking for myself, I'm not quite sure that he is mad.""Not mad!" cried Mrs. Macallan, "after those frantic performances in his chair? Not mad, after the exhibition he made of his unfortunate cousin? Not mad, after the song that he sang in your honor, and the falling asleep by way of conclusion? Oh, Valeria!
Valeria! Well said the wisdom of our ancestors--there are none so blind as those who won't see.""Pardon me, dear Mrs. Macallan, I saw everything that you mention, and I never felt more surprised or more confounded in my life. But now I have recovered from my amazement, and can think it over quietly, I must still venture to doubt whether this strange man is really mad in the true meaning of the word. It seems to me that he only expresses--I admit in a very reckless and boisterous way--thoughts and feelings which most of us are ashamed of as weaknesses, and which we keep to ourselves accordingly. I confess I have often fancied myself transformed into some other person, and have felt a certain pleasure in seeing myself in my new character. One of our first amusements as children (if we have any imagination at all) is to get out of our own characters, and to try the characters of other personages as a change--to fairies, to be queens, to be anything, in short, but what we really are. Mr. Dexter lets out the secret just as the children do, and if that is madness, he is certainly mad. But Inoticed that when his imagination cooled down he became Miserrimus Dexter again--he no more believed himself than we believed him to be Napoleon or Shakespeare. Besides, some allowance is surely to be made for the solitary, sedentary life that he leads. I am not learned enough to trace the influence of that life in making him what he is; but I think I can see the result in an over-excited imagination, and I fancy I can trace his exhibiting his power over the poor cousin and his singing of that wonderful song to no more formidable cause than inordinate self-conceit. I hope the confession will not lower me seriously in your good opinion; but I must say I have enjoyed my visit, and, worse still, Miserrimus Dexter really interests me.""Does this learned discourse on Dexter mean that you are going to see him again?" asked Mrs. Macallan.
"I don't know how I may feel about it tomorrow morning," I said;"but my impulse at this moment is decidedly to see him again. Ihad a little talk with him while you were away at the other end of the room, and I believe he really can be of use to me--""Of use to you in what?" interposed my mother-in-law.
"In the one object which I have in view--the object, dear Mrs.
Macallan, which I regret to say you do not approve.""And you are going to take him into your confidence? to open your whole mind to such a man as the man we have just left?""Yes, if I think of it to-morrow as I think of it to-night. Idare say it is a risk; but I must run risks. I know I am not prudent; but prudence won't help a woman in my position, with my end to gain."Mrs. Macallan made no further remonstrance in words. She opened a capacious pocket in front of the carriage, and took from it a box of matches and a railway reading-lamp.
"You provoke me," said the old lady, "into showing you what your husband thinks of this new whim of yours. I have got his letter with me--his last letter from Spain. You shall judge for yourself, you poor deluded young creature, whether my son is worthy of the sacrifice--the useless and hopeless sacrifice--which you are bent on making of yourself for his sake.
Strike a light!"
I willingly obeyed her. Ever since she had informed me of Eustace's departure to Spain I had been eager for more news of him, for something to sustain my spirits, after so much that had disappointed and depressed me. Thus far I did not even know whether my husband thought of me sometimes in his self-imposed exile. As to this regretting already the rash act which had separated us, it was still too soon to begin hoping for that.
The lamp having been lighted, and fixed in its place between the two front windows of the carriage, Mrs. Macallan produced her son's letter. There is no folly like the folly of love. It cost me a hard struggle to restrain myself from kissing the paper on which the dear hand had rested.
"There!" said my mother-in-law. "Begin on the second page, the page devoted to you. Read straight down to the last line at the bottom, and, in God's name, come back to your senses, child, before it is too late!"I followed my instructions, and read these words:
"Can I trust myself to write of Valeria? I _must_ write of her.
