XXIV
THE JAPHA MANSION
"Ah what a warning for a thoughtless man,
Could field or grove, could any spot on earth
Show to his eye an image of the pangs
Which it has witnessed; render back an echo
Of the sad steps by which it hath been trod. – Wordsworth.
Unexplained actions if long continued, lose after awhile their interest if not their mystery. The aged lady who now for many years had been seen at every night-fall to leave her home, traverse the village streets, enter the Japha mansion, remain there an hour and then re-issue with tremulous steps and bowed head, had become so common a sight to the village eye, that even the children forgot to ask what her errand was, or why she held her head so hopefully when she entered, or looked so despondent when she came forth.
But to Paula, for reasons already mentioned, this secret and persistent vigil in a forsaken and mysterious dwelling, was fraught with a significance which had never lost its power either to excite her curiosity or to arouse her imagination. Many a time had she gone home from some late encounter with the aged lady, to brood by the hour upon the expression of that restless eye which in its wanderings never failed to turn upon her own youthful face and linger there in the manner I have already noted. She thought of it by night, she thought of it by day. She felt herself drawn to that woman's suffering heart as by invisible cords. To understand the feelings of this desolate being, she had even studied the face of that old house, until she knew it under its every aspect. Often in shutting her eyes at night, she would perceive as in a mirror a vision of its long gray front, barred door and sealed windows shining in the moon, save where the deep impenetrable shadows of its two guardian poplars lay black and dismal upon its ghostly surface. Again she would behold it as it reared itself dark and dripping in a blinding storm, its walls plastered with leaves from the immovable poplars, and its neglected garden lying sodden and forlorn under the flail of the ceaseless storm. Then its early morning face would strike her fancy. The slow looming of its chimney-tops against a brightening sky; the gradual coming out of its forsaken windows and solemn looking doors from the mystery of darkness into the no less mystery of day; the hint of roselight on its barren boards; the gleam of sunshine on its untrodden threshold; a sunshine as pure and sweet as if a bride stood there in her beauty, waiting for admission into the deserted halls beyond. All and everything that could tend to invest the house and its constant visitor with an atmosphere of awe and interest, had occurred to this young girl in her daily reveries and nightly dreams. It was therefore with a thrill deep as her expectation and vivid as her sympathy, that she recognized in her eager interlocutor and proposed confident, the woman about whose life and actions rested for her such a veil of impenetrable mystery. The thought moved her, excited her, and made the rest of the evening pass like a dream. She was anxious for the next day to come, that she might seek this Mrs. Hamlin in her home, and hear from her lips the tale of devotion that should mate her own simple but enthusiastic poem.
When the next day did come, it rained, rained bitterly, persistent and with a steady drive from the north east, that made her going out impossible. The day following she was indisposed, and upon the succeeding afternoon, she was engaged in duties that precluded all thought of visiting. The next day was Sunday, and Monday had its own demands which she could not slight. It was therefore well nigh a week from the night of the entertainment, before the opportunity offered for which she was so anxious. Her curiosity and expectation had thus time to grow, and it was with a determination to allow nothing to stand in her way, that she set out from home in a flood of mild September sunshine, to visit Mrs. Hamlin. But alas, for resolutions made in a country village prior to the opening of a church fair! She had scarcely gone a dozen steps before she was accosted by one of the managers, a woman who neither observes your haste, nor pays any attention to your possible preoccupation. Do what she could, she found it impossible to escape from this persistent individual until she had satisfied her upon matters which it took a full half hour to discuss, and when at last she succeeded in doing so, it was only to fall into the hands of an aged deacon of the church, whose protecting friendship it were a sin to wound, while his garrulous tongue made it no ordinary trial of patience to stand and listen. In short the best part of the afternoon was gone before she found herself at the door of Mrs. Hamlin's house. But she was not to be deterred by further hesitation from the pursuit of her object. Rapping smartly on the door, she listened. No stir came from within. Again she rapped and again she listened. No response came to assure her that her summons had been heard. Surprised at this, for she had been told Mrs. Hamlin was always at home during the afternoon, she glanced up at the church clock in plain view from the doorstep, and blushed to observe that it was six o'clock, the hour at which this mysterious woman always left her house, to accomplish her vigil at the Japha mansion.
"What have I done?" thought Paula, and felt a strange thrill as she realized that even at that moment, the woman with the eager but restless eyes, was shut within the precincts of that deserted dwelling, engaged in prayer, perhaps wet with tears, who knows? The secret of what she did in that long and quiet twilight hour had never been revealed. Leaving the little brown house behind, Paula found herself insensibly taking the road to the Japha mansion. If she could not enter it and share the watch of the devoted woman who had promised her her confidence, she could at least observe if the windows were open or the blinds raised. To be sure she ought to be at home, but Miss Belinda was indulgent and did not question her comings and goings too closely. An irresistible force drew her down the street, and she did not hesitate to follow the lead of her impulse. No one accosted her now, it was the tea hour in most of these houses and the streets were comparatively deserted. The only house whose chimneys lacked the rising smoke, was the one towards which her footsteps were tending. She could descry it from afar. Its gaunt walls from which the paint had long ago faded, stared uncompromisingly upon her in the autumn sunshine. There was no welcome in its close shutters with their broken slats from which hung tangled strips of old rags – the remnants of some boy's kite. The stiff and solemn poplars rose grim and forbidding at the gate once swung wide to the fashion and gallantry of proud ladies and stalwart gentlemen, but now pushed aside solely by the hand of a tremulous old woman, or the irreverent palm of some daring school-boy. From the tangled garden looked forth neither flower nor blossoming shrub. Beauty and grace could not thrive in this wilderness of decay. A dandelion would have felt itself out of place beneath the eye of that ghostly door, with the sinister plank nailed across it, like the separating line between light and darkness, right and wrong, life and death. What loneliness! what a monument of buried passions outliving death itself!
Paula paused as she reached the gate; but remembering that Mrs. Hamlin was accustomed to enter the house by a side door, hurried around the corner and carefully surveyed the windows from that quarter. One of the shutters was open, allowing the flame of the setting sun to gild the panes like gold. She did not know then nor has she been able to explain since, what it was that came over her at the sight, but almost before she realized it, she had returned to the gate, opened it, threaded the overgrown garden, reached the door which she had so frequently beheld the aged woman enter and knocked.
Instantly she was seized with a consciousness of what she had done, and frightened at her temerity, meditated an immediate escape. Drawing the folds of her mantle about her form and face, she prepared to fly, when she remembered the look of entreaty with which this woman had said on that night of their conversation, "Do not disappoint me! Do not keep me long in suspense!" and moved by a fresh impulse, turned and inflicted another resounding knock on the door.
The result was unlooked-for and surprising. To the sound from within of a quick passionate cry, there came a hurried movement, followed by a deep silence, then another hasty stir succeeded by a longer silence, then a rush which seemed to bring all things with it, and the door opened and Mrs. Hamlin appeared before her with a countenance so pallid with expectancy, that Paula instinctively felt that in some unconscious way, she had loosened the bonds of an uncontrollable emotion, and was drawing back, when the woman with a quick look in her shrouded face, exultantly caught her hand in hers, and drawing her over the threshold, gasped out in a delirium of incomprehensible joy:
"I knew you would come! I knew that God would not let you forget! Fifteen years have I waited, Jacqueline! fifteen long, tedious, suffering years! But they all seem like nothing now! You have come, you have come, and all that I ask, is that God will not let me die till I realize my joy!"
The emotion with which she uttered these strange words was so overpowering, and her body seemed so weak to stand the strain, that Paula instinctively put forth her hand to sustain her. The action loosened her cloak. Instantly the eyes that had been fixed upon her with such delirious rapture grew blank with dismay, a frightful shudder ran through the woman's aged frame; she tore at the cloak that still enveloped the young girl's shoulders, and pulling it off, took one view of the fresh and beautiful countenance before her, and without uttering a word, fell back in a deep and deadly swoon upon the floor.
"O what have I done?" cried Paula, flinging herself down beside that pale and rigid figure; but instantly remembering herself she leaped to her feet and looked about for some means to resuscitate the sufferer. There was a goblet of water on a table near by. Seizing it, she bathed the face and hands of the woman before her, moaning aloud in her grief and dismay, "Have I killed her! O what is this mystery that brings such a doom of anguish to this poor heart?"
But from those pallid lips came no response, and feeling greatly alarmed, Paula was about to rush from the house for assistance, when she felt a tremulous pull upon her skirt, and turning, saw that the glassy eyes had opened at last and were now gazing upon her with mute but eloquent appeal.
She instantly returned. "O I am so sorry," she murmured, sinking again upon her knees beside the suffering woman. "I did not know, could not realize that my presence here would affect you so deeply. Forgive me and tell me what I can do to make you forget my presumption."
The woman shook her head, her lips moved and she struggled vainly to rise. Paula immediately lent her the aid of her strong young hand and in a few minutes, Mrs. Hamlin was on her feet. "O God!" were her first words as she sank into the chair which Paula hastily drew forward, "that I should taste the joy and she be still unsaved!"
Seeing her so absorbed, Paula ventured to glance around her. She found herself in a large square room sparsely but comfortably furnished in a style that bespake it as the former sitting-room of the dead and buried Japhas. From the walls above hung a few ancient pictures. A large hair-cloth sofa of a heavy antique shape, confronted the eye from one side of the room, an equally ancient book-case from the other. The carpet was faded and so were the curtains, but they had once been of an attractive hue and pattern. Conspicuous in the midst stood a large table with a well-trimmed lamp upon it, and close against it an easy chair with an upright back. This last as well as everything else in the room, was in a condition of neatness that would have surprised Paula if she had not been acquainted with the love and devotion of this woman, who in her daily visits to this house, probably took every pains to keep things freshened and in order.
Satisfied with her survey, she again directed her attention to Mrs. Hamlin, and started to find that person's eyes fixed upon her own with an expression of deep, demanding interest.
"You are looking at the shadows of things that were," exclaimed the old lady in thrilling tones. "It is a fearful thought to be shut up with the ghost of a vanished past, is it not? That chair by your side has not been sat in since Colonel Japha rose from it twelve years ago to totter to the bed where he breathed his last. It is waiting, everything is waiting. I thought the end had come to-night, that the vigil was over, the watch finished, but God in his wisdom says, 'No,' and I must wait a little longer. Alas in a little while longer the end will be here indeed!"
The despondency with which she uttered these last words showed where her thoughts were tending, and to comfort her, Paula drew up a chair and sat down by her side. "You were going to tell me the story of a great love and a great devotion. Cannot you do so now?"
The woman started, glanced hastily around, and let her eyes travel to Paula's face where they rested with something of their old look of secret longing and doubt.
"You are the one who wrote the poem," she murmured; "I remember." Then with a sudden feverish impulse, leaned forward, and stroking back the waving locks from Paula's brow, exclaimed hurriedly, "You look like her, you have the same dark hair and wonderful eyes, more beautiful perhaps, but like her, O so like her! That is why I made such a mistake." She shuddered, with a quick low sob, but instantly subdued her emotion and taking Paula's hand in hers continued, "You are young, my daughter; youth does not enjoy carrying burdens; can I, a stranger ask you to assist me with mine?"
"You may," returned Paula. "If it will give you any relief I will help you bear it willingly."
"You will! Has heaven then sent me the aid my failing spirits demand? Can I count on you, child? But I will ask for no promise till you have heard my story. To no one have I ever imparted the secret of my life, but from the first moment I saw your fair young face, I felt that through you would come my help, if help ever came to make my final moments easier and my last days less bitter." And rising up, she led Paula to a door which she solemnly opened. "I am glad that you are here," said she. "I could never have asked you to come, but since you have braved the dead and crossed this threshold, you must see and know the whole. You will understand my story better."
Taking her through a dark passage, she threw wide another door, and the parlors of the vanished Japhas opened before them. It was a ghostly vision. A weird twilight scene of clustered shadows brooding above articles of musty grandeur. In spite of the self-command learned by her late experiences, Paula recoiled, saying,
"It is too sad, too lonesome!" But the woman without heeding her, hurried her on over the worm-eaten carpet and between the time-worn chairs and heavy-browed cabinets, to the hall beyond.
"I have not been here, myself, for a year," said Mrs. Hamlin, glancing fearfully up and down the dusky corridor. "It is not often I can brave the memories of this spot." And she pointed with one hand towards the darkened door at its end, whose spacious if not stately panels gave no hint to the eye of the dread bar that crossed it like a line of doom upon the outside, and then turning, let her eye fall with still heavier significance upon the broad and imposing staircase that rose from the centre of the hall to the duskier and more dismal regions above.
"A brave, old fashioned flight of steps is it not! But the scene of a curse, my child." And unheeding Paula's shudder, she drew her up the stairs.
"See," continued her panting guide as they reached a square platform near the top, from which some half dozen or more steps branched up on either side. "They do not build like this nowadays. But Colonel Japha believed in nothing new, and thought more of his grand old hall and staircase, than he did of all the rest of his house. He little dreamed of what a scene it would be the witness. But come, it is getting late and you must see her room."
It was near the top of the staircase and was fully as musty, faded and dismal as the rest. Yet there was an air of expectancy about it, too, that touched Paula deeply. From between the dingy hangings of the bed, looked forth a pair of downy pillows, edged with yellowed lace, and beneath them a neatly spread counterpane carefully turned back over comfortable-looking blankets, as one sees in a bed that only awaits its occupant; while on the ancient hearth, a pile of logs stood heaped and ready for the kindling match.
"It is all waiting you see," said the old lady in a trembling voice, "like everything else, just waiting."
There was an embroidery frame in one corner of the room, from which looked a piece of faded and half completed work. The needle was hanging from it by a thread, and a skein of green worsted hung over the top, Paula glanced at it inquiringly.
"It is just as she left it! He never entered the room after she went and I would never let it be touched. It is just the same with the piano below. The last piece she played is still standing open on the rack. I loved her so, and I thought then that a few months would bring her back! See, here is her bible. She never used to read it, but she prized it because it was her mother's. I have placed it on the pillow where she will see it when she comes to lay her poor tired head down to rest." And with a reverent hand the aged matron drew the curtains back from the open bed, and disclosed the little bible lying thick with dust in the centre of the nearest pillow.
"O who was this you loved so well? And why did she leave you?" cried Paula with the tears in her eyes, at sight of this humble token.
The aged lady seized her hand and hurried her back into the room below. "I will tell you where I have waited and watched so long. Only be patient till I light the lamp. It is getting late and any chance wanderer going by and seeing all dark, might think I had forgotten my promise and was not here."
XXV
JACQUELINE
"The cold in clime are cold in blood,
And love as scarce deserves the name,
But mine is like the lava flood
That burns in Etna's breast of flame." – Byron.
"There are some men that have the appearance of being devoid of family affection, who in reality cherish it in the deepest and most passionate degree. Such a man was Colonel Japha. You have doubtless heard from your cradle what the neighbors thought of this stately, old fashioned gentleman. He was too handsome in his youth, too proudly reticent in his manhood, too self-contained and unrelenting in his age, not to be the talk of any town that numbered him among its inhabitants. But only from myself, a relative of the family and his housekeeper for years, can you learn with what undeviating faith and love he clung to the few upon whom he allowed his heart to fasten in affection. When he married Miss Carey, the world said, 'He has chosen a beauty, because fine manners and a pretty face look well behind the Japha coffee-urn!' But we, that is, this same young wife and myself, knew that in marrying her he had taken unto himself his other half, the one sweet woman for whom his proud heart could beat and before whom his stately head could bow. When she died, the world exclaimed, 'He will soon fill her place!' But I who watched the last look that passed between them in the valley of the shadow of that death, knew that the years would come and the years would go without seeing Colonel Japha marry again.
"The little babe whom she left to his care, took all the love which he had left. From the moment it began to speak, he centered in its tiny life all the hope and all the pride of his solitary heart. And the Japha pride was nearly as great as the Japha heart. She was a pretty child; not a beauty like her mother or like you, my dear, who however so nearly resemble her. But for all that, pretty enough to satisfy the eyes of her secretly doting father, and her openly doting nurse and cousin. I say secretly doting father. I do not mean by that that he regarded her with an affection which he never displayed, but that it was his way to lavish his caresses at home and in the privacy of her little nursery. He never made a parade of anything but his pride. If he loved her, it was enough for her to know it. In the street and the houses of their friends, he was the strict, somewhat severe father, to whom her childish eyes lifted at first with awe, but afterwards with a quiet defiance, that when I first saw it, made my heart stand still with unreasoning alarm.
"She was so reserved a child and yet so deeply passionate. From the beginning I felt that I did not understand her. I loved her; I have never loved any mortal as I did her – and do; but I could not follow her impulses or judge of her feelings by her looks.
"When she grew older it was still worse. She never contradicted her father, or appeared in any open way to disobey his commands, or thwart him in his plans. Yet she always did what she pleased, and that so quietly, he frequently did not observe that matters had taken any other direction, than that which he had himself ordained. 'It is her mother's tact,' he used to say. Alas it was something more than that; it was her father's will united to the unscrupulousness of some forgotten ancestor.
"But with the glamour of her eighteen years upon me, I did not recognize this then, any more than he. I saw her through the magic glasses of my own absorbing love, and tremble as I frequently would in the still scorn of her unfathomable passion, I never dreamed she could do anything that would seriously offend her father's affection or mortify his pride. The truth is, that Jacqueline did not love us. Say what you will of the claims of kindred, and the right of every father to his childrens' regard, Jacqueline Japha accepted the devotion that was lavished upon her, but she gave none in return. She could not, perhaps. Her father was too cold in public and too warm in his home-bursts of affection. I was plain and a widow; no mate for her in age, condition or estate. She could neither look up to me nor lean upon me. I had been her nurse in childhood and though a relative, was still a dependent; what was there in all that to love! If her mother had lived – But we will not dwell on possibilities. Jacqueline had no mother and no friend that was dear enough to her, to teach her unwilling soul the great lesson of self-control and sacrifice.
"You will say that is strange. That situated as she was, she ought to have found friends both dear and congenial; but that would be to declare that Jacqueline was like others of her age and class, whereas she was single and alone; a dark-browed girl, who allured the gaze of both men and women, but who cared but little for any one till – But wait, child. I shall have to speak of matters that will cause your cheeks to blush. Lay your head down on my knee, for I cannot bear the sight of blushes upon a cheek more innocent than hers."
With a gentle movement she urged Paula to sit upon a little stool at her feet, pressed the young girl's head down upon her lap, and burying the lovely brow beneath her aged hands, went hurriedly on.
"You are young, dear, and may not know what it is to love a man. Jacqueline was young also, but from the moment she returned home to us from a visit she had been making in Boston, I perceived that something had entered her life that was destined to make a great change in her; and when a few weeks later, young Robert Holt from Boston, came to pay his respects to her in her father's house, I knew, or thought I did, what that something was. We were sitting in this room I remember, when the servant-girl came in, and announced that Mr. Holt was in the parlor. Jacqueline was lying on the sofa, and her father was in his usual chair by the table. At the name, Holt, the girl rose as if it had suddenly thundered, or the lightning had flashed. I see her now. She was dressed in white – though it was early fall she still clung to her summer dresses – her dark hair was piled high, and caught here and there with old-fashioned gold pins, a splendid red rose burned on her bosom, and another flashed crimson as blood from her folded hands.
"'Holt?' repeated the Colonel without turning his head, 'I know no such man.'
"'He said he wished to see Miss Jacqueline,' simpered the servant.
"'Oh,' returned the Colonel indifferently. He never showed surprise before the servants – and went on with his book, still without turning his head.
"I thought if he had turned it, he would scarcely sit there reading so quietly; for Jacqueline who had not stirred from her alert and upright position, was looking at him in a way no father, least of all a father who loved his child as he did her, could have beheld without agitation. It was the glance of a tigress waiting for the sight of an inconsiderate move, in order to spring. It was wild unconstrainable joy, eying a possible check and madly defying it. I shuddered as I looked at her eye, and sickened as I perceived a huge drop of blood ooze from her white fingers, where they unconsciously clutched a thorn, and drop dark and disfiguring upon her virgin garments. At the indifferent exclamation of her father, her features relaxed, and she turned haughtily towards the girl, with a veiling of her secret delight that already bespoke the woman of the world.
"'Tell Mr. Holt that I will see him presently,' said she, and was about to follow the girl from the room when I caught her by the sleeve.
"'You will have to change your dress,' said I, and I pointed to the ominous blot disfiguring its otherwise spotless white.
"She started and gave me a quick glance.
"'I have a skin like a spider's web," cried she. 'I should never meddle with roses.' But I noticed she did not toss the blossom away.
"'Who is this Mr. Holt?' now asked the Colonel suddenly turning, the servant having left the room.
"'He is a gentleman I met in Boston,' came from his daughter's lips, in her usual light and easy tones. 'He is probably passing through our town on his way to Providence, where I was told he did business. His call is no more than a formality, I presume.' And with an indifferent little smile and nod, she vanished from the room, that a moment before had been filled with the threat of her silent passion. The Colonel gave a short sigh but returned undisturbed to his book.
"In the course of a few minutes Jacqueline came back. She had changed her dress for one as summerlike as the other, but still finer and more elaborate. She looked elegant, imperious, but the joy had died out from her eyes, and in its place was another expression incomprehensible to me, but fully as alarming as any that had gone before. 'Mr. Holt finds himself obliged to remain in town over night, and would like to pay his respects to you,' said she to her father.
"The Colonel immediately rose, looking very grand as he turned and surveyed his daughter with his clear penetrating eye.'
"'You have a lover, have you not?' he asked, laying his hand on her bare and beautifully polished shoulder.
"An odd little smile crossed her lip. She looked at her hands on which never a ring shone, and coquettishly tossed her head. 'Let the gentleman speak for himself,' said she, 'I give no man his title until he has earned it.'
"Her father laughed. A lover was not such a dreadful thing in his eyes provided he were worthy. And Jacqueline would not choose unworthily of course – a Japha and his daughter! 'Well then,' said he, 'let us see if he can make good his title; Holt is not a bad name and Boston is not a poor place to hail from.' And without more ado, they hurried from the room. But the light had all died out from her face! What did it mean?
"At tea time I met the gentleman. He had evidently made his title good. I was not only favorably impressed with him but actually struck. Of all the high-bred, clear-eyed, polished and kindly gentlemen who had sat about the board since I first came into the family in Mrs. Japha's lifetime, here was surely the finest, the handsomest and the best; and surprised in more ways than one, I was giving full play to my relief and exhilaration, when I caught sight of Jacqueline's eye, and felt again the cold shudders of secret doubt and apprehension. Smile upon him as she would, coquet with him as she did, the flame and the glory that drew her like an inspiration to her feet when his name was announced, had fled, and left not a shadow behind. Had he failed in his expressions of devotion? Was he hard or cold or severe, under all that pleasant and charming manner? Had the hot soul of our motherless child rushed upon ice, and in the shock of the dreadful chill, fallen inert? No, his looks bespake no coldness; they dwelt upon Jacqueline's lovely but inscrutable face, with honest fervor and boundless regard. He evidently loved her most passionately, but she – if it had not been for that first moment of unconscious betrayal, I should have decided that she cared for him no more than she did for the few others who had adored her, in the short space of her incomprehensible life.
"The mystery was not cleared up when she came to me that night with a short, 'How do you like my lover, Margery?' I was forty years her senior, but she always called me Margery.
"'I think he is the finest, most agreeable man I ever met,' said I. 'Is he your lover, Jacqueline? Are you going to marry him?'
"She turned about from the vase which she was denuding of its flowers, and gave me one of her sphinx-like looks. 'You must ask papa,' said she. 'He holds the destinies of the Japhas in his hand, does he not?'