The Midnight Bell/Volume II/Chapter XII

CHAPTER XII.

We now return to Alphonsus, whom we left on that fatal night on which Lauretta was conveyed from him by the villainy of Theodore.

The night was far advanced, when Alphonsus returned from the water; and, on approaching his little habitation, his surprise was instantly excited by seeing the door open, and no light burning within against his return;—he entered,—all was silent.—He called on Lauretta, and on the girl who attended her; no answer was given him:—he sought her in every part;—again he called on her, it was in vain.—Frantic with surprise and fear, he ran to the habitation nearest to his own: he awoke its inhabitants, and, scarcely knowing what he said, or able to explain his own ideas, he asked for Lauretta; she was not there.—He then flew to the next cottage, and so on to every one in succession:—Lauretta was not to be found, or any information to be gained respecting her.—He again returned to his own dwelling; again he searched it, and again he called on his beloved Lauretta; but Lauretta answered him not.—"She is gone! lost for ever!" he exclaimed—"Theodore, the cursed Theodore, has torn her from me; he triumphs over me, and tortures her!"—In the wildest agitation he threw himself on the ground; then starting from the momentary trance into which he had fallen, and with his net still on his arm, as he had brought it from his boat, he rather flew than ran towards Smaldart castle.

The baron was just risen as Alphonsus reached the castle:—Alphonsus perceived him in the garden, and flying to him, apologised for his abrupt intrusion, and then requested the baron to inform him whether Theodore was absent from the castle.

The baron answered, that he had not seen him since the preceding evening; and immediately asked his reason for the inquiry; and Alphonsus, in as collected a manner as the agitation of his spirits would allow him to speak, related to the baron all that had passed since Theodore's arrival in Germany.

The baron was too well acquainted with the disposition of Theodore, to doubt either what Alphonsus had said of him, or his being the means of Lauretta's being torn from her husband, and immediately dispatched a servant to the chamber of Theodore, to ascertain whether he was in the castle.

The servant quickly returned, with information that Theodore was still in bed.

"I did not suppose he had left the castle," said the baron; "I am well acquainted with his extraordinary temper, and see the motives of his entire conduct;—not love, but pride, first edged him on to supplant you in the affections of an amiable and lovely woman; the triumph he there sought to gain was defeated by your Lauretta's virtue; revenge is now the only passion left open to him, and he seeks its gratification in separating the persons of those whose affections he could not divide:—but rely on my friendship and services; he has doubtless entrusted your wife to the care of some bribed peasant in the neighbourhood till he can find an apt moment for carrying her beyond your reach:—saddle the fleetest horses in my stable, take two of my domestics to accompany you, and visit every habitation in the circle of my estate, commanding them in my name not to retain her.—I will in the mean time be answerable that Theodore shall not pursue her."

With terms of unfeigned gratitude to the baron, Alphonsus ran to the stables, and having announced what the baron had authorised him to perform, in a few minutes' time departed from the castle, together with the two domestics appointed to accompany him.

Theodore, if he had slept at all (and sleep is rarely the portion of even the most secure villainy), had been awakened by the entrance of the servant into his chamber, and had immediately risen, and descended into the hall; he was inquiring of every domestic the cause of his uncle's having asked for him at so early an hour, when the baron entered from the garden; and perceiving Theodore, who was listening with the utmost counterfeited composure to the story of Lauretta's disappearance, as relating by one of the servants to his fellows, he beckoned him to follow him into an apartment.

Theodore obeying his uncle's call, entered the room, and threw himself into a chair; the baron closed the door, and thus addressed him: "Theodore, the unlimited indulgence of a too fond uncle has been your ruin,—boyish errors, left unchastised, have ripened with your years into crimes; those crimes, either from their having been confined within the limits of too lenient laws, or from the inability of those you have wronged, to punish, have escaped with impunity; on this presumption your haughty spirit, triumphing in its imaginary security, seeks revenge for every thwarted inclination; but know, that the forbearance of an uncle may be too far imposed upon, and the laws of your country too highly insulted. I greatly fear you have been tempting the former, and abusing the latter."

Theodore rose in great agitation, and was beginning to speak.—

"Be calm, and hear me," continued the baron; "your passion of revenge has been excited against two amiable persons, sufficiently unhappy in their knowledge of you without the addition of your cruelty: but it was not enough for you that they were not miserable;—this was only to be done by tearing them asunder, and you have effected it: but they shall meet again to your confusion."

Choking with rage at this open declaration of the sentiments of the baron, when he had buoyed himself up with the idea of having so dexterously conducted the villainous act, as to have removed all fear of the slightest suspicion falling upon him, Theodore exclaimed, "Me! accuse me of having carried off the wife of Alphonsus the fisherman! You pay an exalted compliment to my taste, and to my knowledge of my rank in life."—Then, with a satirical smile, he added, "But I beg the female's pardon, 'tis unfair to decide on the merits of her I never saw."

"Never saw!" returned the baron, fixing his eyes steadfastly on his nephew.

Theodore met the baron's eyes;—he read in them his knowledge of the falsehood he had uttered; and a frown of passion succeeding the sneer of contumely which had before sat upon his countenance, he cried, "No, I swear by heaven, that"——

"Hold," interrupted the baron, "violate not heaven by an oath, which, ten times repeated, would not convince me. I cannot suppose that the man whom I suspect to be the perpetrator of a crime, heinous as that of which I now accuse you, will hesitate the commission of a second, whereby he hopes to clear away the imputation of the first."

Perceiving the baron to be firm in the point he was urging, and thinking a patient show of innocence to be most likely to win on the baron in his favour, he said, "If you are determined to think so hardly of me, sir, I must trust alone to the conviction time will give you of my innocence, for my return to your good opinion; in the interval I have, however, my own heart to refer to for consolation."

What villain is not skilled in fair words?—The baron was too well acquainted with the human heart, to ask the confession of Theodore. He knew that guilt is stubborn, and that the urgency of entreaty tends only to harden, not relax, its obstinacy.

He accordingly thus addressed him. "Theodore, you may be innocent with regard to what has occurred; it would greatly delight me to find you so, but I much fear you are not. If you are guilty, the restraint I am about to impose on you, will be only what you merit: if otherwise, the elucidation of this mystery will be to your honour. I am resolute in my determination, that the two apartments at the end of the northern gallery shall be your prison, till Lauretta is restored to her husband. Should it be possible that she has fled from Alphonsus on any other account, or with any other person, you have no business to interfere in what concerns them only: if you have conveyed her hence, it is my duty to prevent your pursuing her, and I will take care to put an effectual bar to your further annoying her peace."

Theodore raised his hands and eyes with a look of astonishment and sorrow, then walked slowly to the window with his handkerchief to his face.

The apartments to which the baron had alluded, were immediately prepared; and Theodore, in sullen silence, entered them; and the lock was turned upon him by the baron's own hand.

The key of the apartments wherein the chevalier was confined, was given, by the baron, to a trusty servant; with orders to visit him frequently, and to supply him with every necessary of life, and any article of amusement he required; but on no account to suffer him to pass the limits of his prison.

Late in the evening, Alphonsus returned much fatigued, and his spirits greatly depressed by the want of success that had attended his numerous inquiries.

Exhausted as he was, he immediately sought the baron, and requested permission of him to exchange his steed, and again set out in search of his beloved Lauretta. The baron informed him of what had passed between him and Theodore since his departure; and besought him, for his health's sake, to await the morning, before he again set out. But no consideration of what he might himself undergo, could restrain Alphonsus from the pursuit of one whose safety was so essential to his happiness; and, having scarcely permitted himself to partake of a hasty repast, he mounted a fresh horse that had been prepared for him, and set out in a different direction from the castle to that he had before taken.

In the course of the following day, the baron visited Theodore. Confinement, to which he was unaccustomed, had already gone far towards curbing his crabbed disposition; and, on seeing his uncle, he burst into a peevish exclamation, which sued for liberty; and during which it was with difficulty that he restrained his tears. The baron having looked round the apartments in order to satisfy himself that they were secure in every part, and the accommodation of his nephew good, left him without speaking a single word.

Midnight brought back Alphonsus to Smaldart castle: the fatigue of body and mind he had undergone, had so far exhausted nature, as to require the most assiduous attention being paid to him; and being lifted off his horse, he was immediately, by the baron's order, conveyed to a bed in the castle.

"She is gone for ever, for ever!" he exclaimed, as the baron approached the side of the bed on which he lay: he endeavoured to say more, but weakness overpowered him.

The baron used every argument he could devise to cheer him, but he was too miserable to be soothed by any consolation, save the presence of his Lauretta.

Early in the morning the baron sent out four horsemen, commanding them to take a more extended circuit than Alphonsus had done, and to omit no possible means that might lead to the discovery of the object they were going in pursuit of.

A fever in the blood had seized upon Alphonsus, and towards evening the wildest delirium possessed him: at intervals, with returning reason, he asked for tidings of Lauretta; then again raving, in thought, beheld her standing by him; and again, reason returned to prove the pleasing vision a fallacy.

Thus passed on eight days of the most unhappy nature to all parties: to Theodore the most irksome imagination can conceive; the success of his base plan alone affording him a slender satisfaction, which was nearly outweighed by the idea that suspicion fell too heavily upon him to be easily shaken off. A thousand plans had he formed for escaping from his confinement, and as many obstacles arose to render them impracticable: worn out by curbing his violent temper or venting it on empty air, he at length submitted to entreat, where before he had scarcely deigned to command; and in the humblest language, interlarded with the most liberal promises which the hope of obtaining his wish could instigate, he besought the domestic whom the baron had appointed to serve and watch over him, to favour his escape.

The servant, on whom the baron's injunctions had been too forcibly laid, to hesitate a single moment in the discharge of the trust reposed in him, ventured to remonstrate with the chevalier on the impropriety of the request he so strongly urged, and the inadequacy of any reward to the loss of the baron Smaldart's favour.

The baron, who had not visited his nephew since the second day of his inhabiting those apartments, now entered, and thus put a stop to a further conversation. Theodore, on beholding his uncle, burst into a flood of tears, and calling on heaven to witness his innocence, besought a remission of his confinement.

"I had weighed well my reasons for the punishment I have doomed you to," cried the baron, "ere I enforced it; and those tears, the effect of disappointed villainy, shall not impel me to relax its severity. Is every thing here to your satisfaction? I wish you to undergo no farther inconvenience than what you may suffer in being prevented from leaving these walls."

To one subject alone could Theodore attend; he reiterated his declarations of innocence, and in louder accents implored for his accustomed liberty.

The baron had too tenderly loved Theodore, to be entirely unmoved by his protestations and entreaties, and accordingly left the apartment, lest they should exact from him an indulgence he might afterwards repent.

Towards evening of the eighth day Alphonsus' fever began to abate, and the frantic sorrow which had before possessed him began to subside into a silent melancholy.

On the following day the messengers returned; they informed the baron, that they had met with an old woman, who had told them, that a female, answering to the description of Lauretta, and who had talked much of Smaldart castle, had been brought in a vehicle by two men to her cottage, early in the morning of the very day on which Lauretta had been missed, and had remained there during the whole of that day; the woman, they said, had pointed out to them the road along which the men and the female had journeyed, and they had followed the track many leagues, but all their endeavours to discover the object of their search had proved equally fruitless.

Farther conviction of Theodore's guilt beamed upon the baron in this account delivered by the old woman; but conjecture only tended the more to perplex him, and he determined to see her himself, and gain from her such intelligence as she was able to give him: he accordingly commanded two of the horsemen to refresh themselves, and be prepared to set out again with him in an hour's time.

The conduct of Theodore was now exhibiting in striking colours, that villainy will submit to the most humiliating meanness, in the hope of gaining its desired ends. Whenever the domestic visited him, he raved, fawned, and prayed by turns, for the grant of his supplication, till the domestic, sensible how wrongly he should be acting were he to acquiesce, and wishing Theodore not to flatter a hope which he did not mean to realize, gave him a gentle refusal.

Contradiction from a servant Theodore had never yet experienced, and even in his present humiliating state he could not brook it; he therefore seized the domestic by the throat, and throwing him upon the ground, gave a loose to his rage. Stunned by the blow, the man lay in a state of insensibility: Theodore perceived his situation, and determining to avail himself of it, hastily searched his pockets, and having found the key of the outward apartment, he unlocked the door, and sallied cautiously forth, again closing it as he went out.

An hour after mid-day the baron arrived at the cottage; and its hostess, who was no other than Bartha, gave him the same information she had delivered to the horsemen; adding, that the young woman had much wished to write a letter to be conveyed to Smaldart castle, but that she had not been able to furnish her with the requisites; and that her husband had meant to visit the castle on the following day with the message she had then desired her to get conveyed thither, being the first day he could spare from his laborious avocation. The message was only, that she had been conveyed to the cottage by two ruffians, whom she knew to be the instruments of Theodore, and an entreaty that the baron would assist her husband in finding some means to accomplish her rescue.

The wood-cutter, Bartha's husband, then told the baron, that on the afternoon prior to Lauretta's being brought to his cottage, two men had accosted him whilst at his daily labour in the neighbouring wood, and inquired whether he lived near that spot; whether he would give them the use of his dwelling on the following day; and whether money could bribe him to secrecy. "I am very poor," continued the woodman, "and extending my hand to receive a couple of pieces of gold which one of them held in his, I told them I would do any thing but murder to serve them. 'We require nothing but secrecy,' he returned:—'we shall bring a young woman, for whom you must provide a bed, early in the morning, to your cottage, and stay with you all day.' I agreed to this, and having walked with them a few steps to show them where my cot stood, they wished me good night, and left me."

"Proceed," said the baron.

"Well, sure enough, early in the morning they brought a young woman, and my wife took her up stairs, and then one of the men went away with the vehicle in which they had brought her, and came back with only the horses; and at night one of them took the young woman on a horse before him, and they gave me another piece of gold, and away they went, and we have neither seen them, nor heard of them since."

"Would you had informed me of this sooner!" exclaimed the baron. "But complaints are useless where there is no remedy for the evil." So saying, he presented Bartha with a piece of money, and returned to his castle.

Hoping that this incontrovertible proof of Theodore's guilt might be efficacious in drawing from him a confession of the truth, the baron proceeded towards his apartments, where, to his astonishment, he saw extended on the floor, the servant, just recovering from the blow he had sustained, and unable to give any account of Theodore. As his escape had not been long effected, he could not consequently have proceeded far distant from the castle; accordingly every domestic and even the baron himself, ran out in search of him.

Theodore had, during this interval, concealed himself in his bed-chamber, and now seeing from its window the servants and his uncle issue from the portal, he ventured to descend into the hall of the castle, where having met with no interruption to his progress, he ran hastily out of the postern gate, and having reached the stable, he saddled and mounted his steed: all danger now vanished before him, for he knew his pursuers to be on foot, and he was well acquainted with the fleetness of the horse on which he rode; accordingly he clapped spurs to his beast, and galloped dauntlessly forward.

Thus providence in its all-wise direction allots a certain portion of triumph to the machinations of the wicked, which ultimately shall edge them on to become the instruments of their own conviction and punishment.

Shortly after the baron returned to the castle, and four of his vassals were immediately commanded to mount their horses, and set off, in hope of overtaking Theodore. His horse was now missed, and this information caused the baron the more earnestly to urge their speed.

As the slight information which the baron had received relative to Lauretta, tended only to prove that she was in the power of Theodore's agents—a circumstance which the chevalier's recent escape had rendered the more distressing—he forbore to inform Alphonsus either of what he had heard, or of what had that day occurred at Smaldart castle.

Early on the next morning the baron entered the apartment of Alphonsus, and on meeting his eyes, which the opening of the door had drawn towards the baron, he exclaimed, "Joy! joy, Alphonsus! Lauretta is found! Lauretta is in safety!"

The intelligence was too smiling for Alphonsus instantly to believe that his senses had been true to him; he feared to ask a repetition of the baron's words, lest the pleasing idea should vanish in his reiterated voice. He seized the baron's hand, and pressing it in his own, the tears gushed from his eyes.

The baron now put into his hand the letter of Lauretta's own writing, which he had a few minutes before received from the peasant commissioned by the hermit, who had that morning reached the castle.

Although the fever under which Alphonsus laboured had been much abated by the skill of an able physician whom the baron had procured to attend him, yet while the cause, namely, the violent agitation of his spirits, continued, it was not possible that the effect could have been removed; and he was reduced to so weak a state by what he had undergone during the last ten days, not less in body than in mind, that, on receiving tidings at once so joyful, and yet, from the despondent state of his mind, so little expected, it was with great difficulty for some time that life could be retained within him.

At length an hysteric fit of laughter, accompanied by many tears, relieved his overburdened heart, and he pressed alternately to his lips and to his bosom the paper which contained the account of his Lauretta's safety.

When Alphonsus was sufficiently recovered from the frenzy of joy that had possessed him, to attend to the words of the baron, that kind friend informed him, that he would take upon himself the office of being Lauretta's guardian and conductor to the castle.

Alphonsus sprang from the bed in which he had before been scarcely able to raise himself; and, declaring himself to be now recovered, entreated to accompany the baron: but to this the physician gave a stern denial, declaring that it was absolutely necessary to his health and safety, that he should not yet leave his bed, or have his composure broken by any avoidable means.

Sufficiently secure of the safety of his Lauretta under the protection of the kind baron, Alphonsus reluctantly yielded to the remonstrances of the physician; and the baron departed, accompanied by two of his servants, and the peasant who was to conduct him to the hermit's cell.

The baron had not proceeded far on his journey to the hermitage, ere he was met by his returning vassals, whose pursuit of Theodore had proved ineffectual: and, as he now knew Lauretta to be removed from the reach of the chevalier, he commanded them to discontinue their search.

On the third day after the baron's departure, Alphonsus was so much recovered as to be permitted to leave his chamber:—his fever had quitted him;—his strength was returning, and his spirits were highly elated, as he dwelt on the mortification which Theodore, whom he vainly imagined still to be the sullen inhabitant of the prison his uncle had decreed him, would in his turn experience, on his seeing Lauretta safely restored to the arms of her husband. Theodore's escape the baron had judged it most advisable to conceal from Alphonsus, as the knowledge of it could only increase his fears for Lauretta's sufferings.

On the evening of the fourth day, the baron was expected to return; and Alphonsus awaited on the tiptoe of expectation the hour that should bring him to his castle. Midnight sounded, and the baron did not arrive: Alphonsus endeavoured to console himself with the possibility of the baron's journey having deceived him in the length of a few hours, and sat listening with anxiety for sounds which he might construe into the approach of the expected carriage. Morning dawned, and disappointment still prevailed: day passed on in a state of inexplicable inquietude; and night closed in with increased apprehensions to the trembling Alphonsus.

About the first hour of the morning, as Alphonsus was traversing his chamber, with a mind swelled with the most hideous phantoms of the fate that might have befallen her in whom his every wish and thought were centred, the distant approach of a carriage fell on his ear. He seized his lamp, and the increasing sound of joy accompanied him as he descended into the hall of the castle. Unacquainted with the exact method of opening the door, and his hand being infirm from agitation, it was some time ere he could effect it; and he drew it back on its hinges, at the very moment the carriage stopped.

Alphonsus issued out with the lamp in his hand; and, having scarcely permitted himself to salute the baron as he left the carriage, he sprang forward to meet Lauretta. Vain thought! Lauretta was not within it.

Grief and astonishment petrified Alphonsus.

The baron took his hand in his, and led him into the hall of the castle.

"Tell me the worst at once," cried Alphonsus. When, at length, after many ineffectual efforts, articulation was again granted him, "Tell me she is dead; the sound will be my summons to her grave."

"Afflict thee not so deeply: she is not dead, though gone from us."

"Gone! how? whither? by what means?" exclaimed Alphonsus, his eyes rolling wildly in their sockets. "Has the vile hermit betrayed her to . . . . . .?"

"Sully not unjustly his venerable name," interrupted the baron. "He has, I fear, suffered much in her cause: when I reached his humble cell, the first object that presented itself to my sight was his lifeless form, stretched on the earth."

"And Lauretta!" cried Alphonsus, waiting to have the sentence filled up by the baron.

"Has baffled my most diligent search of her," added the baron.

"Mysterious heaven!" returned the youth; "who could have learned her retreat?—who have carried her from thence?—Is not the chevalier at this very moment in the castle?"

"Is Theodore then returned?" asked the baron eagerly.

Alphonsus started, and fixed a look of inquiry, surprise, and suspicion, on the baron, that at once convinced him how unguardedly he had spoken, and how fully explicative of Theodore's escape, which he had hitherto so carefully concealed from Alphonsus, the few words he had just uttered had proved. He endeavoured to retract what he had said; but Alphonsus flew to substantial proof; and the deserted apartments, which had been the chevalier's prison, were but a too certain conviction of all his fears.

Ye who have felt, can alone conceive and participate in the poignant feelings of Alphonsus, on this heart-rending discovery:—by turns silent agony and frantic grief possessed him. The plan which one moment suggested, the next taught him to reject; and, from a chaos of ideas, his perturbed mind could fix on no one to adopt in the present moment of despair and madness.

Descending into the hall, he for a short space of time traversed it with hasty and uncertain steps. Suddenly stopping, he exclaimed, "It may not yet be too late to save her! Just heaven, nerve my arm, and guide my steps to the object of my search!" and fled from the hall with hasty steps.

The baron, alarmed by the wild mien of Alphonsus on his discovering the absence of Theodore from Smaldart castle, had ascended to the apartment of the physician, to inform him what had occurred, and summon him to the aid of his patient, at the same moment that Alphonsus had run to investigate the late prison of the chevalier. And, having first sought him in the northern gallery, then in the apartment which had been assigned to him in the castle, and lastly in the great hall, he saw not for some minutes the open gate which bespoke his having left the castle. Immediately on perceiving it, he ran out in search of him: but it was too late: he had mounted a horse, which he had taken from the stable, and departed unseen by any one.