Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851.

She loosened herself from my arm, and walked apart from me in silence. This action, and the sort of panic it indicated, filled me with alarm.

"Astræa, you have not answered my question. What is the reason of your silence?"

"Be the consequences what they may!" she reiterated. "I did not think of that, but it is right I should. I should have thought of it before – I did think of it; but of what avail, while I suffered myself to indulge in a dream which that thought ought to have dispelled?"

"You speak in a language that is unintelligible to me; but there is no time now for explanations. We must decide, Astræa, at once, for to-day and forever. I only ask your explicit pledge. Let us reserve explanations for hereafter."

"You say this in ignorance of what awaits you. I feel that I ought not to make any pledge until – " and she hesitated again.

"If I am satisfied to take your pledge, and all consequences with it, and to repay it with the devotion of my life, why, beloved Astræa, should you hesitate? Let the responsibility fall on me – of that another time. Every hour is precious now, and you will understand why I urge you so impatiently when I tell you that I can never again enter the house where you are now residing."

"I knew it. I saw it clearly from the first word you uttered. It was revealed to me in the very tone of your voice. Now hear me patiently. Your peace, your honor, all feelings that contribute to the respect and happiness of life, are at stake upon this moment."

The determination of her manner left me no choice but to listen.

"Are you prepared to risk all other ties, obligations, and prospects, in the consummation of this one object? to hazard friends, opinion, the world – perhaps it may be, to sacrifice them for the love that has grown up between us, and which, for good or evil, must this day bind us together, or sever us for the rest of our lives?"

"What a question to put to me! The 'world!' it is ashes without you. I tell you, Astræa, that if the choice lay between the grave and the single word that would sunder us, I would die rather than utter it. I don't know what your question implies – I don't seek to know; and would prefer to remain ignorant of it, that I may the more clearly prove to you the depth of my trust and devotion, which will be satisfied with the simple pledge that makes you mine. That, at least, you have in your own power; let me answer for the rest."

"Consider well what you are saying. Is your love strong enough to bear the hazards I have pointed out? Search your own nature – look into your pride, your sensitiveness to neglect and censure, your high sense of personal dignity. I have seen how ill you can brook slight affronts – do you believe that your love will enable you to bear great ones – scorn, contumely, perhaps opprobrium? Think, think, and weigh well your decision."

"Astræa, you put me upon the rack. I have no other answer to give. For you, and for your sake, come what may, I am ready to risk all!"

"For me and for my sake, if it be necessary, to forsake the world? to relinquish friends and kindred? to dedicate yourself in solitude to her who, in solitude, would be content to find her whole world in you? To do this, without repining, without looking back with anguish and remorse upon the sacrifices you had made, without a regret or a reproach? A woman can do this. Is it so sure there lives a man equal to such trials?"

"If these sacrifices be imperative upon us, we make them together. There can be nothing for either of us to reproach the other with. And as to the solitude you speak of, my heart yearns for it. It is in that solitude we can the more fully understand and develop the profound devotion that shall have drawn us into it. I am sick of the world – weary and tired of it, and longing for the repose which you alone can consecrate. It will be no sacrifice to abandon the world for you. Sacrifice, my Astræa? it will be the crowning happiness of my life!"

"And you are confident that you can depend upon the firmness of your resolution? I do not ask this for my own sake – for I know myself, what I can suffer and outlive – but for yours."

"I solemnly and finally answer, that no earthly influence can shake my resolution."

"Then," said Astræa, placing her hand in mine, and in a grave voice, laden with emotion, "I am yours forever. Henceforth, I owe no allegiance elsewhere – here, in the sight of Heaven, I pledge my faith to you, and hold the compact as binding as if at this moment it were plighted at the altar."

I was transported with the earnestness of these words, and covering her hand with kisses, I exclaimed —

"And I ratify it, Astræa, my own Astræa, with my whole heart. Now, who shall divide us? We are one, and no human power can part us."

I then related to her the circumstances that had taken place the preceding evening. She heard me throughout with a calmness that surprised me. I expected that the extraordinary conduct of the dwarf would have excited her indignation; but she seemed to know him better than I did, and although I could perceive a heavy flush sometimes rush into her cheeks, and a sudden pallor succeed it, the narrative of his mysterious menaces did not appear to produce half as much astonishment in her mind as it did in mine.

"We will talk of this another time," she observed; "at present we must think of ourselves. I know his character – I know the demoniac revenge he is capable of; and, for our own safety, we must avoid him."

"Revenge!" I echoed. The phrase coming from Astræa fell strangely on my ears.

"I will leave the house to-morrow; but, for your sake, I will hold no communication with you till I am beyond his reach. Once assured of that, I will write to you, and you will come to me. This is the only act I will ask to take upon my own responsibility, and I do so because it will secure our mutual safety. From that hour I shall be implicitly guided by you."

I should have been glad to have adopted a different course, and to have claimed her openly. My pride, wounded by the insolent denunciations of the dwarf, demanded a more public vindication of her independence and mine; and this stolen flight, and the necessity it imposed upon me of observing a similar caution in my own movements, looked so like fear and evasion that I submitted to it very reluctantly. The notion of concealment and secrecy galled me, and even at this moment, when my happiness was on the eve of consummation, it gave me a thrill of uneasiness that cast an oppressive shadow over the future. Astræa, however, had evidently a strong reason for insisting on privacy, and I was too anxious about hastening our union to throw any new obstacle in the way of its accomplishment.

We separated in the Park, Astræa being unwilling to suffer me to escort her any further lest we should be seen together. This little incident, trifling as it was, increased the nervous annoyance and sense of humiliation I felt at being required to act as if I had any fear of the results; nor could I comprehend why she should be so much alarmed at being seen walking with me alone, when she knew that in a few days we should be indissolubly united. But I submitted to her wishes. Passion is willful and unreasonable, and takes a wayward pleasure in shutting its eyes, and rushing onward in the dare. I stifled my vexation in the anticipation of the joy that lay before me, which would be victory enough over the impotent hatred of Mephistophiles.

VIII

Throughout the whole of the next day I waited anxiously in the expectation of hearing from Astræa. Evening came and passed, and there was no communication. When the last post-hour was gone by, and all hope of a letter was at an end, I ventured into the streets, hoping to gather some signs of her movements from the outside of her house. The blinds were down as usual in the drawing-room windows, and there seemed to be rather an extraordinary flush of lights within, as if some commotion was going forward. I could see huge, shapeless shadows of people moving about the room, in great bustle and excitement; and it appeared to me, from the frequency and confusion of then: motions, that the ordinary family party was augmented by additional numbers. The gathering, whatever it might have been, was not for festivity; and the constant swaying backward and forward, and vehement tossing of long streaks of heads and arms on the blinds, resembled the action of a violent domestic scene, in which the angry passions were strenuously engaged. I hardly knew what to conclude from this incoherent pantomime. Either Astræa was there, in the midst of a stormy contention; or she had left the house, and they were disputing furiously over the causes of her departure.

After I had been some time watching this unintelligible phantasmagoria, and vainly endeavoring to collect a meaning for it, the hall-door opened, and in the momentary gleam of light that shot into the street I saw the dwarf issuing out, muffled to the ears in a cloak. He stood for a moment on the pavement, and adjusting his cloak more carefully about his face, and crushing his hat down over his eyes, he set off at a quick pace in an opposite direction to that part of the street where I was standing. I confess I felt ashamed of the espionage in which I was occupied, and although I followed my mercurial fiend at a safe distance, for the distinct purpose of earthing him wherever he was going, I by no means liked the office which a sort of fatality had forced upon me. But I was somewhat reconciled to it by a secret conviction that the abominable little demon had himself come out upon an equally discreditable expedition, which I soon detected from the infinite pains he took to elude observation.

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