The Daltons; Or, Three Roads In Life. Volume II

“Tell me of your father, Lola,” said D’Esmonde, in a low, soft voice, as he drew her low seat to his side.

“He was killed at Madrid; he died before the Queen!” said she, proudly.

“The death of a Toridor!” muttered the priest, mournfully.

“Yes, and Pueblos too, – he is dead!”

“Not the little child that I remember – ”

“The same. He grew up to be a fine man; some thought him handsomer than my father. My mother’s family would have made a priest of him, but he chose the prouder destiny.”

“I cannot think of him but as the child, – the little fellow who played about my knees; dressed like a matador, his long silky hair in a net.”

“Oh, do not – do not speak of him,” cried the girl, burying her face between her hands; “my heart will not bear those memories.”

The priest’s face was lighted up with a malevolent delight as he bent over her, as if revelling in the thought the emotions could call up.

“Poor little fellow!” said he, as if to himself. “How I remember his bolero that he danced for me.” He stopped, and she sobbed bitterly. “He said that Lola taught him.”

She looked up; the tears were fast coursing along her cheeks, which were pale as death.

“Eustace,” said she, tremulously, “these thoughts will drive me mad; my brain is reeling even now.”

“Let us talk of something else, then,” said he. “When did you leave the ‘Opera’ – and why?”

“How can you ask? you were at Seville at the time. Have you forgotten that famous, marriage, to which, by your persuasion, I consented; was this scheme only one of those unhappy events which are to be the seed of future good?”

The sneer made no impression on the priest, who calmly answered, “Even so, Lola.”

“What do you mean, sir?” cried she, angrily; “to what end am I thus? Was I so base born and so low? Was my lot in life so ignominious that I should not have raised my ambition above a fortune like this, – the waiting-woman of one whose birth is not better than my own?”

“You are right, Lola, – perfectly right; and with patience and prudence you will be her equal yet. Acton is an English noble – ”

“What care I for that?” said she, passionately; “the marriage was a counterfeit.”

“The marriage was a true and valid one.”

“And yet you yourself told me it was not binding.”

“I had my reasons for the deceit, Lola,” said he, persuasively. “You were deserted and desolate; such widowhood would have brought you to the grave with sorrow. It were better that you should strive against misery.”

“Even in shame?” asked she, scornfully.

“Even in shame, for the shame would be short-lived; but Lord Norwood is alive, and you are his wife.”

“Lord Norwood! I have heard that name so often,” said she, musingly.

“At Florence, of course, he was every night at the Mazzarini Palace; the same Gerald Acton you remember long ago.”

“And he is a lord, – an English noble?”

“And you are an English peeress, Lola. There is not a coronet more safe upon a titled head than I can make yours, – can and will make,” added he, slowly. “But you must be patient; I must now speak to you, Lola, of themes in which you can take no interest, and subjects of which you know nothing. But listen to me attentively, and hear me; for fortune has not thus thrown us together without a meaning.

“The hour is come, Lola, when heretics and infidels have determined on an attack of our faith; not as they have hitherto attempted, and with such signal failure, by the weapons of controversy and discussion, but by brute force; by the might of millions driven to madness from want and misgovernment To avert this terrible calamity is now the unceasing thought of the Church. Some have counselled one thing, some another; some would go forth to the fight, trusting that, as of old, God would not forget his people; there are others who deem this course presumptuous and unwise. The hearts of kings are not as they once were, – in their confessors’ keeping. Our age and manners would send forth no crusade. The battle must be otherwise contested. You could not follow me, Lola, were I to tell you either of the perils or their antidotes. Enough that I say we must have trusty and faithful agents in every land of Europe, and in every rank in every people. From the secret whisperings of the Czar to the muttered discontent of the Irish peasant, we must know them all. To this end have we labored anxiously and eagerly for some time back, and already have we made great progress. From every Court of Europe we now receive tidings, and there is not a royal palace where our interests are unguarded. Some serve us for the glorious cause itself, some have their own price, some again are in our own hands from motives of self-interest or terror, but all are alike true. This Princess – this Dalton – I destined for a duty of the same nature. Married to a man of Midchekoff’s wealth and influence, she might have done good service, but I scarcely dare to trust her; even at the sacrifice of herself she might fail me, and, although in my power, I cannot count upon her. Think, then, of my joy at finding you, one on whose fidelity I may hazard life itself. You can be all to me, and a thousand times more than ever she could.”

“Your spy,” said the girl, steadily, but without the slightest semblance of anger.

“My friend, my counsellor, my correspondent, Lola.”

“And the price?”

“You may name it. If your heart be set on mere worldly distinction, I will prove your marriage, and although Norwood is not rich, his country never neglects the class he belongs to. Would you break the tie, the bond is in my keeping.”

“I never loved him,” cried she, passionately, “and you knew it. The marriage was one of those snares on which your mind never ceases to dwell – ”

“If you loved another, Lola – ?” said he, interrupting, and then waiting for her to finish her speech.

“And if I had,” burst she forth, “am I credulous enough to fancy that your word can reconcile every difference of rank and fortune, – that you can control destiny, and even coerce affection? No, no, Eustace; I have outlived all that!”

“Then were you wiser when you believed it,” said he, gravely. “Now for his name.”

There was a tone of almost commanding influence in which these last few words were uttered, and his dark full eyes were steadily fixed on her as he spoke them.

She hesitated to answer, and seemed to reflect.

“I ask no forced confession, Lola,” said he, proudly, and rising at the same time from his seat “In all the unreserve of our old affection, I told you my secret; yours is with yourself.”

“But can you – ” She stopped.

“I can, and I will aid you,” said he, finishing her sentence.

“There is the name, then!” cried she, as, with a passionate gesture, she drew a sealed letter from her bosom, and showed him the superscription.

D’Esmonde almost started; but, recovering himself in an instant, he said, —

“The address is not correct, Lola. It should be thus – ” And taking a pen, he drew it across the last line on the cover, and wrote, instead, “Dewanpore Barracks, Calcutta.” “We must talk together this evening,” said he, restoring the letter, and, without more, withdrew.

CHAPTER X. D’ESMONDE’S LETTER

It will spare the reader a somewhat lengthy digression if we give him a peep at an extract from a letter written at this period by the Abbé D’Esmonde to a friend and fellow priest in Ireland. It was written on the very evening whose events we have just mentioned, and when fresh from the scenes of which he speaks.

The name or circumstances of the Abbe’s confidant have no interest for us; nor need we allude to him more particularly than by stating that he was one who took a prominent part in his country’s politics, and was a well-known agitator, both in print and on the platform. The present moment might not be inopportune to show the injustice of that sneer so often passed upon men of this stamp, and which assumes that their whole lives are spent in the agitation of small and irritating questions of mere local interest, – the petty intrigues of a village or a hamlet, – and without knowledge or interest for those greater themes which stir the heart of all Europe. We must not, however, be led away from our purpose, but, leaving these inferences to our reader’s appreciation, keep to the sober business of our task.

We have only to premise that D’Esmonde and his friend had been schoolfellows and college companions, and that the revelations made were in all the confidence of unbounded trust and security. Neither was the hazard of a post-office incurred, for the document was forwarded, with several letters from Rome, by a private hand, – a priest, who twice each year performed the journey on a similar errand, and – shall we startle our reader if we add, in a spirit apart from all the caprices of fiction – still travels on the same mission.

After some apology for the time the epistle would be on the road, seeing that it should first return to Rome ere it began its journey northward, D'Ësmonde next alludes to some private and personal matters, and some individuals of their acquaintance, and then proceeds: —

“It is not without much inconvenience that I am here at this moment, but my presence was necessary to neutralize the influence of this troublesome old Countess, and who would fain stop, if she could, all these liberal movements ere they have developed their true meaning. You can have no idea how difficult is this task, nor with what persistent folly people go on repeating each other’s ‘platitudes’ about ‘timely checks,’ ‘scotching the snake,’ and so forth. It is now upwards of half a century since Europe has seen a real political convulsion. A new lesson is wanting. I often used to hope that you of the West might be able to give it. I had great expectations of Chartism at one time. It possessed the due elements of mischief in abundance; it was infidel and hungry; but it wanted the great requisites, – determination and courage. The example must come from the Continent, and, in one respect, it is so much the better. Your home disturbers would be necessarily the enemies of the Anglican Church, whereas our anarchists here are inseparably associated with Protestantism. This coup required some cleverness, but we at last accomplished it. Ronge’s movement of secession gave the first opportunity; the Swiss troubles offered the second; a little more, and the Bonnet rouge will be the symbol of the Protestant faith. Mark the advantage of this; see the distrust with which every nation of the Continent will regard England and her constitution mongering; look how they will be induced to associate her printed cottons with her Church, and connect the spread of her trade with the treacherous dissemination of her doctrines. So far, so good. And then, remember, that to all this anarchy and ruin the Church of the true faith alone offers any effectual opposition, – the ‘Platoon’ for the hour of conflict; but to the priest must they come to consolidate the shattered edifice, – to rebuild the tottering fabric of society. Men do not see this yet; and there is but one way to teach it, – a tremendous lesson of blood and anarchy. This is in store for them, believe me. “My great difficulty is to persuade these people to patience. They will not wait, as Napoleon did for the Prussians, till they were 'en flagrant délit;’ and yet, if they do not, the whole experiment goes for nothing. With all their hordes of horse, foot, and dragoons, their grape and canister, their grenades and rocket-batteries, they have not the courage of a poor priest His Holiness is, however, doing better. He has taken the whole au sérieux; he has brought himself to believe that moderate reforms – what are they? – will satisfy the wishes of demagogue ambition, and that when he has lashed popular fury into full speed, he can check it at will. Of course you guess what will follow, and you already see what a busy time is before us. Oh, my dear Michel, I can stop here, and, closing my eyes, revel in the glorious future that must succeed! I see the struggle before me; and know that some good men, mayhap some great ones, will fall in it; but in the distance I see the dome of St. Peter’s rising majestically above the clouds of battle, and the countless millions kneeling once more before its altars! “I do not clearly understand you about Ireland, although I agree in the policy of putting the Protestant rebel in the foreground. A conflict ever so brief with the Government would be most useful. I have thought a good deal on the subject, and am convinced that nothing would awe England more than the impression of any foreign assistance being given to Irish insurrection, while it would lend to your loyalty the grand trait of nationality. This is a highly important feature. Remark how they are taunting us with being ultramontane just now, and think what an answer this will be to the sarcasm! I am sure – that is, if you concurred with me – I could easily persuade some young fellows in this service to join the movement. As officers, and well acquainted with military details, they would have a formidable effect in English eyes. I have two or three in my mind already; one, a brother of my young Princess, that fair damsel of whom I spoke in my last letter as my destined chargé d’affaires at St. Petersburg, – a very difficult post to fill, and one for which I am by no means sure she will be adequate. When I reflect on the difficulties experienced by us in arriving at truth, we, who have the hearts of men so open before us, I am astounded at any success that attends a mere secular government. More than two thirds of those with whom I live are, so to say, in my power, – that is, their reputation and their fortunes; and yet I must make them feel this ten times a day to turn them to my account. Believe me the Holy Office was right: there is an inseparable bond of union between truth and a thumb- screw! “Tell me if you wish for military aid; substantially, I am well aware, it would be worth nothing, but it might assist in pushing your patriots, who, I must own, are a cautious race, a step further. This Dalton boy is a thorough Austrian up to this, – a regular ‘God and the Emperor’ soldier; but I have thrown more stubborn metal into the crucible, and seen it come out malleable. “You ask about the ‘converts;’ and I must own that their defection is a greater slur on Protestantism than any matter of glorification to us. They are unceasing in their exactions, and all fancy that no price is too high for the honor of their alliance; not a shovel-hat amongst them who does not expect to be a ‘monsignore’ at least! “Some, however, like my friend Lady Hester, are wealthy, and in this way reward the trouble they give us. On her security I have obtained a loan, not of the sum you wished for, but of a smaller amount, the particulars of which I enclose. I know not if you will agree with me, but my opinion is, that nothing should be expended on the Irish press. Its influence is slight, and purely local; reserve all your seductions for the heavier metal on the other side of the Channel, and who, however ignorantly they talk, are always heard with respect and attention. “I cannot go over as you propose, nor, if I could, should I be of any use to you. You all understand your people, their habits and modes of thought, far better than we do, who have been fencing with cardinals, and sparring with the sacred college, for the last ten or a dozen years. Above all things, no precipitation; remember that your grand policy is the maintenance of that feverish condition that paralyses every effort of English policy. Parade all your grievances; but rather to display the submission with which you bear them than to pray for their relief. Be touchy only for trifles; keep all your martyrdom for great occasions; never forget that this time it is your loyalty! is to be rewarded. Adieu, my dear Michel. Tell his Grace whatever you think fit of these my opinions, and say, also, that he may rely on us here for withdrawing or confirming, as he pleases, any concessions he may deem proper to grant the English Government. We know his difficulties, and will take care not to augment them. As to the cardinal’s hat, let him have no doubts; only beg him to be circumspect, and that this is not the time to assume it! If men would but see what a great cause we have, and how it is to be won by waiting, – nothing more, Michel, – nothing more, believe me, than mere waiting! “All that you tell me, therefore, about titles and dignities, and so forth, is premature. With patience you will be enabled to assume all, from which a momentary precipitation would infallibly see you repulsed. A few of your leading men still cling to the ruinous notion of elevating Ireland; for Heaven’s sake cease not to combat this. It is the Church – the Church alone – for which we combat. Her difficulties are enough, without linking her fortune to such a sinking destiny! you have many able men amongst you, and they ought to see this proposition in its true light. “You are right – though you only threw it out in jest – about the interest I feel for my little Princess and her brother. It was the charity of a relative of theirs – a certain Mr. Godfrey – that first gave me the entrance into my career. He sent me to Louvain as a boy, and thence to Salamanca, and afterwards to Borne. He paid liberally for my education, and I believe intended, had he lived, to have provided handsomely for me. The story has an ugly ending; at least the rumors are gloomy ones; and I would rather not revive their memory. Here have I fallen into a sad track of thought, dear Michel; and now it is past midnight, and all is silent about me, and I feel half as if I ought to tell you everything, and yet that everything resolves itself into nothing; for of my actual knowledge, I possess not one single fact “Can you conceive the position of a man with a great, a glorious future before him, – rewards the very highest his wildest ambition ever fancied, – a sphere to exercise powers that he feels within, and but needing a field for their display? Picture to yourself such a man, and then fancy him tortured by one terrible suspicion, one damning doubt, – that there is a flaw in his just title to all this; that some day or other there may rise up against him – he knows not how or whence or why – from the very earth as it were, a voice to say, ‘you are disowned, disgraced, – you are infamous before men!’ Such a terrible hell have I carried for years within me! Yes, Michel, this ulcer is eating at my very heart, and yet it is only like a vision of evil, – some mind-drawn picture, carried up from infancy through boyhood, and stealing on, year by year, into the prime of life, strengthening its ties on me like a malady. “You will say this is a diseased imagination, – the fruits of an overworked brain, or, not improbably, the result of an overwrought vanity, that would seek consolation for failures in the dim regions of superstition. It may be so; and yet I have found this terror beset me more in the seasons of my strength and activity than in those of sickness and depression. Could I have given a shape and color to my thoughts, I might have whispered them in the confessional, and sought some remedy against their pain; but I could not. They flash on my waking faculties like the memories of a recent dream. I half doubt that they are not real, and look around me for the evidences of some change in my condition. I tremble at the first footstep that draws near my door, lest the new-comer should bring the tidings of my downfall! “I was at Borne – a student of the Irish college – when this cloud first broke over me. Some letter came from Ireland, – some document containing a confession, I believe. I was summoned before the superiors, and questioned as to my family, of which I knew nothing; and as to my means, of which I could tell as little. My attainments at the college were inquired into, and a strict scrutiny aa to my conduct; but though both were above reproach, not a word of commendation escaped them; on the contrary, I overheard, amid their whisperings, the terrible word ‘degradato!’ You can fancy how my heart sank within me at a phrase so significant of shame and debasement! “I was told the next morning that my patron was dead, and that, having no longer the means to support the charges of a student, I should become a ‘laico;’ in other words, a species of servant in the college. These were dreadful tidings; but they were short of what I feared. There was nothing said of ‘degradation.’ I struggled, however, against the hardship of the sentence, – I appealed to my proficiency in study, the prizes I had won, the character I bore, and so on; but although a few months more would have seen me qualified for the priesthood, my prayer was rejected, and I was made a ‘laico.’ Two months afterwards I was sent to the convent of ‘Espiazione,’ at Ancona. Many of my early letters have told you the sufferings of that life! – the awful punishments of that gloomy prison, where all are ‘degradati,’ and where none are to be found save men stained with the foulest crimes. I was seventeen months there, – a ‘laico,’ – a servant of the meanest class, – no consolation of study, no momentary solace in tracing others’ thoughts to relieve the horrible solitude of my own. Labor – incessant debasing labor – my lot from day till dawn. “I have no clew to the nature of my guilt I declare solemnly before Heaven, as I write these lines, that I am not conscious of a crime, save such as the confessional has expiated; and yet the ritual of my daily life implied such. The offices and litanies I had to repeat, the penances I suffered, were those of the ‘Espiazione!’ I dare not trust myself to recall this terrible period, – the only rebellious sentiment my heart has ever known sprang from that tortured existence. As an humble priest in the wildest regions of Alpine snow, as a missionary among the most barbarous tribes, I could have braved hardships, want, death itself; but as the ‘de-gradato,’ dragging out life in failing strength, with faculties each day weaker, watching the ebb of intellect, and wondering how near I was to that moping idiocy about me, and whether in that state suffering and sorrow slept! Oh, Michel! my hands tremble, and the tears blot the paper as I write. Can this ordeal ever work for good? The mass sink into incurable insanity, – a few, like myself, escape; and how do they come back into the world? I speak not of other changes; but what hardness of the heart is engendered by extreme suffering, what indifference to the miseries of others I How compassionless do we become to griefs that are nothing to those we have ourselves endured! you know well that mine has not been a life of indolence, that I have toiled hard and long in the cause of our faith, and yet I have never been able to throw off the dreary influence of that conventual existence. In the excitement of political intrigue I remember it least; in the whirlwind of passions by which men are moved, I can for a time forget the cell, the penance, and the chain. I have strong resentments, too, Michel. I would make them feel that to him they sentenced once to ‘degradation’ must they now come for advice and guidance, – that the poor ‘laico’ can now sit at their councils and direct their acts. There is something so glorious in the tyranny of Rome, so high above the petty sovereignty of mere kings, soaring beyond the bounds of realms and states, crossing Alps and oceans, proclaiming its proud edicts in the great cities of Europe, declaring its truths in the silent forests of the Far West, stirring the heart of the monarch on his throne, thrilling the rugged breast of the Indian in his wigwam, that even to bear a banner in its ranks is a noble privilege. And now I come back to these children, with whose fortunes I feel myself – I know not how – bound up. They were related to this Mr. Godfrey, and that, perchance, may be the secret link which binds us. The girl might have won a grand destiny, – she had beauty, grace, fascination, all that men prize in these days of ours; but there was no high ambition, – nothing beyond the thirst for personal admiration. I watched her anxiously and long. There was a weak goodness about her heart, too, that gave no promise of self-sacrifice. Such, however, as she is, she is mine. As for the boy, I saw him yesterday for the first time; but he cannot be a difficult conquest. Again I hear you ask me, why can I turn from great events and stirring themes to think of these? and again I own that I cannot tell you. Power over every one, the humblest as the highest, the weakest in purpose and the strongest of heart, – power to send forth or to restrain, to crush or to exalt, – this is the prize of those who, like you and me, walk humbly, that we may reign proudly. “And now, dear Michel, good-bye. I have made you a confession, and if I have told little, the fault is not mine. You know all my sentiments on great events, – my hopes and my anticipations. I must leave this to-morrow, or the day after, for there is much to do beyond the Alps. If kings and kaisers but knew as much as we poor priests, the coming would scarce be a merry Christmas with them.