" hear me ! It is true this man has been here ; it is true that,
fearful and terrible as he is, he has agitated and alarmed me :
but it was only for you, Morton, ā by the Holy Virgin, it was
only for you! 'The moment,' said he, and his voice ran shiv-
eringly through my heart like a dagger, 'the moment Mor-
ton Devereux discovers who is his rival, that moment his
death-warrant is irrevocably sealed ! ' "
DEVEREUX. 157
"Arrogant boaster!" I cried, and my blood burned with
tlie intense rage which a much slighter cause would have kin-
dled from the natural fierceness of my temper. "Does he
think my life is at his bidding, to allow or to withhold? Un-
hand me, Isora, unhand me ! I tell you I will seek him this
moment, and dare him to do his worst ! "
"Do so," said Isora, calmly, and releasing her hold; "do
so ; but hear' me first ā¢ the moment you breathe to him your
suspicions you place an eternal barrier betwixt yourself and
me ! Pledge me your faith that you will never, while I live
at least, reveal to him ā to any one whom you suspect ā your
reproach, your defiance, your knowledge ā nay, not even your
lightest suspicion ā of his identity with my persecutor; prom-
ise me this, Morton Devereux, or I, in my turn, before that
crucifix, whose sanctity we both acknowledge and adore, ā
that crucifix which has descended to my race for three un-
broken centuries, ā which, for my departed father, in the sol-
emn vow, and in the death-agony, has still been a witness, a
consolation, and a pledge, between the soul and its Creator,
ā by that crucifix which my dying mother clasped to her
bosom when she committed me, an infant, to the care of that
Heaven which hears and records forever our lightest word,
^I swear that I will never be yours ! "
" Isora ! " said I, awed and startled, yet struggling against
the impression her energy had made upon me, "you know not
to what you pledge yourself, nor what you require of me.
If I do not seek out this man, if I do not expose to him my
knowledge of his pursuit and unhallowed persecution of you,
if I do not effectually prohibit and prevent their continuance,
think well, what security have I for your future peace of
mind, ā nay, even for the safety of your honour or your life?
A man thus bold, daring and unbaffled in his pursuit, thus
vigilant and skilful in his selection of time and occasion, ā so
that, despite my constant and anxious endeavour to meet him
in your presence, I have never been able to do so, ā from a
man, I say, thus pertinacious in resolution, thus crafty in
disguise, what may you not dread when you leave him utterly
fearless by the license of impunity? Think too, again, Isora,
158 DEVEREUX.
that the mystery dishonours as much as the danger menaces.
Is it meet that my betrothed and my future bride should be
subjected to these secret and terrible visitations, ā visitations
of a man professing himself her lover, and evincing the vehe-
mence of his passion by that of his pursuit? Isora ā Isora ā
you have not weighed these things ; you know not what you
demand of me."
"I do! " answered Isora; "I do know all that I demand of
you; I demand of you only to preserve your life."
" How, " said I, impatiently, " cannot my hand preserve my
life? and is it for you, the daughter of a line of warriors, to
ask your lover and your husband to shrink from a single
foe?"
"No, Morton," answered Isora. "Were you going to bat-
tle, I would gird on your sword myself ; were, too, this man
other than he is, and you were about to meet him in open
contest, I would not wrong you, nor degrade your betrothed,
by a fear. But I know my persecutor well, ā fierce, unre-
lenting, ā dreadful in his dark and ungovernable passions as
he is, he has not the courage to confront you: I fear not the
open foe, but the lurking and sure assassin. His very ear-
nestness to avoid you, the precautions he has taken, are alone
sufficient to convince you that he dreads personally to oppose
your claim or to vindicate himself."
"Then what have I to fear? "
"Everything! Do you not know that from men, at once
fierce, crafty, and shrinking from bold violence, the stuff for
assassins is always made? And if I wanted surer proof of
his designs than inference, his oath ā it rings in my ears now
ā is sufficient. 'The moment Morton Devereux discovers
who is his rival, that moment his death-warrant is irrevoca-
bly sealed.' Morton, I demand your promise; or, though my
heart break, I will record my own vow."
" Stay ā stay, " I said, in anger, and in sorrow : " were I to
promise this, and for my own safety hazard yours, what
could you deem me?"
"Fear not for me, Morton," answered Isora; "you have no
cause. I tell you that this man, villain as he is, ever leaves
DEVEREUX. 159
me humbled and abased. Do not think that in all times, and
all scenes, I am the foolish and weak creature you behold me
now. Kemember that you said rightly I was the daughter
of a line of warriors; and I have that within me which will
not shame my descent."
" But, dearest, your resolution may avail you for a time ;
but it cannot forever baffle the hardened nature of a man.
I know my own sex, and I know my own ferocity, were it
once aroused."
"But, Morton, you do not know me," said Isora, proudly,
and her face, as she spoke, was set, and even stern : "I am
only the coward when I think of you; a word ā a look of
mine ā can abash this man; or, if it could not, I am never
without a weapon to defend myself, or ā or ā " Isora's voice,
before firm and collected, now faltered, and a deep blush
flowed over the marble paleness of her face.
"Or what?" said I, anxiously.
"Or thee, Morton!" murmured Isora, tenderly, and with-
drawing her eyes from mine.
The tone, the look that accompanied these words, melted
me at once. I rose, ā I clasped Isora to my heart.
"You are a strange compound, my own fairy queen; but
these lips, this cheek, those eyes, are not fit features for a
heroine."
" jMorton, if I had less determination in my heart, I could
not love you so well."
"But tell me," I whispered, with a smile, "where is this
weapon on which you rely so strongly? "
"Here!" answered Isora, blushingly; and, extricating her-
self from me, she showed me a small two-edged dagger,
which she wore carefully concealed between the folds of her
dress. I looked over the bright, keen blade, with surprise,
and yet with pleasure, at the latent resolution of a character
seemingly so soft. I say with pleasure, for it suited well
with my own fierce and wild temper. I returned the weapon
to her, with a smile and a jest.
" Ah ! " said Isora, shrinking from my kiss, " I should not
have been so bold, if I only feared danger for myself."
160 DEVEREUX.
But if, for a moment, we forgot, in the gusliings of our
affection, the object of our converse and dispute, we soon re-
turned to it again. Isora was the first to recur to it. She
reminded me of the promise she required; and she spoke with
a seriousness and a solemnity whicli I found myself scarcely
able to resist.
" But, " I said, " if he ever molest you hereafter ; if again I
find that bright cheek blanched, and those dear eyes dimmed
with tears ; and I know that, in my own house, some one has
dared thus to insult its queen, ā am I to be still torpid and
inactive, lest a dastard and craven hand should avenge my
assertion of your honour and mine?"
"No, Morton; after our marriage, whenever that be, you
will have nothing to apprehend from him on the same ground
as before ; my fear for you, too, will not be what it is now ;
your honour will be bound in mine, and nothing shall induce
me to hazard it, ā no, not even your safety. I have every
reason to believe that, after that event, he will subject me no
longer to his insults: how, indeed, can he, under your per-
petual protection? or, for what cause should he attempt it,
if he could? I shall be then yours, ā only and ever yours;
what hope could, therefore, then nerve his hardihood or in-
stigate his intrusions? Trust to me at that time, and suffer
me to ā nay, I repeat, promise me that I may ā trust in you
now ! "
What could I do? I still combated her wish and her re-
quest; but her steadiness and rigidity of jDurpose made me,
though reluctantly, yield to them at last. So sincere, and
so stern, indeed, appeared her resolution, that I feared, by
refusal, that she would take the rash oath that would sepa-
rate us forever. Added to this, I felt in her that confidence
which, I am apt to believe, is far more akin to the latter
stages of real love than jealousy and mistrust; and I could
not believe that either now, or, still less after our nuptials,
she would risk aught of honour, or the seemings of honour,
from a visionary and superstitious fear. In spite, therefore,
of my deep and keen interest in the thorough discovery of
this mysterious persecution; and, still more, in the preveu-
DEVEREUX. 161
tion of all future designs from his audacity, I constrained
myself to promise her that I would on no account seek out
the person I suspected, or wilfully betray to him by word or
deed my belief of his identity with Barnard.
Though greatly dissatisfied with my self-compulsion, I
strove to reconcile myself to its idea. Indeed, there was
much in the peculiar circumstances of Isora, much in the
freshness of her present affliction, much in the unfriended
and utter destitution of her situation, that, while on the one
hand, it called forth her pride, and made stubborn that
temper which was naturally so gentle and so soft; on the
other hand, made me yield even to wishes that I thought un-
reasonable, and consider rather the delicacy and deference due
to her condition, than insist upon the sacrifices which, in more
fortunate circumstances, I might have imagined due to my-
self. Still more indisposed to resist her wish and expose
myself to its penalty was I, when I considered her desire was
the mere excess and caution of her love, and when I felt that
she spoke sincerely when she declared that it was only for
me that she was the coward. Nevertheless, and despite all
these considerations, it was with a secret discontent that I
took my leave of her, and departed homeward.
I had just reached the end of the street where the house
was situated, when I saw there, very imperfectly, for the
night was extremely dark, the figure of a man entirely envel-
oped in a long cloak, such as was comm^only worn by gallants
in affairs of secrecy or intrigue ; and, in the pale light of a
single lamp near which he stood, something like the bril-
liance of gems glittered on the large Spanish hat which over-
hung his brow. I immediately recalled the description the
woman had given me 'of Barnard's dress, and the thought
flashed across me that it was he whom I beheld. "At all
events," thought I, "I may confirm my doubts, if I may not
communicate them, and I may watch over her safety if I may
not avenge her injuries." I therefore took advantage of my
knowledge of the neighbourhood, passed the stranger with a
quick step, and then, running rapidly, returned by a cir-
cuitous route to the mouth of a narrow and dark street, which
11
162 DEVEREUX.
was exactly opposite to Isora's house. Here I concealed m}'-
self by a projecting porch, and I had not waited long before I
saw the dim form of the stranger walk slowly by the house.
He passed it three or four times, and each time I thought ā
though the darkness might deceive me ā thab he looked up to
the windows. He made, however, no attempt at admission,
and appeared as if he had no other object than that of watch-
ing by the house. Wearied and impatient at last, I came
from my concealment. "I may confirm my suspicions," I
repeated, recurring to my oath, and I walked straight towards
the stranger.
"Sir," I said very calmly, "I am the last person in the
world to interfere with the amusements of any other gentle-
man; but I humbly opine that no man can parade by this
house upon so very cold a night, without giving just ground
for suspicion to the friends of its inhabitants. I happen to
be among that happy number; and I therefore, with all due
humility and respect, venture to request you to seek some
other spot for your nocturnal perambulations."
I made this speech purposely prolix, in order to have time
fully to reconnoitre the person of the one I addressed. The
dusk of the night, and the loose garb of the stranger, certainly
forbade any decided success to this scrutiny; but methought
the figure seemed, despite of my prepossessions, to want the
stately height and grand proportions of Gerald Devereux. I
must own, however, that the necessary inexactitude of my
survey rendered this idea without just foundation, and did
not by any means diminish my firm impression that it was
Gerald whom I beheld. "While I spoke, he retreated with a
quick step, but made no answer. I pressed upon him: he
backed with a still quicker step; and Avhen I had ended, he
fairly turned round, and made at full speed along the dark
street in which I had fixed my previous post of watch. I fled
after him, with a step as fleet as his own : his cloak encum-
bered his flight; I gained upon him sensibly; he turned a
sharp corner, threw me out, and entered into a broad thor-
oughfare. As I sped after him, Bacchanalian voices burst
upon my ear, and presently a large band of those youug men
DEVEREUX. 103
who, under the name of Mohawks, were wont to scour the
town nightly, and, sword in hand, to exercise their love of
riot under the disguise of party zeal, became visible in the
middle of the street. Through them my fugitive dashed
headlong, and, profiting by their surprise, escaped unmo-
lested. I attempted to follow with equal speed, but was less
successful. " Hallo ! " cried the foremost of the group, plac-
ing himself in my way.
"N"o such haste I Art Whig or Tory? Under which king,
Bezonian? speak or die! "
"Have a care. Sir," said I, fiercely, drawing my sword.
"Treason, treason! " cried the speaker, confronting me with
equal readiness. "Have a care, indeed! have at thee.''''
"Ha!" cried another, "'tis a Tory; 'tis the Secretary's
popish friend, Devereux: pike him, pike him."
I had already run my opponent through the sword arm,
and was in hopes that this act would intimidate the rest, and
allow my escape ; but at the sound of my name and political
bias, coupled with the drawn blood of their confederate, the
patriots rushed upon me with that amiable fury generally
characteristic of all true lovers of their country. Two swords
l^assed through my body simultaneously, and I fell bleeding
and insensible to the ground. "When I recovered I was in
my own apartments, whither two of the gentler Mohawks
had conveyed me: the surgeons were by my bedside; I
groaned audibly when I saw them. If there is a thing in the
world I hate, it is in any shape the disciples of Hermes ; they
always remind me of that Indian people (the Padaei, I think)
mentioned by Herodotus, who sustained themselves by de-
vouring the sick. "All is well," said one, when my groan
was heard. "He will not die," said another. "At least not
till we have had more fees," said a third, more candid than
the rest. And thereupon they seized me and began torturing
my wounds anew, till I fainted away with the pain. However,
the next day I was declared out of immediate danger ; and the
first proof I gave of my convalescence was to make Desmarais
discharge four surgeons out of five : the remaining one I thought
my youth and constitution might enable me to endure.
164 DEVEREUX.
That very evening, as I was turning restlessly in my bed,
and muttering with parched lips the name of "Isora," I saw
by my side a figure covered from head to foot in a long veil,
and a voice, low, soft, but thrilling through my heart like a
new existence, murmured, " She is here ! "
I forgot my wounds ; I forgot my pain and my debility ; I
sprang upwards: the stranger drew aside the veil from her
countenance, and I beheld Isora!
" Yes ! " said she, in her own liquid and honeyed accents,
which fell like balm upon my wound and my spirit, "yes,
she whom you have hitherto tended is come, in her turn, to
render some slight but woman's services to you. She has
come to nurse, and to soothe, and to pray for you, and to be,
till you yourself discard her, your handmaid and your slave ! "
I would have answered, but raising her finger to her lips,
she arose and vanished ; but from that hour my wound healed,
my fever slaked, and whenever I beheld her flitting round
my bed, or watching over me, or felt her cool fingers wiping
the dew from my brow, or took from her hand my medicine
or my food, in those moments, the blood seemed to make a
new struggle through my veins, and I felt palpably within
me a fresh and delicious life ā a life full of youth and pas-
sion and hope ā replace the vaguer and duller being which I
had hitherto borne.
There are some extraordinary incongruities in that very
mysterious thing sympathy. One would imagine that, in a
description of things most generally interesting to all men,
the most general interest would be found; nevertheless, I be-
lieve few persons would hang breathless over the progressive
history of a sick-bed. Yet those gradual stages from danger
to recovery, how delightfully interesting they are to all who
have crawled from one to the other ! and who, at some time
or other in his journey through that land of diseases ā civil-
ized life ā has not taken that gentle excursion? "I would be
ill any day for the pleasure of getting well, " said Fontenelle
to me one morning with his usual naivete; but who would not
be ill for the mere pleasure of being ill, if he could be tended
by her whom he most loves?
DEVEREUX. 165
I shall not therefore dwell upon that most delicious period
of my life, ā my sick bed, and my recovery from it. I pass
on to a certain evening in Avhich I heard from Isora's lips the
whole of her history, save what related to her knowledge of
the real name of one whose persecution constituted the little
of romance which had yet mingled with her innocent and
pure life. That evening ā how well I remember it ! ā we
Avere alone ; still weak and reduced, I lay upon the sofa be-
side the window, which was partially open, and the still air
of an evening in the first infancy of spring came fresh, and
fraught as it were with a prediction of the glowing woods
and the reviving verdure, to my cheek. The stars, one by
one, kindled, as if born of Heaven and Twilight, into their
nightly being; and, through the vapour and thick ether of
the dense city, streamed their most silent light, holy and
pure, and resembling that which the Divine Mercy sheds
upon the gross nature of mankind. But, shadowy and calm,
their rays fell full upon the face of Isora, as she lay on the
ground beside my couch, and with one hand surrendered to
my clasp, looked upward till, as she felt my gaze, she turned
her cheek blushingly away. There was quiet around and
above us; but beneath the window we heard at times the
sounds of the common earth, and then insensibly our hands
knit into a closer clasp, and we felt them thrill more palpably
to our hearts ; for those sounds reminded us both of our exist-
ence and of our separation from the great herd of our race !
What is love but a division from the world, and a blending
of two souls, two immortalities divested of clay and ashes,
into one? it is a severing of a thousand ties from whatever is
harsh and selfish, in order to knit them into a single and sa-
cred bond! Who loves hath attained the anchorite's secret;
and the hermitage has become dearer than the world.
respite from the toil and the curse of our social and banded
state, a little interval art thou, suspended between two eterni-
ties, ā the Past and the Future, ā a star that hovers between
the morning and the night, sending through the vast abyss
one solitary ray from heaven, but too far and faint to illu-
mine, while it hallows the earth!
166 DEYEREUX.
There was nothing in Isora's tale which the reader has not
already learned or conjectured. She had left her Andalusian
home in her early childhood, but she remembered it well, and
lingeringly dwelt over it in description. It was evident that
little, in our colder and less genial isle, had attracted her
sympathy, or wound itself into her affection. Nevertheless, I
conceive that her naturally dreamy and abstracted character
had received from her residence and her trials here much of
the vigour and the heroism which it now possessed. Brought
up alone, music, and books ā few, though not ill-chosen, for
Shakspeare was one, and the one which had made upon her
the most permanent impression, and perhaps had coloured
her temperament with its latent but rich hues of poetry ā
constituted her amusement and her studies.
But who knows not that a woman's heart finds its fullest
occupation within itself? There lies its real study, and
within that narrow orbit, the mirror of enchanted thought re-
flects the whole range of earth. Loneliness and meditation
nursed the mood which afterwards, with Isora, became love
itself. But I do not wish now so much to describe her char-
acter as to abridge her brief history. The first English
stranger of the male sex whom her father admitted to her ac-
quaintance was Barnard. This man was, as I had surmised,
connected with him in certain political intrigues, the exact
nature of which she did not know. I continue to call him by
a name which Isora acknowledged was fictitious. He had
not, at first, by actual declaration, betrayed to her his affec-
tions : though, accompanied by a sort of fierceness which early
revolted her, they soon became visible. On the evening in
which I had found her stretched insensible in the garden,
and had myself made my first confession of love, I learned
that he had divulged to her his passion and real name;
that her rejection had thrown him into a fierce despair; that
he had accompanied his disclosure with the most terrible
threats against me, for whom he supposed himself rejected,
and against the safety of her father, whom he said a word of
his could betray; and her knowledge of his power to injure
us ā us ā yes, Isora then loved me, and then trembled for
DEVEREUX. 167
my safety ! had terrified and overcome her ; and that in the
very moment in which my horse's hoofs were heard, and as
the alternative of her non-compliance, the rude suitor swore
deadly and sore vengeance against Alvarez and myself, she
yielded to the oath he prescribed to her, ā an oath that she
would never reveal the secret he had betrayed to her, or suffer
me to know who was my real rival.
This was all that I could gather from her guarded confi-
dence ; he heard the oath and vanished, and she felt no more
till she was in my arms ; then it was that she saw in the love
and vengeance of my rival a barrier against our union; and
then it was that her generous fear for me conquered her at-
tachment, and she renounced me. Their departure from the
cottage so shortly afterwards was at her father's choice and
at the instigation of Barnard, for the furtherance of their
political projects ; and it was from Barnard that the money
came which repaid my loan to Alvarez. The same jjerson, no
doubt, poisoned her father against me, for henceforth Alvarez
never spoke of me with that partiality he had previously felt.
They repaired to London: her father was often absent, and
often engaged with men whom she had never seen before ; he
was absorbed and uncommunicative, and she was still igno-
rant of the nature of his schemings and designs.
At length, after an absence of several weeks, Barnard reap-
peared, and his visits became constant; he renewed his suit
to her father as well as herself. Then commenced that do-
mestic persecution, so common in this very tyrannical world,
which makes us sicken to bear, and which, had Isora been
wholly a Spanish girl, she, in all probability, would never
have resisted : so much of custom is there in the very air of a
climate. But she did resist it, partly because she loved me,
ā and loved me more and more for our separation, ā and
partly because she dreaded and abhorred the ferocious and
malignant passions of my rival, far beyond any other misery
with which fortune could threaten her. " Your father then
shall hang or starve ! " said Barnard, one day in uncontrolla-
ble frenzy, and left her. He did not appear again at the
house. The Spaniard's resources, fed, probably, alone by
168 DEVEREUX.