Fairy Fingers. Anna Cora Ogden Mowatt Ritchie
by the internal sunshine of her patient, trustful spirit, culminated and broke in that wild flood. Hope was drowned in that heavy rain; all the flowers that brightened, and the sweet, springing herbs that lent their balm to her weary pilgrimage, were beaten down into the mire of despair. There was no ark, no Ararat; she was alone, without refuge, on the waste of waters.
Her heavy sobs prevented her hearing the entrance of Bertha, and it was only when the arms of the young girl were fondly twined about her, that she became aware of her presence.
"Madeleine, dear, dear Madeleine! What has happened? Why do you weep thus?"
"Do not speak to me, Bertha!" replied Madeleine in a stifled voice. "You cannot, cannot help me; there is no hope left—none, none! My father has died to me again to day, and I am alone once more!—alone in a desert that has no place of shelter for me, but a grave beneath its swathing sands!"
Her tears gushed forth with redoubled violence.
"Do not treat me so cruelly! Do not cast me off!" pleaded Bertha, as her cousin tried to disengage herself from her encircling arms. "If you are wretched, so am I—because you are! Only tell me the reason for this terrible sorrow. I was awaiting you in your room; but, as you did not come, I felt sure my cousin Maurice had detained you."
At those last words an involuntary cry of intense suffering burst from Madeleine's lips.
"Then I saw my aunt and Maurice returning together, and Maurice appeared to be talking in an excited manner, and my aunt looked blacker than any thunder-cloud. Still you did not come, and I went in search of you. Tell me why I find you thus?—you, who have always borne your griefs with such silent fortitude. What has my aunt said or done to you?"
"She has ceased to love me—she has ceased to esteem me—she even repents of the benefits she has conferred upon me."
"No, no, Madeleine; you are mistaken."
"Oh, I am not mistaken—my eyes are opened at last. The thin, waxen mask of assumed kindness has melted from her face! I am a burden to her—an encumbrance—an offence. She only desires to be rid of me!"
"You—the fairy of good works in her household? What could she do without you? It is only excitement which makes you imagine this."
"I never guessed, never dreamed it before; but I have wilfully deceived myself. Now all is too clear! A thousand recollections rise up to testify to the truth; a thousand suspicions, which I repulsed as unworthy of me and of her, return to convince me; words and looks, coldness and injustice, slights and reproaches start up with frightful vividness, and throw a hideous light upon conduct I never dared to interpret aright."
"What looks? what words? what actions?" asked Bertha, though her heart told her with what a catalogue she could answer her own question.
"They could not be rehearsed in an hour or in a day. But it is not to my aunt alone that my presence is offensive. Cousin Tristan also chafes at the sight of his dependent relative. I have seen it when I took my seat at table; I have seen it when room was made for me in the carriage; I have seen it on numberless occasions. His glances, his accents, his whole demeanor, have seemed to reproach me for the place I occupied, for the garments I wore, for the very bread I ate—the bread of bitter, bitter charity! And oh!" she groaned, "must this be so still? Must I still accept these bounties, which are begrudged me? Must I still be bowed to the dust by the weight of these charities? Alas! I must, because I have nothing of my own—because I am nothing of myself!"
"Madeleine! one of these days"—
Madeleine did not heed her. "Oh, my father! my father! To what torturing humiliations you subjected me in bequeathing me nobility with poverty! Well may you have wished that you had been born a peasant! Had I been a peasant's child, I might have lived by, and rejoiced in, honest labor! Had I been the daughter of a mechanic, I might have gained my bread by some useful trade. Had I even been the child of some poor gentleman, I might have earned a livelihood by giving lessons in music, in drawing, by becoming a governess, or teaching in a school. But, the daughter of the Duke de Gramont, it is one of the curses of my noble birth that I must live upon charity—charity unwillingly doled out and thrown in my face, even when I am receiving it with meekness!"
"But, Madeleine, if you will but listen to me"—
Madeleine went on bitterly. "And I am young yet—young and strong, and capable of exertion; and I have dared to believe that, while one is young, some of the benefits received could be repaid by the cheerful spirit of youth—by the performance of needful offices—by hands ever ready to serve, and a heart ever open to sympathize; but, if I am an encumbrance, an annoyance while I am young, what an intolerable burden I must become when youth passes away! Then I shall either be repulsed with aversion, or sheltered with undisguised reluctance—forced to remember every moment that the hospitality I receive is an alms! Oh! it is too horrible! Death would be a thousand times preferable."
"And you can forget how dreadful it would be for us, who love you, to lose you?"
"I forget everything, except the misery of my own degraded position! I ask for nothing save that God, in his mercy, will free me from it, I care not how! I look despairingly on all sides, and see no escape! I am bound, hand and foot, by the chains of my own noble birth, and shut within the iron walls of circumstance. I struggle vainly in my captivity; no way of freedom is open to me! And yet I can never again resign myself to passive endurance."
"If you only knew how wretched you make me by talking in this strain!"
"I make you wretched, as I have made all others, by my presence here—yes, I know it! You see how ungrateful, how selfish misery has rendered me, since I am cruel even to you whose pure love I never doubted."
Before Bertha could make a fresh attempt to console her cousin, Baptiste entered, bearing a letter. He looked dismayed when he beheld Madeleine's face of woe, and Bertha's tearful countenance; but the latter checked his glance of inquiry by asking abruptly what he wanted.
Still regarding Madeleine with an expression of deep concern, he replied, "The vâlet of Count Damoreau has just left this letter for Mademoiselle Madeleine, and desired that it should be delivered to her at once."
"Very well; that will do."
Bertha took the letter, and motioned to Baptiste to withdraw.
"What can Count Damoreau have to write to you about? Do open the letter and tell me."
"Not now, Bertha. Leave me to myself for a little while. I scarcely know what I am doing or saying. I entreat you to leave me!"
"Madeleine, if I were in trouble, I would not send you from me."
"Go, if you love me! And you—you, at least, do love me!"
"If I love you? I will even leave you to prove that I do; but it is very hard."
Bertha walked slowly away, taking the path that led from the château. In a few moments she paused, turned suddenly, and quickened her steps in the opposite direction, prompted by an impulse to seek Maurice and tell him of Madeleine's grief. Perhaps he might have the power to console her.
Count Tristan had been prevented opening the letters which M. de Bois had delivered. When the two gentlemen reached the château, several visitors were awaiting the count, and their stay was protracted. The instant his guests took their leave, he hastened to the library, which his mother entered at the same moment. He listened impatiently as she briefly recounted the scene which had taken place in the summer-house.
"The time has come when we must put an end to this madness," answered the count; "and I trust that I hold the means in my hands. These are the replies of Madeleine's relations."
He broke one of the seals, and glanced over the contents of the letter, gnawing his under lip as he read.
"Well, my son, what reply?"
"This letter is from M. de Bonneville. He writes that his château is only