C. Despard

“ For sometimes when Margaret felt her strength failing, a sudden fear for Laura's future would take possession of her. If—if—God should take her too from the little one! But that was a possibility at which she dared not glance. To live as she was living, lonely, unloved, was bad enough, but through all its darkness was a gleam of something bright, the hope of a vague, dim to-come, that might possibly bring back her joy. To die was to shut even this out, and for ever; to pass away unforgiven, misunderstood, a stain on her fair fame. ”

“ It is like the look in the eyes of the wild creatures, misery and pain—misery and pain.' Her voice dropped. Into her face came a look of horror as if some vision long driven back were forcing itself upon her. 'How did it come?' she whispered. 'Where does it go? It must be somewhere, even when there is peace. Is it below us, ready, like the wild beasts, to spring at our throats, or does it go away? When we open our eyes there, shall we see it, misery and pain—misery and pain?'
'Grace, for pity's sake, for my sake,' said Tom hoarsely, 'try to forget. ”

“ Ah, mon Dieu! to tell of his sadness! He would have no more to say to the night-spirit who had tempted him; he shut himself up in his dark star; he waited, waited, night after night, thinking that the power and gladness of shining might come back. It did not come; even, it seemed, his star grew blacker as the ages passed, as if the dark spirit were wrapping it round in her heavy plumes. So sad a change! No little children looking up to him, no weary traveller blessing him for his help, no pleasant music sounding from him in the evening; nothing but darkness, sorrow, misery. ”

“ Aglaia, fly for him! Tell him Grace is in a faint. Tom, give her this; she must take it, she must. Heavens! how helpless men are! let me try! Grace, sweetest, it is Trixy, your sister. For her sake! see love!'—her tears were raining over the white hands—'Grace, I shall never be happy again if you leave us! Try this once, and no one shall torture you again as long as you live. One little drop if you love me!' The spoon was between her lips, but it was in vain, she could not swallow. ”

“ For in a case of this kind the man is, perhaps, a greater sufferer than the woman. True, he can wander hither and thither, throwing himself into the stirring life of the world—business, pleasure, excitement; but in the deep, strong nature the sting remains, bitter, poignant, ever present; not the soft sadness of the weaker sex, which in many cases, stooping down under the stroke, reaps the reward of submission in a certain gradual dulling of the pain; but the fierce, angry plunging of a soul that will not yield to dire necessity—that will not look its sorrow in the face and bear it. ”

“ I will hide, breathless, in the jungle; I will listen to the shouts of infuriated mobs that seem to be always at my heels; I will plunge into a river, and strike out for dear life; I will crawl on shore at dead of night to rest my aching limbs, and measure sadly the distance that divides me from my friends; I will listen to tales that make the hair of my flesh stand up with horror, and try feebly to understand that they were our very own—the dear women and fair children that made the rapture of our lives—who have been hacked and hewn, and torn limb from limb, by fiends in human form. ”

“ With long strides L'Estrange passed on through the darkness, for, though the child was in his arms, he did not grow weary. His love prevented him from feeling her a burden.
"I shall only give thee up to one, my treasure," he whispered; and Laura was quite content.
If she was becoming unspeakably dear to her friend, he was also becoming dear to her. In his tenderness and devotion he seemed to clasp her round like a providence. The little one began to think that he must be her father, whatever he might say to the contrary. ”

“ Few of us can have any conception of its horror. From a life that is quiet, simple, and secure, to be plunged all in a moment into the dark, strenuous world of tragedy, nerves strung up, senses on the alert, affection made lurid by passion, heart-consuming anxiety the companion of our solitude. Can we imagine it? If so, we shall have a faint picture of the experiences of many of us in that terrible May and June.
When the Rajah of Gumilcund heard of the uprising, his brain seemed to reel with the shock. His impulse was to go to Meerut himself, but Chunder Singh dissuaded him. ”

“ She thanked them with her gentle smile, gave a sigh of intense contentment; then, after a few moments, fell into a quiet, healthy sleep.
It was this sleep which Adèle had been watching in the dark room until, so quiet and peaceful had been the sleeper's face, the tension on her watcher's nerves was partially relaxed. She turned from that earnest gazing at the pale face, so beautiful in its pure outlines, to look at the outside world—to think and dream and hope. For in the heart of the young hope is ever rampant. ”

“ Anything to equal the climate of this Indian winter Tom had never seen. Morning after morning there would be the same brisk, invigorating air; day after day the same dark blue heavens, unbroken by the lightest cloud, would overarch, like a blessing from the Almighty, the vast plains through which they were travelling; and evening after evening the same rose-lilac hue, wonderful beyond the power of words to describe, would steal over the sky. Hoosanee was their guide, and his ways afforded some amusement and occasionally a little annoyance to his master. ”

“ They are nearer to heaven, nearer to the invisible, than those who have weathered a hundred storms, who have lost their faith in humanity, who have travelled for long years along the dusty highways of the world, tarnishing much of their soul's beauty, and forgetting too often the grandeur of their high destiny.
What wonder that the little ones sometimes see farther than we? for the invisible chord which binds their soul to heaven is, at their tender age, free for the passage to and fro of the angels, and it may be that they whisper to the children of the things that no eye can see. ”

“ Everyone who has seen you must love you. But I think—I think—no one will ever love you as I do. My heart, my soul, my life; everything I have and am are yours, if you will only take them.'
And here suddenly he stops, the eloquent words frozen on his lips. Grace has covered her face with her hands. 'What is it?' he whispers very low. He would draw one of those little hands down and cover it with kisses; but he dares not. In the next instant he is trembling. She has lifted her sad eyes; she is looking at him, looking at him—oh, God!—with the very eyes of his vision. ”

“ It looked like a blot in the dazzle the sunset radiance had cast over Margaret's sight. But the child was at her feet; her heart was moved for its little trouble. She stooped to ask about the sorrow, and with a sudden shock recognized in the weeping little one her own Laura. The child's dress was in disorder; the pretty, fair hair was uncovered by hat or bonnet and flying wildly over her face and neck; her cheeks were stained with tears which seemed to have been flowing abundantly; her little hands were red and sore. ”

“ A breath of cool air, soft and tremulous as the kiss of loving lips, aroused him; and, with a curious sense of refreshment at his heart, he looked out. At first he saw nothing. It was the hollow blackness of a moonless Indian night that smote upon his eyeballs. Then, gradually, he began to see dim ghostly shapes moving in slow procession across the face of the sky. He was aware too of a curious, subdued tumult, multitudinous whisperings, growing, now and then, into a low shriek or wail, and with them a rushing noise as if winged creatures innumerable were sweeping by. ”

“ The face that looked out into the dim night was as strange as the scene could be, though it lacked the utter stillness of the shrouded, moonlit earth. The eyes were wild and wandering, with an impatient, hungry look in them, as though they were searching, seeking, striving to draw from the visible the secrets of that which no eye beholds; the mouth quivered with the storms of feeling; the brow was contracted by a mortal agony, and from time to time the pale lips moved as if in pitiful appeal to some hidden power. But after a few moments of earnest gazing some of all this passed by. ”

“ She did not speak, she did not stir; but as the silence prolonged itself a sigh, soft as the breath of a sleeping child, escaped her lips.
'Vivien!' he said tremulously, 'is that you?'
'Yes, it is I; I am near you. You will come with me, Tom?' she murmured; and, in low caressing tones, 'Dearest Tom!'
'Why do you say that?' he said, hoarsely.
'Listen to him, poor child!' she cried. 'Why? Can't you tell? Can't you imagine?'
'You are false!' he groaned; 'you have said it of yourself!'
'False to others, Tom; never to you!'
'False to one is false to all.'
'Listen to him!' she cried again. ”

“ In a dark phalanx rose before her mind tales of sorrow and wrong; pallid faces passed her by, tones of bitter misery rang in her ears. She covered her face with her hands. "They are the many," she cried, "the great multitude! Why should any think to be happy? God help us! for this is a dreary world." The words were spoken half aloud, for in the momentary despair she had forgotten everything but this—the aching of her own heart, the sadness of a hope-forsaken world. ”

“ She was like one who is in search of something, and who has a clue which makes him believe that he will not be long in ignorance.
Suddenly, like a flash of light in midwinter darkness, there rose before her a scene out of the past—a little room, with bare mud walls and costly furniture: in its midst an Englishwoman, dressed in Oriental robes, and lovely as a vision, with soft eyes and dimpled cheeks, and a little voice like rippling waves on a pebbly shore. She—Grace—is standing before her. Her hands are bound; her face is stained; her garments are dirty and ragged. ”

“ After the delirium which had so nearly been fatal a great calm had fallen upon Margaret. With the touch of Maurice's hand, with the encircling of his arms, the unrest seemed to have fled. She did not look up, apparently she did not know him; but her eyes closed, her breathing became soft and regular, she lay back in his arms contentedly, like a weary child that has found its resting-place.
In times of intense feeling a life seems to be condensed into a moment. ”

“ His tears stopped; his lips set themselves together; his frame seemed to dilate, and the ragged garments which he drew about him were like the raiment of a king. 'Did I say for ever?' he cried out. 'I was wrong. I see the imprisoned spirits rise, and my flesh is stirred, and the hair of my head rises up. The hour of release is coming—it is near. On the dial of eternity it is written. In blood and fire the dominion of the stranger-race shall come to an end.'
'Hush! Hush!' cried Tom. 'You are beside yourself.'
For an instant the man glared at him fiercely, then his eyes fell. ”

“ For it is the good, not the bad in a character, that draws and enchains the loving worship of womanhood.
Where a man reads weakness a woman's keen eye beholds what underlies that weakness, and if it be lovable she is ready to adore.
What L'Estrange wanted was this: A soul to understand the beauty and glory of truth—truth on the lips and truth in the life. To indulge his love of beauty he had wrapped himself in the rose-colored mists of dreams; to preserve himself and others from pain he had never hesitated to resort to falsehood. ”

“ By the time he had reached Grindelwald, the little village in which he intended to stay for some time, even some of his cynicism had melted. Doubtless it was only for the time. Nature can do much, but she cannot really draw the sting of bitter aching from the heart, or give back to the spirit the brightness and elasticity of that fresh time when men are divine and women are earth-angels, and the world is a region of enchantment, a "palace of delights;" even the eternal snows and the grand sights and sounds of the mountain-country may pall upon the eyes and sicken the disappointed heart. ”

“ Whether the troops at Nowgong had been faithful, or whether they had risen, no one at Meerut knew. To poor Lady Elton, watching by her husband, and looking at the pale faces of her girls, as they came and went sorrowfully, doing what they could to help her, it would seem sometimes as if Grace was the dearest of all.
She was her first-born. It was her little plaintive voice, and the touch of her baby-hands, that had awakened in her heart the rapturous joys of motherhood. From beautiful girlhood she had blossomed under her eyes into a womanhood that was no less lovely. ”

“ His words, his looks, his pride in her, the glad confidence of his strong, young manhood,—she felt them once more around her like the pale ghosts of a happy time gone by for ever; but they had been real once, warm, living flesh and blood; and with their holy power they warded off the tempter's influence.
Her first feeling was of burning shame and penitence. Was she then so absolutely weak? Should it be possible for misery and loneliness even to degrade her, to take from her that in which, through all her misery, she had rejoiced—the proud consciousness of unshaken rectitude? ”

“ Flat cakes, the sacrament of union in life and in death, were carried from village to village. From one to another, through the crowded bazaars and markets, and into the temples defrauded of their gains, there flew a mysterious whisper of impending change. It penetrated to the palace where the Ranee sat, nursing her vengeance, and with a rapture, such as she had never hoped to know, her darkened spirit leapt to meet it. Destruction—death—torrents of blood—a great dominion established on strength and cemented by terror, passing away for ever. ”

“ These things preyed upon Adèle's mind. In the darkness and solitude, in the suspension of immediate anxiety, her heart sank, her spirit began with itself humanity's dreary questioning.
Everywhere, everywhere—in the angry cries of the young child, in the quiet sorrow of those of riper years, in the patient sadness of the aged, in the pallor of young faces—it can be read—the why that rises evermore to Heaven, the great mystery of human woe. ”

“ For security is the watchword of our modern life. To be robbed of this—to live consciously, day and night, on the brink of an abyss—to see the earth open, and the subversive forces which are for ever underlying it, break upwards in ravage and desolating fury—to have all our softnesses and superiorities swept away, and, in their place, terror, nakedness and an aching sense of our own insignificance—who of us all can fitly image it? I cannot, I know, although I took part in it all long ago. Yet sometimes, even now, a nightmare vision will flash it all back again. ”

“ Another day and yet another, with no line from Arthur, the consciousness of his devotion, of his thoughtful affection, making his silence the more strange and ominous; winter in its dreary desolation looking in at her from sea and land, telling loudly of the difficulty—even perhaps the danger—of travelling; the life of her friend waning, passing in its miserable famine of all that makes a woman's joy. ”