Sydney C. Grier

“ True, my dear, but what should be the subject? My beloved girl knows that I love her, and to waste paper in repeating assurances of that would be to outdo even a lover’s folly. When the history of one day is told, you have ’em all. Know then that the mornings have been spent seated under the awning on deck, we ladies with our embroidery at hand, to give us a decent semblance of industry, but really occupied in watching for distant sails, or the sight of land, or flying-fishes, or a change of wind, or any of the important nothings that appear of so much moment to the traveller on board ship. ”

“ That you, madam, was joined with your humble correspondent in a common admiration for our incomparable Miss Freyne, is reason enough for me to regard you as my sole remaining friend, and I can’t doubt but Mrs Hurstwood’s worthy spouse will allow me in this melancholy pleasure of reckoning with his lady how much we have both lost. There are at present but two thoughts in my distracted mind, the one to kill the Nabob, the other to fulfil the last pious duties to the mortal (alas that I must write it!) —the mortal remains of my charmer. ”

“ Did you ever know a young woman more sweetly obliging than your Sylvia, Amelia? How otherwise could she have consented to appear at the table of the first general of the age in a horrid limp muslin gown without a hoop, made by her own hands, and a cap hastily fashioned (yes, my dear, I’ll own it) out of one of her spouse’s pocket-handkerchiefs? But there was no other ladies present, so that at least no comparisons could be drawn to her disadvantage, and the gentlemen were all in undress, as was, indeed, only proper at an entertainment held in a captured town in the middle of a campaign. ”

“ Unhappily the remedy fell into the hands of another slave—a rival of the young person in the good graces of the Princess—who mingled poison with it, and succeeded in effecting the death of the favourite. The unhappy event was attributed to me, and had I not fled precipitately to Calcutta, I had fallen a victim to the Begum’s resentment. You are carrying me back to Muxadavad, Beebee, and what can I look for but death? If you enjoyed the Nabob’s favour you might protect your slave, but resolved as you are to withstand him, there’s nothing but destruction for both of us. ”

“ I don’t know what to think, my Amelia. A sudden sound terrifies me. I am ready to run away from the most harmless stranger. I screamed aloud this morning when I came suddenly upon the molly in the garden. Plots and conspiracies seem to be thick on every side of me. I fear, though I don’t dare hint this to my papa, that the words of the Unknown regarding Mrs Freyne’s compact with Mr Menotti may be true, and what a prospect then opens before me! I know how deeply my dear Miss Turnor will pity her unsuspicious Sylvia, who thus finds herself entangled in a web of mysteriousness. ”

“ The last female of our nation in India, Amelia! Is there any use in leaving these records of her fate, when there’s no one can read them or convey them home? Perhaps some future age may bring them to light, and I won’t destroy them. Do you remember my name in your prayers daily, my dear friend, as I do yours, and as we promised to do when we parted? If you knew at this moment that your Sylvia’s earnest prayer was for death, would you have the humanity to join your petitions with hers? If you truly loved your poor girl you would, for death is now her only hope. ”

“ But, on my honour, I don’t think you would find me an unkind spouse. I would never seek to deprive you of the diversions natural to your sex and age; on the contrary, I would feel honoured in attending you to ’em. The desire for knowledge, which displays the ingenious bent of your mind, I would do my best to gratify. Your heart, as I know well, I can’t aspire to possess, but if respect and complaisance could win it, even that treasure would be mine—in short, if Miss Freyne could tolerate me as a spouse, it should go hard with me if she were not happy, or at least contented in her lot. ”

“ Were it not that Colonel Lawrence, Mr Clive’s ancient superior in the Carnatic wars, enjoys but poor health, we would questionless find in him another claimant to the honour. Lying, as I am, in the Admiral’s own house, where I have received such continual and obliging kindness as could not have been exceeded in my own father’s abode, I am in the way of hearing all that goes on from the gentlemen who visit me, full of indignation and resentment, as much almost against Colonel Adlercron and his intimates as against Surajah Dowlah. ”

“ I can well believe it, Amelia. I never look at him if I can help it, for so great is the loathing with which the man inspires me that I can’t bear to meet his eye, but when through inadvertence I have done so, I perceive in it a sort of sombre ferocity united with delight in my sufferings that makes me tremble. Can my dear Miss Turnor figure to herself the being forced to enter a tyger’s cage for the purpose of diverting the tyger? Which would be the worse, does she think, this, or that the tyger should be so obliging as to exert himself to entertain you? ”

“ Then I remembered everything—the Captain’s disguising me, my papa’s death, our being hurried into the black hole of the Fort, and the awful night that we passed in that horrid prison. Reaching this point, my spirits could no longer endure the recollections that came crowding upon ’em, and I burst into a passion of sobs and tears that seemed as if it could never cease, so that the old woman, who stood patiently by, became alarmed, and sought to quiet me.
“Alas, Beebee,” she said, “why should a young lady of your fine prospects indulge yourself in such transports of grief? ”

“ Could any assembly of motives have been so strong as the desire to save her own reputation, not only in the eyes of Calcutta, but in those of her spouse, and to deliver the whole factory from destruction? One can’t feel surprised that your poor Sylvia’s preferences weighed but lightly in the opposite balance. But what a Sabbath was this, my dear, beginning in so awful a manner, for Mrs Freyne, for your unhappy girl and her honoured papa, and for the wretched Menotti! ”

“ But here I thought that Mr Watts was gone too far, for the unfortunate lady fell back against the goods behind her, as pale as death. “Alas!” she murmured, “must I involve yet another in the miseries I bring on all concerned with me—and this one my brave deliverer?”
“Nay, madam,” cried Mr Watts, “the young gentleman is of opinion that you may compensate him if you will for any risques to which he may have been exposed. But, as I was saying, who could expect Miss Freyne to sacrifice herself for such an insignificant person?” ”

“ There, Amelia! ’Tis now two in the afternoon, and this pencilled chitt, which reached me about an hour back, contains the latest intelligence we possess. All the morning I have spent at the top of the tower, with every man of our sick garrison that was strong enough to climb so high, watching for messengers, and listening to the distant sound of cannon brought to us on the wind. At noon the rain began again, and drove me indoors and to my writing, and so far as we can discern, forced the cannonade almost entirely to cease. I had no notion that a battle took so long to fight, had you, Amelia? ”

“ The fearful news that my dearest girl had been carried into the most frightful and revolting slavery imaginable threw me at first into such a sickness that both Dr Knox and a Dutch physician from the factory here predicted my immediate dissolution, but, sir, I can’t, I won’t die, while my Sylvia needs a disinterested friend. If I can do no more than incite you to attempt her deliverance, I shan’t have lived in vain, but I fear that I don’t trust Mr Fraser sufficiently to die happy until I have seen him actually successful. ”

“ Since my last writing, Amelia, I have endured three interviews with Sinzaun. Such is the horrible cunning of this wicked man, that he don’t present himself at regular intervals, nor inform me of his intended visit until a short time before he appears, so that I spend my whole time with the dread hanging over me of being suddenly confronted with him. This garden seems to be haunted with his image; the slightest footstep—even a shadow falling on the path—drives me into an agony of fear, and the wretch can’t help perceiving, when he comes, the condition my terror throws me into. ”

“ Truly, my dear, I can conceive nothing that would grieve me more than to disappoint the dear gentleman in any particular, though I fear I shall never attain to the high ideal he has so obligingly formed of me. My Amelia would, I am convinced, discover a perpetual fund of amusement in the mutual dread which Mr Fraser and I entertain of losing each other’s good opinion. I must tell her that so many years spent on shipboard have rendered my spouse an adept in what he prefers to call making things fast. ”

“ Their stupidity must be assumed, Amelia, for if I spoke Moors as badly as they pretend, how could I make Misery understand me, which she does without the smallest difficulty? The truth is, my dear, that it’s useless to seek to work upon people of this sort without you have money to offer ’em, and that I have not, and they know it. Had I command of sufficient sums, I believe I might be able to buy over even Misery herself, for I have seen her eyes sparkle with avarice when I hinted at the quantity of rupees my friends would pay were I restored to them. ”

“ Do you remember that there’s not a person in India would be willing to shelter me; or, if willing, would not be deterred by fear of Sinzaun and the Nabob? And how should an unhappy creature, that has already contributed to destroy her country’s settlements here, have the assurance to involve any other community, as that of the Armenians or the Prussians, in her misfortunes? But even to do this further mischief I must find means to leave this house, and how? Misery, the only creature I speak to, and that will speak to me, is impenetrable, incorruptible. ”

“ Do you think I shall be like that soon, Amelia? How melancholy must life appear when one can take no delight in such beauties as are to be observed around one, and all for thinking of those upon which one placed but little value when one possessed ’em! But sure the whole polite world, and not only the unhappy exiles that, like myself, have most probably bid farewell to Britain for ever, would cry shame on me for comparing the poor barbarous works of the pagans here with the handiwork of Europe. ”

“ But you must understand now that for a female that is a Christian and a Briton there could be no greater disgrace and wretchedness than to become the Nabob’s slave, as you propose, were he ten times as great and rich as the Emperor of Delly himself. I can die, if it please Heaven so to decree, but I had rather die a hundred times over than purchase a dishonoured life by a weak compliance. ”

“ Miss Hamlin has used me kindly enough, yet with the contemptuous kindness that says nothing better could be expected from a boarding-school miss, and I must do my best to find happiness in the future in a strict obedience to the commands of my dear papa. But oh, Amelia, if only Mr Freyne were a Papist, as Mrs Hamlin once said! Sure you’ll think I am gone mad, but I mean that in that case he might suffer me to follow my own inclinations, and lead a single life. Why is it that parents will never allow their daughters in this mode of life? ”