The World Before Them Volume Ii Part 9

But it was to describe Dorothy's interview with Lord Wilton, and not to moralize on love and disappointment that we commenced this chapter.

The n.o.bleman dismounted from his horse, and accosted his _protegee_ with his usual kindness, and inquired with great earnestness of look and tone, "If Gilbert Rushmere had been down to see her, and if she was pleased with his promotion."

The first question she promptly replied to in the negative. His lords.h.i.+p seemed surprised and annoyed. "With regard to his promotion," she said, "his parents could but be pleased and gratified, and the young soldier spoke of it with the deepest grat.i.tude."

"But what do you think of it, Dorothy? Will his good fortune make you happy?"

The young girl's lips quivered. She grew very red, then turned as pale as ashes, but mastering her emotion, she answered with tolerable self-command.

"I hope so for his parents' sake."

"Not for your own, Dorothy."

Dorothy's voice dropped almost to a whisper, as she stammered out: "Oh, my lord, don't ask me, I have really not the courage to speak about it."

"But, my dear girl, I must know the reason of this distress. I thought you and Gilbert were one?"

"I thought so once." She looked down and pressed her hands tightly over her breast. "My lord, Gilbert Rushmere has forgotten me."

"The traitor."

"Do not blame him too severely, my lord. Perhaps I have been too harsh in my condemnation. It is not his fault that I placed too high an estimate on his character, was too confident in his love. He has only acted according to his nature. He has not deceived me, I have suffered my affection for him to blind my eyes to his faults."

"My n.o.ble girl, I cannot suffer you to excuse him by taking the blame of such selfish, heartless conduct on yourself."

"Ah, my lord, we are all more or less selfish and the creatures of circ.u.mstance; while I continued to love Gilbert, his desertion seemed to me very dreadful; the anguish it gave me was almost more than I could bear, but now when it is all over, and I can think of it calmly, I see it in a very different light. While we lived in the same house, learned from the same books, and worked together in the same fields, there was a natural equality between us. But since Gilbert has acquired a higher position, a.s.sociated with well educated people, and seen more of the great world, he feels a superiority over me, of which he was before entirely ignorant. He has advanced, while I remain in the same position in which he left me, a servant, in his father's house."

Lord Wilton winced. "An adopted daughter, I thought."

"Ah, my lord! truth is truth. I may deserve to be so considered, and as far as dear Mrs. Rushmere is concerned I enjoy the love and confidence of a child. With the old man I am only his servant."

Lord Wilton sighed heavily. Dorothy's speech evidently pained him, but he made no comment upon it. He walked on by her side for some minutes in silence. "And what led you to conclude that Gilbert Rushmere had forgotten you?"

"Simply, my lord, because he has ceased to mention me in his letters, and talks of marrying some one else."

"Very conclusive reasons, my poor child. But are you certain that this is no jealous freak on your part, but really a deliberate act of desertion on his?"

"I never was jealous of Gilbert in my life," and Dorothy drew herself up with no little dignity, "my faith in his love was too great for that."

"Which makes your present disappointment harder to bear."

"Yes, my lord," and Dorothy drew a long sigh, "but I feel it less than I did a month ago. The heart knows its own bitterness; a stranger cannot enter into its joys or sorrows. So the Scriptures say. I do not quote the pa.s.sage correctly, but it is something to that effect. My mind has been more tranquil, since I knew for certain that I could never be Gilbert Rushmere's wife."

"He may see his folly, Dorothy, and return to his first love."

"My lord, that is impossible. Love is a stream that always flows onward; it never returns to fill the channel that it has deserted and left dry.

You might as well try to collect the shower that the thirsty earth drank up yesterday. Love once dead, can never revive again or wear the same aspect that it did at first, for the spirit that kindled it is gone, and what you once adored is only a silent corpse."

"You are resigned to the loss of your lover?"

"My lord, it is all for the best. Gilbert was the idol to whom I gave the undivided wors.h.i.+p of my whole heart. G.o.d in his mercy saw fit to dash it in pieces. Let us leave the fragments in the dust, and speak of them no more."

"So young and so wise," mused the Earl, regarding his companion with intense interest. "How have you learned to bear so great a sorrow with such heroic fort.i.tude?"

"I employed my hands constantly in useful labour, which kept me from pondering continually over painful thoughts. There is no better remedy for acute sorrow. I have always found it so; it gives strength both to the body and mind. But it was not this alone, my lord, which reconciled me to my grief." She paused a moment. Lord Wilton waved his hands impatiently.

"Go on, Dorothy, I am listening intently. What was your next step?"

"I sought the advice and a.s.sistance of a higher power than my own. I laid my poor broken heart in the dust at His feet, and poured the anguish of my soul before Him. He heard my bitter cry, 'Save me Lord, for I perish,' and lifted me out of the deep waters as they closed over me. From that hour, I have clung to Him for help with the same confidence that a little child clings to the bosom of its mother. I know and feel that all He does is right, and that He does not causelessly afflict the children of men."

"The difficulty is in recognizing that our trials and sufferings are from G.o.d," said the Earl, "G.o.d the all merciful. I fear, Dorothy, that I should find your remedy very inefficient when applied to an incurable sorrow."

"Ah, do try it, my lord," said Dorothy, with great earnestness. "It may be slow in its operations, but in the end it never fails. There is no sorrow that is _incurable_, if you will only bring it to the foot of the cross, and lay it down there. It will melt away from your soul, like the mist before the rising sun--and when you contemplate the blessed Saviour in His terrible death agony, and remember that He bore it all for such as you, your sufferings will appear light indeed when compared with His, and you will learn from Him the truth--the glorious truth that will set you free from the bondage of sin and the fear of death. That makes slaves and cowards of us all."

"Softly, my dear girl. I want the faith to realize all this. Do you speak from your own experience, or only repeat the lessons taught you by Henry Martin?"

"I speak of that which I have known and felt," said Dorothy, emphatically. "Of that which has taught me to bear patiently a great affliction, that has reconciled me to a hard lot, and brought me nearer to G.o.d. I can now bless Him for my past trials. If I had never known trouble, I should never have exchanged it for His easy yoke, or felt a divine peace flowing out of grief."

"I do not doubt your word, Dorothy. I am a miserable man, overwhelmed with the consciousness of guilt, without the power to repent."

"Oh, my lord, this cannot be, and you so good and kind. If you are a bad man, where in this world shall we look for a righteous one?"

"My poor child, you know little of the world, and still less of me. You esteem me happy, because I am rich and high-born, deriving from my wealth and position the means of helping others who are dest.i.tute of these advantages. There is no real merit in this. I cannot bear to witness physical suffering; and give from my abundance that I may be relieved from the sight of it."

"But you confer a benefit upon the poor by relieving their necessities, which must be acceptable in the sight of G.o.d."

"I fear not. Infinite wisdom looks deeper into these things than short-sighted men, and the motive which induces the act is of more value in His sight than the mere act. I have more money than I can use, and possess every luxury and comfort that gold can buy. It is no sacrifice to me giving to the poor. I really lose nothing, and my vanity is pleased by the admiration they express at my generosity; I often feel deeply humiliated by the self-approbation induced by these trifling donations."

"I wish there were more people in the world like your lords.h.i.+p."

"Dorothy, Dorothy! you see before you a wretched conscience-stricken creature, who would gladly give all that he has in the world for the peace of mind you say that you enjoy. You, like the rest of my neighbours, think me little short of perfection, for to most people the outward and tangible is always the real. But, alas, I know myself better. Listen to me, Dorothy, while I give you a page from my life's history, which will show your benefactor in a new light."

Dorothy looked wonderingly up into her companion's face. His brow was knitted, his lips firmly compressed, and the sorrowful expression of his pale face almost bordered on despair. She shuddered, and tears involuntarily filled her eyes. Was this new idol going to resolve itself into a mere image of clay? If he were no better than other men, where in this world would she find truth? Dorothy was grieved and perplexed, but she walked on in silence till the Earl again spoke.

"I confide more willingly in you, Dorothy, because, like me you have realized the great agony of having loved and lost. Yes, I loved as my own soul a young girl as pure and artless as yourself. She held a dependent and subordinate situation, and was far beneath me in rank. But beauty is a great equalizer, and I never for a moment considered that n.o.ble creature my inferior. I sought her love, and won her whole heart, but circ.u.mstances prevented me from taking her by the hand, and publicly acknowledging her as my wife to the world, and I sacrificed to the Moloch of wealth and power her happiness and my own, and blasted for ever the only wealth she possessed, a pure and unsullied name."

"Oh, my lord, how could you do so?"

"Ah! how indeed. I ask myself a thousand times a-day the same torturing question. The fear of what people would say, Dorothy--the dread of poverty--of loss of caste--for I was not at that time an elder son, made me a coward and a fool. I left her--left the woman I adored to struggle through the difficulty in which I had placed her, single-handed and alone.

"I was appointed _attache_ to a foreign emba.s.sy, and left England for several years, and was only recalled to inherit my present t.i.tle, and all the large property that fell to me by the death of an uncle, and that of my eldest brother. No longer deterred from doing her justice by the base fear of losing these advantages, I sought her in her old home, my mother having dismissed her in disgrace from her service. Here I found that her cruel grandmother had driven her forth into the streets, and all traces of her had been lost. For seventeen years I have sought her sorrowing through the world, to make reparation for my selfishness and cruelty; but her fate remains a mystery, and the only clue that I have obtained of her probable history, fills my mind with shame and remorse. I can no longer wipe this foul stain from her memory if I would.

"You look at me in surprise and horror, Dorothy. Can you still think me a good and great man. See how you have been deceived in your estimate of me."

Tears were in the Earl's eyes and on his pale cheeks. Dorothy looked down to hide her own.

"My lord," she said, in a soft low voice, "you have been very unfortunate, and perhaps are less guilty than you think yourself, and oh, I pity you with my whole heart."