The Black Dwarf by Walter Scott (e book free reading txt) 📖

of him who gave life to you. So soon as I foresaw the excesses into which his headlong passion (for, to do him justice, I believe his unreasonable conduct arises from excess of attachment to you) was likely to hurry him, I endeavoured, by finding a plausible pretext for your absence for some weeks, to extricate myself from the dilemma in which I am placed. For this purpose I wished, in case your objections to the match continued insurmountable, to have sent you privately for a few months to the convent of your maternal aunt at Paris. By a series of mistakes you have been brought from the place of secrecy and security which I had destined for your temporary abode. Fate has baffled my last chance of escape, and I have only to give you my blessing, and send you from the castle with Mr. Ratcliffe, who now leaves it; my own fate will soon be decided.”

“Good Heaven, sir! can this be possible?” exclaimed Isabella. “O, why was I freed from the restraint in which you placed me? or why did you not impart your pleasure to me?”

“Think an instant, Isabella. Would you have had me prejudice in your opinion the friend I was most desirous of serving, by communicating to you the injurious eagerness with which he pursued his object? Could I do so honourably, having promised to assist his suit?—But it is all over, I and Mareschal have made up our minds to die like men; it only remains to send you from hence under a safe escort.”

“Great powers! and is there no remedy?” said the terrified young woman.

“None, my child,” answered Vere, gently, “unless one which you would not advise your father to adopt—to be the first to betray his friends.”

“O, no! no!” she answered, abhorrently yet hastily, as if to reject the temptation which the alternative presented to her. “But is there no other hope—through flight—through mediation—through supplication?—I will bend my knee to Sir Frederick!”

“It would be a fruitless degradation; he is determined on his course, and I am equally resolved to stand the hazard of my fate. On one condition only he will turn aside from his purpose, and that condition my lips shall never utter to you.”

“Name it, I conjure you, my dear father!” exclaimed Isabella. “What CAN he ask that we ought not to grant, to prevent the hideous catastrophe with which you are threatened?”

“That, Isabella,” said Vere, solemnly, “you shall never know, until your father’s head has rolled on the bloody scaffold; then, indeed, you will learn there was one sacrifice by which he might have been saved.”

“And why not speak it now?” said Isabella; “do you fear I would flinch from the sacrifice of fortune for your preservation? or would you bequeath me the bitter legacy of life-long remorse, so oft as I shall think that you perished, while there remained one mode of preventing the dreadful misfortune that overhangs you?”

“Then, my child,” said Vere, “since you press me to name what I would a thousand times rather leave in silence, I must inform you that he will accept for ransom nothing but your hand in marriage, and that conferred before midnight this very evening!”

“This evening, sir?” said the young lady, struck with horror at the proposal—“and to such a man!—A man?—a monster, who could wish to win the daughter by threatening the life of the father—it is impossible!”

“You say right, my child,” answered her father, “it is indeed impossible; nor have I either the right or the wish to exact such a sacrifice—It is the course of nature that the old should die and be forgot, and the young should live and be happy.”

“My father die, and his child can save him!—but no—no—my dear father, pardon me, it is impossible; you only wish to guide me to your wishes. I know your object is what you think my happiness, and this dreadful tale is only told to influence my conduct and subdue my scruples.”

“My daughter,” replied Ellieslaw, in a tone where offended authority seemed to struggle with parental affection, “my child suspects me of inventing a false tale to work upon her feelings! Even this I must bear, and even from this unworthy suspicion I must descend to vindicate myself. You know the stainless honour of your cousin Mareschal—mark what I shall write to him, and judge from his answer, if the danger in which we stand is not real, and whether I have not used every means to avert it.”

He sate down, wrote a few lines hastily, and handed them to Isabella, who, after repeated and painful efforts, cleared her eyes and head sufficiently to discern their purport.

“Dear cousin,” said the billet, “I find my daughter, as I expected, in despair at the untimely and premature urgency of Sir Frederick Langley. She cannot even comprehend the peril in which we stand, or how much we are in his power—Use your influence with him, for Heaven’s sake, to modify proposals, to the acceptance of which I cannot, and will not, urge my child against all her own feelings, as well as those of delicacy and propriety, and oblige your loving cousin,—R. V.”

In the agitation of the moment, when her swimming eyes and dizzy brain could hardly comprehend the sense of what she looked upon, it is not surprising that Miss Vere should have omitted to remark that this letter seemed to rest her scruples rather upon the form and time of the proposed union, than on a rooted dislike to the suitor proposed to her. Mr. Vere rang the bell, and gave the letter to a servant to be delivered to Mr. Mareschal, and, rising from his chair, continued to traverse the apartment in silence and in great agitation until the answer was returned. He glanced it over, and wrung the hand of his daughter as he gave it to her. The tenor was as follows:—

“My dear kinsman, I have already urged the knight on the point you mention, and I find him as fixed as Cheviot. I am truly sorry my fair cousin should be pressed to give up any of her maidenly rights. Sir Frederick consents, however, to leave the castle with me the instant the ceremony is performed, and we will raise our followers and begin the fray. Thus there is great hope the bridegroom may be knocked on the head before he and the bride can meet again, so Bell has a fair chance to be Lady Langley A TRES BON MARCHE. For the rest, I can only say, that if she can make up her mind to the alliance at all—it is no time for mere maiden ceremony—my pretty cousin must needs consent to marry in haste, or we shall all repent at leisure, or rather have very little leisure to repent; which is all at present from him who rests your affectionate kinsman,—R. M.”

“P.S.—Tell Isabella that I would rather cut the knight’s throat after all, and end the dilemma that way, than see her constrained to marry him against her will.”

When Isabella had read this letter, it dropped from her hand, and she would, at the same time, have fallen from her chair, had she not been supported by her father.

“My God, my child will die!” exclaimed Vere, the feelings of nature overcoming, even in HIS breast, the sentiments of selfish policy; “look up, Isabella—look up, my child—come what will, you shall not be the sacrifice—I will