Peveril of the Peak

“You err, Alice, you err,” cried Julian eagerly. “That I hold this language – that the son of Peveril addresses thus the daughter of your father – that he thus kneels to you for forgiveness of injuries which passed when we were both infants, shows the will of Heaven, that in our affection should be quenched the discord of our parents. What else could lead those who parted infants on the hills of Derbyshire, to meet thus in the valleys of Man?”

Alice, however new such a scene, and, above all, her own emotions, might be, was highly endowed with that exquisite delicacy which is imprinted in the female heart, to give warning of the slightest approach to impropriety in a situation like hers.

“Rise, rise, Master Peveril,” she said; “do not do yourself and me this injustice – we have done both wrong – very wrong; but my fault was done in ignorance. O God! my poor father, who needs comfort so much – is it for me to add to his misfortunes? Rise!” she added more firmly; “if you retain this unbecoming posture any longer, I will leave the room and you shall never see me more.”

The commanding tone of Alice overawed the impetuosity of her lover, who took in silence a seat removed to some distance from hers, and was again about to speak. “Julian,” said she in a milder tone, “you have spoken enough, and more than enough. Would you had left me in the pleasing dream in which I could have listened to you for ever! but the hour of wakening is arrived.” Peveril waited the prosecution of her speech as a criminal while he waits his doom; for he was sufficiently sensible that an answer, delivered not certainly without emotion, but with firmness and resolution, was not to be interrupted. “We have done wrong,” she repeated, “very wrong; and if we now separate for ever, the pain we may feel will be but a just penalty for our error. We should never have met: meeting, we should part as soon as possible. Our farther intercourse can but double our pain at parting. Farewell, Julian; and forget we ever have seen each other!”

“Forget!” said Julian; “never, never. To you, it is easy to speak the word – to think the thought. To me, an approach to either can only be by utter destruction. Why should you doubt that the feud of our fathers, like so many of which we have heard, might be appeased by our friendship? You are my only friend. I am the only one whom Heaven has assigned to you. Why should we separate for the fault of others, which befell when we were but children?”

“You speak in vain, Julian,” said Alice; “I pity you – perhaps I pity myself – indeed, I should pity myself, perhaps, the most of the two; for you will go forth to new scenes and new faces, and will soon forget me; but, I, remaining in this solitude, how shall I forget? – that, however, is not now the question – I can bear my lot, and it commands us to part.”

“Hear me yet a moment,” said Peveril; “this evil is not, cannot be remediless. I will go to my father, – I will use the intercession of my mother, to whom he can refuse nothing – I will gain their consent – they have no other child – and they must consent, or lose him for ever. Say, Alice, if I come to you with my parents’ consent to my suit, will you again say, with that tone so touching and so sad, yet so incredibly determined – Julian, we must part?” Alice was silent. “Cruel girl, will you not even deign to answer me?” said her lover.

“I would refer you to my father,” said Alice, blushing and casting her eyes down; but instantly raising them again, she repeated, in a firmer and a sadder tone, “Yes, Julian, I would refer you to my father; and you would find that your pilot, Hope, had deceived you; and that you had but escaped the quicksands to fall upon the rocks.”

“I would that could be tried!” said Julian. “Methinks I could persuade your father that in ordinary eyes our alliance is not undesirable. My family have fortune, rank, long descent – all that fathers look for when they bestow a daughter’s hand.”

“All this would avail you nothing,” said Alice. “The spirit of my father is bent upon the things of another world; and if he listened to hear you out, it would be but to tell you that he spurned your offers.”

“You know not – you know not, Alice,” said Julian. “Fire can soften iron – thy father’s heart cannot be so hard, or his prejudices so strong, but I shall find some means to melt him. Forbid me not – Oh, forbid me not at least the experiment!”

“I can but advise,” said Alice; “I can forbid you nothing; for, to forbid, implies power to command obedience. But if you will be wise, and listen to me – Here, and on this spot, we part for ever!”

“Not so, by Heaven!” said Julian, whose bold and sanguine temper scarce saw difficulty in attaining aught which he desired. “We now part, indeed, but it is that I may return armed with my parents’ consent. They desire that I should marry – in their last letters they pressed it more openly – they shall have their desire; and such a bride as I will present to them has not graced their house since the Conqueror gave it origin. Farewell, Alice! Farewell, for a brief space!”

She replied, “Farewell, Julian! Farewell for ever!”

Julian, within a week of this interview, was at Martindale Castle, with the view of communicating his purpose. But the task which seems easy at a distance, proves as difficult, upon a nearer approach, as the fording of a river, which from afar appeared only a brook. There lacked not opportunities of entering upon the subject; for in the first ride which he took with his father, the Knight resumed the subject of his son’s marriage, and liberally left the lady to his choice; but under the strict proviso, that she was of a loyal and an honourable family; – if she had fortune, it was good and well, or rather, it was better than well; but if she was poor, why, “there is still some picking,” said Sir Geoffrey, “on the bones of the old estate; and Dame Margaret and I will be content with the less, that you young folks may have your share of it. I am turned frugal already, Julian. You see what a north-country shambling bit of a Galloway nag I ride upon – a different beast, I wot, from my own old Black Hastings, who had but one fault, and that was his wish to turn down Moultrassie avenue.”

“Was that so great a fault?” said Julian, affecting indifference, while his heart was trembling, as it seemed to him, almost in his very throat.

“It used to remind me of that base, dishonourable Presbyterian fellow, Bridgenorth,” said Sir Geoffrey; “and I would as lief think of a toad: – they say he has turned Independent, to accomplish the full degree of rascality. – I tell you, Gill, I turned off the cow-boy, for gathering nuts in his woods – I would hang a dog that would so much as kill a hare there. – But what is the matter with you? You look pale.”

Julian made some indifferent answer, but too well understood, from the language and tone which his father used, that his prejudices against Alice’s father were both deep and envenomed, as those of country gentlemen often become, who, having little to do or think of, are but too apt to spend their time in nursing and cherishing petty causes of wrath against their next neighbours.

In the course of the same day, he mentioned the Bridgenorth to his mother, as if in a casual manner. But the Lady Peveril instantly conjured him never to mention the name, especially in his father’s presence.

“Was that Major Bridgenorth, of whom I have heard the name mentioned,” said Julian, “so very bad a neighbour?”

“I do not say so,” said Lady Peveril; “nay, we were more than once obliged to him, in the former unhappy times; but your father and he took some passages so ill at each other’s hands, that the least allusion to him disturbs Sir Geoffrey’s temper, in a manner quite unusual, and which, now that his health is somewhat impaired, is sometimes alarming to me. For Heaven’s sake, then, my dear Julian, avoid upon all occasions the slightest allusion to Moultrassie, or any of its inhabitants.”

This warning was so seriously given, that Julian himself saw that mentioning his secret purpose would be the sure way to render it abortive, and therefore he returned disconsolate to the Isle.

Peveril had the boldness, however, to make the best he could of what had happened, by requesting an interview with Alice, in order to inform her what had passed betwixt his parents and him on her account. It was with great difficulty that this boon was obtained; and Alice Bridgenorth showed no slight degree of displeasure, when she discovered, after much circumlocution, and many efforts to give an air of importance to what he had to communicate, that all amounted but to this, that Lady Peveril continued to retain a favourable opinion of her father, Major Bridgenorth, which Julian would fain have represented as an omen of their future more perfect reconciliation.

“I did not think you would thus have trifled with me, Master Peveril,” said Alice, assuming an air of dignity; “but I will take care to avoid such intrusion in future – I request you will not again visit the Black Fort; and I entreat of you, good Mistress Debbitch, that you will no longer either encourage or permit this gentleman’s visits, as the result of such persecution will be to compel me to appeal to my aunt and father for another place of residence, and perhaps also for another and more prudent companion.”

This last hint struck Mistress Deborah with so much terror, that she joined her ward in requiring and demanding Julian’s instant absence, and he was obliged to comply with their request. But the courage of a youthful lover is not easily subdued; and Julian, after having gone through the usual round of trying to forget his ungrateful mistress, and entertaining his passion with augmented violence, ended by the visit to the Black Fort, the beginning of which we narrated in the last chapter.

We then left him anxious for, yet almost fearful of, an interview with Alice, which he prevailed upon Deborah to solicit; and such was the tumult of his mind, that, while he traversed the parlour, it seemed to him that the dark melancholy eyes of the slaughtered Christian’s portrait followed him wherever he went, with the fixed, chill, and ominous glance, which announced to the enemy of his race mishap and misfortune.

The door of the apartment opened at length, and these visions were dissipated.

CHAPTER XIII

         Parents have flinty hearts! No tears can move them.– OTWAY.

When Alice Bridgenorth at length entered the parlour where her anxious lover had so long expected her, it was with a slow step, and a composed manner. Her dress was arranged with an accurate attention to form, which at once enhanced the appearance of its puritanic simplicity, and struck Julian as a bad omen; for although the time bestowed upon the toilet may, in many cases, intimate the wish to appear advantageously at such an interview, yet a ceremonious arrangement of attire is very much allied with formality, and a preconceived determination to treat a lover with cold politeness.

The sad-coloured gown – the pinched and plaited cap, which carefully obscured the profusion of long dark-brown hair – the small ruff, and the long sleeves, would have appeared to great disadvantage on a shape less graceful than Alice Bridgenorth’s; but an exquisite form, though not, as yet, sufficiently rounded in the outlines to produce the perfection of female beauty, was able to sustain and give grace even to this unbecoming dress. Her countenance, fair and delicate, with eyes of hazel, and a brow of alabaster, had, notwithstanding, less regular beauty than her form, and might have been justly subjected to criticism. There was, however, a life and spirit in her gaiety, and a depth of sentiment in her gravity, which made Alice, in conversation with the very few persons with whom she associated, so fascinating in her manners and expression, whether of language or countenance – so touching, also, in her simplicity and purity of thought, that brighter beauties might have been overlooked in her company. It was no wonder, therefore, that an ardent character like Julian, influenced by these charms, as well as by the secrecy and mystery attending his intercourse with Alice, should prefer the recluse of the Black Fort to all others with whom he had become acquainted in general society.

His heart beat high as she came into the apartment, and it was almost without an attempt to speak that his profound obeisance acknowledged her entrance.

“This is a mockery, Master Peveril,” said Alice, with an effort to speak firmly, which yet was disconcerted by a slightly tremulous inflection of voice – “a mockery, and a cruel one. You come to this lone place, inhabited only by two women, too simple to command your absence – too weak to enforce it – you come, in spite of my earnest request – to the neglect of your own time – to the prejudice, I may fear, of my character – you abuse the influence you possess over the simple person to whom I am entrusted – All this you do, and think to make up by low reverences and constrained courtesy! Is this honourable, or is it fair? – Is it,” she added, after a moment’s hesitation – “is it kind?”

The tremulous accent fell especially on the last word she uttered, and it was spoken in a low tone of gentle reproach, which went to Julian’s heart.

“If,” said he, “there was a mode by which, at the peril of my life, Alice, I could show my regard – my respect – my devoted tenderness – the danger would be dearer to me than ever was pleasure.”

“You have said such things often,” said Alice, “and they are such as I ought not to hear, and do not desire to hear. I have no tasks to impose on you – no enemies to be destroyed – no need or desire of protection – no wish, Heaven knows, to expose you to danger – It is your visits here alone to which danger attaches. You have but to rule your own wilful temper – to turn your thoughts and your cares elsewhere, and I can have nothing to ask – nothing to wish for. Use your own reason – consider the injury you do yourself – the injustice you do us – and let me, once more, in fair terms, entreat you to absent yourself from this place – till – till – ”

She paused, and Julian eagerly interrupted her. – “Till when, Alice? – till when? – impose on me any length of absence which your severity can inflict, short of a final separation – Say, Begone for years, but return when these years are over; and, slow and wearily as they must pass away, still the thought that they must at length have their period, will enable me to live through them. Let me, then, conjure thee, Alice, to name a date – to fix a term – to say till when!”

“Till you can bear to think of me only as a friend and sister.”

“That is a sentence of eternal banishment indeed!” said Julian; “it is seeming, no doubt, to fix a term of exile, but attaching to it an impossible condition.”

“And why impossible, Julian?” said Alice, in a tone of persuasion; “were we not happier ere you threw the mask from your own countenance, and tore the veil from my foolish eyes? Did we not meet with joy, spend our time happily, and part cheerily, because we transgressed no duty, and incurred no self-reproach? Bring back that state of happy ignorance, and you shall have no reason to call me unkind. But while you form schemes which I know to be visionary, and use language of such violence and passion, you shall excuse me if I now, and once for all, declare, that since Deborah shows herself unfit for the trust reposed in her, and must needs expose me to persecutions of this nature, I will write to my father, that he may fix me another place of residence; and in the meanwhile I will take shelter with my aunt at Kirk-Truagh.”

“Hear me, unpitying girl,” said Peveril, “hear me, and you shall see how devoted I am to obedience, in all that I can do to oblige you! You say you were happy when we spoke not on such topics – well – at all expense of my own suppressed feelings, that happy period shall return. I will meet you – walk with you – read with you – but only as a brother would with his sister, or a friend with his friend; the thoughts I may nourish, be they of hope or of despair, my tongue shall not give birth to, and therefore I cannot offend; Deborah shall be ever by your side, and her presence shall prevent my even hinting at what might displease you – only do not make a crime to me of those thoughts which are the dearest part of my existence; for believe me it were better and kinder to rob me of existence itself.”

“This is the mere ecstasy of passion, Julian,” answered Alice Bridgenorth; “that which is unpleasant, our selfish and stubborn will represents as impossible. I have no confidence in the plan you propose – no confidence in your resolution, and less than none in the protection of Deborah. Till you can renounce, honestly and explicitly, the wishes you have lately expressed, we must be strangers; – and could you renounce them even at this moment, it were better that we should part for a long time; and, for Heaven’s sake, let it be as soon as possible – perhaps it is even now too late to prevent some unpleasant accident – I thought I heard a noise.”

“It was Deborah,” answered Julian. “Be not afraid, Alice; we are secure against surprise.”

“I know not,” said Alice, “what you mean by such security – I have nothing to hide. I sought not this interview; on the contrary, averted it as long as I could – and am now most desirous to break it off.”

“And wherefore, Alice, since you say it must be our last? Why should you shake the sand which is passing so fast? the very executioner hurries not the prayers of the wretches upon the scaffold. – And see you not – I will argue as coldly as you can desire – see you not that you are breaking your own word, and recalling the hope which yourself held out to me?”

“What hope have I suggested? What word have I given, Julian?” answered Alice. “You yourself build wild hopes in the air, and accuse me of destroying what had never any earthly foundation. Spare yourself, Julian – spare me – and in mercy to us both depart, and return not again till you can be more reasonable.”

“Reasonable?” replied Julian; “it is you, Alice, who will deprive me altogether of reason. Did you not say, that if our parents could be brought to consent to our union, you would no longer oppose my suit?”

“No – no – no,” said Alice eagerly, and blushing deeply, – “I did not say so, Julian – it was your own wild imagination which put construction on my silence and my confusion.”

“You do not say so, then?” answered Julian; “and if all other obstacles were removed, I should find one in the cold flinty bosom of her who repays the most devoted and sincere affection with contempt and dislike? – Is that,” he added, in a deep tone of feeling – “is that what Alice Bridgenorth says to Julian Peveril?”

“Indeed – indeed, Julian,” said the almost weeping girl, “I do not say so – I say nothing, and I ought not to say anything concerning what I might do, in a state of things which can never take place. Indeed, Julian, you ought not thus to press me. Unprotected as I am – wishing you well – very well – why should you urge me to say or do what would lessen me in my own eyes? to own affection for one from whom fate has separated me for ever? It is ungenerous – it is cruel – it is seeking a momentary and selfish gratification to yourself, at the expense of every feeling which I ought to entertain.”

“You have said enough, Alice,” said Julian, with sparkling eyes; “you have said enough in deprecating my urgency, and I will press you no farther. But you overrate the impediments which lie betwixt us – they must and shall give way.”

“So you said before,” answered Alice, “and with what probability, your own account may show. You dared not to mention the subject to your own father – how should you venture to mention it to mine?”

“That I will soon enable you to decide upon. Major Bridgenorth, by my mother’s account, is a worthy and an estimable man. I will remind him, that to my mother’s care he owes the dearest treasure and comfort of his life; and I will ask him if it is a just retribution to make that mother childless. Let me but know where to find him, Alice, and you shall soon hear if I have feared to plead my cause with him.”

“Alas!” answered Alice, “you well know my uncertainty as to my dear father’s residence. How often has it been my earnest request to him that he would let me share his solitary abode, or his obscure wanderings! But the short and infrequent visits which he makes to this house are all that he permits me of his society. Something I might surely do, however little, to alleviate the melancholy by which he is oppressed.”

“Something we might both do,” said Peveril. “How willingly would I aid you in so pleasing a task! All old griefs should be forgotten – all old friendships revived. My father’s prejudices are those of an Englishman – strong, indeed, but not insurmountable by reason. Tell me, then, where Major Bridgenorth is, and leave the rest to me; or let me but know by what address your letters reach him, and I will forthwith essay to discover his dwelling.”

“Do not attempt it, I charge you,” said Alice. “He is already a man of sorrows; and what would he think were I capable of entertaining a suit so likely to add to them? Besides, I could not tell you, if I would, where he is now to be found. My letters reach him from time to time, by means of my aunt Christian; but of his address I am entirely ignorant.”

“Then, by Heaven,” answered Julian, “I will watch his arrival in this island, and in this house; and ere he has locked thee in his arms, he shall answer to me on the subject of my suit.”

“Then demand that answer now,” said a voice from without the door, which was at the same time slowly opened – “Demand that answer now, for here stands Ralph Bridgenorth.”

As he spoke, he entered the apartment with his usual slow and sedate step – raised his flapp’d and steeple-crowned hat from his brows, and, standing in the midst of the room, eyed alternately his daughter and Julian Peveril with a fixed and penetrating glance.

“Father!” said Alice, utterly astonished, and terrified besides, by his sudden appearance at such a conjuncture, – “Father, I am not to blame.”

“Of that anon, Alice,” said Bridgenorth; “meantime retire to your apartment – I have that to say to this youth which will not endure your presence.”

“Indeed – indeed, father,” said Alice, alarmed at what she supposed these words indicated, “Julian is as little to be blamed as I! It was chance, it was fortune, which caused our meeting together.” Then suddenly rushing forward, she threw her arms around her father, saying, “Oh, do him no injury – he meant no wrong! Father, you were wont to be a man of reason and religious peace.”

“And wherefore should I not be so now, Alice?” said Bridgenorth, raising his daughter from the ground, on which she had almost sunk in the earnestness of her supplication. “Dost thou know aught, maiden, which should inflame my anger against this young man, more than reason or religion may bridle? Go – go to thy chamber. Compose thine own passions – learn to rule these – and leave it to me to deal with this stubborn young man.”

Alice arose, and, with her eyes fixed on the ground, retired slowly from the apartment. Julian followed her steps with his eyes till the last wave of her garment was visible at the closing door; then turned his looks to Major Bridgenorth, and then sunk them on the ground. The Major continued to regard him in profound silence; his looks were melancholy and even austere; but there was nothing which indicated either agitation or keen resentment. He motioned to Julian to take a seat, and assumed one himself. After which he opened the conversation in the following manner: —

“You seemed but now, young gentleman, anxious to learn where I was to be found. Such I at least conjectured, from the few expressions which I chanced to overhear; for I made bold, though it may be contrary to the code of modern courtesy, to listen a moment or two, in order to gather upon what subject so young a man as you entertained so young a woman as Alice, in a private interview.”

“I trust, sir,” said Julian, rallying spirits in what he felt to be a case of extremity, “you have heard nothing on my part which has given offence to a gentleman, whom, though unknown, I am bound to respect so highly.”

“On the contrary,” said Bridgenorth, with the same formal gravity, “I am pleased to find that your business is, or appears to be, with me, rather than with my daughter. I only think you had done better to have entrusted it to me in the first instance, as my sole concern.”