Part 6

It would no doubt have gratified the poor mourner to have known, that, surrounded by joyous and congratulating friends, Caroline sighed for the absent Agnes, and felt the want of her congratulations--"Surely she will write to me!" said she mentally, "I am sure she wishes me happy; and one of my greatest pangs at leaving my native place is, the consciousness that I leave her miserable."

The last words that Caroline uttered, as she bade adieu to the domestics, were, "Be sure to send after me any note or letter that may come." But no note or letter from Agnes arrived; and had Caroline known the reason, she would have loved her once happy friend the more.

The next day, earlier than usual, Agnes went in quest of her father. She did not absolutely flatter herself that he had missed her the day before, still she did not think it _impossible_ that he _might_. She dared not, however, ask the question; but, luckily for her, the keeper told her, unasked, that Fitzhenry was observed to be restless, and looking out of the door of his cell frequently, both morning and evening, as if expecting somebody; and that at night, as he was going to bed, he asked whether the lady had not been there.

"Indeed!" cried Agnes, her eyes sparkling with pleasure--"Where is he?--Let me see him directly." But, after the first joyful emotion which he always showed at seeing her had subsided, she could not flatter herself that his symptoms were more favourable than before.

The keeper also informed her that he had been thrown into so violent a raving fit, by the agitation he felt at parting with her the last time she was there, that she must contrive to slip away unperceived whenever she came: and this visit having passed away without any thing material occurring, Agnes contrived to make her escape unseen.

On her return she repeated to Fanny several times, with a sort of pathetic pleasure, the question her father had asked--"He inquired whether the lady had not been there;--think of that, Fanny:" while so incoherent was her language and so absent were her looks, that Fanny again began to fear her afflictions had impaired her reason.

After staying a few days with the new-married couple, Mr. Seymour returned home, Caroline having, before he left her, again desired him to be the friend of the penitent Agnes whenever he heard her unpityingly attacked; and an opportunity soon offered of gratifying his daughter's benevolence, and his own.

Mr. Seymour was drinking tea in a large party, when a lady, to whose plain, awkward, uninteresting daughters the once beautiful, graceful and engaging Agnes had formerly been a powerful rival, said, with no small share of malignity, "So!--fine impudence indeed!--I hear that good for nothing minx, Fitzhenry's daughter, is come to town: I wonder for my part she dares show her face here----But the assurance of these creatures is amazing."

"Aye, so it is," echoed from one lady to another. "But this girl must be a hardened wretch indeed," resumed Mrs. Macfiendy, the first speaker: "I suppose her fellow is tired of her, and she will be on the town soon----"

"In the church-yard rather," replied Mr. Seymour, whom a feeling of resentment at these vulgar expressions of female spite had hitherto kept silent:--"Miss Fitzhenry has lost all power of charming the eye of the libertine, and even the wish;--but she is an object whom the compassionate and humane cannot behold, or listen to, without the strongest emotion."

"No, to be sure," replied Mrs. Macfiendy bridling--"the girl had always a plausible tongue of her own--and as to her beauty, I never thought that was made for lasting.--What then you have seen her, Mr. Seymour? I wonder that you could condescend to _look_ at such trash."

"Yes, madam, I have seen, and heard her too;--and if heart-felt misery, contrition, and true penitence, may hope to win favour in the sight of God, and expiate past offences, 'a ministering angel might this frail one be, though we lay howling.'"

"I lie howling, indeed!" screamed out Mrs. Macfiendy: "Speak for yourself, if you please, Mr. Seymour! for my part, I do not expect, when I go to another world, to keep such company as Miss Fitzhenry."

"If with the same measure you mete, it should be meted to you again, madam," replied Mr. Seymour, "I believe there is little chance in another world that you and Miss Fitzhenry will be visiting acquaintance." Then, bespeaking the attention of the company, he gave that account of Agnes, her present situation, and her intentions for the future, which she gave the governors; and all the company, save the outrageously virtuous mother and her daughters, heard it with as much emotion as he felt in relating it.--Exclamations of "Poor unfortunate girl! what a pity she should have been guilty!--But, fallen as she is, she is still Agnes Fitzhenry," resounded through the room.

Mrs. Macfiendy could not bear this in silence; but with a cheek pale, nay livid with malignity, and in a voice sharpened by passion, which at all times resembled the scream of a pea-hen, she exclaimed, "Well, for my part, some people may do any thing, yet be praised up to the skies; other people's daughters would not find such mercy. Before she went off, it was Miss Fitzhenry this, and Miss Fitzhenry that,--though other people's children could perhaps do as much, though they were not so fond of showing what they could do."

"No," cried one of the Miss Macfiendys, "Miss Fitzhenry had courage enough for any thing."

"True, child," resumed the mother; "and what did it end in? Why, in becoming a--what I do not choose to name."

"Fie, madam, fie!" cried Mr. Seymour: "Why thus exult over the fallen?"

"Oh! then you do allow her to be fallen?"

"She is fallen indeed, madam," said Mr. Seymour; "but, even in her proudest hour, Miss Fitzhenry never expressed herself towards her erring neighbours with unchristian severity;--but set you an example of forbearance, which you would do well to follow."

"She set _me_ an example!" vociferated Mrs. Macfiendy--"she indeed! a creature!--I will not stay, nor shall my daughters, to hear such immoral talk. But 'tis as I said--some people may do any thing--for, wicked as she is, Miss Fitzhenry is still cried up as something extraordinary, and is even held up as an example to modest women."

So saying, she arose; but Mr. Seymour rose also, and said, "There is no necessity for _your_ leaving the company, madam, as I will leave it: for I am tired of hearing myself so grossly misrepresented. No one abhors more than I do the crime of Miss Fitzhenry; and no one would more strongly object, for the sake of other young women, to her being again received into general company: but, at the same time, I will always be ready to encourage the penitent by the voice of just praise; and I feel delight in reflecting that, however the judges of this world may be fond of condemning her, she will one day appeal from them to a merciful and long-suffering judge."

Then, bowing respectfully to all but Mrs. Macfiendy, he withdrew, and gave her an opportunity of remarking that Mr. Seymour was mighty warm in the creature's defence. She did not know he was so interested about her; but she always thought him a _gay man_, and she supposed _Miss Fitzhenry_, as he called her, would be glad to take up with any thing _now_.

This speech, sorry am I to say, was received with a general and complaisant smile, though it was reckoned unjust; for there are few who have virtue and resolution enough to stand forward as champions for an absent and calumniated individual, if there be any thing ludicrous in the tale against him;--and the precise, careful, elderly Mr. Seymour, who was always shrinking from censure like a sensitive plant from the touch, accused by implication of being the private friend of the youthful Agnes, excited a degree of merry malice in the company not unpleasant to their feelings.

But, in spite of the efforts of calumny, the account Mr. Seymour had given of Agnes and her penitence became town talk; and, as it was confirmed by the other governors, every one, except the ferociously chaste, was eager to prevent Agnes from feeling pecuniary distress, by procuring her employment.

Still she was not supplied with work as fast as she executed it; for, except during the hours which she was allowed to spend with her father, she was constantly employed; and she even deprived herself of her accustomed portion of rest, and was never in bed before one, or after four.

In proportion as her business and profits increased, were her spirits elevated; but the more she gained, the more saving she became: she would scarcely allow herself sufficient food or clothing; and, to the astonishment of Fanny, the once generous Agnes appeared penurious, and a lover of money. "What does this change mean, my dear lady?" said Fanny to her one day.--"I have my reasons for it," replied Agnes coldly; then changed the subject: and Fanny respected her too much to urge an explanation.

But Agnes soon after began to wonder at an obvious change in Fanny. At first, when Agnes returned from visiting her father, Fanny used to examine her countenance: and she could learn from that, without asking a single question, whether Fitzhenry seemed to show any new symptoms of amendment, or whether his insanity still appeared incurable. If the former, Fanny, tenderly pressing her hand, would say, "Thank God!" and prepare their dinner or supper with more alacrity than usual: if the latter, Fanny would say nothing; but endeavour, by bringing little Edward to her, or by engaging her in conversation, to divert the gloom which she could not remove: and Agnes, though she took no notice of these artless proofs of affection, observed and felt them deeply; and as she drew near the house, she always anticipated them as one of the comforts of her home.

But, for some days past, Fanny had discontinued this mode of welcome so grateful to the feelings of Agnes, and seemed wholly absorbed in her own. She was silent, reserved, and evidently oppressed with some anxiety which she was studious to conceal. Once or twice, when Agnes came home rather sooner than usual, she found her in tears; and when she affectionately asked the reason of them, Fanny pleaded mere lowness of spirits as the cause.

But the eye of anxious affection is not easily blinded. Agnes was convinced that Fanny's misery had some more important origin; and, secretly fearing that it proceeded from her, she was on the watch for something to confirm her suspicions.

One day, as she passed through the room where Fanny kept her school, Agnes observed that the number of her scholars was considerably diminished; and when she asked Fanny where the children whom she missed were, there was a confusion and hesitation in her manner, while she made different excuses for their absence, which convinced Agnes that she concealed from her some unwelcome truth.

A very painful suspicion immediately darted across her mind, the truth of which was but too soon confirmed. A day or two after, while again passing through the school-room, she was attracted by the beauty of a little girl, who was saying her lesson; and, smoothing down her curling hair, she stooped to kiss her ruddy cheek: but the child, uttering a loud scream, sprang from her arms, and, sobbing violently, hid her face on Fanny's lap. Agnes, who was very fond of children, was much hurt by symptoms of a dislike so violent towards her, and urged the child to give a reason for such strange conduct: on which the artless girl owned that her mother had charged her never to touch or go near Miss Fitzhenry, because she was the most wicked woman that ever breathed.

Agnes heard this new consequence of her guilt with equal surprise and grief; but, on looking at Fanny, though she saw grief in her countenance, there was no surprise in it; and she instantly told her she was convinced that the loss of her scholars was occasioned by her having allowed her to reside with her. Fanny, bursting into tears, at last confessed that her suspicions were just; while to the shuddering Agnes she unfolded a series of persecutions which she had undergone from her employers, because she had declared her resolution of starving, rather than drive from her house her friend and benefactress.

Agnes was not long in forming her resolution; and the next morning, without saying a word to Fanny on the subject, she went out in search of a lodging for herself and child--as gratitude and justice forbade her to remain any longer with her persecuted companion.

But after having in vain tried to procure a lodging suitable to the low state of her finances, or rather to her saving plan, she hired a little cottage on the heath above the town, adjoining to that where she had been so hospitably received in the hour of her distress; and having gladdened the hearts of the friendly cottager and his wife by telling them that she was coming to be their neighbour, she went to break the unwelcome tidings to Fanny.

Passionate and vehement indeed was her distress at hearing that her young lady, as she still persisted to call her, was going to leave her: but her expostulations and tears were vain; and Agnes, after promising to see Fanny every day, took possession that very evening of her humble habitation.

But her intention in removing was frustrated by the honest indignation and indiscretion of Fanny. She loudly raved against the illiberality which had robbed her of the society of all that she held dear; and, as she told every one that Agnes left her by her own choice and not at her desire, those children who had been taken away because Agnes resided with her were not sent back to her on her removal. At last the number of her scholars became so small, that she gave up school-keeping, and employed herself in shawl-working only; while her leisure time was spent in visiting Agnes, or in inveighing, to those who would listen to her, against the cruelty that had driven her young lady from her house.

Fanny used to begin by relating the many obligations which her mother and she had received from Agnes and her father, and always ended with saying, "Yet to this woman, who saved me and mine from a workhouse, they wanted me to refuse a home when she stood in need of one! They need not have been afraid of her being too happy! Such a mind as hers can never be happy under the consciousness of having been guilty; and could she ever forget her crime, one visit to her poor father would make her remember it again."

Thus did Fanny talk, as I said before, to those who would listen to her; and there was one auditor who could have listened to her for ever on this subject, and who thought Fanny looked more lovely while expressing her affection for her penitent mistress, and pleading her cause with a cheek flushed with virtuous indignation, and eyes suffused with the tears of artless sensibility, than when, attended by the then happy Agnes, she gave her hand in the bloom of youth and beauty to the man of her heart.

This auditor was a respectable tradesman who lived in Fanny's neighbourhood, to whom her faithful attachment to Agnes had for some time endeared her; while Fanny, in return, felt grateful to him for entering with such warmth into her feelings, and for listening so patiently to her complaints; and it was not long before he offered her his hand.

To so advantageous an offer, and to a man so amiable, Fanny could make no objection; especially as Agnes advised her accepting the proposal. But Fanny declared to her lover that she would not marry him, unless he would promise that Agnes and her child should, whenever they chose, have a home with her. To this condition he consented; telling Fanny he loved her the better for making it; and Agnes had soon the satisfaction of witnessing the union of this worthy couple.

But they tried in vain to persuade Agnes to take up her residence with them. She preferred living by herself. To her, solitude was a luxury; as, while the little Edward was playing on the heath with the cottager's children, Agnes delighted to brood in uninterrupted silence over the soothing hope, the fond idea, that alone stimulated her to exertion, and procured her tranquillity. All the energies of her mind and body were directed to one end; and while she kept her eye steadfastly fixed on the future, the past lost its power to torture, and the present had some portion of enjoyment.

But were not these soothing reveries sometimes disturbed by the pangs of ill-requited love? and could she, who had loved so fondly as to sacrifice to the indulgence of her passion every thing that she held most dear, rise superior to the power of tender recollection, and at once tear from her heart the image of her fascinating lover? It would be unnatural to suppose that Agnes could entirely forget the once honoured choice of her heart, and the father of her child; or that, although experience had convinced her of its unworthiness, she did not sometimes contemplate, with the sick feelings of disappointed tenderness, the idol which her imagination had decked in graces all its own.

But these remembrances were rare. She oftener beheld him as he appeared before the tribunal of her reason--a cold, selfish, profligate, hypocritical deceiver, as the unfeeling destroyer of her hopes and happiness, and as one who, as she had learned from his own lips, when he most invited confidence, was the most determined to betray. She saw him also as a wretch so devoid of the common feelings of nature and humanity, that, though she left her apartments in London in the dead of night, and in the depth of a severe winter, an almost helpless child in her arms, and no visible protector near, he had never made a single inquiry concerning her fate, or that of his offspring.

At times the sensations of Agnes bordered on phrensy, when in this heartless, unnatural wretch she beheld the being for whom she had resigned the matchless comforts of her home, and destroyed the happiness and reason of her father. At these moments, and these only, she used to rush wildly forth in search of company, that she might escape from herself: but more frequently she directed her steps to the abode of the poor; to those who, in her happier hours, had been supported by her bounty, and who now were eager to meet her in her walks, to repay her past benefactions by a "God bless you, lady!" uttered in a tone of respectful pity.

When her return was first known to the objects of her benevolence, Agnes soon saw herself surrounded by them; and was, in her humble apparel and dejected state, followed by them with more blessings and more heart-felt respect than in the proudest hour of her prosperity.

"Thank God!" ejaculated Agnes, as she turned a glistening eye on her humble followers, "there are yet those whose eyes mine may meet with confidence. There are some beings in the world towards whom I have done my duty." But the next minute she recollected that the guilty flight which made her violate the duty which she owed her father, at the same time removed her from the power of fulfilling that which she owed the indigent; for it is certain that our duties are so closely linked together, that, as the breaking one pearl from a string of pearls hazards the loss of all, so the violation of one duty endangers the safety of every other.

"Alas!" exclaimed Agnes, as this melancholy truth occurred to her, "it is not for me to exult; for, even in the squalid, meagre countenances of these kind and grateful beings, I read evidences of my guilt--They looked up to me for aid, and I deserted them!"

In time, however, these acute feelings wore away; and Agnes, by entering again on the offices of benevolence and humanity towards the distressed, lost the consciousness of past neglect in that of present usefulness.

True, she could no longer feed the hungry or clothe the naked, but she could soften the pangs of sickness by expressing sympathy in its sufferings. She could make the nauseous medicine more welcome, if not more salutary, by administering it herself; for, though poor, she was still superior to the sufferers whom she attended: and it was soothing to them to see "such a lady" take so much trouble for those so much beneath her--and she could watch the live-long night by the bed of the dying, join in the consoling prayer offered by the lips of another, or, in her own eloquent and impassioned language, speak peace and hope to the departing soul.

These tender offices, these delicate attentions, so dear to the heart of every one, but so particularly welcome to the poor from their superiors, as they are acknowledgements of the relationship between them, and confessions that they are of the same species as themselves, and heirs of the same hopes, even those who bestow money with generous profusion do not often pay. But Agnes was never content to give relief unaccompanied by attendance: she had reflected deeply on the nature of the human heart, and knew that a participating smile, a sympathizing tear, a friendly pressure of the hand, the shifting of an uneasy pillow, and patient attention to an unconnected tale of twice-told symptoms, were, in the esteem of the indigent sufferer, of as great a value as pecuniary assistance.

Agnes, therefore, in her poverty, had the satisfaction of knowing that she was as consoling to the distressed, if not as useful, as she was in her prosperity; and, if there could be a moment when she felt the glow of exultation in her breast, it was when she left the habitation of indigence or sorrow, followed by the well-earned blessings of its inhabitants.

Had Agnes been capable of exulting in a consciousness of being revenged, another source of exultation might have been hers, provided she had ever deigned to inquire concerning her profligate seducer, whom she wrongfully accused of having neglected to make inquiries concerning her and her child. Agnes, two months after her return from London, saw in the paper an account of Clifford's marriage; and felt some curiosity to know what had so long retarded an union which, when she left town, was fixed for the Monday following; and Fanny observed an increased degree of gloom and abstraction in her appearance all that day. But, dismissing this feeling from her mind as unworthy of it, from that moment she resolved, if possible, to recall Clifford to her imagination, as one who, towards her, had been guilty not of perfidy and deceit only, but of brutal and unnatural neglect.

In this last accusation, however, as I said before, she was unjust. When Clifford awoke the next morning after his last interview with Agnes, and the fumes of the wine he had drunk the night before were entirely dissipated, he recollected, with great uneasiness, the insulting manner in which he had justified his intended marriage, and the insight into the baseness of his character which his unguarded confessions had given to her penetration.

The idea of having incurred the contempt of Agnes was insupportable. Yet, when he recollected the cold, calm, and dignified manner in which she spoke and acted when he bade her adieu, he was convinced that he had taught her to despise him; and, knowing Agnes, he was also certain that she must soon cease to love the man whom she had once learned to despise.

"But I will go to her directly," exclaimed he to himself, ringing his bell violently; "and I will attribute my infernal folly to drunkenness." He then ordered his servant to call a coach, finding himself too languid, from his late intemperance, to walk; and was just going to step into it when he saw Mrs. Askew pale and trembling, and heard her, in a faltering voice, demand to see him in private for a few minutes.