CHAPTER CXCIX.

THE MARCHIONESS OF DELMOUR.

The Marquis of Delmour awoke, as it were from a deep trance; and, opening his languid eyes, he beheld a female form bending over him. He attempted to speak: but the lady placed one slender finger on her lips in token of silence;--and, closing his eyes again, the old nobleman endeavoured to collect his scattered ideas--or rather, to dispel the mist which hung over them.

It struck him that the countenance which he had just seen was not unknown to him;--and as he dwelt upon it in imagination, it gradually became more familiar,--while, by imperceptible degrees, it awoke reminiscences of the past--some of pleasure, but most of pain,--until an idea of the real truth dawned in upon the mind of the Marquis.

Then again he opened his eyes;--and though long years had elapsed since last he beheld that countenance, each feature--each lineament was immediately recognised. But so confused were his thoughts that he could not recollect why a feeling of aversion and repugnance prevented him from experiencing joy at the presence of her who was standing, in painful suspense, by his bed-side.

At last, as reason asserted her empire, a knowledge of who she was and all the incidents associated with her revived in his soul; while, at the same time and with a species of under-current of the reflections, a feeling of what had happened to himself and why he was stretched in his couch came slowly upon him. They he suddenly raised his hand to his throat; and the bandage _there_ convinced him that the last reminiscence which had just stolen into his mind, was indeed too true!

Averting his eyes from the mournful and plaintive countenance which was still bending over him, he groaned aloud in very bitterness:--and then a deep silence ensued in the chamber.

Several minutes elapsed, during which the burning tears streamed down the lady’s face: but she subdued the sobs that almost choked her--for she would not for worlds permit any evidence of her own deep grief to disturb the meditations of the enfeebled nobleman. On his side, he was absorbed in profound thought,--the incidents of the past rapidly becoming more definite and vivid in his memory, until there were few things left in uncertainty or doubt--and nothing in oblivion.

Slowly turning towards the lady, the Marquis saw that she was overwhelmed with sorrow--although she hastily wiped away her tears;--and moved--deeply moved by this spectacle, as well as influenced by a host of tender recollections, the old man extended his hand towards her, murmuring, “My wife! is it indeed she who is now watching by my side?”

“O heaven! he recollects me--he will forgive me!” she exclaimed, in a tone of the liveliest joy; and carrying her husband’s emaciated hand to her lips, she covered it with kisses.

“Sophia,” said the old man, in a low voice and speaking with difficulty, “we meet after a long--long separation. But let us forget the past----”

“Is it possible that _you_ can forget it?” asked Mrs. Sefton--or rather the Marchioness of Delmour; and bending her burning face over his hand which she still retained in both her own, she added in a tone so low that it seemed as if she feared even to hear her own words, “You have so much to pardon! But I never viewed my conduct in this light until I came and beheld you stretched upon the bed of--of----”

“Of death,” said the Marquis, his pale countenance becoming, if possible, more ghastly pallid still.

“No--no,” exclaimed the Marchioness, with the excitement of voice and the gesture of despair; “you must not talk nor think thus despondingly! But tell me, my husband--tell me--oh! say, can you forgive me for the past?”

“We have much to forgive on either side, Sophia,” responded the Marquis: “and as I was the first cause of dissension between us--as I indeed was the author of all your unhappiness, by forcing you into a marriage which you abhorred--’tis for me to demand pardon first. Tell me, then, Sophia--tell me that you _can_ pardon me for all the misery I have been the wretched means of heaping upon your head?”

“Oh! yes--yes!” exclaimed the lady, the tears again pouring in torrents down her cheeks: “would to heaven that I could prove to you how deeply sensible I am of this kindness which you now manifest towards me!”

“Then you forgive me!” cried the nobleman, pressing her hand tenderly, while joy beamed in his eyes hitherto dim with the glazing influence of a mortal enervation:--“then you forgive me!” he repeated, his voice becoming stronger.

“Yes--oh! yes--a thousand times _yes_!” she exclaimed; and bending over him, she pressed her lips upon his cold forehead. “But do you pardon me likewise?” she asked, after a few moments’ pause.

“It was I who provoked all that has occurred--I who was the unhappy means of blighting the pure affections of your youth,” returned the Marquis; “and therefore--whatever may have been the consequences--I am bound to pardon and forget. Alas! Sophia, often and often--and with feelings of ineffable pain and anguish--have I thought of that fatal day when, long years ago, I levelled at you a terrible accusation. But I was a coward--and I was cruel thus to have taxed you with a fault which at that period my jealous suspicions alone----”

“To what do you allude?” demanded the Marchioness, inwardly shocked, and with her heart bleeding as she asked the question: for she divined too well to what her husband _did_ allude--and she was almost crushed with a devouring sense of shame.

“Oh! if you can have forgotten that fatal day,” exclaimed the Marquis, whose sight was too dim, and whose mental powers of perception were too weak to enable him to understand rightly his wife’s present emotions,--“then are you happy indeed! For, alas! I referred to the day on which we separated, sixteen or seventeen years ago--I cannot now remember accurately how many have passed since then----”

“And why allude to that unhappy epoch?” asked the lady, in a low and tremulous tone.

“Because I wish to convince you that I am indeed repentant for all the share which I took in sealing our misery,” replied the nobleman. “On that memorable day, I accused you of infidelity towards me--and yet subsequent reflection has convinced me that you were innocent _then_! Oh! never--never shall I forget that tone in which you breathed the fatal words--‘_All is now at an end between you and me! We part--for ever!_’ I have thought since--aye, and I have said that you resembled what would be a sculptor’s or an artist’s conception of _Injured Innocence_; and then, when I adjured you in the name of your infant daughter to stay, you uttered a wild cry and fled! That cry rings in my ears now--has vibrated in my brain ever since----”

“Oh! in the name of heaven, proceed not thus!” murmured the Marchioness, covering her face with her hands and sobbing bitterly.

But wherefore, did she thus weep?--wherefore were her emotions so powerful? Why was her heart thus wrung until every fibre appeared to be stretched to its utmost power of tension? It was because on the occasion to which the Marquis referred, _guilt_ and not _innocence_ had made her voice hollow and thick as she breathed the words which decreed an eternal separation!--it was because that wild cry had been wrung from her by the appeal that was made in the name of the infant child whom she knew to be the offspring of her amour with Sir Gilbert Heathcote! But there are times when _Conscious Guilt_ so much resembles _Injured Innocence_, that the most keen observer may be deceived;--and such was the fact in the case now alluded to.

A long pause ensued--during which the Marquis, still totally ignorant of the real nature of his wife’s emotions, gazed upon her with an affectionate interest that was rapidly growing into a resuscitated love.

“Weep not, dearest,” he at length said;--“weep not, I implore you!”

“I weep, because I feel that I am so completely unworthy of your present kindness,” responded the Marchioness, withdrawing her hands from her face, and bending her tearful eyes with an expression of such mournfulness and such profound penitence upon her husband, that had he the power to raise himself in the bed, he would have snatched her to his bosom.

“It is now my turn to implore you not to dwell longer upon the past,” he said, taking one of her hands and conveying it to his lips. “We have promised mutual forgiveness. You have pardoned me for forcing you into a marriage which caused all your unhappiness: and I have pardoned you for your connexion with Sir Gilbert Heathcote since the period of our separation. This is the understanding between us, Sophia--and now we are friends again. But tell me, my dear wife--tell me how long I have been stretched on this bed, and how you came thus to be here to minister unto me?”

“Four days have elapsed since you--since--” began the Marchioness, hesitating how to allude to the dreadful attempt at suicide which her husband had committed.

“Oh! name not the horrible deed!” he groaned forth, writhing in anguish.

“But it is not known--save to three or four persons,” hastily observed his wife, well aware that this assurance would prove consolatory.

“Heaven be thanked!” murmured the old nobleman, clasping his hands fervently. “And now tell me, my dear Sophia, how you came to learn the shocking intelligence?”

“If you will compose yourself as much as you can, and speak but little, I will explain every thing to you,” she answered, assuming, with captivating tenderness of tone and manner, the position of wife and nurse.

“One word first!” exclaimed the Marquis. “Agnes--”

“Is here--beneath your roof,” was the reply.

“My daughter again near me!” he murmured, joy animating his countenance: but in another moment a cloud overspread his features, as he said hesitatingly, “Does she know of the dreadful attempt that I made upon my life?”

“Heaven forbid!” ejaculated the Marchioness, shocked at the bare idea. “That circumstance has been religiously withheld from her. She is however now aware that she is the daughter of the Marquis of Delmour, and not of plain Mr. Vernon; and she believes you to be dangerously