Yet Maria had been more fortunate than many under the same circumstances. She had not been deserted by him for whom she had sacrificed every thing; on the contrary, he had made every reparation in his power. She had been kindly received by his family, she enjoyed rank and riches, her children were dutiful and affectionate, no adventitious circumstances aggravated her wretchedness.
The miseries described in the preceding narrative are simply those to which every erring woman is liable.
CHAPTER V.
Emily was nearly eighteen, and she was to appear in the world as became the daughter of Lord Sotheron. They went to London. Maria made up her mind never to accompany her daughter, even to the few places where she might be kindly received. She thought there was more dignity in voluntarily retiring than in appearing occasionally at some houses, and consequently proving that she was not seen elsewhere because she would not be admitted.
Invitations for Lord Sotheron and Lady Emily Fitz-Eustace flocked to the house, and Maria received the cards from the porter’s hand with a tightness of heart, a difficulty of breathing, at which she was herself surprised. “Can I,” she thought, “who have endured such real sorrow, be so moved by a contemptible invitation to a foolish ball?” But she blushed crimson, as she felt her daughter’s eye glance over the card on which her mother’s name was omitted.
However, she rejoiced that Emily knew the truth; that she had not now to learn it. The evening came, when the lovely Lady Emily Fitz-Eustace was to make her début in the great world. Her mother presided at her toilet. She smoothed every curl, she arranged every fold. Her hands trembled, her eye was haggard, her voice was unsteady, but she fought hard not to allow her emotion to be visible. She would not cloud the innocent young creature’s anticipated joys.
Lord Sotheron was waiting below, and before they entered the carriage Maria wished to know if he approved of his daughter’s dress and appearance. As she held a candle that he might examine some ornaments he had just given her, he was forcibly struck by the contrast between the glowing cheek; the sparkling eye, the fresh parure of the blooming young girl, and the neglected dress, the homely morning cap, and, above all, the fearful expression of countenance of the mother. A pang of remorse shot through him, and he inquired if she felt ill, in a tone of unusual tenderness.
“I am quite well,” she answered, hurriedly, and they went down stairs. She remained suspended till she heard their carriage drive away, when her over-strung nerves gave way, and she flung herself on the sofa, in an agony of tears. She could not go to bed. She felt it impossible to try to sleep while thus constrained to desert the natural duty of a mother. Sick at heart, she sat expecting her daughter’s return, and listening to the eternal carriages rolling in endless succession to scenes where she could not be admitted to watch over her child.
At length she heard the growing sound of approaching wheels, and the clatter of the horses’ feet stopping at the door. Emily was surprised to find her still up, but was hastening to describe all the brilliant scene she had witnessed, when her attention was arrested by the woe-worn countenance, and swollen eyes of her mother.
“Mamma,” she said, “I will never go out again. I see it makes you unhappy. These foolish flowers, these fine necklaces—how you must have suffered while you were decking me out in them! And I! giddy thing, only thought of the unknown wonders I was going to see. Oh, mamma! how cruel, how unfeeling of me!”
“My child, my child,” interrupted Maria; “it is true I have acutely felt seeing you launched on the dangerous and stormy sea of life without my watchful eye to guard you. I should deceive you if I attempted to disguise my pangs of mortified affection, of mortified pride; but believe me, I should suffer far, far more, if I thought my fault condemned my innocent child to a life of seclusion; if I thought she was to be cut out from all society, because I have forfeited my own place in it. I am not so selfish! Mix with the world, dearest Emily, and trust me, that to see you and your brothers good and happy, can now alone give this aching heart one throb of pleasure;” and she pressed her hand to her left side, where she had of late felt considerable pain and uneasiness; “and now, good night, my love, I do not feel quite well.”
Habit did not deaden the keenness of her mortification. Every night when Emily returned home, Maria underwent the same ever new sufferings. To her sensitive feelings which were morbidly alive to every the most indifferent circumstance, scarcely a day or an hour passed in which something did not occur which wounded them.
If in ordering a dress for Emily, the milliner made use of those expressions so common in the mouth of every marchande de modes. “On ne le porte plus.”—“C’est la mode passée;” she shrunk into herself, and thought “Even the milliner is aware I am excluded from society, and thinks I can know nothing that is going forward in the world.”
One morning a young friend of Emily’s called on her at the moment when Lord Sotheron was leaving London to pass a few days in the country, and she thoughtlessly exclaimed,
“Oh! what will you do, Lady Emily? You must go to the Spanish ambassador’s ball to-morrow night, and who can you get to chaperon you?”
Maria could scarcely command sufficient composure to remain in the room, and to appear engrossed with the book which she had been reading.
It often happened that in some morning excursion, Emily was joined by one or two of the young men with whom she had become acquainted. On such occasions the duty of introducing them to her mother devolved on Emily, and she performed the necessary little ceremony with grace and modesty, but with a certain air of shyness and distress. Maria felt that in her case the usual order of things was reversed. She felt that Emily’s acquaintance would look her over with curiosity; she felt that if any one was a serious admirer, his intentions towards the daughter might be influenced, by the disgrace of the mother being thus forced upon his recollection; she felt that Emily was shy, and she fancied she must feel ashamed of her.
In this manner all the mortifications of the first years after her divorce were renewed with tenfold bitterness. Perhaps the constant state of painful excitement in which she lived, combined with late hours (for she invariably sat up till Emily’s return), might have aggravated a disorder that soon after assumed a more serious character. Before the London season was over, she became so ill that Emily could no longer be induced to mix in society, but devoted herself to soothing her mother’s hours of sickness. She had a constant difficulty of respiration, a gasping for breath, a palpitation at the heart, for which the physicians recommended quiet of mind and body. When they had left her one day after a long consultation, she smiled, and looking up at Emily, said,
“They cannot minister to a mind diseased. It is here, my child, here!” pressing her hand to her heart. “The canker has long been consuming me, and now it will soon have done its work. I wish your brothers were in London, for my end may perhaps be sudden, and I would not pass away without giving them my blessing.” Poor Emily communicated her mother’s wish to Lord Sotheron, and Charles and Edward were summoned from college.
Lord Sotheron was constant in his attentions, and spared no pains to soften and alleviate Maria’s sufferings. He had once truly loved her; and when he felt assured he was about to lose this devoted being, she rose before his imagination, beautiful, and brilliant, the cynosure of all hearts and eyes, as when he had first known her, and his conscience told him he had himself blasted all he had so passionately admired.
One day Maria was much exhausted by a more than usually severe attack of palpitation, and they had moved her towards an open window. They were all anxiously attending upon her, and she gazed round upon the group with tenderness and thankfulness.
“I am better now,” she said, “so do not look so much frightened, dear children. It is going off for this time. Still there is no use in our deceiving ourselves and each other. I have long felt pain and oppression, which I thought would one day prove fatal. But I bless a merciful Providence who has granted me time for repentance and for preparation, and now I bless that Providence who will soon release me from my life of penance.
“I trust that the time allowed me has not been allowed me in vain. Each bitter pang that I have endured, I have considered as part of my atonement, and I have offered it up to offended Heaven. There is one pain I have been spared! one joy I have tasted! you have been all a mother’s heart could wish—continue as you are. Be good, my blessed children—be good, and trust to Providence for the rest. Walter, in virtue alone there is true happiness! Is it not so! Dearly as I have loved you, and how dearly even you yourself can scarcely know,—Heaven alone, who knows how I have wrestled with my love, can know—dearly, devotedly as I have loved you, not for one moment, even when you seemed to love me with affection equal to my own, have I known happiness—happiness—that is only for the guiltless.”
“Seemed to love you, Maria!” whispered Lord Sotheron in a half reproachful tone.
“I did not mean to say that, dearest Walter. Thank you for your past affection, thank you for your present tenderness. Oh! it is all here, Walter! that love of many years, is all here, in this breaking, this bursting heart, but I hope sanctified by our long union. If it is sinful to feel it on the threshold of the grave, Heaven be merciful to me!” and she clasped her hands. “Pray for me, my children, now, and pray for me when I am gone. Your innocent prayers will win me mercy! Pray for me! pray for me!” and she sank back exhausted. The state of excitement into which her feelings had been worked, brought on a fresh attack of palpitation more severe than the former, which was followed by a fainting fit. From this time she spoke but little, and before the close of the following day, her spirit, we will hope her purified spirit, passed from its earthly tenement.
END OF THE SECOND VOLUME.
VOLUME THE THIRD.