And why had she now retired once more, to hide the out-pourings of an intense anguish?
CHAPTER LXXIV.
THE MEETING.
WHEN Isabella retired to her chamber the second time, she hastily put on her bonnet and shawl, and then hurried to the garden at the back of the mansion; for she felt the necessity of fresh air, to cool her burning brow.
She walked slowly up and down for a few minutes, her mind filled with the most distressing thoughts, when the sounds of voices fell upon her ears. She listened; and the consequential tone of the hussar-captain, alternating with the childish lisp of Sir Cherry Bounce, warned her that the two young coxcombs had also directed their steps towards the garden.
She felt in no humour to listen to their chattering gossip—wearisome at all times, but intolerable in a moment of mental affliction; still she could not return to the house without encountering them in her way. A thought struck her—the gardener had been at work all the morning; and the back-gate of the enclosure had been left open for his convenience. Perhaps it was not locked again? Thither did she hurry; and, to her joy, the means of egress into the fields were open to her.
The delicate foot of that beauteous creature of seventeen scarcely made an impression upon the grass, nor even crushed the daisy, so light was her tread! And yet her heart was heavy. Grief sate upon her brow; and her bosom was agitated with sighs.
She walked onward; and, turning the angle of a grove, was now beyond the view of any one in her father's garden. She relaxed her speed, and moved slowly and mournfully along the outskirts of the grove, vainly endeavouring to conquer the sorrowful ideas that obtruded themselves on her imagination.
But Woe is an enemy that knows no remorse, gives no quarter, while it retains poor mortal in its grasp; and when its victim is a young and innocent girl, whose heart beats with its first, its virgin love—that direful enemy augments its pangs in proportion to the tenderness and sensibility of that heart which it thus ruthlessly torments.
Isabella's reverie was suddenly interrupted by a deep sigh.
She turned her head; and there, on her left hand—seated upon the trunk of a tree that had been blown down by the late winds—with his face buried in his hands, was a gentleman apparently absorbed in reflections of no pleasurable nature.
He sighed deeply, and his lips murmured some words, the sound of which, but not the meaning, met her ears.
She was about to retrace her steps, when her own name was pronounced by the lips of the person seated on the tree—and in a tone, too, which she could not mistake.
"Oh! Isabella, Isabella, thou knowest not how I love thee!"
An exclamation of surprise—almost of alarm—burst from the lips of the beautiful Italian; and she leant for support against a tree.
Richard Markham—for it was by his lips that her name had been pronounced—raised his head, and gave vent to a cry of the most wild, the most enthusiastic joy.
In a moment he was by her side.
"Isabella!" he exclaimed: "to what good angel am I indebted for this unexpected joy—this immeasurable happiness?"
"Oh! Mr. Markham—forgive me if I intruded upon you—but, accident—"
"Call it not accident, Isabella: it was heaven!—heaven that prompted me to seek this spot to-day, for the first time since that fatal night—"
"Ah! that fatal night," repeated the signora, with a shudder.
Markham dropped the hand which he had taken—which he had pressed for a moment in his: and he retreated a few paces, his entire manner changing as if he were suddenly awakened to a sense of his humiliating condition.
"Signora," he said, in a low and tremulous tone, "is it possible that you can believe me guilty of the terrible deed which a monster imputed to me?"
"Oh! no, Mr. Markham," answered the young lady hastily; "I never for an instant imagined so vile—so absurd an accusation to be based upon truth."
"Thank you, signora—thank you a thousand times for that avowal," exclaimed Richard. "Oh! how have I longed for an opportunity to explain to you all that has hitherto been dark and mysterious relative to myself:—how have I anticipated a moment like this, when I might narrate to you the history of all my sorrows—all my wrongs, and part with you—either bearing away the knowledge of your sympathy to console me, or of your scorn to crush me down into the very dust!"
"Oh! Mr. Markham, I cannot hear you—I dare not stay another moment here," said Isabella, excessively agitated. "My father's anger—"
"I will not detain you, signora," interrupted Richard, coldly. "Obey the will of your parents; and if—some day—you should learn the narrative of my sorrows from some accidental source, then—when you hear how cruelly circumstances combined, and how successfully villains leagued to plunge me into an abyss of infamy and disgrace—then, signora, then reflect upon my prayer to be allowed to justify myself to you to-day—a prayer which obedience to your parents compels you to reject."
"To me, Mr. Markham, no explanation is necessary," said Isabella, timidly, and with her eyes bent towards the ground so that the long black fringes reposed upon her cheeks.
"Oh! fool that I was to flatter myself that you would hear me—or to hope that you would listen to aught which I might say to justify myself!" ejaculated Markham. "Pardon me, signora—pardon my presumption; but I judged your heart by mine—I measured your sympathy, your love, by what I feel;—and I have erred—yes, I have erred—but you will pardon me! Oh! how could the freed convict dare to hope that the daughter of a noble—a lady of spotless name, and high birth—should for a moment stoop to him? Ah! I indulged in a miserable delusion! And yet how sweet was that dream in my solitary hours! for you must know, lady, that I have fed myself with hopes—with wild insane hopes—until my soul has been comforted, and for a season I have forgotten my wrongs, deep—ineffaceable though they be! I thought to myself—'There is one being in this cold and cheerless world who will not put faith in all that calumny proclaims against me—one being who, having read my heart, will know that I have suffered for a deed which I never committed, and from which my soul revolts—one being who can understand how it is possible for me to have been unfortunate but never criminal—one being whose sympathy follows me amidst the hatred and scorn of others—one being in a word, who would not refuse to hear from my lips a sad history, and who would be prepared to find it filled with sorrows, but not stained with infamy!'—Such were my thoughts—such was my hope—such was my delusive dream: O God! that I had never yielded to so bright a vision! It is now dissipated; and I can well understand, lady—now—that no explanation is indeed necessary!"
"Mr. Markham," said Isabella, in a voice scarcely audible through deep emotion—"Mr. Markham—you misunderstand me—I did not mean that I would hear no explanation;—Oh! very far from that—"
"But that it would be now useless!" exclaimed Markham, his tone softening, for he saw that the lovely idol of his heart was deeply touched. "You mean, signora, that all explanation would be now too late; that, whether innocent or guilty of the crime for which I suffered two years' cruel imprisonment, I am so surrounded by infamy—my name is so encrusted with odium, and scorn, and disgrace, that to associate with me—to be seen for a moment near me, is a moral contagion—a plague—a pestilence—"
"Oh! spare me—spare me these reproaches," cried Isabella, now weeping bitterly; "for reproaches they are—and most unjust ones, too!"
"Unjust ones!" exclaimed Richard; "what mean you, signora?"
"That by me at least they are undeserved, Mr. Markham," returned the lovely girl.
"How undeserved? how