Agnes, or, Beauty and Pleasure — page 374: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

' geass oe eee — 5e6 whole form trembled as if a wild tumultuous agi- tation were sweeping through it. “Good heavens!” cried Winifred, affrighted at those altered looks ; “ what has happened to your wife, Gustavas? Something dreadful, I fear; for your regards 3 “ No, no, Winifred! do not attach any import- ance—I mean to say that there was nothing in my regards—in short, Winifred, I know not what I am saying - ““Good God, Gustavus! This does indeed seem to be only too true!”’—and again did Winifred gaze with a real affright upon the countenance of her cousin. * Ob, how uselessly you alarm yourself !’”’—and Gostavus aflected to laugh ; but there was some- thing hollow and unnatural in the sound of his laughter, as if it were a captive in a dungeon whose attempted merriment derived a sepulchral sound from the living tomb itself. “ In a word, Winifred, I ought to be more happy than mise- rable ; for I am released from a thraldom which you know was most odious to me!—yes, liberated from that tyranny which tore me away from England seven months back, without permitting me a moment’s leisure to return to you, or to deliver the precious document into the hands of our grandsire.” “Liberated from this tyranny? freed from this thraldom 2?” said Winifred, repeating the words as if the action were mechanical and the words them- selyes were meaningless,—so vacant, so uncertain was her look, “ Yes, Winifred,” resumed Gustavus; and again he essayed to chuckle—but it was a laugh which did one harm to hear it: “liberated from all those Londs by a power against which not even the in- domitable self-will of the quadroon Emily could sustain a conflict! And that power, Winifred, was death!” “Death, Gustavus?” said the young lads, with a start. “Death ? Is Emily—your wife” she paused and gasped ——“ dead ?” “Yes, dead!” was the young man’s response, delivered in the gloomiest tone and with the most sombre look. “Dead!” repeated Winifred; and there was an- other pause: and then she added, ** Bat, Ob, Gus- tavus! how light you seem to treat the loss of your wife! No—not lightly! I scarcely know how to describe it; for though there is laughter on your lips, there is horror in your looks. Ob, my God! Gustavus, the effect which all this prodnces upon | me is something terrible! Ah, I fear to give utterance to the hideous thought !—but, Ob! heaven forgive you, Gustavus, if in a moment of desperation, goaded to madness by the very despot- ism of a wife’s jealous loye—you have done aught dreadful!” “What, Winifred! do you think—do you—do you”—and the youth gasped, while his counte- nance was so haggard—Oh, so pale and haggard! —‘‘do you think that I !aid a violent hand “Just God! I know not what to think!” ejacu- lated the youug lady, whose recent firmness and self-possession were all rapidly losing themselves in a terrible excitement. ‘‘ Auswer me, Gustavus —answer me as if it were the voice of heaven itself demanding an account of your wife—even as heave&’s yuice in the beginning of the world de- ae a * mc AGNES; A OF AT Oe Se BEAUTY AND PLEASURE. as if a wild tumultuous agi- { manded from the first murderer an account of his murderer an account of his brother!" “ Murderer !”—and it was in a hollow tone and with a shuddering form that the youth thus echoed the fearful word; while all the details of the frightful scene at the cliff in Jamaica swept like a horrible phantasmagoria before his imagination. “Gustavus!” almost shrieked forth Winifred, “what means all this? Why have you risen up like a ghost before me, as if to proclaim something dreadful to my ears ?” At this moment the young man exercised an almost preterhuman power over himself: he be- came immediately calm and self-possessed—at least outwardly so; and therefore it was an unnatural tranguillity which thus seized upon him: but it was sufficient to deceive Winifred for a space—for she began to think that she must have cruelly wronged and outraged him with her wild suspi- cions, as he said, “Cousin, I know not wherefore we should be thus exciting ourselves. My wife is dead. It was no more my fault that she died than if any other human being were to put a period to an existence which had suddenly become intolerab/e.” “Ah!” said Winifred, shuddering: “ then I begin to understand ! "Your unfortunate wife committed suicide—and the deed has left such a horrible impression upon your mind ig “Yes, Winifred!” interjected Gustavus; “it is thus that you may account for any wild words which may flow from my lips, as well as for any horror that there may be in my looks. But did not Mr, Hargrave tell you anything? did he aot give you apy exp! tapations re “He gave me none,” ejaculated Winifred. “He simply assured me that it was not your fault the document had not been before delivered: he pro- mised to call again, and enter more explicitly into details. Alas! I fear that those details must be sad, judging from ail that has hitherto fallen from your lips.” “Sad indeed!” quickly replied Gustayus,— “more than sad!—fearful! atrocious! Oa the day that I parted from you seven months ago, I met my wife, who suspecting that I was here with you, had come to.seek me. She lured me back™to the hotel, by specious promises that she herself would presently accompany me to visit my grandfather and then to call upon you. Ske made me drink wine—she must have drugged that wine—I suspected it not then—I suspected it not indeed until months afterwards, when all the blackness of Her wickedness suddenly burst upon me like a storm-cloud! have now no doubt! Therefore was it that under the influence of narcotics I was taken on board a ship: when I returned to consciousness the vessel was under weigh—and to go back was impossible! Emily socthed and tranquillized me with the falsest and most treacherous representations: she declared that she had forwarded the document to my grandsire, accompanied with the kindest mes- sages to you both. On that point I was conse- quently satisfied.” “Ob, this was indeed very, very bad!” seid Ww inifred : und then with her natural generosity of heart, she added, “ But now that your unfor- tunate wife is nv more—and sinve, after all, the ducument has come into our possession, and has Bat that it was so I. COMMiclooolK<s