The Soldier's Wife — page 154: what you’re looking at

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

THE SOLDIER'S WIFE. goslec by the images of those beloved ones whose condition nad been so much altered by the fiendish persecution of Bates,— Lonsdale hastened to the canteen, closely followed by half a dozen of bis comrades, whom he had in- vited to partake of the treat he proposed to give them. ‘There was a hurry in his brain—a fearful agitation in his heart, that prevented him for a moment from being a free-agent. Indeed, such was the condition of the unlor- tunate man at the time that had he committed a murder, he could not righteously have been held responsible for the deed. He was in such a state of frenzied excitement that he had never known before. His fellow soldiers, how- ever, did not attach so much importance to it as to adopt any measures of coercion or per- suasion to tranquillize him. They thought that he had broken out at length—that he was pre pared for “a lark’—and they were ready to yoin heart and soul in it. Had they rightly understood the condition of his mind, their con- duct would have been very different ; and there- fore it was in no ungenerous nor selfish humor on their part that they suffered him to speed to the canteen, and likewise followed him thither. On arriving there, Frederick tossed down half-a-sovereign—for be it remembered that he and his wife had an ample supply of ready money ;—and he called for a bottle of brandy. His comrades were delighted: they fancied he had experienced a windfall somehow or another, and meant to celebrate it by regaling them. The glass of brandy he poured down his throat was the first dram of raw spirits he had ever taken in his life; and no sooner had he swallowed it, than by a strange revulsion of feeling he was seized with the consciousness of having done a wrong deed—and a pang of remorse shot violently through his heart, as if a dagger had suddenly transfixed it. His mood changed all in a moment: the fever heat of an unnatural excitement subsided—and his com rades fancied that he had suddenly become sober. ‘Taking up the change which the keeper of the canteen had to render him out of his half sovereign, Lonsdale walked forth from the public-house without uttering a word. Those who remained behind, laughingly asked each other what on earth had come over him ?—but speecily ceasing to trouble themselves any more on the subject, they drank the remainder of the brandy to his health, though he was absent. . While passing through the streets on the way to the lodging, Frederick Lonsdale recol- lected the condition in which he had left Luey in the morning; and his heart was smitten with an indescribable sadness. He felt that the moment he was freed from his duties at the barracks, he ought to have rushed to his wife, to assure himself that she had sustained no relapse and that she was better. Altogether he was deeply dissatisfied with himself; and he inwardly yowed to make the amplest atone. ment, by the kindness of his demeanor thence- forth, for this first instance of neglect whereof he had been guilty. On reaching the house, he hastened up stairs to the apartment. Lucy was circumstantial evidence against him. 135 at work—little Frederick was learning his lesson: but the instant our he1s entered the room, the work was laid down—the task-book temporarily abandoned—and he bestowed thé usual embrace first upon his wife, then upon his son. Ah! wherefore did Lucy, as she re- ceived that caress, suddenly gaze upon her hus- band with a look of dismay # She smelt hig breath: it was laden with the fume of potem liquor, “ Yes, dearest Lucy,” he said, in the spirit of that open-hearted frankness which was really natural to him, “ I confess that 1 did enter the canteen—but only for a moment; and that was a moment of desperation. I[t shall not oceur again, Pray believe me. I know you will not reproach me: but it is your continued Confidence that I seek.” Lucy pressed his hand in silence; for it was a hard struggle on her part to restrain her tears and subdue the emotions that were swelling ia her bosom. Throughout the rest of that day our hero was so affectionate iu his language and manner, and so strenuously exerted himself te keep «ff the dark mood, that bis wife’s confidence was completely restored; and she hoped that the momentary weakness of which her husband had been guilty, would serve as a waruing to maintain him in the right path, and not as the stepping-stone of temptauous to lead him inte the wrong one, CHAPTER XXX, 4 THE HOUSE IN THE DARK ALLEY, Caprain Reppurn returned to his regiment in an exceeding ill-humour with himself and all the world. The sensuous passion which he had conceived fur Adela Clive was mistaken by him for the sincerest and most genuine love; and at all events the feeling was strong enough to render the disappointment most goading and vexatious. Besides, he was cruglly humiliated —profouundly mortified: for it was well known at Oakleigh, and amongst the surrounding nobility aud gentry, that he was paying his addresses to the beautiful patrician damsel at the Manor house; and to be so summarily rejected was indeed more than sufficient to aim a blow at his vanity and self conceit. But thia was not all. He had a law-suit pending, for an offence which he had in reality never com- mitted, but which notwithstanding he had every reason to apprehend might be established by Had it been some high-born beauty of the patrician sphere whom he was thus charged with seducing from the paths of virtue, his vanity would have been gratified—his self-conceit rendered exult- ant: he would have considerea it a feather in lis cap—and he would not have even taken the trouble to defend the action, although the allegation wags in itself false. Quite the contrary | —he would have cheerfully allowed his father to pay some few thousands of pounds damages, so long as he might retain the credit of such a brilliant ‘amour, But a bailiff’s wife—and te CORNICE OOOKSs CO)