Chapter IV: A Year of Joy

A very simple circumstance--an occasion of every-day life--a railway journey, brought about the awful tragedy in her life, by which she was left a widow at twenty, after being wedded a year--which she called a year of joy, left without a near relation in the world but her brother, Victor Gabion, a captain of Artillery, who, strange to say, was the source of all her sorrow.

'After leaving the English convent at Bruges, I returned to the house of my guardian, M. Hoboken, a merchant in the Avenue du Commerce here. My parents were dead; I had but one brother, Victor Gabion, to whose brother officer Lucien I had been betrothed by them, and whom I had known from his early boyhood, when we had been playmates together, and before we came to those restrictions in intercourse peculiar to French and Belgian society in later years.

'We had learned to love each other very much, Lucien and I, though now we could only see each other at given times, and always in presence of a third party; and each time I seemed to discover some fresh trait in his disposition which rendered him more worthy of love and more worthy of the tenderest affection.

'He was so handsome, my Lucien, so kind, so tender; and so good, so religious and true! He had that dark southern beauty which makes a man so attractive to a fair woman, and, moreover, he possessed that charm which is more attractive and dangerous still--he was interesting.'

Alison thought of her own _fiancée_, Bevil Goring, and believed she could understand all this to the fullest extent.

'His means were ample and his position good, for, apart from his rank in the artillery, he was the representative of the Volcarts, one of the seven _Families Patriciennes d'Anvers_, whose seven coats-of-arms, all bearing a _fesse checky_ you may see at this hour carved in the ancient Steyne of Antwerp. But why think of or boast of such things, when life, we are told, is but a dream, and often a very painful and feverish one!

'I have told you that I was educated in the convent at Bruges with English girls and English ladies. Hence I picked up among them some of that genuine and honest freedom of action which they understood and enjoyed; so when my betrothal to Lucien was fully known, and even the time of our marriage stated, we contrived to have more than one pleasant meeting unknown to my grim guardian, M. Hoboken, whose absorption in business, and often long absence at the Bassin du Kattendyk, and even at Flushing, afforded us facilities we could not otherwise have had.

'But in all this there was a dire fatality, and I shall never forget the day that brought it about.

'M. Hoboken was to be absent at Flushing for two days, and madame was an invalid--unable to go abroad. I met Lucien by appointment in one of the solitary walks, in the quiet park near the Avenue du Commerce, with a gift I had procured for him, when within a week of our marriage.

'"Look what I have brought for you!" said I, as I opened a morocco case containing an armlet of silver, like an Indian bangle--you know what I mean--flat and broad, and closed by a spring lock. In raised letters on the outside was my name, Alison, with the date of our coming marriage.

'"You are my prisoner already," said I, laughingly, as I fitted the band round his wrist, and the spring closed with a snap, thus it could neither fall off nor pass over his hand.

'"My dear love!" he exclaimed, and pressed me passionately to his breast.

'"Now, you are most completely mine," I whispered; "fettered for life--as without my aid you can never get it off."

'"Why?"

'"Because I shall keep the key," said I, and coquettishly dropped it into my bosom.

'"Even as you have the key to my heart," he added,

'After a pause he said,

'"M. Hoboken is still at Flushing?"

'"Yes--and does not return till to-morrow."

'"Très bien!" said Lucien, "by what hour, at the utmost, may Madame Hoboken miss you--or require you?"

'"By seven certainly, and she supposes me to be at the Beguinage--and so will ask no questions, to put me in a false position."

'"Seven--it wants eight hours of that time. See, Lisette, how lovely the day is-- how bright the sun, and how beautiful the white and pink hawthorn that load the air with fragrance."

'"Well, what of that?"

'"Does not such a day make you long to leave dusty Antwerp behind you, and to roam in the country?"

'"It does indeed; but I dare not think of such a thing--till--till next week," I replied, coyly.

'"Lisette," said he, "were you ever at the village of Elewyt, where the old château of Rubens stands, between Malines and Vilvorde? It is a lovely place, and wild as lovely; not a soul would see us there. Come with me, darling, and let us spend one happy day together."

'"I dare not--I dare not," as a vision of Madame Hoboken, grim, prim, and full of proprieties, oppressed me, though I was secretly overwhelmed with delight at the suggestion of this stolen and, to me, new kind of pleasure--a whole beautiful summer afternoon to be spent hand in hand with Lucien--hand in hand, as we were wont to be when children in the Place Verte or on the Boulevards.

'"Come with me, sweet one," he whispered, "it will never--can never be known. It is less than an hour by railway, and, amid the bosky thickets and gardens of the old château we shall seem to leave the world behind us."

'So strong was the temptation to spend an untrammelled afternoon with my betrothed--he who within a week was to be my husband--that I yielded. I knew that I ran a dreadful risk in being seen alone with him, for Antwerp is one of the most scandalous and gossipy towns in Belgium. In this country the rules are very strict as regards the daily intercourse of ladies and gentlemen, in the mere matters of meeting or conversing, as compared with you in England, where the perfect freedom of the innocent is so great; and hence, I doubt not, your happier marriages; for in Belgium, as in France, we are forced to espouse those to whose inner lives we are strangers, and to whose hearts, before marriage, we can have no key, if it is ever found at all.

'A voiture took us to the train, and we took seats in separate carriages. Already the simple, child-like expedition had an air of guilt, and a tremulous fear possessed me as the train glided out of the station, through a cutting in the fortifications at the Rue du Rempart--the wet fosse was left behind, and we sped through the open country.

'Glorious was the summer day; exhaled by heat, the silvery mist was curling up from the rich pastures, amid which the drowsy cattle stood knee-deep, and from the fertile arable lands, over which the giant sails of the windmills cast their shadows; but my heart--now that I was alone, though separated from Lucien by only a carriage or two--sank lower and lower with vague apprehension, and I restrained my tears with difficulty. I was full of terrors, scruples, and fears an English girl, circumstanced as I was, would fail to comprehend, and after traversing miles of dairy farms, where the summer breeze played so sweetly on the long ripples of verdant grass, we reached the little roadside station, where a path diverged to Elewyt. I gathered courage when Lucien Volcarts joined me, and we found ourselves indeed alone, for we were the only persons who quitted the train, which steamed slowly--as all Belgian trains do--on its way to Vilvorde, and our short but delicious day of rambling and planning, scheming and dreaming out our future, hand clasped in hand, began.

'We saw the old château of Rubens, now falling fast to decay, amid its trees, on the land of which he was seigneur, but we did not go near it, and contented ourselves with wandering amid the sylvan scenery, all of which had the charm of extreme novelty to me. The birds that flew overhead or sung in the hedgerows; the thickets of beech and oak, casting shadows over pools where the trout rose to catch the floating fly; the white, waxen-like lilies floating also on their surface; a little stream pouring slowly between gravel banks and sandstone rocks; deep water-cuts in which the Cuyp-like cattle stood midleg for coolness; the quaint cottages, few and far apart; the carillons playing in a distant spire, were all sources of delight to me--delight all the more that I could turn from them ever and anon to look into the tender and loving eyes of Lucien.

'At one of the cottages, which quite approached the dignity of a small farm, we got some refreshment--bread, milk, and cheese--just as we had been wont to do when children in charge of the same _bonne_, and the recollection of that made us laugh and all the more enjoy such simple fare; and truth to tell, though so near our marriage day, in the freedom of the hour we felt very much as if we were happy children again; and long we lingered in one spot, I remember, on a grassy bank under a bower of hawthorn, where the flies buzzed and the bees hummed, and the village bells rang softly out, but now it was their evening chime.

'Evening--that suggested thoughts of home and the necessity for returning, and we had some miles to walk to the railway-station at Elewyt.

'"It is only five, dearest Lisette," urged Lucien, looking at his watch; "and the train, which deposits us at Antwerp, is not due for an hour yet. In a little time we shall go, _petite_."

'The die was cast, for a day of pleasure but marred by secret fears. I was content to remain a little longer, and then we set out for the station. More than once did my apprehensive heart, full of undefined forebodings, suggest the sound of a coming train upon the air, and once, perhaps, it was real, for, on reaching the hamlet of Elewyt, we found the station-gate shut and the platform untenanted.

'Lucien looked at his watch and grew pale. The hands still stood at five o'clock--it was now past seven, the hour at which I should have been at Madame Hoboken's, and the _last_ train had gone some minutes before.

'"Gone!" replied Lucien, in a bewildered tone, to his informant; "and the next?"

"'Not till seven to-morrow morning--from Brussels _viâ_ Vilvorde."

'Both of us were filled with dire dismay as we heard this. Could a voiture, a vehicle of any kind, be procured? Alas! there was not such a thing at Elewyt.

'We turned away with sickening hearts, and I must own that mine died within me. How was I ever to face grim and grave Madame Hoboken? I felt as if I had committed a terrible crime; I shed the bitterest tears, and I cannot tell you, here at least, how sweetly Lucien strove to console and soothe me.

'"I must find you shelter for the night at yonder cottage, where we got the milk, till train time to-morrow," said Lucien; "for myself, I must find it where I may. Come, _petite_, take courage; a little time, and we shall be blessedly independent of everyone."

'On seeing Lucien's well-filled purse, the woman at the cottage was willing enough to accommodate us, especially on learning that we had lost the train; but she filled me with fresh dismay on informing me, with a cunning and penetrating glance there was no mistaking, that she had "but one _chambre à coucher_, which she sometimes let to passing English people and others who wished to avoid strangers; and you, monsieur----"

'"Oh! I will sleep in the stable, or anywhere, madame, provided you can accommodate _mademoiselle ma sœur_," interrupted Lucien, colouring at the necessary falsehood which he told for the first time in all his blameless life, but it was one to protect me.

'Whether the landlady believed him or not I cannot say; but there was a strange and saucy twinkle in her eyes, and while in attendance upon us she provoked me by an air of discretion she adopted; from past experience apparently she was far too discreet to make sudden irruptions on our _tête-à-tête_ evening, however innocent it was, in outward seeming as she no doubt thought, and Lucien twisted his dark moustache angrily, as he muttered,

'"_Sapristi!_ this hag does not live mid-way between Brussels and Antwerp for nothing."

'"Darkness must be closing over Antwerp now, and all the lamps in the Avenue du Commerce will be lighted throughout its spacious length and breadth," was then my thought; "what would Madame Hoboken be thinking and saying of my non-appearance? Had Monsieur Hoboken returned by train from Flushing? Doubtless he had. Where would they be anxiously and angrily suspecting I was?" If they supposed me to be remaining--as I had more than once done if a night proved wet--when visiting here at the Beguinage all would be well; but the morning might ere long produce untoward revelations, and I wept as if my heart would break when once again I was left alone, as my poor Lucien betook him to sleep in a loft above the stables, deploring the _malheur_ in which he had involved us both; but he had no one to scold him save his colonel if he missed a parade, while my life and whole future might be made a burden to me.

'Anyway, I was, from a Belgian point of view especially, in a dreadfully false position. 'There could have been no mistake as to the hour of the fatal train, though all public clocks in Belgium strike the hour half an hour beforehand, thus at half-past eleven the clock announced twelve; and luckily for me Lucien was in plain clothes, not _en grande tenue_ as he usually was, with sword and epaulettes on; consequently he would be less remarked, and fortunately the rain fell heavily that night, which might account for my remaining for shelter at the Beguinage.

'When morning came my spirits rose a little, and I was up betimes to meet the early train. How lovely looked the opening summer day. The grass in the fields, the herbs and flowers in the gardens all glittered in the rays of the sun, as if the dew that moistened them had been diamonds, and the tops of the firs seemed edged with silver. A golden and purple glow filled all the eastern sky, and between it and earth the vapours of night were floating. The birds were awake, and the bees hummed and the butterflies flitted about.

'To me the country seemed new and charming, and its continuity of horizontal lines, each rising beyond the other to the level horizon, where in the distance rose the spires of Antwerp, gave a sense of vastness and novelty.

'In different carriages Lucien and I returned to the city. We parted with but a glance at the station, and with a palpitating heart I sought my temporary home in the Avenue du Commerce--my mind a prey to dire misgivings, full of the stolen summer day at Elewyt, the lost train, the cottage amid the pastures, and Madame Hoboken to be confronted!

'My innocent secret made a very coward of me. Never had I told a falsehood, and I felt as if I would rather die than tell one now. I had done nothing to be ashamed of, and yet the inferences were terrible, especially in society constituted as it is in Belgium.

'"You were, of course, at the Beguinage?" said madame, interrogatively, as she came in from early mass.

'"Yes; I went there in the forenoon," I replied, with a sinking heart, though such was precisely the case.

'"And doubtless the rain detained you all night?"

'"The rain," said I, assentingly.

'"Yet it did not begin to fall till after you should have been at home."

'I hurried to my own room to avoid further questioning, happy in the conviction that in six days now I should be the wife of Lucien, and a free woman.

'Let me hasten over all that followed.

'How my brother Victor--cold, proud, and stern--discovered our escapade I never exactly knew, nor ever shall know probably till that day when all things shall be revealed, but he became, fatally for us, aware of it all.

'"You were not at the Beguinage on the night you said you were?" said he, in a low concentrated voice, two days after, while grasping my wrist like a vice, and eyeing me with eyes that sparkled with fury.

'"How do you dare to say so?" I exclaimed, but in a low and agitated voice.

'"Sapristi!" said he. "You shall learn in time."

'My heart died within me, for there was the blackness of a thundercloud in Victor's face as he flung me from him, and matters progressed quickly after that. I was confined to my own room, but Madame Hoboken informed me that several officers came to and fro after Lucien--that there were long and grave conferences--that Lucien seemed terribly disturbed, and she feared there was to be a duel on the subject, and a duel there was, but not with swords or pistols. Oh, mon Dieu! In the agony of my heart I am anticipating.

'I grew nearly mad with terror till my marriage morning came, and I found that no catastrophe had taken place, for Victor came to conduct me to church, and I wept tears of thankfulness, joy, and gratitude, as one who had escaped the shipwreck of a whole life (through no fault of my own), when I was united by Père Leopold to Lucien in the Church of St. André--the church in which we had both been baptised, where we had made our first communion together--that church with its wonderfully carved pulpit, representing Andrew and Peter called from their nets and boats by the Saviour, all as large as life; and the altar of St Anthony, with his little pig; and the black devil, with a long, red tongue, that used to frighten me in childhood.

'The moment the ceremony was over Victor quitted the church without a word, and I never saw him again. He never visited or came near us, but remained sullenly aloof, as the months of the first, and alas, last, year of our married life--my year of joy--rolled swiftly on. His mood would change, I hoped, in time. Meanwhile, Lucien, my husband, was all the world to me; and how proud and pleased I used to be to see our names united, Volcarts-Gabion, as is the custom in Antwerp.

'Looking back to that time I fear that, in our excessive love for each other, Lucien and I were a little selfish. We seemed to have so much to do in our new home--a pleasant house in the Avenue Van Dyck, overlooking the wooded mounds and beautiful lakes of the park--we had ever so much to say to each other, that we seemed to have no leisure for making friends, or even acquaintances, and we forgot to return, or did so grudgingly, the visits of our hospitable neighbours.

'If I am to speak from personal experience no woman was ever more superlatively happy than I, or more blessed in her husband, and every hour that Lucien could spare from his military duties at the Caserne de Predicateurs was devoted me; and so my year of joy stole swiftly away, and the first anniversary of our marriage drew near.

'At last I became painfully conscious of a new and unusual gloom, restlessness, and depression of manner in Lucien, even when he was caressing me, which he began to do more tenderly and frequently than ever. There was something unfathomable in the expression of his eyes, and unaccountable in the sadness of his voice, and in vain I pressed him to tell me what grieved him.

'"Every human heart has some secret which it longs to keep hidden from all," said he one day at last.

'"But you, dearest Lucien, should have none from me," I urged, with my face on his breast, which was heaving painfully under my cheek.

'"That to which I refer you will learn in time--most terribly--my darling Lisette," said he.

'"Oh, why not now?" I urged; "how cruel this is of you, Lucien!"

'"In old tales," said he, kissing away my tears, "you have read of persons who sold themselves to the devil?"

'"Yes," said I, breathless with wonder and apprehension at his manner.

'"And whose time on earth was hence allotted?"

'"Yes."

'"Do you think that after such a bond was signed--perhaps in blood--life would be pleasant?"

'"No, Lucien; but what _do_ you mean?"

'"That I seem to have so sold myself," he replied, wildly, with his eyes closed.

'"Oh, explain--what do you--what can you mean?" I asked him, imploringly, as a dreadful fear came over me that his brain was affected.

'"I have sold myself to an evil spirit, and now come remorse and misery--remorse for what you will suffer, misery for my own future."

'"Oh, Lucien--my husband!" I exclaimed, folding him in my arms, a what do these dreadful words mean?"

'"I have so sold myself in a manner, Lisette," said he, passionately, "and I shall have to pay the bitter, bitter penalty in losing you and life, and even more, perhaps, and all for what is called honour."

'"What awful riddle is this?" I moaned.

'His words seemed to me like some dead language, the import of which I failed to understand.

'"Do not, oh, Lisette, when the fatal time comes, deem me a madman," said he, covering my face with kisses--yea, and tears too.

'"What end--oh, what can all this mean?" I cried, repressing with difficulty a desire to shriek aloud, while holding him in my embrace, for he seemed almost to faint; his lips were a violet tint, and his face was deathly pale.

'"I cannot tell you all that is before me, or what I have to do and to suffer, beyond even what I suffer now, lest you should loathe me, scorn me; but oh, pity me, Lisette, pity me when all is over."

'"Oh, God, he is mad!" I whispered in my heart.

'"I dare not tell you," he resumed; "I have an enemy who is merciless, and I have blighted your life and my own by an act of folly, almost baseness, over which I had no control."

'Unutterable, indescribable was my longing, my anxious and affectionate curiosity to know what this secret was, but next day--on the anniversary of our marriage--I knew all.

'By an arrangement of which all the officers of their corps were cognizant, Lucien and my brother, Victor Gabion, who had challenged him, fought what was called an American duel two days before our marriage. Two little balls, a black and a white one, had been placed in a hat, and each of the two principals drew out one, with the understanding "that he who drew the black one must be numbered with the dead within twelve months."

'The year--my year of joy--had expired, and in the evening Lucien shot himself! Two days before, he had written a touching letter to Victor, praying him for my sake to release him from the penalty he had incurred, but the letter miscarried, it was never delivered, and no answer came.

'Lucien had died on the instant, and he was found with my bracelet clasped upon his arm. It is buried with him, and my heart is buried too,' added the Beguine, sweetly and simply.

Hence it was, doubtless, that Captain Victor Gabion had such a horror of duels, as he told Bevil Goring, and that the memory of one haunted him; and hence it was also that Sister Lisette, after being a Red Cross nurse in the war, finally entered the Beguinage, that she might the better dedicate herself to the service of God and to prayer for the dead.

Alison Cheyne had endured many bitternesses, humiliations, and mortifications during her short experience of life; but, save the loss of her mother and brothers, no such keen and unmerited misery as her poor Belgian namesake, whose strange story gave her some food for reflection, when the world of waters rolled between them.

The sojourn of Alison in the Beguinage of the Rue Rouge was an epoch in the history of that ancient institution, an era in the peacefully monotonous and uneventful lives of the Sisterhood.

Before this sudden illness fell upon her, Alison's health had been at a very low ebb, 'down many pegs too low,' as her father had said. She had lived in a series of excitements, joys, and sorrows of a feverish nature, the joy of meetings with Bevil, the sorrows of their separation; fears for her father's health, his debts and duns; she had to exert herself all day, yet lay all night awake; then came the rough voyage and the catastrophe which formed a part of it. Her delicate frame was being worn out, without the necessary supports of proper rest or proper food, and yet latterly she had been an inmate of one of the largest and most magnificent hotels in Antwerp.

But she had great vitality about her, and now recovered fast.

'We must meet again--we shall meet again!' exclaimed Alison, as she kissed her namesake many times while bidding her adieu.

'How are we ever to meet,' said the Sister, smiling, 'unless you come to the Beguinage, as I never leave it?'

'Time will show,' said Alison.

'Yes,' replied the other, 'time and God will show.'

Alison remembered these apparently prophetic words after she was at home, and Antwerp was far away, and her visit there seemed but as a dream; for three days after saw her and Sir Ranald in England. 'Ours is a nation of travellers,' says a writer, 'and no wonder, when the elements, air, water, fire, attend our bidding to transport us from shore to shore; when the ship rushes into the deep, her track the foam as of some mighty torrent, and in three hours or less we stand gazing or gazed at among a foreign people. None want an excuse. If rich they go to enjoy; if poor to retrench; if sick to recover; if studious to learn; if learned to relax from their studies.'

None of these objects had brought Alison--the creature of circumstances, and of the plans formed by others--to Antwerp, and now that she was home again--or once again on British soil--the reader may imagine how anxiously she longed for some tidings of Bevil Goring (all unwitting that he had been so long near her, in the land of the stranger), whether he had gone to face the perils of war on the Gold Coast, or been detached at home; and the only one who could have speedily enlightened her thereon was the person to whom she dared not utter his name--Sir Ranald.

So poor Alison could but sigh and think with L.E.L. that

'Earth were too like Heaven
If length of life to love were given.'