Chapter XXVIII: Vengeance

One sole desire, one passion now remains
To keep life’s fever still within her veins—
Vengeance! dire vengeance on the wretch who cast
O’er her and all she loved that ruinous blast,
For this she still lives on, careless of all
The honor that upon her head might fall;
For this alone exists—like lightning fire
To speed one bolt of vengeance and expire!—_Moore._

It is impossible to define the boundary line that separates extravagant emotions from absolute madness. Evil passions lose themselves by fine gradations in the dark shadows of insanity.

Who can adequately describe the effect of monstrous wrongs upon a temperament sensitive, ardent and impassioned as that of Lionne? Grief, shame and rage made a hell of her heart. Maddened at last by what she supposed to be the dreadful fate of her child, she had rushed from the cavern and plunged into the darkest depths of the forest. Here for many days and nights she had wandered about in a state of frenzy.

Vulcan wildly sought her through the woods in vain. At last, by heavy bribes, he gained the assistance of the old squaw in the search.

And Kalougoora, with her matchless Indian tact in tracing a fugitive, soon fell upon the trail of Lionne and tracked her to her lair.

There, in a thicket of undergrowth in the depths of the forest, she lay collapsed, prostrate and exhausted from madness, hunger and exposure.

Vulcan hastily constructed a rude litter of brush, upon which he placed her unresisting and almost insensible form, and with the help of Kalougoora bore it back to the lodge by the Singing Stream.

Here the wretched girl lay a long time in a state bordering upon idiocy. At length, by the united care of her faithful attendant and the skill of the old Indian doctress, Lionne slowly recovered some degree of life. And with this new life came the restlessness of a reviving sense of pain.

“I cannot stay here, Vulcan,” she said, addressing her humble friend. “I cannot stay here! every feature of this land is too fraught with agonizing associations.”

“But where will you go, then, dear mistress?”

“Anywhere! anywhere! out of this place!”

“At least you will let me attend you, wherever you go, dear mistress?”

“No! no! no! no! I will not be followed! No one that loves me, however humble, shall share my fate, my sins and sufferings!”

Vulcan did not presume to insist; but from that day he resolved never to lose trace of his wretched young mistress, but to watch over her, to protect her, and to follow her, if need should be, (to use his expression) “to the end of the world.”

And thus, one night, when Lionne, with some dark purpose goading her onward, arose and stole to the stable, and saddled her horse and set out for the East, Vulcan mounted his old mule, and, unknown to his mistress, set forth upon the same road, only taking care to keep out of sight in the rear.

The miserable girl reached River-view only to learn from the poor people of the neighborhood, from whom, as a stranger traveller, she received hospitality, that Mr. and Lady Adelaide Deville had gone to Scotland to spend the ensuing winter with their uncle, the Earl of Glen Lennark.

With her own deeply-wronged, awfully-bereaved father!

Some fatality led Lionne still farther to pursue her recreant husband. She was still in possession of a part of that large sum of money given her by her father some months previous, and with that she embarked in a small merchant vessel trading between Norfolk and Glasgow.

Vulcan, who, unknown to her, had followed his mistress, shipped as a seaman on the same barque. His presence here could not possibly be long concealed from her.

On the third day after sailing, she recognized him among the crew. As he was engaged with three or four others in taking in sail, she could not speak to him. But the next day, an opportunity offering, she approached and accosted him.

“Vulcan, my poor friend, why are you here?”

“Mistress, I belong to you!”

“Ah, Vulcan! why have you followed me?”

“Because I am yours.”

“Vulcan, do you know whither my dark path leads?”

“I know! I know!”

“And _yet_ you follow me?”

“Yes.”

“Alas! why?”

“To _save_ you, if I _may_! To _perish_ with you, if I _must_.”

The approach of the mate cut short the colloquy, and Lionne turned sadly away.

A short passage of four weeks brought the vessel to Glasgow.

Lionne left the vessel and commenced her journey into the Highlands.

Vulcan, who had only shipped for the voyage, received his pay and his discharge, and attended his mistress, who no longer attempted to prevent him, to Glen Lennark.

There the first news that met them from the simple peasantry was that of the death of the Earl of Glen Lennark.

Again was Lionne overwhelmed with affliction.

She threw herself down beside the wild rocky path leading through the glen, and abandoned herself to the wildest frenzy of woe. Vulcan stood in silent, respectful sympathy beside her, while her informants passed on their way with many a wondering look behind at the “poor daft stranger body” and her queer guide.

Suddenly Lionne started to her feet, turned, and taking the path leading up to the most savage fastnesses of the mountains north of Glen Lennark, disappeared among the rocks.

In great terror for her life, Vulcan followed her as fast as age and clumsiness would permit.

He found her far up in the mountain, seated upon the brink of a dreadful precipice; a shelving crag overhanging her head and overshadowing her whole form; a wild torrent raging below her feet. She sat with her black dress flowing upon the bleak rocks; her elbow resting upon her knee; her chin dropped into the palm of her hand; her long black hair streaming like a meteor around her; her fierce black eyes glaring into vacancy;—she sat—where all around was desolation—the most desolate object!

With the yearning tenderness of a mother, Vulcan stretched his arms towards her, praying—

“Oh, mistress, come down!”

“Oh, Vulcan!” she wailed—“when that black traitor betrayed me unto death, and I arose from the grave to find my child devoured of wild beasts, I thought that fate, with all her malignity, had no more poisoned arrow left. But now! now! oh, my father! my dear, my gentle, my noble father! your heart has been broken by the loss of your child. ‘Your gray hair has been brought with sorrow to the grave!’ Oh, Vulcan, I seemed to die that he might live! Ah, it was useless all! My loss killed him even as the knowledge of my _dishonor_ might!”

“Your _misfortune_, mistress! there can be no dishonor where there is no fault,” replied the poor dwarf.

“Ah, Orville! traitor! destroyer! this is but another count in the awful indictment against you!” she hissed through her clenched teeth.

Vulcan climbed to where she sat, and with almost worshipping servility cast himself down upon the rocks before her, grovelling at her feet and praying—

“Mistress! Lionne! my child! my nursling! my lady! Oh, look up! listen to me! to me, your poor old servant, who would lay down his life, and think it all too cheap a price, if it purchased you one hour’s peace! Listen to me!”

“Well, Vulcan; well, speak!”

“Lady, look up and see what life has left for you. Your child is gone; your father dead; your secret safe in one faithful heart that would be torn bleeding from its breast rather than betray that trust——”

“Do you speak, then, only to remind me of my wrongs and sorrows?”

“No, but to pray you to cast from you all memory of your wrongs and sorrows, and all thoughts of hatred and revenge: to become your better, nobler, higher self. The hereditary coronet of the Earls of Glen Lennark awaits your brow. Your mortal foe is at your mercy, and dares not dispute your claim. Countess of Glen Lennark, arise, dispossess the usurper, assume the insignia of your rank and the rule of your domain.”

She gazed upon the speaker with wild, amazed, incredulous eyes.

“Would you leave that unsullied coronet upon the unworthy brow of the traitor, the destroyer, the usurper?” asked Vulcan, pointedly.

She started violently.

“No, never! Vulcan, you are right. Leonora Lorne, dead to all the world else, must survive to him! The living bar to his succession; the living retribution of his crime; the living fate to all his future! I may not claim my RIGHT nor forget my WRONG; but I will hold the POWER with which both right and wrong has invested and armed me—a sword of Damocles above his head. With this invisible sword will I drive him forth from all his possessions! With this sword will I come between him and every blessing of nature! Ay, with this fire of vengeance and sword of power will I lay waste his life! Arise, let us go.”

“Lionne, my mistress, oh, think of what you do!” prayed Vulcan.

“By day and night I think of nothing else!”

“Good heavens, lady, if all is lost on earth, need all be lost in heaven too? Alas! is it well to send your own soul to ruin after your lost happiness?”

“Yes—for _love_ I risked heaven! for HATE I would dare hades!”

Appalled by the ruthless spirit of revenge that raged in her heart, yet resolved to save her or to share her fate, Vulcan arose and followed his mistress down the step.

Seeking concealment, they found shelter in a mountain cavern. And from this obscurity kept watch upon the castle.

Deeply vailed and hidden in the crowd, Lionne was present at the funeral ceremony, and even looked, for the last time, upon the loved face of her father, before the coffin lid closed down upon it forever. She then concealed herself within the turret-cabinet, to hear any chance details of his last illness and death. Alas! she was not gratified. His form was hidden from the eyes; his name banished from the lips; his very memory exiled from the minds of men.

Already, as I said before, the world had turned from the grave of the dead Earl to do honor to his living successor, neither knowing nor caring to know, how the one had risen upon the fall of the other.

Lionne writhed with rage.

“The Earl of Glen Lennark lies broken hearted in his grave! His heiress wanders, a vagrant and pariah on the face of the earth! And while the old man moulders in his shroud, and the young woman sorrows in her bitterness, shall _he_, the miscreant, the traitor who brought the one to misery and the other to death, sit in the Earl’s seat, be hailed by his title, and enjoy his estates? No! no! no! no! not while I have power to prevent it! This hand may not be raised to grasp my father’s coronet, but it _shall_ be lifted to hurl its usurper, his destroyer, my enemy, from his seat!”

From her hiding place in the turret-cabinet she watched the company that gathered to hear the reading of the will; she saw them go into the dining-room and take their places at the table. She listened to the fulsome flattery, the flippant conversation, and the formal toasts. She heard a toast proposed in honor of the Countess of Glen Lennark, and recognizing in that incident her best opportunity to break “the good meeting with most admired disorder,” she glided from her concealment, stood shrouded in mourning habiliments, and paler than a visitant from the grave, and in deep, bell-like tones, that tolled like a funeral knell through the room—uttered these startling words:

“_The Countess of Glen Lennark accepts your toast and thanks your courtesy!_” The effect of this speech, spoken by what seemed a spectre from the grave, might be easily imagined, if it had not already been described. The so-called Earl of Glen Lennark started to his feet; the guests arose in disorder; the Lady Adelaide dropped, swooning, from her chair.

In the general confusion that ensued, Lionne glided away and made her escape to the fastnesses of the Highlands.

Vulcan attended her, and remained as before, her sole connecting link with the outer world. From Vulcan she continued to hear news of those whom she called usurpers at the castle. With savage joy she heard of the calamity that disappointed the quasi Earl of an heir, and prostrated his wife upon a bed of illness that had nearly been one of death. She learned the horror and amazement with which Lady Adelaide regarded her (Lionne’s) appearance at the feast, and of the orders of the family physician that her ladyship should travel far from the scene of her distress.

Finally she was told of the family’s departure for the continent. And then she left her hiding place to follow them. How she kept upon their track, never revealing herself, yet never losing sight of them, waiting, like some bloodthirsty wild beast, the time to spring upon her prey, needs not to be related here at length. Suffice it to say, that when they sailed for the United States, she embarked by the next vessel bound for the same place, and that she arrived at Norfolk the very day upon which they landed at that port.

She followed them to River-view, where, unseen and unsuspected, she hovered as some ill-omened bird of night about their path—their secret, terrible, relentless enemy, consuming with a fierce, insatiable passion of vengeance—a passion that grew by what it fed upon!

She was aware, by observation, of the fond parental hopes that had brought the young pair to their native home. And she ruthlessly resolved to thwart their hopes!

“Through his treachery _my_ one child was left to be devoured by wild beasts! Therefore, no child of his shall be left to bless him! every one of them, as it is born, shall be offered a sacrifice to her manes! One, the first-born, the heir, has already perished! the next shall follow, and every infant his dainty wife shall live to bring, shall share the same fate!” muttered the wretched girl, as with a malignity that nothing but insanity could explain, she watched and waited to wreak her frenzied vengeance upon a being that always stands the very type of perfect innocence and perfect helplessness—“an unborn babe!”

Seldom does any other than tender cares and fervent prayers and devoted love, wait to greet an infant on its entrance into life! This child of Adelaide was met at the very threshold of existence by a fierce, terrible and relentless foe! Like the prowling leopardess, she could lurk, and watch, and wait for the time to pounce upon her prey! Nay, like the same beast, when sure of the steadiness of her eye, the length of her spring and the sharpness of her claws, she, certain of her power, could even trifle with opportunity and play with her victim! It was in this perverse spirit that she let chance after chance of stealing the new-born infant pass by, and waited for some signal opportunity when the theft of the child should be felt by the whole community, with the most tremendous effect.

Thus she waited for the christening-festival. She contrived to steal, unseen, into the house, and to conceal herself within the shubberies of the conservatory connecting with the drawing-rooms on the one hand and with Mr. Deville’s study on the other. Here she waited until the lamps were lighted and the guests assembled. With the savage joy of anticipated triumph, she watched the ceremonial of the baptism to its conclusion. She heard the mother’s pretty name—“Adelaide”—bestowed upon the infant. She heard the officiating clergyman invite his hearers to unite with him, in a final prayer for God’s blessing upon this “first-born daughter” of the youthful parents.

Then from her concealment in the shrubberies, she uttered the awful words—

“The first-born daughter of Orville Deville is beyond your prayers! _Living_, no home sheltered her infancy! _Dead_, no grave received her corpse! Born in a cave and devoured by wild beasts—the first-born daughter of Orville Deville is past your prayers!”

The tremendous effect produced by this horrible speech, uttered as it was, by the hollow voice of an invisible speaker, has been already described; the shock, the confusion, and the fruitless search, that followed, have been depicted.

Secure in her hiding place, Lionne, unseen, saw every thing!

She waited until the spoiled festivities of the evening came to a conclusion. She saw the guests take leave and depart.

She heard Mr. Deville persuade his wife to go to rest. She saw him enter his study and sit down to his writing-table, and then, through the vine-shaded glass door, between the conservatory and the study, unseen, she watched him at her leisure.

The conservatory was in deep darkness, the study was lighted up, so that invisible herself, she had the clearest view of him as pale, weary and disturbed, he sat leaning his elbow upon the table and his head upon his hand. So still he sat that she supposed he slept, and envying that repose, and drawn by an irresistible attraction, she softly opened the glass door, parted the foliage, glided into the study and stood before him.

Her form intercepting the light, her shadow falling upon his face, startled him!

He raised his eyes, and recognizing the shape or _shade_ of the dreaded girl, he faltered forth the question—

“Lionne! why are you here?”

Then came the fearful answer—

“TO WARN! The wild beast growls before he springs! the serpent hisses before he stings! and _I_ speak before I strike! Look to your child!”

And before he could recover from the panic produced by these words, she had glided away!

With the swiftness and silence of thought, she sped to the nursery, softly raised the sleeping infant in her arms, fled down the back-stairs, out through the back-door into the shrubberies, thence through the vineyard, the orchard, and the field, to the forest.

And by the time the child was missed and the search was commenced, both were lost beyond pursuit, in the interminable intricacies of the wilderness.