Melmoth the Wanderer

shriek of rage and horror, and his arms extended, as if to grapple with the fearful objects of some imaginary struggle, he was rushing from the arch under which they stood, lost in the picture which his guilt and despair had drawn, and whose images he was forever doomed to behold.

The slender form that had clung to him was, by this sudden movement, prostrated at his feet; and, with a voice choked with terror, yet with that perfect devotedness which never issued but from the heart and lip of woman, she answered his frightful questions with the simple demand, “Will you be there?”

“Yes!⁠—there I must be, and forever! And will you, and dare you, be with me?” And a kind of wild and terrible energy nerved his frame, and strengthened his voice, as he spoke and cowered over pale and prostrate loveliness, that seemed in profound and reckless humiliation to court its own destruction, as if a dove exposed its breast, without flight or struggle, to the beak of a vulture. “Well, then,” said the stranger, while a brief convulsion crossed his pale visage, “amid thunder I wed thee⁠—bride of perdition! mine shalt thou be forever! Come, and let us attest our nuptials before the reeling altar of nature, with the lightnings of heaven for our bed-lights, and the curse of nature for our marriage-benediction!” The Indian shrieked in terror, not at his words, which she did not understand, but at the expression which accompanied them. “Come,” he repeated, “while the darkness yet is witness to our ineffable and eternal union.” Immalee, pale, terrified, but resolute, retreated from him.

At this moment the storm, which had obscured the heavens and ravaged the earth, passed away with the rapidity common in those climates, where the visitation of an hour does its work of destruction unimpeded, and is instantly succeeded by the smiling lights and brilliant skies of which mortal curiosity in vain asks the question, Whether they gleam in triumph or in consolation over the mischief they witness?

As the stranger spoke, the clouds passed away, carrying their diminished burden of wrath and terror where sufferings were to be inflicted, and terrors to be undergone, by the natives of other climes⁠—and the bright moon burst forth with a glory unknown in European climes. The heavens were as blue as the waves of the ocean, which they seemed to reflect; and the stars burst forth with a kind of indignant and aggravated brilliancy, as if they resented the usurpation of the storm, and asserted the eternal predominance of nature over the casual influences of the storms that obscured her. Such, perhaps, will be the developement of the moral world. We shall be told why we suffered, and for what; but a bright and blessed lustre shall follow the storm, and all shall yet be light.

The young Indian caught from this object an omen alike auspicious to her imagination and her heart. She burst from him⁠—she rushed into the light of nature, whose glory seemed like the promise of redemption, gleaming amid the darkness of the fall. She pointed to the moon, that sun of the eastern nights, whose broad and brilliant light fell like a mantle of glory over rock and ruin, over tree and flower.

“Wed me by this light,” cried Immalee, “and I will be yours forever!” And her beautiful countenance reflected the full light of the glorious planet that rode bright through the cloudless heaven⁠—and her white and naked arms, extended towards it, seemed like two pure attesting pledges of the union. “Wed me by this light,” she repeated, sinking on her knees, “and I will be yours forever!”

As she spoke, the stranger approached, moved with what feelings no mortal thought can discover. At that moment a trifling phenomenon interfered to alter her destiny. A darkened cloud at that moment covered the moon⁠—it seemed as if the departed storm collected in wrathful haste the last dark fold of its tremendous drapery, and was about to pass away forever.

The eyes of the stranger flashed on Immalee the brightest rays of mingled fondness and ferocity. He pointed to the darkness⁠—“Wed me by this light!” he exclaimed, “and you shall be mine forever and ever!” Immalee, shuddering at the grasp in which he held her, and trying in vain to watch the expression of his countenance, yet felt enough of her danger to tear herself from him. “Farewell forever!” exclaimed the stranger, as he rushed from her.

Immalee, exhausted by emotion and terror, had fallen senseless on the sands that filled the path to the ruined pagoda. He returned⁠—he raised her in his arms⁠—her long dark hair streamed over them like the drooping banners of a defeated army⁠—her arms sunk down as if declining the support they seemed to implore⁠—her cold and colourless cheek rested on his shoulder.

“Is she dead?” he murmured. “Well, be it so⁠—let her perish⁠—let her be anything but mine!” He flung his senseless burden on the sands, and departed⁠—nor did he ever revisit the island.

XIX

Que donne le monde aux siens plus souvent,
Echo Vent.
Que dois-je vaincre ici, sans jamais relacher,
Echo la chair.
Qui fit le cause des maux, qui me sont survenus,
Echo Venus.
Que faut dire après d’une telle infidelle,
Echo Fi d’elle.

Magdaleniade, by Father Pierre de St. Louis

Three years had elapsed since the parting of Immalee and the stranger, when one evening the attention of some Spanish gentlemen, who were walking in a public place in Madrid, was arrested by a figure that passed them, habited in the dress of the country (only without a sword), and walking very slowly. They stopped by a kind of simultaneous movement, and seemed to ask each other, with silent looks, what had been the cause of the impression this person’s appearance had made on them. There was nothing remarkable in his figure⁠—his demeanour was quiet; it was the singular expression of his countenance which had struck them with a sensation they could