Rookwood

'That smile chills me—freezes me. Oh, Reginald! could you but know what I have endured this morning on your account. My brother Lionel has been here.'

'Indeed!'

'Nay, look not so. He insisted on knowing the reason of my altered appearance.'

'And no doubt you made him acquainted with the cause. You told him your version of the story.'

'Not a word, as I hope to live.'

'A lie!'

'By my truth, no.'

'A lie, I say. He avouched it to me himself.'

'Impossible! He could not—would not disobey me.

Sir Reginald laughed bitterly.

'He would not, I am sure, give utterance to any scandal,' continued Lady Rookwood. 'You say this but to try me, do you not?—ha! what is this? Your hand is bloody. You have not harmed him? He is safe? Whose blood is this?'

'Your brother spat upon my cheek. I have washed out the stain,' replied Sir Reginald, coldly.

'Then it is his,' shrieked Lady Rookwood, pressing her hands shudderingly before her eyes. 'Is he dead—dead?'

Sir Reginald turned away.

'Stay,' she cried, exerting her feeble strength to retain him, and becoming white as ashes, 'abide and hear me. You have killed me, I feel, by your unkindness. I have striven against it, but it would not avail. I am sinking fast— dying. I, who loved you, only you; yea, one beside—my brother, and you have slain him. Your hands are dripping in his blood, and I have kissed them—have clasped them. And now,' continued she, with an energy that shook Sir Reginald, 'I hate you—I abhor you—I renounce you—for ever! May my dying words ring in your ears on your deathbed, for that hour will come. You cannot shun that. Then think of him! think of me!'

'Away!' interrupted Sir Reginald, endeavouring to shake her off.

'I will not away! I will cling to you—will curse you. My unborn child shall live to curse you—to requite you—to visit my wrongs on you and yours. Weak as I am, you shall not cast me off. You shall learn to fear even me.'

'I fear nothing living, much less a frantic woman.'

'Fear the dead then.'

'Hence! or by the God above us—'

'Never!'

There was a struggle—a blow—and the wretched lady sank, shrieking, upon the floor. Convulsions seized her. A mother's pains succeeded fierce and fast. She spoke no more, but died within the hour, giving birth to a female child.

Eleanor Rookwood became her father's idol—her father's bane. All the love he had to bestow was centred in her. She returned it not. She fled from his caresses. With all her mother's beauty, she had all her father's pride. Sir Reginald's every thought was for his daughter—for her aggrandisement. In vain. She seemed only to endure him, and while his affection waxed stronger, and entwined itself round her alone, she withered beneath his embraces as the shrub withers in the clasping folds of the parasite plant. She grew towards womanhood. Suitors thronged around her—gentle and noble ones. Sir Reginald watched them with a jealous eye. He was wealthy, powerful, high in royal favour;—and could make his own election. He did so. For the first time, Eleanor promised obedience to his wishes. They accorded with her own humour. The day was appointed. It came. But with it came not the bride. She had fled, with the humblest and meanest of the pretenders to her hand—with one upon whom Sir Reginald supposed she had not deigned to cast her eyes. He endeavoured to forget her, and, to all outward seeming, was successful in the effort. But he felt that the curse was upon him, the undying flame scorched his heart. Once and once only they met again, in France, whither she had wandered. It was a dread encounter—terrible to both; but most so to Sir Reginald. He spoke not of her afterwards.

Shortly after the death of his first wife, Sir Reginald had made proposals to a dowager of distinction, with a handsome jointure, one of his early attachments, and was, without scruple, accepted. The power of the family might then be said to be at its zenith; and but for certain untoward circumstances, and the growing influence of his enemies, Sir Reginald would have been elevated to the peerage. Like most reformed spendthrifts, he had become proportionately avaricious, and his mind seemed engrossed in accumulating wealth. In the meantime, his second wife followed her predecessor; dying, it was said, of vexation and disappointment.

The propensity to matrimony, always a distinguishing characteristic of the Rookwoods, largely displayed itself in Sir Reginald. Another dame followed—equally rich, younger, and far more beautiful than her immediate predecessor. She was a prodigious flirt, and soon set her husband at defiance. Sir Reginald did not condescend to expostulate. It was not his way. He effectually prevented any recurrence of her indiscretion. She was removed, and with her expired Sir Reginald's waning popularity. So strong was the expression of odium against him, that he thought it prudent to retire to his mansion in the country, and there altogether seclude himself. One anomaly in Sir Reginald's otherwise utterly selfish character was uncompromising devotion to the house of Stuart; and shortly after the abdication of James II, he followed that monarch to St. Germains, having previously mixed largely in secret political intrigues; and only returned from the French Court to lay his bones with those of his ancestry in the family vault at Rookwood.

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