CHAPTER XXIX

.

LADY SHANNO'S VOW.

"Love bids touch truth, endure truth, and embrace Truth, though, embracing truth, love crush itself. 'Worship not me, but God!' the angels urge." --ROBERT BROWNING.

Not knowing whither she went, only impelled by a restless craving to rush from herself and her own thoughts, Shanno's steps unconsciously directed themselves up the old familiar pathway towards Craig Aran Peak, and presently, as the cold night air refreshed her burning brain, her thoughts began to collect themselves into more definite shape, and she tried to think collectedly of the tale she had heard, and of its bearing upon her life, ever repeating half-aloud the words which seemed to be branding themselves as with a hot iron into her brain. "The curse is _not_ dead, mother--it is not!" Alas, now she knew the meaning of that strange, black shadow, which, from her early childhood, had, though but for brief and fleeting moments, come at intervals between her and the sunlight of her happy life, terrifying her by its nameless horror, seeming, as it were, to be the very presence of some evil thing at her side, impelling her to some horrible, unknown sin, filling her with a vague yet dreadful craving for _something_--she knew not what! Strange, mysterious, almost ever unspoken trouble of her childhood's and girlhood's days, too intangible and nameless to be confessed or shared with any one since that one occasion when she had spoken of it to her guardian, yet none the less real and full of intense suffering--a dark, mysterious veil, drawn for a few short hours at intervals in her life between her and all that was good and beautiful--wrestled with in secret agonies of prayer and tears, and passing again at last as suddenly as it had come, to be no more remembered until it should fall once again! And now for two happy, unutterably happy years it had been unknown. Since her first meeting two summers ago, in this same mountain loneliness, with him who was the very sunlight of her existence, no shadow of the old trouble had e'er marred her bliss; it was as though the pure and holy presence of Sir Galahad had once and for all exorcised the evil spirit, and as though the subtle influences breathed forth unconsciously from his beautiful life and character, and filling her own life with untold joy and gladness, had for ever banished the brief dreams of darkness which had tortured her--banished them so completely that it had seemed of late as though they had never been, so utterly had all recollection of them been swallowed up by her love for him. But now--now the black shadow had fallen again, and this time with horrible revealed meaning! It was the awful curse of the drink-craving, which had destroyed generation after generation of her forefathers, that she, a pure and innocent maiden, full of holy thoughts and aspirations, had been doomed unconsciously to bear, and now consciously to wrestle with as a terrible foe, suddenly starting forth between her and all her hopes of happiness. Dare she, knowing what she now knew, marry Percival Vere, and let the curse be perpetuated through still further generations? Could she ever bear to see him, whose one life-effort was to be the stemming of this particular vice and sin, endure the misery of seeing his own son or daughter a prey to its power--a victim to the curse which none had ever yet had power to undo?

Yet Percival was about to marry her in full knowledge of the blight upon her house and name, in fuller knowledge of the evil and all its possible consequences than she could dream of, in knowledge gained through deep study of this very thing! If he were willing to brave all and make her his wife, why need she care? He was the stronger and the better able to judge, and, besides, the wedding-day was fixed and all was ready--his heart would break did she dare now, at the eleventh hour, to break the marriage contract! And her mother, who had given her own life-joy to shield her child from the curse, and whose youth had been renewed and the colour brought back to her cheek by the joy with which she looked forward to her union with one who would surely help her to build up anew the fallen fortunes of her house--how could she bring upon her this bitter disappointment? It would surely kill her--she could not do it! Yet, and the pitiless voice of conscience rang remorselessly in her shuddering ear: "Neither Percival nor your mother, nor even the learned Rhiwallon, in whom they place implicit confidence, know that you bear the weight of the curse. They believe that in you it has at last mercifully died out, that, owing to your special up-bringing and removal from its influences from your babyhood, you have grown up free from the smallest shadow or suspicion of the evil. Hence your mother's fond hopes for the future, and the crowning joy of marriage, with which your lover longs to cement in this present world your soul-union with him, without fear of evil. They do not know you have long borne, in your girlish ignorance, this secret shadow, which you now bear in knowledge!" "And they shall never know it!" cried the agonised human spirit in hasty answer. "What need ever to destroy their peace by revealing it? I have known the shadow, it is true, but never have I yielded to the evil. There is no danger after these years that I should ever yield to it, and if I ne'er succumb, what fear need I have for my children? I will ne'er confess to the dark shadow so long borne alone. For these two years past it has been utterly forgotten and blotted out in the joy of my love, and surely that joy will blot it out for ever! I will forget the gipsy, and the horror of her tale, and prepare for my bridal with a light heart as before."

Then once more rang the voice through the poor, confused, and tortured brain; "I will visit the sins of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation!" And Primrose cried in agony; "I dare not do it! Oh, Percival, my love, my love, I dare not marry you! Oh, why have I ever lived to bring you such sorrow, and to kill my mother with grief? Why does God permit such misery in His beautiful world? My heart is breaking! Oh, God, my God, where art Thou? All is darkness--I cannot see Thy face!" and rushing to the edge of the dark pool, lying still and black in the awful midnight silence, she fell on her knees upon its brink, and gazed with strangely fixed, stony eyes into its depths. "Oh, love, my love!" she murmured, pressing her hands upon her aching brow; "I would give my all for thee, to save thee one moment's pain--and I must wring thy heart with bitter misery--that heart which loves me so truly! Nay, I cannot do it! I will risk all--my very life itself for thy sake!" "Thy life, perchance," laughed a hideous, mocking voice in her ear, "but not thy soul! Wilt risk _that_ for thy love? Nay, thou darest not!" And it seemed as though a hundred scoffing voices joined in the Evil One's taunting cry. "Yes, my soul--all that is mine I will give for thee, beloved!" cried the heart-broken girl aloud in desperation. "Apart from thee I have no soul--none. I dare all for thee! Yes, here will I plunge and be at rest. There is no place for me longer in this bright world, which to-morrow's sun will gladden! I may not marry my love, and I cannot live without him! Oh, God, forgive me this sin, for my heart is breaking! Here only, in these quiet waters, can I find rest." Yet lower she knelt over the black abyss, till her long golden tresses touched the water, and floated out in a glittering stream upon its dark surface. Then suddenly she shrank back in horror. "How dark and dreadful a grave!" she muttered, "and I so young to die! But a few short hours ago there was no happier girl in all the world than I. Oh, what has happened? It is but some evil dream, from which I shall presently awake, and all will be well." And as she recoiled a moment from the black gulf, the fiend-like voices again whispered mockingly, exultantly, in her ear, "She dare not--she dare not!" "Yes, I dare all!" her agonised spirit cried in passionate answer; "I dare all but to live without thee, Percival! Ah, it is all truth, dreadful truth, and there is no escape--none. No happy marriage--no blessed, holy home for me in the valley! Percival must dwell there alone, while I sleep beneath these black waters! Yes, I will make the fatal plunge. Farewell, my true love, and pray ever that God may forgive a poor maiden whose brain is turned with misery!" And once more the girl rushed wildly to the brink--then stood transfixed at the sudden wild cry, "Shanno, Shanno!" which rent the still night air. From rock to rock the cry re-echoed, in low, lingering tones of imploring agony, till the very atmosphere seemed ringing with the musical accents of the name--"Shanno, Shanno!" Primrose trembled from head to foot, and pressing her cold hands upon her throbbing brow convulsively, drew back, shuddering, from the water's edge. "It is Percival's voice!" she murmured. "It is his spirit sent to call me back from my self-chosen grave! Ah, God, Thou hast hid Thy face from me, but Thou hast made me hear Thy voice, through Thy servant's cry in the darkness to his beloved! I will live, not die for thee, Percival." And as the last faint echo of the mysterious tones was borne away in sad music on the faint night breeze, she flung herself upon the ground, and burst into an agony of bitter weeping, so terrible that the sobs seemed to rend the slight girlish form in twain. But that outlet to their misery saved the poor bursting heart and brain, and at length the storm of agony spent itself, and she rose, exhausted, but in her right mind, and calm, with a strange new sense of peace and rest.

The first faint flush of early dawn appeared in the eastern sky, and Primrose sat still upon the cold ground, and watched it spread its golden wings over the dark horizon, and unfold one by one its faint rose leaves upon the mountain peaks, feeling too utterly worn out in mind and body for thought or movement. At last she slowly crept once more to the edge of the lake, and looked again into the black waters, but this time with a strong and steadfast gaze. "Your voice has saved me, sweetheart," she murmured softly. "Your holy soul could not watch mine fling itself away for ever from you and from my God, and keep silence! You loved the immortal maiden, Percival;--now it must be an immortal love only that you shall ever bear me. For us no mortal tie can ever be, and we must needs love as the angels in heaven, 'who neither marry nor are given in marriage.' Here, where you first loved me, sweetheart, and where I first saw your face, I vow to you and to God that though you shall never call me by the sweet name of wife, yet I will be true to you through life and through eternity. And in that world, which I have so nigh forfeited by the deed from which your voice has saved me, our love will but shine the brighter for our present sacrifice. Oh, God, give me strength to keep my vow, and not to suffer his pleadings to overcome me, and forgive me for this my great sin and wickedness!" Long Primrose knelt by the water's edge in silent, agonised prayer and wrestling, and the sun was high in the heavens when at last she turned her weary feet homewards, and crept, unobserved, into the farm, and up the staircase to her chamber. And there, in that still and darkened chamber, Lady Bryn Afon kept watch for many long days and nights over her unconscious form, sometimes tossing restlessly to and fro in the delirium of the fever brought on by her long exposure to the cold night air and by her intense mental suffering, sometimes lying so still and prostrate that her mother, with Percival and Rhiwallon, who had been at once summoned from the castle--whither indeed the physician had but just returned with the earl from town--bent in agony over her pillow, fearing lest unawares the faint breathing might wholly cease and the pure young spirit take its flight from the tortured body.

During the first lonely night of watching, ere the messenger despatched in hot haste to Bryn Afon could retrace with the faithful lover and physician the weary miles of hill and dale which lay between the Gwynnon Vale and Craig Aran, Lady Bryn Afon learned from Shanno's wandering lips the story of her midnight agony by the dark pool, and that vow, by which she had for ever crushed out all hope of earthly joy from her own young life and Percival's--those two bright young lives so soon to have been made one--and blighted all her mother's long-cherished hopes. Poor Lady Bryn Afon! Her own heart felt crushed within her, yet she could not part with all hope without a struggle. She would wait patiently until her daughter's health of body and mind returned, and then reason gently with her and soothe away all remembrance of the strange black shadow of which she raved, which was doubtless but a creature of her sick and deluded fancy. Meanwhile she would tell Percival none of his darling's unhappy ravings, merely explaining to him that her illness had been caused by the cruelly-sudden knowledge of the curse, which had come upon her, and by the horror of the circumstances under which it had been revealed. And the Black Horseman, sorely troubled in spirit, yet clinging with a fierce tenacity to his belief in his wondrous antidote to the cruel curse, assured Percival that all would yet be well, and bade him look to hear his marriage-bells ring cheerily ere many weeks had passed; though oft, when alone in his own chamber, he was wont to smite his breast, and cry in sudden bitterness of awful misgiving; "May God forgive me if I lie!"

But the chaplain was young, and hope was brave within him, and knowing well the sensitive and tender heart of her he loved, he was fain to look upon his great happiness as but postponed, and not destroyed by this untoward sickness; yet he was at times sorely perplexed by her sad and constant cry that she had deceived him and broken her mother's heart. "I did not know, Percival, I did not know!" she would cry wildly, and her lover would clasp her hands within his own, and murmur softly-whispered prayers in her ear till his loved voice unconsciously soothed her into quietness.

The weary watching was ended at last, and there came a day when Shanno's dark-fringed lids opened gently, and the deep blue-grey eyes rested with a look of calm knowledge and conscious love upon the face of her beloved. Percival bent his head upon his hand to hide the tears of joy and gratitude which rushed to his eyes at this first glance of loving recognition, and Primrose drew him gently down, and clasped her wasted arms around his neck. "You here, Percival!" she said in a glad whisper. "Now I can be strong. I have been very ill, have I not, and very weak and sinful, my beloved? But you are strong and brave, and now I am content. It is not very hard, is it, to forgive those we love? And I know you love me dearly--you will try to forgive me when I tell you all?" "Sweetheart," he answered, "I know not what I have to forgive, but if there be aught, let no fear of my displeasure vex your sweet spirit. Tell me nothing now, for you are weak and faint, and I can be patient. By-and-by I will hear gladly all you have to tell me, and my love shall soothe away all your grief." "Yes, by-and-by," said Primrose faintly. "By the shores of the black lake, Percival, where we first met, there you must hear me, and be strong. Where is my mother?" "She rests awhile in her chamber," said Percival, "while I play a nurse's part. Sweetheart, I am glad to be here to catch first the conscious music of this dear voice, and take the first conscious kiss from these sweet lips. I pray you look not troubled at these weak tears; they are shed but in joy and thankfulness. Now rest awhile this golden head upon my breast in silence; so shall you presently greet your mother the more bravely."

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