Hearts Afire

A FIGHT TO THE DEATH.

The news of the duel spread with the proverbial rapidity of evil news. At the doors of all the public houses, in every open shop, on every private stoop, and at the street-corners, people were soon discussing the event, with such additions and comments as their imaginations and prejudices suggested. One party insisted that lawyer to be Sir Edward was dead; another, that it was the young man Harleigh Daly; a third, that both died as they were being carried from the ground.

Joris Morgan, who had lingered to the last moment at the scene of the fight, heard the story from many a lip as he went home. He was bitterly indignant at Charlotte. He felt betrayed, indeed, that she had not ended this triangle of love. How wicked Charlotte had been not to remember that she had a family whose spotless name would be tarnished by her love affairs! He was hot with haste and anger as he walked his house.

Lysbet Morgan on the front-stoop, looking anxiously down the road. She was aware that Elder Van Heemskirk had called for her husband, and she had heard from the wagging tongues that they had left town in unexplained haste. At first, the incident did not trouble her much. Perhaps one of the valuable Norman horses was sick, or there was an unexpected ship in, or an unusually large order. Lysbet Morgan only worried because supper must be delayed an hour, and that delay would leave the supper stone cold. As Lysbet Morgan was on the front-stoop watching for her husband, who was becoming dreadfully late; and, like many other loving women, she could think of nothing good which might have detained him, but her heart was full only of evil apprehensions. It was then. She thought the hour would never come. Eagerly she watched her husband coming down the road; certainty it would be better than such cruel fear and suspense.

“Where is Charlotte?” That was the Father’s first question, and he called her through the house. From the closed best parlor, Charlotte came, white and weeping.

“What is the matter, then, that you are crying? And why into the dark room go you?”

“Full of sorrow I am, father, and I went to the room to cry alone; but I cannot weep but a teardrop.”

“Full of sorrow. Yes, for that scamp Harleigh Daly you are full of sorrow. And how can you weep for yourself when you are disobeying your good father? Your teardrop will dry as fast as it falls.”

Joris Morgan was not pitiless; but he was angered and troubled, and Charlotte's grief irritated him at the moment. “Go and tell mother to bring in the tea. The work of the house must go on,” he muttered.

Ere the words were finished, just as Lysbet Morgan said, “The tea is served” the large figure of Joris Morgan loomed through the gathering grayness; and the women waited for him. He came upon the room without his usual greeting; and his face was so injured and portentous that Lysbet Morgan, with a little cry, put her arms around his neck. He gently removed them.

“No time is this, Lysbet, for embracing. A great disgrace has come to the family; and I, who have always stood up for morality, must bear it too.”

“Disgrace! The word goes not with our name, Joris; and what mean you, then? In one word, speak.”

But Joris loved too well any story that was to be wondered over, to give it in a word; though madam's manner snubbed him a little, and he said, with less of the air of a wronged man,—

“Well, then, Sir Edward and Harleigh Daly have fought a duel. That is what comes of giving way to passion. I never fought a duel. It is a fixed principle with me.”

“But what? And how?”

“With swords they fought. Like two banshees they fought, as if to pieces they would cut each other.”

“Poor Sir Edward! His fault I am sure it was not.”

“Lysbet! Sir Edward is nearly dead. A fool he played to follow his heart.”

In the shadow behind them Charlotte stood. The pallor of her face, the hopeless droop of her white shoulders and arms, were visible in its gloomy shadows. Softly as a spirit she walked as she drew nearer to them.

“And the other? Is he hurt?”

“Killed. He has at least twenty wounds. Till morning he will not live. It was the fate himself who separated the men.”

For a moment Charlotte's consciousness reeled. The air of the wind which girds our life round was in her ears, the feeling of chill and collapse at her heart. But with a supreme will she took possession of herself. “Weak I will not be. All I will know. All I will suffer.” And with these thoughts she went back to the room, and took her place at the table. In a few minutes the rest followed. Joris Morgan did not speak to her. It was also something of a cross to him that madam would not talk of the event. He did not think that Charlotte deserved to have her ill-regulated feelings so far considered, and he had almost a sense of personal injury in the restraint of the whole household.

Joris Morgan had anticipated his wife's amazement and shock. He had felt a just satisfaction in the suffering he was bringing to Charlotte. He had determined to point out to Charlotte the difference between herself and family. But nothing had happened as he expected. The meal, instead of being pleasantly lengthened over such dreadful intelligence, was hurried and silent. Charlotte, instead of making herself an image of wailing or unconscious remorse, sat like other people at the table, and pretended to drink her tea.

It was some comfort that after it Lysbet and he could walk in the garden, and talk the affair thoroughly over. Charlotte watched them away, and then she fled to her room. For a few minutes she could let her sorrow have way, and it would help her to bear the rest. And oh, how she wept! She took from their hiding-place the flowers her lover had giving her, and she mourned over them as women mourn in such extremities. She kissed the petal with passionate love; she vowed, amid her broken ejaculations of tenderness, to be faithful to him if he lived, to be faithful to his memory if he died. She never thought of Sir Edward; or, if she did, it was with an anger that frightened her. In the full tide of her anguish. Charlotte Morgan had become a woman that night, and a woman's sorrow had found her.

Once in the garden. Lysbet noticed his face was troubled, his clothing disarranged and blood-stained; and his wife never remembered to have seen him so completely exhausted. “Guy Barrington is with Sir Edward,” he blurted out; “he will not be home.”

“And the other?”

“I witnessed them carry—him. To the “King's Arms” they took him. I stayed for a moment; that is all.”

“Live will he?”

“His right lung is pierced clean through. A bad wound in the throat he has. At death's door is he, from loss of the blood. But then, youth he has, and a great spirit, and hope. I wish not for his death, my God knows.”

“Sir Edward, what of him?”

“Unconscious he was when I left him. I stayed not there. His father and Guy Barrington were by his side Does Charlotte know?”

“She knows.”

“How then?”

“The words of trouble fly faster on the wings of vultures, then do the good tidings of a song bird.”

“O Joris, if in her room thou could have heard her crying! My heart for her aches, the sorrowful one!”

“See, then, that this lesson she miss not. It is a hard one, but learn it she must. If thy love would pass it by, think this, for her good it is. Many bitter things are in it. What unkind words will now be said! With our own people a disgrace it will be counted. Can I not hear towns folk grumble, and that evil old woman, Madam Van Corlaer, will shake her head and whisper, Yes, neighbors, and depend upon it, the girl is of a light mind and bad morals, and it is her fault; and I shall take care my nieces to her speak no more. So it will be; Charlotte herself will find it so.”

The next morning was the Sabbath, and many painful questions suggested themselves to Joris and Lysbet. Joris felt that he must not take his seat among the deacons until he had been fully exonerated of all blame of blood-guiltiness by his elders and deacons in full kirk session. Madam could hardly endure the thought of the glances that would be thrown at her daughter, but these things did not seem to Joris a sufficient reason for neglecting worship. He thought it best for people to face the unpleasant consequences of wrong-doing; and he added, “In trouble also, my dear ones, where should we go but into the house of the good God?”

Charlotte had not spoken during the discussion but, when it was over, she said, “My dear mother, today I cannot go! For me have some pity. Bear it I cannot. I shall fall down, I shall be ill; and there shall be shame and fear, and the service to make stop, and then more wonder and more talk, and the dominie angry also! At home I am the best.”

“Well, then, so it shall be.”

But Joris was stern to Charlotte, and his anger added the last bitterness to her grief. No one had said a word of reproach to her; but, equally, no one had said a word of pity. Even Lysbet was shy and cold, for Joris had made her feel that one's own daughter may fall below moral par and sympathy. “If either of the men die,” he had said, “I shall always consider Charlotte guilty of murder; and even while the matter is uncertain, is it not right to be careful? Are we not told to avoid even the appearance of evil?” So that, with this charge before him, Joris felt that countenancing Charlotte in any way was not keeping it.

And certainly the poor girl might well fear the disapproval of the general public, when her own family made her feel her fault so keenly. The service that morning would have been the pillory to her. She was unspeakably grateful for the solitude of the house, for space and silence, in which she could have the relief of unrestrained weeping. About the middle of the morning, she sighted Guy Barrington as he walked toward the front gate. She divined why he had come, and she shrank from meeting him until he removed the clothing he had worn during the night's bloody vigil. Guy Barrington had not thought of Charlotte's staying from the morning service; and when she confronted him, so tear-stained and woe-be gone, his heart was full of pity for her. “My poor little Charlotte!” he said; and she threw her arms around his neck, and sobbed upon his breast as if her heart would break.

“My Charlotte, who has grieved thee?”

“O Guy! Is he dead?”

“Who? Sir Edward? I think he will get well once more.”

“What care I for Sir Edward? The wicked one! I wish that he might die. Yes that I do.”

“Whish!—to say that is wrong.”

“Guy! Guy! A little pity give me. It is the other one. Hast thou heard?”

“How can he live? Look at the sorrow he hath caused.”

“No, I will not look at it. I will ask God every moment that he may get well. Could I help that I should love him? So kind, so generous, is he! Oh, my dear one, my dear one, would I had died for thee!”

Guy Barrington was much moved. Within the last twenty-four hours he had begun to understand the temptation in which Charlotte had been; begun to understand that love never asks, 'What is thy name? Of what country art thou? Who is thy father?

“Everyone is angry at me, Guy, father will not sit on the chair at my side; and mother says a great disgrace I have made for her. And thou? Wilt thou also scold me? I think I shall die of grief.”

“Scold thee, thou little one? That I will not. And those that are angry with thee may be angry with me also. How could they make thee weep? Cruel are they to do so. And as for your father, mind him not. Not much I think of Joris! If he says this or that to thee, I will answer him.”

“Guy! My Guy! My only friend! There is one comfort for me,—if I knew that Harleigh still lived; if one hope thou could give me!”

“What hope there is, I will go and see. Before they are back from the morning service, I will be back; and, if there is good news, I will be glad for thee.”

Not half an hour was Guy Barrington away; and yet, to the miserable girl, how grief and fear lengthened out the moments! She tried to prepare herself for the worst; she tried to strengthen her soul even for the message of death. But very rarely is any grief as bad as our own terror of it. When Guy Barrington came back, it was with a word of hope on his lips.

“I have seen,” he said, “who dost thou think?—the old surgeon. He of all men, he has sat by Harleigh's side all night; and he has dressed and redressed the wound continually all night. And he said to me, Three times, in the Persian desert, I have cured wounds still worse, and, if he can live through the day, the young man shall recover. That is what he said, Charlotte.”

“Forever I will love the surgeon. Though he fail, I will love him. So kind he is, even to those who have not spoken well, nor done well, to him.”

“So kind, also, was his friend Ewan Rawden to me. Now, then, go wash thy face, and take comfort and courage.”

“Guy, leave me not.”

“There is Sir Edward. We have been companions; and his father and his mother are old, and need me.”

“Also, I need thee. All the time they will make me to feel how wicked I have been!”

At this moment the family returned from the morning service, and Guy Barrington rather defiantly drew Charlotte to his side. No one spoke to Charlotte; even her mother was annoyed and humiliated at the social ordeal through which they had just passed, and she thought it only reasonable that the erring girl should be made to share the trial. Joris, however, had much curiosity; and his first thought on seeing Guy Barrington at his home was, “Sir Edward is of course dead, and in the tone of one personally injured by such a fatality, he ejaculated,—

“So it is the end, then. On the Sabbath day Sir Edward has gone. If it should be the Sabbath day in the other world,—which is likely,—it will be the worse for Sir Edward.”

“What mean you?”

“Is not Sir Edward?”

“No. I think, also, that he will live.”

“I am glad. It is good for Charlotte.”

“I see it not.”

“Well, then, if he dies, is it not Charlotte's fault?”

“Goodness! No! Charlotte is not to blame.”

“All respectable and moral people will say so.”

“Better for them not to say so. If I hear of it, then I will make them say it to my face.”

But, though Guy Barrington bravely championed Charlotte he could not protect her from those wicked innuendoes disseminated for the gratification of the virtuous; nor from those malicious regrets of very good people over rumors which they declare to “be incredible,” and yet which, nevertheless, they “unfortunately believe to be too true.” The New Yorkers have a precept which says, “Never speak ill of the dead.” Would it not be much better to speak no ill of the living? Little could it have mattered to Madam Bogardus or Madam Stuyvesant what a lot of silly people said of them in Gates Street or Lewis street, a century after their death; but poor Charlotte Morgan shivered and sickened in the presence of averted eyes and uplifted shoulders, and in that chill atmosphere of disapproval which separated her from the sympathy and confidence of her old friends and acquaintances.

“It is thy punishment,” said her mother, “bear it bravely and patiently. In a little while, it will be forgot.” But the weeks went on, and the wounded men slowly fought death away from their pillows, and Charlotte did not recover the place in social estimation which she had lost through the ungovernable tempers of her lovers. For, alas, there are few social pleasures that have so much vital power as that of exploring the faults of others, and comparing them with our own virtues!