“If you had listened to my advice,” he said, “you would have treated that man Bervie like the hypocrite and villain3 that he is. But no! you trusted to your own crude impressions. Having given him your hand after the duel4 (I would have given him the contents of my pistol!) you hesitated to withdraw it again, when that slanderer5 appealed to your friendship not to cast him off. Now you see the consequence!”
“Wait till we get to Paris!” All the ingenuity6 of Percy’s traveling companion failed to extract from him any other answer than that.
Foiled so far, Mr. Bowmore began to start difficulties next. Had they money enough for the journey? Percy touched his pocket, and answered shortly, “Plenty.” Had they passports? Percy sullenly7 showed a letter. “There is the necessary voucher8 from a magistrate,” he said. “The consul9 at Dover will give us our passports. Mind this!” he added, in warning tones, “I have pledged my word of honor to Justice Bervie that we have no political object in view in traveling to France. Keep your politics to yourself, on the other side of the Channel.”
Mr. Bowmore listened in blank amazement10. Charlotte’s lover was appearing in a new character—the character of a man who had lost his respect for Charlotte’s father!
It was useless to talk to him. He deliberately11 checked any further attempts at conversation by leaning back in the carriage, and closing his eyes. The truth is, Mr. Bowmore’s own language and conduct were insensibly producing the salutary impression on Percy’s mind which Bervie had vainly tried to convey, under the disadvantage of having Charlotte’s influence against him. Throughout the journey, Percy did exactly what Bervie had once entreated12 him to do—he kept Mr. Bowmore at a distance.
At every stage, they inquired after the fugitives13. At every stage, they were answered by a more or less intelligible14 description of Bervie and Charlotte, and of the lady who accompanied them. No disguise had been attempted; no person had in any case been bribed15 to conceal16 the truth.
When the first tumult17 of his emotions had in some degree subsided18, this strange circumstance associated itself in Percy’s mind with the equally unaccountable conduct of Justice Bervie, on his arrival at the manor19 house.
The old gentleman met his visitor in the hall, without expressing, and apparently20 without feeling, any indignation at his son’s conduct. It was even useless to appeal to him for information. He only said, “I am not in Arthur’s confidence; he is of age, and my daughter (who has volunteered to accompany him) is of age. I have no claim to control them. I believe they have taken Miss Bowmore to Paris; and that is all I know about it.”
He had shown the same dense21 insensibility in giving his official voucher for the passports. Percy had only to satisfy him on the question of politics; and the document was drawn22 out as a matter of course. Such had been the father’s behavior; and the conduct of the son now exhibited the same shameless composure. To what conclusion did this discovery point? Percy abandoned the attempt to answer that question in despair.
They reached Dover toward two o’clock in the morning.
At the pier-head they found a coast-guardsman on duty, and received more information.
In 1817 the communication with France was still by sailing-vessels. Arriving long after the departure of the regular packet, Bervie had hired a lugger, and had sailed with the two ladies for Calais, having a fresh breeze in his favor. Percy’s first angry impulse was to follow him instantly. The next moment he remembered the insurmountable obstacle of the passports. The Consul would certainly not grant those essentially23 necessary documents at two in the morning!
The only alternative was to wait for the regular packet, which sailed some hours later—between eight and nine o’clock in the forenoon. In this case, they might apply for their passports before the regular office hours, if they explained the circumstances, backed by the authority of the magistrate’s letter.
Mr. Bowmore followed Percy to the nearest inn that was open, sublimely24 indifferent to the delays and difficulties of the journey. He ordered refreshments25 with the air of a man who was performing a melancholy26 duty to himself, in the name of humanity.
“When I think of my speech,” he said, at supper, “my heart bleeds for the people. In a few hours more, they will assemble in their thousands, eager to hear me. And what will they see? Joskin in my place! Joskin with a manuscript in his hand! Joskin, who drops his voice at the ends of his sentences! I will never forgive Charlotte. Waiter, another glass of brandy and water.”
After an unusually quick passage across the Channel, the travelers landed on the French coast, before the defeated spy had returned from London to Dartford by stage-coach. Continuing their journey by post as far as Amiens, they reached that city in time to take their places by the diligence to Paris.
Arrived in Paris, they encountered another incomprehensible proceeding27 on the part of Captain Bervie.
Among the persons assembled in the yard to see the arrival of the diligence was a man with a morsel28 of paper in his hand, evidently on the lookout29 for some person whom he expected to discover among the travelers. After consulting his bit of paper, he looked with steady attention at Percy and Mr. Bowmore, and suddenly approached them. “If you wish to see the Captain,” he said, in broken English, “you will find him at that hotel.” He handed a printed card to Percy, and disappeared among the crowd before it was possible to question him.
Even Mr. Bowmore gave way to human weakness, and condescended30 to feel astonished in the face of such an event as this. “What next?” he exclaimed.
“Wait till we get to the hotel,” said Percy.
In half an hour more the landlord had received them, and the waiter had led them to the right door. Percy pushed the man aside, and burst into the room.
Captain Bervie was alone, reading a newspaper. Before the first furious words had escaped Percy’s lips, Bervie silenced him by pointing to a closed door on the right of the fireplace.
“She is in that room,” he said; “speak quietly, or you may frighten her. I know what you are going to say,” he added, as Percy stepped nearer to him. “Will you hear me in my own defense31, and then decide whether I am the greatest scoundrel living, or the best friend you ever had?”
He put the question kindly32, with something that was at once grave and tender in his look and manner. The extraordinary composure with which he acted and spoke33 had its tranquilizing influence over Percy. He felt himself surprised into giving Bervie a hearing.
“I will tell you first what I have done,” the Captain proceeded, “and next why I did it. I have taken it on myself, Mr. Linwood, to make an alteration34 in your wedding arrangements. Instead of being married at Dartford church, you will be married (if you see no objection) at the chapel35 of the embassy in Paris, by my old college friend the chaplain.”
This was too much for Percy’s self-control. “Your audacity36 is beyond belief,” he broke out.
“And beyond endurance,” Mr. Bowmore added. “Understand this, sir! Whatever your defense may be, I object, under any circumstances, to be made the victim of a trick.”
“You are the victim of your own obstinate37 refusal to profit by a plain warning,” Bervie rejoined. “At the eleventh hour, I entreated you, and I entreated Mr. Linwood, to provide for your own safety; and I spoke in vain.”
Percy’s patience gave way once more.
“To use your own language,” he said, “I have still to decide whether you have behaved toward me like a scoundrel or a friend. You have said nothing to justify38 yourself yet.”
“Very well put!” Mr. Bowmore chimed in. “Come to the point, sir! My daughter’s reputation is in question.”
“Miss Bowmore’s reputation is not in question for a single instant,” Bervie answered. “My sister has been the companion of her journey from first to last.”
“Journey?” Mr. Bowmore repeated, indignantly. “I want to know, sir, what the journey means. As an outraged39 father, I ask one plain question. Why did you run away with my daughter?”
Bervie took a slip of paper from his pocket, and handed it to Percy with a smile.
It was a copy of the warrant which Justice Bervie’s duty had compelled him to issue for the “arrest of Orlando Bowmore and Percy Linwood.” There was no danger in divulging40 the secret now. British warrants were waste-paper in France, in those days.
“I ran away with the bride,” Bervie said coolly, “in the certain knowledge that you and Mr. Bowmore would run after me. If I had not forced you both to follow me out of England on the first of April, you would have been made State prisoners on the second. What do you say to my conduct now?”
“Wait, Percy, before you answer him,” Mr. Bowmore interposed. “He is ready enough at excusing himself. But, observe—he hasn’t a word to say in justification41 of my daughter’s readiness to run away with him.”
“Have you quite done?” Bervie asked, as quietly as ever.
Mr. Bowmore reserved the right of all others which he most prized, the right of using his tongue. “For the present,” he answered in his loftiest manner, “I have done.”
Bervie proceeded: “Your daughter consented to run away with me, because I took her to my father’s house, and prevailed upon him to trust her with the secret of the coming arrests. She had no choice left but to let her obstinate father and her misguided lover go to prison—or to take her place with my sister and me in the traveling-carriage.” He appealed once more to Percy. “My friend, you remember the day when you spared my life. Have I remembered it, too?”
For once, there was an Englishman who was not contented42 to express the noblest emotions that humanity can feel by the commonplace ceremony of shaking hands. Percy’s heart overflowed44. In an outburst of unutterable gratitude45 he threw himself on Bervie’s breast. As brothers the two men embraced. As brothers they loved and trusted one another, from that day forth46.
The door on the right was softly opened from within. A charming face—the dark eyes bright with happy tears, the rosy47 lips just opening into a smile—peeped into the room. A low sweet voice, with an under-note of trembling in it, made this modest protest, in the form of an inquiry48:
“When you have quite done, Percy, with our good friend, perhaps you will have something to say to ME?”
LAST WORDS.
THE persons immediately interested in the marriage of Percy and Charlotte were the only persons present at the ceremony.
At the little breakfast afterward49, in the French hotel, Mr. Bowmore insisted on making a speech to a select audience of six; namely, the bride and bridegroom, the bridesmaid, the Chaplain, the Captain, and Mrs. Bowmore. But what does a small audience matter? The English frenzy50 for making speeches is not to be cooled by such a trifle as that. At the end of the world, the expiring forces of Nature will hear a dreadful voice—the voice of the last Englishman delivering the last speech.
Percy wisely made his honeymoon51 a long one; he determined52 to be quite sure of his superior influence over his wife before he trusted her within reach of her father again.
Mr. and Mrs. Bowmore accompanied Captain Bervie and Miss Bervie on their way back to England, as far as Boulogne. In that pleasant town the banished53 patriot54 set up his tent. It was a cheaper place to live in than Paris, and it was conveniently close to England, when he had quite made up his mind whether to be an exile on the Continent, or to go back to his own country and be a martyr55 in prison. In the end, the course of events settled that question for him. Mr. Bowmore returned to England, with the return of the Habeas Corpus Act.
The years passed. Percy and Charlotte (judged from the romantic point of view) became two uninteresting married people. Bervie (always remaining a bachelor) rose steadily56 in his profession, through the higher grades of military rank. Mr. Bowmore, wisely overlooked by a new Government, sank back again into the obscurity from which shrewd Ministers would never have assisted him to emerge. The one subject of interest left, among the persons of this little drama, was now represented by Doctor Lagarde. Thus far, not a trace had been discovered of the French physician, who had so strangely associated the visions of his magnetic sleep with the destinies of the two men who had consulted him.
Steadfastly57 maintaining his own opinion of the prediction and the fulfillment, Bervie persisted in believing that he and Lagarde (or Percy and Lagarde) were yet destined58 to meet, and resume the unfinished consultation59 at the point where it had been broken off. Persons, happy in the possession of “sound common sense,” who declared the prediction to be skilled guesswork, and the fulfillment manifest coincidence, ridiculed60 the idea of finding Doctor Lagarde as closely akin43 to that other celebrated61 idea of finding the needle in the bottle of hay. But Bervie’s obstinacy62 was proverbial. Nothing shook his confidence in his own convictions.
More than thirteen years had elapsed since the consultation at the Doctor’s lodgings63, when Bervie went to Paris to spend a summer holiday with his friend, the chaplain at the English embassy. His last words to Percy and Charlotte when he took his leave were: “Suppose I meet with Doctor Lagarde?”
It was then the year 1830. Bervie arrived at his friend’s rooms on the 24th of July. On the 27th of the month the famous revolution broke out which dethroned Charles the Tenth in three days.
On the second day, Bervie and his host ventured into the streets, watching the revolution (like other reckless Englishmen) at the risk of their lives. In the confusion around them they were separated. Bervie, searching for his companion, found his progress stopped by a barricade64, which had been desperately65 attacked, and desperately defended. Men in blouses and men in uniform lay dead and dying together: the tricolored flag waved over them, in token of the victory of the people.
Bervie had just revived a poor wretch66 with a drink from an overthrown67 bowl of water, which still had a few drops left in it, when he felt a hand laid on his shoulder from behind. He turned and discovered a National Guard, who had been watching his charitable action. “Give a helping68 hand to that poor fellow,” said the citizen-soldier, pointing to a workman standing69 near, grimed with blood and gunpowder70. The tears were rolling down the man’s cheeks. “I can’t see my way, sir, for crying,” he said. “Help me to carry that sad burden into the next street.” He pointed71 to a rude wooden litter, on which lay a dead or wounded man, his face and breast covered with an old cloak. “There is the best friend the people ever had,” the workman said. “He cured us, comforted us, respected us, loved us. And there he lies, shot dead while he was binding72 up the wounds of friends and enemies alike!”
“Whoever he is, he has died nobly,” Bervie answered “May I look at him?”
The workman signed that he might look.
Bervie lifted the cloak—and met with Doctor Lagarde once more.
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1
criticise
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| v.批评，评论；非难 | |
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purely
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| adv.纯粹地，完全地 | |
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villain
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| n.反派演员，反面人物；恶棍；问题的起因 | |
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duel
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| n./v.决斗；(双方的)斗争 | |
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slanderer
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| 造谣中伤者 | |
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ingenuity
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| n.别出心裁；善于发明创造 | |
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sullenly
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| 不高兴地，绷着脸，忧郁地 | |
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voucher
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| n.收据；传票；凭单，凭证 | |
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consul
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| n.领事；执政官 | |
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amazement
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| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
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deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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entreated
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| 恳求，乞求( entreat的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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fugitives
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| n.亡命者，逃命者( fugitive的名词复数 ) | |
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intelligible
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| adj.可理解的，明白易懂的，清楚的 | |
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bribed
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| v.贿赂( bribe的过去式和过去分词 )；向（某人）行贿，贿赂 | |
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conceal
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
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tumult
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| n.喧哗；激动，混乱；吵闹 | |
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subsided
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| v.（土地）下陷（因在地下采矿）( subside的过去式和过去分词 )；减弱；下降至较低或正常水平；一下子坐在椅子等上 | |
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manor
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| n.庄园，领地 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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essentially
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| adv.本质上，实质上，基本上 | |
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sublimely
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| 高尚地，卓越地 | |
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refreshments
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| n.点心,便餐;(会议后的)简单茶点招 待 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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proceeding
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| n.行动，进行，(pl.)会议录，学报 | |
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morsel
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| n.一口，一点点 | |
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lookout
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| n.注意，前途，瞭望台 | |
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condescended
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| 屈尊，俯就( condescend的过去式和过去分词 )； 故意表示和蔼可亲 | |
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defense
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| n.防御，保卫；[pl.]防务工事；辩护，答辩 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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alteration
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| n.变更，改变；蚀变 | |
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chapel
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| n.小教堂，殡仪馆 | |
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audacity
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| n.大胆，卤莽，无礼 | |
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obstinate
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| adj.顽固的，倔强的，不易屈服的，较难治愈的 | |
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justify
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| vt.证明…正当(或有理)，为…辩护 | |
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outraged
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| a.震惊的，义愤填膺的 | |
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divulging
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| v.吐露，泄露( divulge的现在分词 ) | |
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justification
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| n.正当的理由；辩解的理由 | |
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42
contented
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| adj.满意的，安心的，知足的 | |
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akin
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| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
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overflowed
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| 溢出的 | |
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gratitude
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| adj.感激，感谢 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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rosy
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| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
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inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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frenzy
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| n.疯狂，狂热，极度的激动 | |
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honeymoon
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| n.蜜月（假期）；vi.度蜜月 | |
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determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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banished
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| v.放逐，驱逐( banish的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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patriot
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| n.爱国者，爱国主义者 | |
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martyr
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| n.烈士，殉难者；vt.杀害，折磨，牺牲 | |
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steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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steadfastly
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| adv.踏实地，不变地；岿然；坚定不渝 | |
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destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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consultation
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| n.咨询；商量；商议；会议 | |
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60
ridiculed
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| v.嘲笑，嘲弄，奚落( ridicule的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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61
celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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62
obstinacy
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| n.顽固；（病痛等）难治 | |
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lodgings
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| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
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barricade
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| n.路障，栅栏，障碍；vt.设路障挡住 | |
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desperately
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| adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地 | |
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wretch
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| n.可怜的人，不幸的人；卑鄙的人 | |
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67
overthrown
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| adj. 打翻的，推倒的，倾覆的 动词overthrow的过去分词 | |
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68
helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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69
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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70
gunpowder
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| n.火药 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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binding
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| 有约束力的，有效的，应遵守的 | |
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