The voyage came to an end. We landed at Paris, and I soon found that I had overtaxed my strength and must repose before continuing my journey. My father's care was indefatigable, but he did not know the origin of my sufferings and sought erroneous methods to remedy the incurable ill. He wished me to seek amusement in society. I abhorred the face of man. Oh, not abhorred! They were my brethren, my fellow beings, and I felt attracted even to the most repulsive among them, as to creatures of an angelic nature and celestial mechanism. But I felt I had no right to share their intercourse. I had unchained an enemy among them whose joy it was to shed their blood and revel in their groans. How they would, each and all, abhor me and hunt me from the world, did they know my unhallowed acts!
My father yielded at length to my desire to avoid society and strove by various arguments to banish my despair. He thought I felt deeply the degradation of being obliged to answer a charge of murder, and he laboured to prove to me the futility of pride.
"Alas! My father," said I, "how little do you know me. Human beings would indeed be degraded if such a wretch as I felt pride. Justine, poor unhappy Justine, was as innocent as I, and she suffered the same charge; she died for it; and I am the cause of this—I murdered her. William, Justine, and Henry—they all died by my hands."
My father had often heard me make such assertions. When I accused myself, he sometimes seemed to desire an explanation; at others he appeared to consider it the offspring of delirium. I avoided explanation and maintained continual silence concerning the wretch I had created. I had a persuasion that I should be supposed mad, and this in itself would for ever have chained my tongue. I could not bring myself to disclose a secret which would fill my hearer with consternation and make fear and unnatural horror the inmates of his breast.
Upon this occasion my father said, with unbounded wonder, "My dearest Victor, what infatuation is this? My dear son, I entreat you never to make such an assertion again."
"I am not mad," I cried; "the sun and the heavens can bear witness of my truth. I am the assassin of those most innocent victims; they died by my machinations. A thousand times would I have shed my own blood to have saved their lives; but I could not sacrifice the whole human race."
The conclusion convinced my father that my ideas were deranged. He instantly changed the subject and endeavoured to alter the course of my thoughts, wished to obliterate the memory of the scenes in Ireland and never alluded to my misfortunes.
As time passed I became more calm; misery had her dwelling in my heart, but I no longer talked in the same incoherent manner of my own crimes. By the utmost self-violence I curbed the imperious voice of wretchedness, and my manners were calmer than they had ever been since my journey to the sea of ice.
A few days before we left Paris I received the following letter from Elizabeth:
"My dear Friend,
"It gave me the greatest pleasure to receive a letter from my uncle dated at Paris; you are no longer at a formidable distance, and I may hope to see you in less than a fortnight. My poor cousin, how much you must have suffered! I expect to see you looking even more ill than when you quitted Geneva.
"Yet I fear that the same feelings now exist that made you so miserable a year ago. I would not disturb you, but a conversation with my uncle renders some explanation necessary before we meet.
"You well know, Victor, that our union had been the favourite plan of your parents ever since our infancy. We were affectionate playfellows during childhood, and dear friends as we grew older. But may not such also be our case? Tell me, dearest Victor—Do you not love another?
"I confess that when I saw you last autumn so unhappy I could not help supposing you might regret our connection. But this is false reasoning. I confess, my friend, that I love you, and that in my airy dreams of futurity you have been my constant friend. But it is your happiness I desire when I declare that our marriage would render me eternally miserable unless it were the dictate of your own free choice.
"Do not let this letter disturb you; do not answer until you come, if it will give you pain. My uncle will send me news of your health, and if I see but one smile on your lips when we meet, I shall need no other happiness.
"Elizabeth Lavenza. Geneva, May 18th, 17—"
This letter revived in my memory the threat of the fiend—"I will be with you on your wedding-night!" On that night would the dæmon employ every art to destroy me and tear me from the glimpse of happiness which promised partly to console my sufferings. On that night he had determined to consummate his crimes by my death. Well, be it so; a deadly struggle would then assuredly take place. If he were victorious I should be at peace; if vanquished, I should be a free man. Alas! What freedom? Such as the peasant enjoys when his family have been massacred, his cottage burnt, his lands laid waste—homeless, penniless, and alone, but free. Such would be my liberty, except that in my Elizabeth I possessed a treasure, balanced by those horrors of remorse which would pursue me until death.
Sweet and beloved Elizabeth! Some softened feelings stole into my heart and dared to whisper dreams of love and joy; but the apple was already eaten, and the angel's arm bared to drive me from all hope. Yet I would die to make her happy. If the monster executed his threat, death was inevitable. He had vowed to be with me on my wedding-night, yet he murdered Clerval immediately after. I resolved that if my immediate union with my cousin would conduce to her or my father's happiness, my adversary's designs against my life should not retard it a single hour.
In this state of mind I wrote to Elizabeth. "I fear, my beloved girl, little happiness remains for us on earth; yet all that I may one day enjoy is centred in you. Chase away your idle fears; to you alone do I consecrate my life. I have one secret, Elizabeth, a dreadful one; when revealed, it will chill your frame with horror. I will confide this tale of misery to you the day after our marriage. Until then, I conjure you, do not mention or allude to it."
About a week after the arrival of her letter we returned to Geneva. The sweet girl welcomed me with warm affection, yet tears were in her eyes as she beheld my emaciated frame. I saw a change in her also; she was thinner and had lost much of that heavenly vivacity, but her gentleness made her a more fit companion for one blasted and miserable as I was.
The tranquillity I now enjoyed did not endure. Memory brought madness with it; when I thought of what had passed, a real insanity possessed me; sometimes I was furious, sometimes low and despondent. Elizabeth alone had the power to draw me from these fits; her gentle voice would soothe me. She wept with me and for me.
Soon after my arrival my father spoke of my immediate marriage with Elizabeth. I remained silent.
"Have you, then, some other attachment?"
"None on earth. I love Elizabeth and look forward to our union with delight. Let the day therefore be fixed."
My father replied that we must cling closer to what remained, and that new and dear objects of care would replace those we had lost. But to me the remembrance of the threat returned. Death was no evil to me if the loss of Elizabeth were balanced with it. I therefore agreed with my father that, if my cousin would consent, the ceremony should take place in ten days, and thus put, as I imagined, the seal to my fate.
Great God! If for one instant I had thought what might be the hellish intention of my fiendish adversary, I would rather have banished myself for ever from my native country than have consented to this miserable marriage. The monster had blinded me to his real intentions, and when I thought I had prepared only my own death, I hastened that of a far dearer victim.
As the period drew nearer, whether from cowardice or a prophetic feeling, I felt my heart sink within me. I concealed my feelings by an appearance of hilarity that brought smiles to the countenance of my father, but hardly deceived the ever-watchful eye of Elizabeth. Preparations were made for the event; through my father's exertions a part of the inheritance of Elizabeth had been restored to her by the Austrian government. A small possession on the shores of Como belonged to her. It was agreed that, immediately after our union, we should proceed to Villa Lavenza and spend our first days of happiness beside the beautiful lake.
I took every precaution to defend my person in case the fiend should openly attack me. I carried pistols and a dagger constantly about me and was ever on the watch to prevent artifice; by these means I gained a greater degree of tranquillity. Indeed, as the period approached, the threat appeared more as a delusion, not worthy to disturb my peace.
On the day that was to fulfil my wishes and my destiny, Elizabeth was melancholy, and a presentiment of evil pervaded her. My father, in the bustle of preparation, only recognised in her melancholy the diffidence of a bride.
After the ceremony a large party assembled; it was agreed that Elizabeth and I should commence our journey by water, sleeping that night at Evian and continuing our voyage on the following day. The day was fair, the wind favourable; all smiled on our nuptial embarkation.
Those were the last moments of my life during which I enjoyed the feeling of happiness. We passed rapidly along; we were sheltered from the sun's rays by a kind of canopy while we enjoyed the beauty of the scene—sometimes on one side of the lake, where we saw Mont Salêve, the pleasant banks of Montalègre, and the beautiful Mont Blanc, with the assemblage of snowy mountains that in vain endeavour to emulate her; sometimes coasting the opposite banks, we saw the mighty Jura opposing its dark side to the invader.
I took the hand of Elizabeth. "You are sorrowful, my love. If you knew what I have suffered, you would let me taste the quiet this one day at least permits me to enjoy."
"Be happy, my dear Victor," replied Elizabeth; "there is, I hope, nothing to distress you. Something whispers to me not to depend too much on the prospect that is opened before us, but I will not listen to such a sinister voice. What a divine day! How happy and serene all nature appears!"
Thus Elizabeth endeavoured to divert her thoughts and mine from melancholy subjects. But her temper was fluctuating; joy for a few instants shone in her eyes, but continually gave place to distraction and reverie.
The sun sank lower; we passed the river Drance and observed its path through the chasms of the higher hills. The Alps here come closer to the lake, and we approached the amphitheatre of mountains which forms its eastern boundary. The spire of Evian shone under the woods that surrounded it.
The wind, which had hitherto carried us along with amazing rapidity, sank at sunset to a light breeze; the soft air just ruffled the water and caused a pleasant motion among the trees as we approached the shore, from which it wafted the most delightful scent of flowers and hay. The sun sank beneath the horizon as we landed, and as I touched the shore I felt those cares and fears revive which soon were to clasp me and cling to me for ever.