Monica, Volume 2 (of 3)

“I believe at times he is mad,” answered Randolph, “with a sort of madness that is not actual insanity, though somewhat akin to it. It is the madness of ungovernable passion and hatred that rises up in him from time to time against certain individuals, and becomes, as it seems, a sort of monomania with him. It was so with his friend and benefactor Colonel Hamilton, when once he felt himself found out. Ever since the horsewhipping I administered to him, I believe he has felt vindictively towards me. Our paths led us wide apart for several years, but as soon as we met again the old enmity rose up once more. He tried to hurt me through my wife.” Randolph looked down at her with a proud smile upon his handsome face. “I need not say how utterly and miserably he has failed.”

Monica glanced up at him, a world of loving confidence in her eyes; yet the clinging clasp of her hands tightened upon his arm. He fancied she trembled a little.

“What is it, my Monica?”

She pressed a little more closely towards him.

“Randolph, do you think he will try to hurt you now – try to do you some injury?”

The husband smiled re-assuringly at her.

“Hurt me? How, Monica?”

“Oh, I don’t know; but he has spoken such cruel, wicked words. He said he had vowed to ruin our happiness – he looked as if he meant it – so vindictive, so terrible!” she shivered a little.

He took her hands, and held them in his warm, strong clasp.

“Are you afraid of what that bad man says, Monica – a man who is a coward and a scoundrel of the deepest dye? Are you afraid of idle threats from his lips? How could he ruin our happiness now?”

She looked up at him, still with a sort of undefined trouble in her eyes.

“He might hurt you, Randolph,” she half whispered. “What hurts you, hurts me. If – if – he were to take you away from me – ”

Randolph laid his hand smilingly upon her lips.

“My darling, you are unnerved by the fright he gave you. When was Monica troubled by idle fears before?”

“I don’t know what I fear, Randolph; but I have feelings sometimes – premonitions, presentiments, and I cannot shake them off. Ever since Conrad came, I felt a kind of horror of him, even though I tried to call him friend. Sometimes I think it must mean something.”

“No doubt it does,” answered Randolph. “It is the natural shrinking of your pure soul from his evil, vicious nature. I can well understand it. It could hardly be otherwise. He could not deceive you long.”

She looked gravely out before her.

“No, I do not think he really deceived me long – not my innermost self of all. But I was very self-willed. I wanted to judge for myself, and I could not judge him rightly. I believed him. I did not want to be unjust – and he deceived me.”

Randolph smiled and laid his hand caressingly upon her shoulder. She looked up with a smile.

“That is right, Monica. You must put away these sad, wistful looks. We must not let this evening’s happiness be marred by any doubts and fears. You have your husband again. Is not that enough?”

She turned and laid her head against his shoulder. His arm was fast about her in a moment. She drew a long breath, almost like a sigh.

“Randolph, I think that moments like this must be a foretaste of heaven.”

He kissed her, and she added, low and dreamily:

“Only there, there will be no fear of parting. Death could not part us there.”

“Death could not sunder our hearts even here, my Monica,” said Randolph. “Some love is for eternity.”

“Yes,” she answered, looking out over the wide sea with a deep smile, that seemed as if it were reading the future in the vast, heaving expanse of moon-lit water. “Our love is like that – not for time alone, but for eternity.”

He caught the gravity of her mood. Some subtle sympathy drew them ever closer and more close together.

“And so,” he added gravely and tenderly, “we need fear nothing; for nothing can alter that one great thing. Nothing can change our love. We belong to one another always – always.”

She stood very still and quiet.

“Yes,” she said, “for ever and ever. Randolph, if we could both die to-night I think it would be a happy thing for us.”

“Why?”

“Because then there would be no parting to fear.”

“And now?”

“Now I do fear it. I fear it without knowing why. He will part us if he can.”

Randolph strained his wife close to his heart.

“If he can! Monica, look up; put away these idle fears, my love. Can I not take care of you and of myself? Let us put him for ever out of our lives.”

“Ah! if only we could!” breathed Monica.

CHAPTER THE EIGHTEENTH.

A SHADOW

The days that followed were very full of happiness and peace for Monica and her husband. They were alone together in the dim old castle, far away from the busy whirl of life they had so gladly left behind, free to be with each other every moment of the flying hours, learning to know and to love one another with a more perfect comprehending love with each succeeding day.

Not one tiny cloud of reserve or distrust clouded the sunshine of their horizon. Monica had laid before Randolph that unlucky letter of Lady Diana’s, had listened with a sort of mingling of delight and indignation to his comments on the composition – delight to hear that he had always loved her from the first, that in gratifying her father’s desire he had but been gratifying the dearest desire of his own heart – indignation towards the mischief-making relative, who had tried to deceive and humiliate her, who had told her one half of the story and concealed the other.

But indignation was only a momentary feeling. Monica was too happy to cherish resentment. Her anger was but a passing spark.

“I should like to speak my mind to Lady Diana,” remarked Randolph, as he tore the paper into small fragments and tossed them over the cliff. “I always distrusted her wisdom, but I did not look for deliberate malice like that. Why did you not show me that letter when it came, Monica, and let me see what I had to say to it?”

She looked up with a smile.

“Because I was so foolish and distrustful in those days. I did long to once, but then came the thought – Suppose it should be true?”

And then they both smiled. There was a charm and sweetness in thus discussing the past, with the light of the happy present shining upon it.

“But she meant to be your friend, Randolph. We must not forget that. I suppose she thought that you would tell me of your love, but that she ought to inform me of your generosity. Poor Aunt Diana! we should get on better now. In those days, Randolph, I think I was very difficile– very wilful and unapproachable. I used to think it would kill me ever to leave Trevlyn. I think now that it would have been the ruin of me to stay. It is not good to grow up in one narrow groove, and to gain no knowledge of anything beyond.”

“That is quite true, Monica. Does that mean that you will be willing to leave Trevlyn, by and-bye?”

“I shall be willing to do anything that you wish, Randolph. You know I would go anywhere with you. Do you want to take me away again?”

“Presently I think I do. I should like to take you to Scotland in August, to stay a month or two at my little shooting-box there. You would like the free, roving life you could lead there, amongst that world of heather. And then there are things to be done at Trevlyn. Monica, will you be able to reconcile yourself to changes here?”