CHAPTER XXVII.
SENSATIONAL!--TERRIFIC!--TREMENDOUS!--I LEAVE THE HOUSE IN A STRANGE WHIRL.--A STORM.--THE DRIVING SLEET.--I WANDER ABOUT.--THE VOICES OF THE STORM, AND OF THE RIVER.--THE CLANGOR OF THE BELLS.--THE SHADOW IN THE DOORWAY.--THE MYSTERIOUS COMPANION.--A TERRIBLE WALK.--FAMILIAR VOICES.--SINKING INTO SENSELESSNESS.--THE LADY OF THE ICE IS REVEALED AT LAST AMID THE STORM!
As I left the house there came a blast of stinging sleet, which showed me that it was a wild night. It was not many days now since that memorable journey on the river; and the storm that was blowing seemed to be the counterpart and continuation of that. It had been overcast when I entered O'Halloran's; when I left it, the storm had gathered up into fury, and the wind howled around, and the furious sleet dashed itself fiercely against me. The street was deserted. None would go out on so wild a night. It was after eleven; half-past, perhaps.
For a moment I turned my back to the sleet, and then drew forth my cloud from my pocket, and bound it about my head.
Thus prepared, and thus armed, I was ready to encounter the fiercest sleet that ever blew. I went down the steps, took the sidewalk, and went off.
As I went on, my mind was filled with many thoughts. A duel was before me; but I gave that no consideration. The storm howled about and shrieked between the houses; but the storm was nothing. There was that in my heart and in my brain which made all these things trivial. It was the image of my Lady of the Ice, and the great longing after her, which, for the past few days, had steadily increased.
I had found her! I had lost her! Lost and found! Found and lost!
The wrath of the storm had only this one effect on me, that it brought before me with greater vividness the events of that memorable day on the river. Through such a storm we had forced our way. From such pitiless peltings of stinging sleet I had sheltered her fainting, drooping head. This was the hurricane that had howled about her as she lay prostrate, upheld in my arms, which hurled its wrathful showers on her white, upturned face. From this I had saved her, and from worse-- from the grinding ice, the falling avalanche, the dark, deep, cold, freezing flood. I had brought her back to life through all these perils, and now--and now!--
Now, for that Lady of the Ice, whose image was brought up before me by the tempest and the storm, there arose within me a mighty and irrepressible yearning. She had become identified with Nora, but yet it was not Nora's face and Nora's image that dwelt within my mind. That smiling face, with its sparkling eyes and its witching smile, was another thing, and seemed to belong to another person. It was not Nora herself whom I had loved, but Nora as she stood the representative of my Lady of the Ice. Moreover, I had seen Nora in unfeigned distress; I had seen her wringing her hands and looking at me with piteous entreaty and despair; but even the power of these strong emotions had not given her the face that haunted me. Nora on the ice and Nora at home were so different, that they could not harmonize; nor could the never-to-be-forgotten lineaments of the one be traced in the other. And, could Nora now have been with me in this storm, I doubted whether her face could again assume that marble, statuesque beauty--that immortal sadness and despair, which I had once seen upon it. That face--the true face that I loved--could I ever see it again?
I breasted the storm and walked on I knew not where. At last I found myself on the Esplanade. Beneath lay the river, which could not now be seen through the blackness of the storm and of the night, but which, through that blackness, sent forth a voice from all its waves. And the wind wailed mournfully, mingling its voice with that of the river. So once before bad rushing, dashing water joined its uproar to the howl of pitiless winds, when I bore her over the river; only on that occasion there was joined in the horrid chorus the more fearful boom of the breaking icefields.
And now the voice of the river only increased and intensified that longing of which I have spoken. I could not go home. I thought of going back again to O'Halloran's house. There was my Lady of the Ice--Nora. I might see her shadow on the window--I might see a light from her room.
Now Nora had not at all come up to my ideal of the Lady of the Ice, and yet there was no other representative. I might be mad in love with an image, a shadow, an idea; but if that image existed anywhere in real life, it could exist only in Nora. And thus Nora gained from my image an attractiveness, which she never could have had in her own right. It was her identity with that haunting image of loveliness that gave her such a charm. The charm was an imaginary one. Had I never found her on the river and idealized her, the might have gained my admiration; but she would never have thrown over me such a spell. But now, whatever she was in herself, she was so merged in that ideal, that in my longing for my love I turned my steps backward and wandered toward O'Halloran's, with the frantic hope of seeing her shadow on the window, or a ray of light from her room. For I could find no other way than this of satisfying those insatiable longings that had sprung up within me.
So back I went through the storm, which seemed still to increase in fury, and through the sleet, which swept in long horizontal lines down the street, and whirled round the corner, and froze fast to the houses.
As I went on, the violence of the storm did not at all weaken my purpose. I had my one idea, and that one idea I was bent on carrying out.
Under such circumstances I approached the house of O'Halloran. I don't know what I expected, or whether I expected, any thing or not. I know what I wanted. I wanted the Lady of the Ice, and in search of her I ha thus wandered back to that house in which lived the one with whom she had been identified. A vague idea of seeing her shadow on the window still possessed me, and so I kept along on the opposite sidewalk, and looked up to see if there was any light or any shadow.
There was no light at all.
I stood still and gazed.
Was there a shadow? Or what was it? There was something moving there--a dark, dusky shadow, in a niche of the gateway, by the corner of the house--a dark shadow, dimly revealed in this gloom--the shadowy outline of a woman's form.
I do not know what mad idea possessed me. I looked, while my heart beat fast and painfully. A wild idea of the Lady of the Ice coming to me again, amid the storm, to be again my companion through the storm, flashed like lightning through my brain.
Suddenly, wild and clear and clanging, there came the toll of a bell from a neighboring tower, as it began to strike the hour of midnight.
For a moment I paused in a sort of superstitious terror, and then, before the third stroke had rung out, I rushed across the street.
The figure had been watching me.
As I came, she started. She hurried forward, and met me at the curb.
With a wild rush of joy and exultation, I caught her in my arms. I felt her frame tremble. At length she disengaged herself and caught my arm with a convulsive clasp, and drew me away. Mechanically, and with no fixed idea of any kind, I walked off.
She walked slowly. In that fierce gale, rapid progress was not possible. She, however, was well protected from the blast. A cloud was wrapped around her head, and kept her face from the storm.
We walked on, and I felt my heart throb to suffocation, while my brain reeled with a thousand new and wild fancies. Amid these, something of my late superstition still lingered.
"Who is she?" I wondered; "Who is she? How did she happen to wait for me here? Is it my Lady of the Ice? Am I a haunted man? Will she always thus come to me in the storm, and leave me when the storm is over?
Where am I going? Whither is she leading me? Is she taking me back to the dark river from which I saved her?"
Then I struggled against the superstitious fancy, and rallied and tried to think calmly about it.
"Yes. It's Nora," I thought; "it's herself. She loves me. This was the cause of her distress. And that distress has overmastered her. She has been unable to endure my departure. She has been convinced that I would return, and hag waited for me.
"Nora! Yes, Nora! Nora! But, Nora! what is this that I am doing? This Nora can never be mine. She belongs to another. She was mine only through my mistake. How can she hope to be mine, or how can I hope to be hers? And why is it that I can dare thus to take her to ruin? Can I have the heart to?"
I paused involuntarily, as the full horror of this idea burst upon me.
For, divested of all sentiment, the bald idea that burst upon my whirling brain was simply this, that I was running away with the wife of another man, and that man the very one who had lately given me his hospitality, and called me his friend. And even so whirling a brain as mine then was, could not avoid being penetrated by an idea that was so shocking to every sentiment of honor, and loyalty, and chivalry, and duty.
But as I paused, my companion forced me on. She had not said a single word. Her head was bent down to meet the storm. She walked like one bent on some desperate purpose, and that purpose was manifestly too strong and too absorbing to be checked by any thing so feeble as my fitful and uncertain irresolution. She walked on like some fate that had gained possession of me. I surrendered to the power that thus held me. I ceased even to think of pausing.
At length we came to where there was a large house with lights streaming from all the windows. It was Colonel Berton's--I knew it well. A ball had been going on, and the guests were departing. Down came the sleighs as they carried off the guests, the jangle of the bells Bounding shrilly in the stormy night. Thus far in my wanderings all had been still, and this sudden noise produced a startling effect.
One sleigh was still at the door, and as we approached nearer we could see that none others were there. It was probably waiting for the last guest. At length we reached the house, and were walking immediately under the bright light of the drawing-room windows, when suddenly the door of the house opened, and a familiar voice sounded, speaking in loud, eager, hilarious tones.
At the sound of that voice my companion stopped, and staggered back, and then stood rigid with, her head thrust forward.
It was Jack's voice.
"Thanks," he said. "Ha! ha! ha! You're awfully kind, you know. Oh, yes.
I'll be here to-morrow night. Good-by. Good-by."
He rushed down the steps. The door closed. He sprang into the sleigh.
It started ahead in an opposite direction, and away it went, till the jangle of the bells died out in the distance, amid the storm.
All was still. The street was deserted. The storm had full possession.
The lights of the house flashed out upon the snowdrifts, and upon the glittering, frozen sleet.
For a moment my companion stood rooted to the spot. Then snatching her arm from mine, she flung up her hand with a sudden gesture, and tore my cloud down from off my face. The lights from the windows shone upon me, revealing my features to her.
The next instant her arms fell. She staggered back, and with a low moan of heart-broken anguish, she sank down prostrate into the snow.
Now hitherto there had been on my mind a current of superstitious feeling which had animated most of my wild fancies. It had been heightened by the events of my wanderings. The bowl of the storm, the voice of the dark river, the clangor of the midnight bell, the shadowy figure at the doorway--all these circumstances had combined to stimulate my imagination and disorder my brain. But now, on my arrival at this house, these feelings had passed away. These signs of commonplace life--the jangling sleigh-bells, the lighted windows, the departing company--had roused me, and brought me to myself. Finally, there came the sound of Jack's voice, hearty, robust, healthy, strong-- at the sound of which the dark shadows of my mind were dispelled. And it was at this moment, when all these phantasms had vanished, that my companion fell senseless in the snow at my feet.
I stooped down full of wonder, and full too of pity. I raised her in my arms. I supported her head on my shoulder. The storm beat pitilessly; the stinging sleet pelted my now uncovered face; the lights of the house shone out upon the form of my companion. All the street was deserted. No one in the house saw us. I, for my part, did not think whether I was seen or not. All my thoughts were turned to the one whom I held in my arms.
I took the cloud which was wrapped around her head, and tenderly and delicately drew it down from her face.
Oh, Heavens! what was this that I saw?
The lights flashed out, and revealed it unmistakably. There--then-- resting on my shoulder--under my gaze--now fully revealed--there lay the face that had haunted me--the face for which I had longed, and yearned, and craved! There it lay--that never-to-be-forgotten face-- with the marble features, the white lips, the closed eyes, the stony calm--there it lay--the face of her whom alone I loved--the Lady of the Ice!
What was this? I felt my old mood returning. Was this real? Was it not a vision? How was it that she came to me again through the storm, again to sink down, and again to rest her senseless form in my arms, and her head upon my breast?