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The Adventures of Hugh Trevor

T >> Thomas Holcroft >> The Adventures of Hugh Trevor




I interrupted her: she had raised some strong surmises, and I was
impatient--'But you forget, Mary; you mentioned something concerning
me?'

'Oh lord! yea; a mort o' questions a _bin_ asked; for she talks as
familiarity to me as if she _wur_ a poor body herself; which gives me
heart, so that I be not _afeard_ to speak. Whereof I could not help
telling her a great many things about you; as how, when little more
but a child, you saved my life; and _consarning_ your goodness and
kind offers to my dear mistress; and how soft hearted and well spoken
you _wur_ even to poor me; just for all the world as I said, like her
own dear good self. Whereupon it gladdened her heart to hear there
_wur_ another good creature, as good as herself. And so she asked
_ater_ your name; which, you know that being no secret, I told her,
and then it _wur_, if you had but a seen her! Her face _wur_ as pale
as my kerchief! and I asked what ailed her ladyship? And she replied
in a faint voice, Nothing. So that I thought there must for _sartinly_
be a _summut_ between you! for she sat down, and seemed to do so! as
if a struggling for breath. And I ran for a smelling bottle; whereupon
she _wur_ better, and said she did not need it. And so she asked how
long you had lived in the house, and whether you looked happy? And I
answered and said there _wur_ not a kinder happier creature breathing.
So she asked again if I _wur_ quite sure that you _wur_ happy? And I
said I _wur mortally sartin_ of it. So then she fetched a deep sigh
from the very bottom of her heart, and said she _wur_ glad of it, very
glad of it indeed. For, said she, my good Mary, for she often calls me
good, which I be very sure is her kindness and not my _desarts_, my
good Mary, said she, I don't wonder that you do love Mr. Trevor for
having a saved your life. He once saved my life; which, says she, I
shall remember the longest day I have to breathe: and--'

'It is she!' exclaimed I; for I could hold no longer. 'It is Olivia!
Benevolent angel! And does she deign to think of me? Does she inquire
after me? Am I still in her thoughts?'

'Anan!' said Mary. 'I hope I a betrayed no secrets? For surely, I ha'
not mentioned a word of her name.'

Just as I was continuing to question Mary farther, Miss Wilmot
returned. I earnestly requested she would come into my apartment,
related the discovery I had made, and spoke with all that enthusiasm
which the revival of hope and the ardour of passion could inspire.
Miss Wilmot sympathized with my feelings; and, with a fervour that
spoke the kindness of her heart, hoped she should one day see a pair
so worthy of each other blessed to the full accomplishment of their
wishes; but she confessed she had her fears, for she thought that the
remark, that lovers best calculated to make each other happy were
seldom united, was but too true.

I prevailed on her to take tea with me; Mary waited, and I put a
thousand questions to her; for my conversation was all on this
subject. I could think of nothing else. O how pure was the delight
of this discovery! That Olivia should quit the scenes of tumultuous
joy, and seek the forlorn and unfortunate, purposely to mitigate
their wants, and administer consolation to their woes, was knowledge
inexpressibly sweet to the soul! And that she should still remember
me! that my very name should raise such commotions in her bosom! that
she should delight to hear my praise, and recollect the fortunate
moment when I bore her from death with such affection!--It was rapture
unspeakable!

I learned from Mary that she lived with her aunt, a few streets
distant; and Miss Wilmot informed me that she constantly visited her
twice, and sometimes oftener, each week. How did my bosom burn with
the wish that she might return that very evening, or at least the next
day! In the impatience and ecstacy of hope, I forgot all impediments.
Let me but see her; let me but know that she was in the house, and
I supposed the moment of perfect bliss would then be come. Happy
evening! Never did seductive fancy paint more delicious dreams, or
raise up phantoms more flattering to the heart.

Pains and pleasures dance an eternal round. The very next day brought
sensations of an opposite kind. My mother had found no person of whom
to purchase an annuity in the country; for, the money being her own by
my free gift, she had not thought proper to venture it with Thornby;
lest under the pretext of monies advanced, he should make she knew
not what deduction. She had therefore written to me, soon after I
came to London, to find her a purchaser; and after some delay, which
the necessity of consulting persons better informed than myself had
occasioned, I had advertised the week before and had entered into a
negotiation.

Terms were agreed upon, and the rough copy of a deed for that purpose
was brought me the same morning that the following letter arrived.

'SIR,

'In spite of my caution, your mother has played the fool once more.
She was too suspicious to trust the money in my hands, though I warned
her to beware of accidents. I must say she is a very weak woman. Her
husband, Mr. Wakefield, has made his appearance, and has trumped up
some tale or another to impose upon her, which I am sorry to find is
no difficult thing. He has got the money you gave her; so what is to
become of her I do not know. She expects he will fetch her away within
a month, and keep her like a lady, on the profits of some place at
court, which, according to his account, a friend was to procure for
him if he could but raise five hundred pounds. You may think how
likely he is to keep his promise. I told her my mind in plain terms,
and I believe she begins to be in a panic. She dare not write to you,
on which I thought it best to let you know the truth at once; for, as
I said before, what is to become of her I do not know.

I am, &c.

NABAL THORNBY.'

The train of ideas which the strange contents of this epistle excited
was painful in the extreme. The idiot conduct of my mother tempted
me to curse, not her indeed, but, according to the narrow limits of
prejudice, God and her excepted, all things else! Yet, who but she was
the chief actor in this scene of lunatic folly? Was there a woman on
earth beside herself that would have been so grossly gulled?

As for her husband, the bitterness of gall was not so choaking as the
recollection of him. The sight or sound of his name excited disgust
too intense to be dwelt upon! To suffocate him as a monster, or a
sooterkin, seemed the only punishment of which he was worthy.

And here it is necessary I should inform the reader of a secret, of
which I was myself at that time and long continued to remain utterly
ignorant. Belmont, the man who had purposely thrown himself in my way,
industriously made himself my intimate, informed me as I supposed of
his private affairs and motives of action, inquired minutely into
mine, wormed every intelligence I could give that related to myself
out of me, designedly attached me to him by intellectual efforts of
no mean or common kind (for he saw they delighted me, and they were
familiar to him) Belmont, I say, possessed of a pleasing person, a
winning aspect, and an address that, though studied with the deepest
art, appeared to be open, unpremeditated, and too daring for disguise,
this Belmont was no other than the hated Wakefield! Yes, it was
Wakefield himself, that by a stratagem which drove me half mad, while
it made every drop of blood in his body tingle with triumph, had thus
circumvented me! He it was who borrowed the ten guineas from me, by
the aid of which he robbed me of five hundred; and then returned to
observe how I endured the goad, laugh at my restive antics, and revel
in the plunder which he had purloined with so much facility from
foolish Trevor, and his still more foolish mother!

But this was not the only trick he had to play me. Secure in the
resources of an invention that might have been occupied in pursuits
worthy of his powers, his perverted philosophy taught him to employ
these resources only for the gratification of passions which he
thought it folly to control, and to exult over men whose sordid
selfishness he despised, and whose limited cunning was the subject of
his derision. He professed himself the disciple of La Rochefoucault
and Mandeville, and his practice did not belie his principles.

From the tenor of his discourse, I am persuaded that, had he found me
apt at adopting his maxims, he would have unbosomed himself freely,
have initiated me in his own arts, and, by making me the associate of
his projects, have induced me to look back on the past rather with
merriment than anger. As it was, he reserved himself to act with me as
with the rest of mankind; to watch circumstances, and turn them to his
own purposes whenever opportunity should offer.

This was the man who was the hero of the letter I had just received!
A letter that I could neither read nor recollect without being stung
almost to frenzy; yet that I could neither forget nor forbear to
peruse!

During two hours I traversed my room, and chafed with something like
bursting anguish. A few weeks ago, when I had received my legacy of
the lawyer, I seemed to be encumbered with wealth. Reflection and the
expence at which I now lived, to the visible and quick consumption
of a sum I then thought so ample, had since taught me that I was in
imminent danger of being reduced to beggary. I had no profession, nor
any means of subsistence till a profession could be secured; at least
no adequate means, unless by retiring to some humble garret, and
confining myself to the society of the illiterate, the boorish, and
the brutal, between whose habits and mine there was no congeniality.
The very day before, Olivia, ecstatic vision, had risen in full view
of my delighted hopes, and, forgetting the tormenting distance which
malignant fate had placed between us, I almost thought her mine. The
recollection of her now was misery.

Restless, desponding, agonizing, when this thought occurred, I was
hastening to go and communicate the accursed news to Miss Wilmot; but
an idea started which, after a moment's reflection, induced me to
desist. If I told her, the story of Wakefield must again be revived.
Olivia too might be informed of circumstances concerning my silly
mother, which, selfishness out of the question, motives of delicacy
ought to conceal. Such were my arguments at that time: I had not then
the same moral aversion to secrecy that I now possess.

I could not however any longer endure the present scene, and to get
rid of it hurried away to the billiard table, where, as usual, I found
the then supposed Belmont. He was not himself at play, but was engaged
in betting. Impatient to unburthen my heart, for as far as my own
affairs were concerned I had now no secrets for him, I hurried him out
of the room immediately that the game was ended.

The moment we came into the park, I shewed him my letter, and desired
him to read. While he perused it, I saw he was more than once
violently tempted to laugh.

'Well!' said he, returning it and restraining his titillation, 'is
this all?'

'All!' answered I. 'What more would you have? Could the maleficent
devil himself do more to drive a man mad?'

He looked in my face! I returned the inquisitive gaze! I saw emotions
the very reverse of mine struggling to get vent. His opposing efforts
were ineffectual; he could contain himself no longer, and burst into a
violent fit of laughter!

Astonished at mirth so ill placed and offensive, I asked what it
meant? The tone of my interrogatory was rouzing, and recalled his
attention. 'Pshaw! Trevor,' replied he, with a glance of half
contemptuous pity, 'you are yet young: you are but at the beginning
of your troubles. Your over weening fondness for the musty morality
of dreaming dotards, or artful knaves who only made rules that they
might profit by breaking them, will be your ruin. I tell you again and
again, if you do not prey upon the world, the world will prey upon
you. There is no alternative. What! be bubbled out of your fortune by
a whining old woman? I am ashamed of you!'

'But that woman is my mother!'

'Yes! and a set of very pretty motherly tricks she has played you! Not
that in the first instance it was so much your fault, who were but a
boy, as that of your old fool of a grandfather. It is now high time
however that you should become a man.'

'My grandfather? Say rather it was the scoundrel Wakefield!'

'You seem very angry with this Wakefield! And why? He appears to me
to be a fellow of plot, wit, and spirit. Instead of resentment, were
I you, I should be glad to become acquainted with the man who so well
perceives the stupidity and folly of the animals around him, laughs at
their apish antics, and with so much facility turns their absurd whims
to his own advantage.'

'Acquainted! Intuitive rascal! I would cut off his ears! Drag him to
the pillory with my own hands! He is unworthy a nobler revenge.'

'Pshaw! Ridiculous! What did your mother want but the gratification
of her paltry passions? which were but the dregs and lees of goatish
inclination; for with her the pervading headlong torrent of desire was
passed. Did she think of morality? She would have sacrificed the youth
and high spirits of Wakefield to her own salacious doating. Why should
not he too have his wishes? Were his the most criminal; or the least
fitted for the faculties of enjoyment?'

'You have not heard me defend my mother's conduct: but his villany to
the young lady I formerly mentioned [meaning Miss Wilmot] deserves the
execration of every man!'

'That is, as she tells the story. Women, poor simple creatures, are
always to be pitied, never blamed! But a little more experience,
Trevor, will tell you the devil himself is not half so cunning! Men
are universally their dupes; nay their slaves, though called their
tyrants. Do not men consume their lives in toils to please them? Who
are the chief instigators to what you call vice and folly? Who are the
mischief makers of the world? Who incite us to plunder, rob, and cut
each other's throats? Who but woman? And is not a little retaliation
to be expected? Poor dear souls! Cunning as serpents, Trevor; but,
though fond of cooing, not harmless as doves. Crocodiles; that only
weep to catch their prey. I once was told of one that died broken
hearted; a great beauty, and much bewept by all the maudlin moralizers
that knew her. The cause of her grief was a handsome fellow, who of
course was a cruel perjured villain. The tale had great pathos, and
would have been very tragical, had it but been true. Ages before that
in which Jove laughed at them, lover's perjuries were the common topic
of scandal, and so continue to be. I have often been reproached in the
same way myself, and I once took the trouble to write an apology; for
which, as it will suit all true lovers, all true lovers are bound to
thank me. Here it is.'

I

Men's vows are false, Annette, I own:
The proofs are but too flagrant grown.
To Love I vow'd eternal scorn;
I saw thee and was straight forsworn!

II

In jealous rage, renouncing bliss,
When Damon stole a rapturous kiss,
I took, with oaths, a long farewell;
How false they were thou best can'st tell.

III

By saints I vow'd, and pow'rs divine,
No love could ever equal mine!
Yet I myself, though thus I swore,
Have daily lov'd thee more and more!

IV

To perjuries thus I hourly swerve;
Then treat them as they well deserve:
Thy own vows break, at length comply,
And be as deep in guilt as I.

'What think you; was not this a valid plea? Are not women apt to take
the advice here given them? Lovely hypocrites! They delight in being
forced to follow their own inclinations!'

There was no resisting the playfulness of his wit, and the
exhilarating whim of his manner. My ill humour soon evaporated;
and yielding to the sympathetic gaiety he had inspired, I said to
him--'You are a wicked wit, Belmont. But, though I laugh, do not
imagine I am a convert to your mandevilian system: it is false,
pernicious, and destructive of the end which it pretends to secure.'

'Do not abuse my system, or me either', replied he. 'I tell you I am
the only honest man of my acquaintance; and the first effort of my
honesty is, as it ought to be, that of being honest to myself.'

'I hear many men profess the same opinions, but I find them acting on
different principles.'

'You mistake. You are young, I tell you. Every man's actions are
strongly tinged by the principles he professes.'

My countenance became a little more serious--'Surely you do not avow
yourself a rascal?'

'Pshaw! Epithets are odious. I do not know the meaning of the word;
nor do you.'

Our conversation continued; it relieved me from a bitterness of
chagrin from which I was happy to escape. We dined together. His flow
of spirits and raillery were unabating; I combated his opinions, he
laughed at my arguments, rather than answered them, and, though I
even then conceived him to be a very bad moralist, I thought him a
delightful companion.




CHAPTER VIII


_Revenge not forgotten: The visit delayed: Wilmot and his poetical
powers: Dreadful intelligence: An appalling picture: A fruitless
search; followed by a surprising discovery_


Stimulated by the ridicule of Belmont, though I never had a thought
of abandoning my mother to want, still I determined, according to the
proverb, to let her bite the bridle. Instead of writing, therefore, I
waited till she should write to me.

Mean time my pamphlet was the grand object of present pursuit. When I
began it, I imagined it would scarcely have been the work of a day,
certainly not of a week. I was deceived. To a man who has any sense of
justice, who fears to affirm the thing that is not, yet is determined
to be inexorable in revenge, no task is so harrassing as that which I
had undertaken. Page after page was written, re-written, corrected,
interlined, scratched, blotted and thrown in the fire. The work had
been three times finished, and three times destroyed. It was a fourth
time begun, and still the labour was no less oppressive, irritating,
and thorny.

It was in this state at the time that Mary brought me the joyful
intelligence relating to Olivia. I had watched with unremitting
assiduity during those hours of the day when she had been accustomed
to visit Miss Wilmot; but my watchings were fruitless; she came no
more.

The fourth day after her last visit, she sent a note to Miss Wilmot,
informing her that her aunt was going to Bath for the recovery of her
health, to which place it was necessary that she should attend her.
The blow was violent, and would have been felt more violently even
than it was, had it not been for an event which I must now relate.

The alarms of Miss Wilmot concerning her brother had not been lightly
excited: they might rather be called prophetic. She had indeed
strongly communicated her terror to me. One morning I was meditating
on the subject, and recollecting those early days when gathering the
first fruits of genius, I was taught by him to distinguish and enjoy
the beauties of its emanations, and the sublimity of its flights. His
affection for me, though but a boy, had induced him to give me some
short poetical compositions of his own. I was reading them over, with
strong feelings, partly of sorrow and partly of indignation, at the
folly and injustice of a world that could overlook such merit. One
of them in particular, which I had always admired for the simple
yet pathetic spirit of poetry in which it was written, I was then
perusing. It was the following.

I

Ho! Why dost thou shiver and shake,
Gaffer-Gray!
And why doth thy nose look so blue?
''Tis the weather that's cold;
'Tis I'm grown very old,
And my doublet is not very new,
Well-a-day!'

II

Then line thy worn doublet with ale,
Gaffer-Gray;
And warm thy old heart with a glass.
'Nay but credit I've none;
And my money's all gone;
Then say how may that come to pass?
Well-a-day!'

III

Hie away to the house on the brow,
Gaffer-Gray;
And knock at the jolly priest's door.
'The priest often preaches
Against worldly riches;
But ne'er gives a mite to the poor,
Well-a-day!'

IV

The lawyer lives under the hill,
Gaffer-Gray;
Warmly fenc'd both in back and in front.
'He will fasten his locks,
And will threaten the stocks,
Should he ever more find me in want,
Well-a-day!'

V

The squire has fat beeves and brown ale,
Gaffer-Gray;
And the season will welcome you there.
'His fat beeves and his beer,
And his merry new year
Are all for the flush and the fair,
Well-a-day!'

VI

My keg is but low I confess,
Gaffer-Gray;
What then? While it lasts man we'll live.
The poor man alone,
When he hears the poor moan,
Of his morsel a morsel will give,
Well-a-day!

In that precise state of mind which associations such as I have
described, and a poem like this could excite, when I was alike
bewailing the madness and turpitude of mankind, that could be blind to
the worth of a man such as Wilmot, while glowing I say and thrilling
with these sensations, my breakfast was brought and with it a paper--!
What shall I say?--It contained what follows! 'Yesterday a middle
aged man, of a genteel and orderly appearance, was seen to walk
despondingly beside the Serpentine river. A gentleman, who having met
him remarked the agitation of his countenance, suspected his design;
and, concealing himself behind some trees at a little distance,
watched him, and at last saw him throw himself into the water. The
gentleman, who was a good swimmer, jumped in after him; but could
not immediately find the body, which after he had brought it out was
conveyed to Mary-le-bone watch-house. A few shillings were found in
his pocket, but nothing to indicate his name, place of abode, or
other information, except a written paper, containing the following
melancholy account of himself.

'This body, if ever this body should be found, was once a thing which,
by way of reproach among men, was called an author. It moved about
the earth, despised and unnoticed; and died indigent and unlamented.
It could hear, see, feel, smell and taste with as much quickness,
delicacy, and force as other bodies. It had desires and passions like
other bodies, but was denied the use of them by such as had the power
and the will to engross the good things of this world to themselves.
The doors of the great were shut upon it; not because it was infected
with disease or contaminated with infamy, but on account of the
fashion of the garments with which it was cloathed, and the name it
derived from its fore-fathers; and because it had not the habit of
bending its knee where its heart owed no respect, nor the power of
moving its tongue to gloze the crimes or flatter the follies of men.
It was excluded the fellowship of such as heap up gold and silver;
not because it did, but for fear it might, ask a small portion of
their beloved wealth. It shrunk with pain and pity from the haunts of
ignorance which the knowledge it possessed could not enlighten, and
guilt that its sensations were obliged to abhor. There was but one
class of men with whom it was permitted to associate, and those were
such as had feelings and misfortunes like its own; among whom it was
its hard fate frequently to suffer imposition, from assumed worth
and fictitious distress. Beings of supposed benevolence, capable of
perceiving, loving, and promoting merit and virtue, have now and then
seemed to flit and glide before it. But the visions were deceitful.
Ere they were distinctly seen, the phantoms vanished. Or, if such
beings do exist, it has experienced the peculiar hardship of never
having met with any, in whom both the purpose and the power were fully
united. Therefore, with hands wearied with labour, eyes dim with
watchfulness, veins but half nourished, and a mind at length subdued
by intense study and a reiteration of unaccomplished hopes, it was
driven by irresistible impulse to end at once such a complication
of evils. The knowledge was imposed upon it that, amid all
these calamities, it had one consolation--Its miseries were not
eternal--That itself had the power to end them. This power it has
employed, because it found itself incapable of supporting any longer
the wretchedness of its own situation, and the blindness and injustice
of mankind: and as, while it lived, it lived scorned and neglected, so
it now commits itself to the waves; in expectation, after it is dead,
of being mangled, belied, and insulted.'

Oh God! what were my feelings while reading this heart appalling
story! It contained volumes; and sufficiently spoke the strength of
the mind that could thus picture its own sensations. It must be my
beloved Wilmot: it could be no one else; or even if it were, the man
who thus could feel and thus could write was no less the object of
admiration, grief, and a species of regret, of the guilt of which
every man partook! It was an act of attainder against the whole world,
in the infamy of which each man had his share!

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