The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 77, March, 1864
V >> Various >> The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 77, March, 1864"Did you know she had a husband living, too?"
"No."
Mr. Muir spoke as if it were beneath him to suppose that use was to be
made, to the damage of the woman, of such acknowledgment.
"It don't look well that people in general are ignorant of the fact. I
tell you it's suspicious. It strikes me I never heard _anybody_ call
her anything but Miss Edgar. Excuse me; of course you knew better."
"Yes, and some beside myself. She told me she was a married woman. But
really, Deane, we couldn't expect, especially of a woman who has been
living for months, as it seems to me, in absolute retirement, that she
should go about making explanations in regard to her private affairs. I
have inferred, I confess, that she had in some unfortunate manner
terminated her union with her husband; and I have always hoped that her
coming here might prove a providential, happy thing,--that somehow she
might find her way out of trouble, and resume, what has evidently been
broken off, a peaceful and happy life. She is familiar with happiness."
"Well, Sir!" Deane exploded on the preacher's mildness, of which he had
grown in the last few seconds terribly impatient, "I don't know how far
Christian charity may go,--a great way farther, it seems, than it need
to, if it will submit to the impertinence of a traitor's coming among us
and accepting our support, at the same time that she takes advantage of
her sex and position to betray us. For _that_ business stands just where
it did before. There isn't the slightest doubt that she will find
abettors enough who are as false and daring and impudent as herself.
Whether we shall suffer them is a question, it seems. Excuse my plain
speaking, but I am surprised all round."
"No more than I am, Mr. Deane. It is, as you say, our duty immediately
to examine into this business; but we cannot, look at it as you will, we
cannot do so with too much caution. It is a disagreeable errand for a
man to undertake. Let us at least defer judgment for the present. I will
speak to Mrs. Edgar about it myself, and communicate the result
immediately to you. Do you prefer to remain here till I return?"
He arose as he spoke, but Deane rose also. It had at last penetrated the
brain of this most shrewd, but also very dull man, that the business
might be conducted with courtesy, and that a little skill might manage
it as effectually as a good deal of courage.
"No, no," he said; "he could trust the business to the minister. Liked
to do so, of course. If there was any shame or remorse in the woman, Mr.
Muir was the proper person to deal with it."
And so Deane retired.
But when he was gone, the minister stood listening to his departing
steps as long as they could be heard; then he sat down in his
study-chair, and seemed in no haste to go about the business with which
he stood commissioned.
Still the organ-music wandered through the church. Prayer of Moses,
Miserere, De Profundis, the Voice of One crying in the Wilderness, a
Song in the Night, the darkness of desolation rifted only by the cry for
deliverance, tragic human experience, exhausted human hope, and dying
faith,--he seemed to interpret the sounds as they swept from the
organ-loft and wandered darkly down the nave among the great stone
pillars, till they stood, a dismal congregation, at the low door of the
vestry-room, pleading with him for her who sent them thither, and
astounding him by the hot calumniation that preceded them.
At last, for he was a man to _do_ his duty, in spite of whatsoever
shrinking,--and if this accusation were true, it would be indeed hard to
forgive, impossible to overlook the offence,--the minister walked out
from the vestry into the church.
The organist must have heard him coming, for she broke off suddenly, and
dismissed the boy who worked the bellows, at the same moment herself
rising to depart.
Just then the minister ascended the steps that led into the choir.
She had no purpose to remain a moment, and merely paused for civil
speech, choosing, however, that he should see she was detained.
He did not accept the signs, and, with his usual grave deference to the
will of others in things trivial, allow her to pass. He said,
instead,--
"Mrs. Edgar, I wish you might give me a moment, though I do not see how
what I have undertaken can be said in that length of time. I choose that
you should hear from one who wishes you nothing but good the strange
story that troubles me."
"I remain, Mr. Muir," was the answer; and she sat down.
The subject was too disagreeable for him to dally with it. If the charge
were a true one, no consideration was due; if untrue, the sooner that
was made apparent, the better.
"It is said that the organist of St. Peter's is not as loyal a citizen
of the United States as might be hoped by those who admire and trust her
most; and not only so, but that she is the wife of a Rebel leader, and
in communication with Rebels. It sounds harsh, but I speak as a friend.
I do not credit these things; but they're said, and I repeat them to
relieve others of what they might deem a duty."
Swiftly on his words came her answer.
"You have not believed it, Sir?"
Looking at her, it was the easiest thing for the minister to feel and
say,--and, oh, how he wished for Deane!--
"Not one word of it, Madam."
"That is sufficient,--sufficient, at least, for me. But do they, does
any one, desire that I should take the oath of fealty to the
Constitution and to the Government? I am ready to do either, or both. I
hardly reverence the Constitution more than I do the man who is at the
head of our affairs. To me he is the hero of this age."
The minister smiled,--a cordial smile, right trustful, cordial, glad.
"It may be well," said he. "These are strange days to live in, and we
all abhor suspicion of our loyalty. Besides, it may be necessary; for
suspicion of this character is an ungovernable passion now. For myself,
I should never have asked these questions; but it is merely right that
you should know the whole truth. A person who reports of himself that he
has escaped from Charleston avers that he has recognized in the organist
of St. Peter's the wife of General Edgar. I don't know the man's name.
But his statement has reached me directly. I give you information I
might have withheld, because I perfectly trust both the citizen and the
lady who has rendered us such noble service here."
"And such trust, I may say, is my right. I shall not forfeit it," said
the organist, rising. "I am ready, at any time, to take the oath, and to
bear my own responsibilities, Mr. Muir. I have neither fellowship nor
communication with Rebels, and I deem it a strange insult to be called a
spy. 'T is a great pity one should stay here to vex himself with puerile
gossip."
She pointed to the stained windows emblazoned with sacred symbols,
glorious now with sunlight, bowed, and was gone.
VI.
There came, on Easter night, to the door of the organist's apartment,
the "contraband" who at present was sojourning under the protection of
Mr. Gerald Deane.
The hour was not early. Evening service was over, and Julius had waited
a reasonable length of time, that his errand might be delivered when she
should be at leisure. He might safely have gone at once; for guests
never came at night, and rarely by day,--the organist's wish being
perfectly understood among the very few with whom she came in contact,
and she being consequently "let alone" with what some might have deemed
"a vengeance." But it satisfied her, and no other dealing would.
Either this man--Julius Hopkins was his name--had not so recently come
to H---- as to be a stranger in any quarter of the town, or he had made
use of his time here; for he seemed familiar with the streets and alleys
as an old resident.
To find the organist was not difficult, when one had come within sight
of the lofty spire of the church, for it was under its shadow she
lived; but if he had been accustomed to carry messages to her door for
years, he could not now have presented himself with fuller confidence as
to what he should find.
When Mrs. Edgar opened the door, not a word was needed, as if these were
strangers who stood face to face. In her countenance, indeed, was
emotion,--unmeasured surprise; in her manner, momentary indecision. But
the surprise passed into a lofty kindliness of manner, and the
indecision gave place to the most entire freedom from embarrassment. She
cut short the words he began to speak with an authoritative, though most
quiet,--
"Julius, come in."
It was not as one addresses the servant of a friend, but spoken with an
authority which the man instantly acknowledged by obedience. He came
into the room, closed the door, and waited till she should speak. She
asked,--
"Why are you here?"
He answered as if unaware that any great change had taken place in their
relations.
"My master sent me. At last I have found my mistress. It took me a great
while."
"Is your master still in arms?"
The man bowed.
"Against the Government?"
"_He_ says, _for_ the Government."
"Of Rebels?"
He bowed again.
"Then, there is no answer,--can be none. Did he not foresee it?"
The slave did not answer. What words that he came commissioned to speak
could respond to the anguish her voice betrayed? She spoke again; she
had recovered from the surprise of her distress, and, looking now at
Julius, said,--
"You are excused from replying; but--you do not, in any event, propose
to return home?"
"Yes, Madam, yes,--immediately, immediately."
It was the first time he had discovered this purpose, and he did so with
a vehemence expressive of desire to vindicate himself where he should be
understood. She answered slowly, but she did not seem amazed, as Deane
would infallibly have been, as you and I had been,--such doubting
worshippers, after all, of the great heroic.
"Do you not hear, Julius, everywhere, that you are a freeman? Is it
possible no one has told you so? Do you not know it for yourself? It is
likely."
"It don't signify. I tended him through one course,--he got a bad cut,
Master did,--and I'll take care of him again. I a'n't through till he
is."
"Is he well?"
"Thanks to me, and the Lord, he _is_ well of the wound again, and gone
to work."
At the pause that now ensued, as if he had only been waiting for this,
the slave approached nearer to his mistress; but he did not lift his
eyes,--he desired but to serve. She was so proud, he thought,--always
was; if he could only get _himself_ out of the way, and let this ugly,
cruel business right itself without a witness! Master knew how to plead
better than any one could for him. He produced a tiny case of
chamois-leather.
"Master sent you this," he said; and it seemed as if he would have given
it into her very hands; but they were folded; so he laid it on the edge
of the piano, and stepped back a pace. He knew there was no need for him
to explain.
Well she understood. Her husband had done his utmost to secure a
reconciliation. Love had its rights, its sacrifices; with these she had
to do, and not with his official conduct and public acts.
She knew well what that trifle of a chamois case contained. It was the
miniature of their child, the little one of earth no more, but
heaven-born: the winged child, with the flame above its head,--symbols
with which, of old, they loved to represent Genius. This miniature was
set in diamonds; it was the mother's gift to the father of the child:
this woman's gift to the man whom loyal men to-day call traitor, rebel,
alien, enemy.
And thus he appealed to her. Oh, tender was the voice! This love that
called had in its utterances proof that it held by its immortality. The
love that pleaded with her appealed to recollections the most sacred,
the most dear, the perpetual,--knowing what was in her heart, knowing
how _it_ would respond.
But there, where Julius left the miniature, it lay; a letter beside it
now, and a purse of gold,--pure gold,--not a Confederate note among it.
Poor Julia Edgar! she need not open the case that shone with such starry
splendor. Never could be hidden from her eyes the face of the child. How
should she not see again, in all its beauty, the garden where her
darling had played, little hands filled full of blooms, little face
whose smiling was as that of angels, butterflies sporting around her as
the wonderful one of old flitted about St. Rose,--alas! with as sure a
prophecy as that black and golden one? How clearly she saw again,
through heavy clouds of tears that never broke, the garden's glory, all
its peace, its happiness, its pride, and love!
No argument, no word, could have pleaded for the father of the child
like this. But it was love pleading against love,--Earth's beseeching
and need, against Heaven's warning and sufficience.
At last she spoke again.
"What is your reward, Julius, for all this danger you've incurred for
him, and for me?"
"He said it should be my liberty."
How he spoke those words! LIBERTY! it was the golden dream of
the man's life, yet he named it with a self-control that commanded her
admiration and reverence.
"I give it to you at this moment, here!" she said.
For an instant the slave seemed to hesitate; but the hesitation was of
utterance merely, not of will.
"My errand isn't half done, Madam. I never broke my word yet. I'll go
back."
"Tell him, then, that I gave you your freedom, and you would not accept
it. And--_go_ back! 't is a noble resolve, worthy of you. Take the
purse. I do not need it. Say that I have no need of it. And you will,
perhaps."
No other message for him? Not one word from herself to him! For she knew
where safety lay.
The slave looked at her, helpless, hopeless, with indecision. The woman
was incomprehensible. He had set out on his errand, had persevered
through difficulties, and had withstood temptations too many to be
written here, with not a doubt as to the success that would attend him.
He remembered the wife of General Edgar in her home; to that home of
happy love and noble hospitality, and of all social dignities, he had no
doubt he should restore her. But now, humbled by defeat, he said,--
"I've looked a great while for you, Madam. I would never 'a' give up,
though, if I'd gone to Maine or Labrador, and round by the Rocky
Mountains, hunting for you. I heard you singing in the church this
morning, and I knew your voice. Though it didn't sound natural
right,--but I knew it was nobody else's voice,--as if the North mostly
hadn't agreed with it. And I heard it yesterday somewhere,--that's what
'sured me. I was going along the street, when I heard it; but it was not
this house you were in."
"And it was you, then, Julius, who betrayed me to the person who
supposes himself to be your protector,--and this because you thought
surely I must be glad to return, when I had lost my friends here through
ill report! Is that the way your war is carried on?"
"My war, Madam?"
But Julius did not look at his mistress; he looked away, and shrugged
his shoulders. The device of which he was convicted had seemed to him so
good, so sure, nevertheless had failed.
She had scarcely finished speaking, when a note was brought to the door.
It was from Adam von Gelhorn.
"I am making my preparations to go at nine to-morrow," said the
note. "Will you come to the church before? I would like to
remember having seen you there last, at the organ. There's a
bit of news just reached me, said to be a secret. General
Edgar's command aims at preventing the junction of our forces
before Y----. He is strong enough, numerically, to overthrow
either division in separate conflict, and this is his
Napoleonic strategy. But he will be outwitted. There's no doubt
of it. Do not despair of our cause, whatever you hear during
the coming fortnight. I shall report myself immediately to
McClellan, and he may make a drummer-boy of me, if he will.
Henceforth I am at his service till the war ends.
"VON G----."
Thrice she read this note; when her eyes lifted at last, Julius was
still standing where she had left him. She started, seeing him, as if
his presence there at the moment took a new significance; her heart
fainted within her.
Had _he_ heard this secret of which Von Gelhorn spoke? It was her
husband's _life_ that was in jeopardy!
"When are you going, Julius?" she asked.
"To-morrow. Oh, Madam, give me some word for him!"
Red horror of death, how it rises before her sight! She shuddered,
cowered, sank before the blackness of darkness that followed fast on
that terrific spectacle of carnage, before which a whirlwind seemed to
have planted her. She heard the cries and yells, the groans and curses
of bleeding, dying men; saw banners in the dust, horsemen and horses
crushed under the great guns, mortality in fragments, heaps upon heaps
of ruin on the field Aceldama.
Where was he? Who would search among the slain for him? Who from among
the dying would rescue him? Who will stanch his bleeding wounds? Who
will moisten his parched lips? Whose voice sound in the ears that have
heard the roar of guns amid the crash of battle? What hand shall bathe
and fan that brow? What eyes shall watch till those eyelids unlock, and
catch the whisper of those lips? Nay, who will save his life from the
needless sacrifice? tell him that his plans are known, warn him back,
warn _him_ of spies and of treachery? Has Julius betrayed him?
She looked at the slave. But before she looked, her heart reproached her
for having doubted him.
"You will need this gold," she said. "Take it. Restore the miniature to
your master. And go,--go at once. If success be in store for _him_, I
share not the shame of it. If defeat, adversity, sickness,--your master
knows his wife fears but one thing, has fled but from one thing. Her
heart is with him, but she abhors the cause to which he has given
himself. She will not share his crime."
Difficult as these words were to speak, she spoke them without
faltering, and they admitted no discussion.
The slave lingered yet longer, but there was no more that she would say.
Assured at last of that, he said,--
"I obey you," and was gone.
He was gone,--gone! and she had betrayed nothing,--had given no
warning,--had uttered not a word by which the life that was of all lives
most precious to her might have been saved!
VII.
By eight o'clock next morning Mrs. Edgar was in the church. Von Gelhorn
preceded her by five minutes; he was walking up the aisle when she
entered, impatient for her appearing, eager to be gone,--wondering,
boy-like, that she came not.
He has performed a prodigious amount of labor since they last met. His
pictures were all removed to the Odeon, he said. His studio, haunt of
dreams, beloved of fame so long, stripped and barren, looked like any
other four-walled room,--and he, a freeman, stood equipped for service.
Yes, an hour would see him speeding to the capital. In less time than it
had taken him to perfect his arrangements he should be at the
head-quarters of the commander-in-chief,--to be made a drummer-boy of,
as he said before, or serve wherever there should be room for him.
He stood there so bright, so ready, eager, daring, was capable of so
much! What had _she_ done to usurp the functions of conscience, and
assume the voice of duty? She had done what she could not revoke, and
yet could not contemplate without a sort of terror,--as if to atone, to
make amends for disloyalty, which, coming even as from herself, a crime
in which she had chief concernment, was not to be atoned for by
repentance merely, nor by any sacrifices less than the costliest. She
had sought her husband's peer,--deemed that she had found
him,--therefore would despatch him to the battle-field, by valor to meet
the valiant. But now the light by which she had hurried forward to that
deed was gone, and she stood as a prophetess may, who, deserted of the
divinity, doubts the testimony of her hour of exaltation.
While they talked,--both apparently standing at an elevation of serene
courage above the level of even warring men and heroic women, but one
causing such misgiving in her heart as to fix her in that mood, and
forbid an extrication,--Fate led a lady down the street, who, passing by
the church and seeing the door ajar, went in. She should find in the
choir some written music, used in yesterday's services, which she had
forgotten to bring away. Out of the pure, bright sunshine she stepped
into the dark, cold shadows, and had come to the choir before she heard
the voices speaking there. Shrined saints that hold your throne-like
niches in the old stone walls! gilded cherubim that hover round the
organ's burnished pipes! what sight do you look down upon? She walked up
quietly,--it was her way, a noiseless, gliding way,--there stood the
organist and Adam von Gelhorn! As if hell had made a revelation, she
stood looking at those two. And both saw her, and neither of the three
uttered one word, or essayed a motion, till she, quietly, it seemed,
though it was with utmost violence, turned to go again.
Then--soft the voice sounded, but to her who spoke there was thunder in
it--the organist called after her, "Sybella!"
She, however, did not turn to answer, neither did she falter in going.
Departure was the one thing of which she was capable,--and what could
have hindered her going? What checks Vesuvius, when the flood says, "Lo,
I come!"? Or shall the little bird that perches and sings on a post in
the Dismal Swamp prevent the message that sweeps along the wire for a
thousand miles?
Von Gelhorn, disturbed by her coming and departure, in that so slight
vibration of air caused by her advance and her retreat, swayed as a reed
in the wind, stood for a moment seeking equipoise. Vain endeavor!
Not with inquiry, neither for direction, his eyes fell on Julia Edgar.
"Go," she said.
She said it aloud; no utterance could have been more distinct. He strode
after Sybella.
She heard him come, but did not pause, or turn, or falter. He came
faster, gained upon, and overtook her. It was just there by the
church-door. And then he spoke. But not like a warrior. It was a hoarse
whisper she heard, and her name in it. At _that_ call she turned. When
she saw his face, she stood.
Why avert her face, indeed, or why go on?
"I am going away,--in search of death, perhaps. I don't know. But to
battle. Will you not come back and listen one moment?"
She stood as if she could stand. Why did he plead but for one moment?
Battle! before that word she laid down her weapons. Under that glare of
awful fire the walls of ice melted, as never iceberg under tropic sun.
Battle! One out of the world who had been so long out of _her_ world!
Out of her world? So is beauty dead and past all resurrection of a
surety, when the dismal winds of March howl over land and sea!
"Yesterday," he said, "I came to church. Not to hear you, but I heard
you. You conquered me. I was giving a word for you to your friend and
mine, when God led you in here. Do not try to thwart Him. We have tried
it long enough. If you should go into my studio,--no, there's no such
place now, but if you went into the Odeon, you would see some faces
there that would tell you who has haunted my dreams and my heart these
years. Forgive me now that I'm going away. Let me hear you speak the
very word, Sybella."
How long must sinner call on God before he sees the smile of Love making
bright the heavens, glad the earth, possible all holiness, probable all
blessing? For He has built no walls, fastened no bars and bolts, blasted
no present, cursed no future. If Love be large, rich, free, strong
enough, it brings itself with one swift bound into the Heavenly Kingdom
where the Powers of Darkness have almost prevailed.
When Mrs. Edgar saw these two coming up the aisle together, she
understood, and, turning full towards them, sang a song such as was
never heard before within those old gray walls.
VIII.
Mr. Muir was but a man. Powerful indeed in his way, but it was behind
his pulpit-desk, with a sermon in his hands, his congregation before
him,--or in carrying out any charitable project, or in managing the
business specially devolving on him. He was nobody when he emerged from
his own distinct path,--at least, such was his opinion; and being so, he
would not be likely to attempt the enforcement of another view of his
power on other men. He was afraid of himself now,--afraid that his own
preferences had made him obtuse where loyalty would have given him a
clearer vision.
Pity him, therefore, when Mr. Deane learned that the son of bondage in
whose deliverance he took such proud delight, as surely became a good
man who greatly valued freedom, aye, valued it as the pearl beyond all
price,--when he learned that the slave had been seen going to the
organist's room, and returning from it, and had not since been seen in
H----.
Mr. Muir reflected on these tidings with perplexity, constrained, in
spite of him, to believe that the slave had actually come on a secret
errand, which he had fulfilled, and that not without enlightenment he
had returned to his master.