Ernest Maltravers | Page 9

whatever passion, caught the caprice of a wild, roving, and all-poetical imagination, Maltravers was, half unconsciously, a poet--a poet of action, and woman was his muse.
He had formed no plan of conduct towards the poor girl he was to meet. He meant no harm to her. If she had been less handsome, he would have been equally grateful; and her dress, and youth, and condition, would equally have compelled him to select the hour of dusk for an interview.
He arrived at the spot. The winter night had already descended; but a sharp frost had set in: the air was clear, the stars were bright, and the long shadows slept, still and calm, along the broad road, and the whitened fields beyond.
He walked briskly to and fro, without much thought of the interview, or its object, half chanting old verses, German and English, to himself, and stopping to gaze every moment at the silent stars.
At length he saw Alice approach: she came up to him timidly and gently. His heart beat more quickly; he felt that he was young and alone with beauty. "Sweet girl," he said, with involuntary and mechanical compliment, "how well this light becomes you. How shall I thank you for not forgetting me?"
Alice surrendered her hand to his without a struggle.
"What is your name?" said he, bending his face down to hers.
"Alice Darvil."
"And your terrible father,--/is/ he, in truth, your father?"
"Indeed he is my father and mother too!"
"What made you suspect his intention to murder me? Has he ever attempted the like crime?"
"No; but lately he has often talked of robbery. He is very poor, sir. And when I saw his eye, and when afterwards, while your back was turned, he took the key from the door, I felt that--that you were in danger."
"Good girl--go on."
"I told him so when we went up-stairs. I did not know what to believe, when he said he would not hurt you; but I stole the key of the front door, which he had thrown on the table, and went to my room. I listened at my door; I heard him go down the stairs--he stopped there for some time; and I watched him from above. The place where he was opened to the field by the back-way. After some time, I heard a voice whisper him; I knew the voice, and then they both went out by the back-way; so I stole down, and went out and listened; and I knew the other man was John Walters. I'm afraid of /him/, sir. And then Walters said, says he, 'I will get the hammer, and, sleep or wake, we'll do it.' And father said, 'It's in the shed.' So I saw there was no time to be lost, sir, and--and--but you know all the rest."
"But how did you escape?"
"Oh, my father, after talking to Walters, came to my room, and beat and--and--frightened me; and when he was gone to bed, I put on my clothes, and stole out; it was just light; and I walked on till I met you."
"Poor child, in what a den of vice you have been brought up!"
"Anan, sir."
"She don't understand me. Have you been taught to read and write?"
"Oh no!"
"But I suppose you have been taught, at least, to say your catechism--and you pray sometimes?"
"I have prayed to father not to beat me."
"But to God?"
"God, sir--what is that?"*
* This ignorance--indeed the whole sketch of Alice--is from the life; nor is such ignorance, accompanied by what almost seems an instinctive or intuitive notion of right or wrong, very uncommon, as our police reports can testify. In the /Examiner/ for, I think, the year 1835, will be found the case of a young girl ill-treated by her father, whose answers to the interrogatories of the magistrate are very similar to those of Alice to the questions of Maltravers.
Maltravers drew back, shocked and appalled. Premature philosopher as he was, this depth of ignorance perplexed his wisdom. He had read all the disputes of schoolmen, whether or not the notion of a Supreme Being is innate; but he had never before been brought face to face with a living creature who was unconscious of a God.
After a pause, he said: "My poor girl, we misunderstand each other. You know that there is a God?"
"No, sir."
"Did no one ever tell you who made the stars you now survey--the earth on which you tread?"
"No."
"And have you never thought about it yourself?"
"Why should I? What has that to do with being cold and hungry?"
Maltravers looked incredulous. "You see that great building, with the spire rising in the starlight?"
"Yes, sir, sure."
"What is it called?"
"Why, a church."
"Did you never go into it?"
"No."
"What do people do there?"
"Father says one man talks nonsense, and the other folk listen to him."
"Your father is--no matter. Good heavens! what shall