Godolphin | Page 5

not through ambition, but through hate, and for revenge! You will seek to rise that you may humble those who have betrayed me! In the social walks of life you will delight to gall their vanities in state intrigues, you will embrace every measure that can bring them to their eternal downfall. For this great end you will pursue all means. What! you hesitate? Repeat, repeat, repeat!--You will lie, cringe, fawn, and think vice not vice, if it bring you one jot nearer to Revenge! With this curse on my foes, I entwine my blessing, dear, dear Constance, on you,--you, who have nursed, watched, all but saved me! God, God bless you, my child!" And Vernon burst into tears.
It was two hours after this singular scene, and exactly in the third hour of morning, that Vernon woke from a short and troubled sleep. The grey dawn (for the time was the height of summer) already began to labour through the shades and against the stars of night. A raw and comfortless chill crept over the earth, and saddened the air in the death-chamber. Constance sat by her father's bed, her eyes fixed upon him, and her cheek more wan than ever by the pale light of that crude and cheerless dawn. When Vernon woke, his eyes, glazed with death, rolled faintly towards her, fixing and dimming in their sockets as they gazed;--his throat rattled. But for one moment his voice found vent; a ray shot across his countenance as he uttered his last words--words that sank at once and eternally to the core of his daughter's heart--words that ruled her life, and sealed her destiny: "Constance, remember--the Oath--Revenge!"

CHAPTER II.
REMARK ON THE TENURE OF LIFE.--THE COFFINS OF GREAT MEN SELDOM NEGLECTED.--CONSTANCE TAKES REFUGE WITH LADY ERPINGHAM.--THE HEROINE'S ACCOMPLISHMENTS AND CHARACTER.-THE MANOEUVRING TEMPERAMENT.
What a strange life this is! what puppets we are! How terrible an enigma is Fate! I never set my foot without my door, but what the fearful darkness that broods over the next moment rushes upon me. How awful an event may hang over our hearts! The sword is always above us, seen or invisible!
And with this life--this scene of darkness and dreadsome men would have us so contented as to desire, to ask for no other!
Constance was now without a near relation in the world. But her father predicted rightly: vanity supplied the place of affection. Vernon, who for eighteen months preceding his death had struggled with the sharpest afflictions of want--Vernon, deserted in life by all, was interred with the insulting ceremonials of pomp and state. Six nobles bore his pall: long trains of carriages attended his funeral: the journals were filled with outlines of his biography and lamentations at his decease. They buried him in Westminster Abbey, and they made subscriptions for a monument in the very best sort of marble. Lady Erpingham, a distant connection of the deceased, invited Constance to live with her; and Constance of course consented, for she had no alternative.
On the day that she arrived at Lady Erpingham's house, in Hill Street, there were several persons present in the drawing-room.
"I fear, poor girl," said Lady Erpingham,--for they were talking of Constance's expected arrival,--"I fear that she will be quite abashed by seeing so many of us, and under such unhappy circumstances."
"How old is she?" asked a beauty.
"About thirteen, I believe."
"Handsome?"
"I have not seen her since she was seven years old. She promised then to be very beautiful: but she was a remarkably shy, silent child."
"Miss Vernon," said the groom of the chambers, throwing open the door.
With the slow step and self-possessed air of womanhood, but with a far haughtier and far colder mien than women commonly assume, Constance Vernon walked through the long apartment, and greeted her future guardian. Though every eye was on her, she did not blush; though the Queens of the London World were round her, her gait and air were more royal than all. Every one present experienced a revulsion of feeling. They were prepared for pity; this was no case in which pity could be given. Even the words of protection died on Lady Erpingham's lip, and she it was who felt bashful and disconcerted.
I intend to pass rapidly over the years that elapsed till Constance became a woman. Let us glance at her education. Vernon had not only had her instructed in the French and Italian; but, a deep and impassioned scholar himself, he had taught her the elements of the two great languages of the ancient world. The treasures of those languages she afterwards conquered of her own accord.
Lady Erpingham had one daughter, who married when Constance had reached the age of sixteen. The advantages Lady Eleanor Erpingham possessed in her masters and her governess Constance shared. Miss Vernon drew well, and sang divinely;