Part 12

Leonard was not pleased at what he considered the intrusion, but Achille’s fine manners and the easy tone of his conversation were really a welcome relief to the uncomfortable strain introduced by the Burr topic. Achille was cheery and agreeable, and had plenty of those little critical things to say of acquaintances every one likes to hear—critical, but not unkindly so. This night, also, he was even unusually handsome, and his sumptuous dress only in the diapason of the general air of luxury which was the distinguishing quality of his life.

To the gay persiflage of his conversation madame paid little attention. She was lost in thoughtful reminiscence, and when she re-entered the society of those around her she returned to the conversation which the entrance of Achille had interrupted.

“I have been taking thought, Leonard,” she said, “and I wonder me at you! Of good days are you tired? If so, then join yourself to Aaron Burr. I am not pleased that you should do this, but so, nothing will help, I fear—at least no ordinary advice.”

“Is not that a hard thing to say, madame?”

“Very well, but it is the truth. So then, to make short work of it, no ordinary advice will I give you; but an extraordinary reason, that may perhaps turn your mind another way. I know not—there are none so blind as those who will not see.”

“First, madame, permit me to ask Mr. St. Ange, in your presence, if he thinks I require either ordinary or extraordinary arguments against the course I have marked out for myself.”

Madame moved her head in assent, and then Leonard, in a few sentences, told Achille of his proposed study with Mr. Burr, and asked him frankly “if he considered Mr. Burr’s duelling experience inimical to business relations with him?”

And Achille answered promptly: “If Mr. Burr had not fought Mr. Hamilton I should consider your engagement with him disastrous, both to your social and business reputation. Mr. Hamilton had slandered Mr. Burr in public and in private, and even while Mr. Burr supposed him to be his friend he had disseminated the unguarded sallies of his host while a guest at his dinner table. As I understand the subject, Mr. Burr had no alternative between two inexorable facts—to fight, which might mean physical death; not to fight, which would certainly mean social and political death. Mr. Burr had, I think, a too great patience. I would have appealed to the sword to stop the tongue long before Mr. Burr did.”

Leonard was delighted and grateful, and said so, and Achille added: “We must remember that Cheetham, who edited Hamilton’s newspaper, asked the public through that organ: ‘Is the Vice-President sunk so low as to submit to be insulted by General Hamilton?’ It seems to me then that Cheetham really sent the challenge to Mr. Burr, and that the Vice-President had no honourable alternative. He had to fight or be eternally branded a poltroon, a dastardly coward!” And he uttered these shameful words with such passionate scorn that they seemed to disturb the air like wildfire.

“About duelling there may be two opinions,” said Madame, “but when treason is the question, what then?”

“But that question was settled by Mr. Burr’s trial, madame,” answered Leonard. “The law and the testimony, the judge, and the jury decided that Mr. Burr was not guilty of treason. Should we go behind that settlement?”

“The people have gone behind it, and will do so.”

“I doubt that as a final result,” said Leonard. “Many are of Mr. Vanderlyn’s opinion, that the natural boundaries of the United States are the Atlantic and Pacific, and that all foreign authority must be got rid of within that territory. If Aaron Burr did not succeed, he thought others would.”

“But Aaron Burr would have set up a monarchy for himself.”

“That is not conceivable, madame. I said so to Mr. Vanderlyn, and he laughed at the idea. He said, ‘Burr had remarkable military genius, and that his object was to atone for his political failure by some great military feat, but whatever the feat he contemplated, it would have been in the end for his country.’ Vanderlyn put aside all evidence to the contrary, because given by men who had been at first confederate with Burr, and then betrayed him. What reliance could be placed on anything such men said? I believe,” said Leonard, with confident fervour, “that Mr. Burr will outlive the memory of his faults and attain yet the success his great abilities deserve.”

“He will not!” said madame. “The hatred of the living a man may fight, and hope to conquer, but the vengeance of the dead, who then can escape that? Sooner or later it drives ‘the one followed’ to destroy himself. This trouble began twelve years gone by. Hamilton and Burr called it to themselves, that night they tricked justice, slandered the innocent, and let the guilty go free. Snuff the candles, Achille, the room is full of shadows; more light give us, and I will tell you when, and how, the doom of both men was called to them.”

There was a few minutes’ delay, during which the silence was unbroken, and then madame continued:

“It was in the year of God eighteen hundred, in the month of March, and we had come near to the spring. Mr. Hamilton was then of all the lawyers in New York the most famous, and it was one of the sights of the city to see him going to court with his papers and books. In that month came the trial of Levi Weekes for the murder of the beautiful Gulielma Sands, and Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Burr were united in the defence of Weekes. Very well indeed I knew Elma Sands, for she lived with her uncle and aunt Ring, who were tenants of mine for many years. At the time of her murder they lived in Greenwich Street, near Franklin; and Weekes boarded with them. He was a brother of Ezra Weekes, who kept the famous City Hotel, and with his brother he could have boarded. But not so, with the Rings he stayed, because of Elma, and every one said they were promised to each other, and when the spring came were to be married. Well, then, this dreadful thing happened—Elma Sands went out with Levi Weekes one Sunday in December, 1799, and never again was she seen by any one. Distracted were her uncle and aunt, and everywhere, far and near, Elma was sought. It was no good. What I could do, I did, for I had watched the orphan girl grow from her childhood to her womanhood, and so sorry also was I for the uncle and aunt, who slept not, nor yet rested, and whose terrible suspense was ended in five weeks, by the finding of Elma’s body in a well eighty feet deep. Then the city went wild about her murder; for the appearance of the body left no room for doubt as to what poor Elma’s fate had been; and every one felt quite sure that Levi Weekes was the criminal.” Here madame paused and appeared to be much affected, and Achille, without a word, pushed a glass of water closer to her, and having drank of it, she continued:

“It was Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Burr that defended the prisoner; the prosecutor was Cadwallader D. Colden, and Chief Justice Lansing was the judge. On both sides there were great lawyers, and the trial was long and wearisome; but never were Elias Ring and his wife absent from it, no, not for one hour. So the end came at last. It was a stormy night in April that it came, and very late, and the court room was but dimly lighted, for some of the candles had burned themselves away, and had not been renewed, and the people had been listening to Hamilton’s speech, and thinking of nothing else. A great speech it was; my son Judge Bloommaert told me it was wonderful; and though every one was worn out, none left the building.

“Then Aaron Burr arose. Some facts he set forth in such a way as to throw all suspicion on the chief witness against Weekes; and while people were amazed at the charge, and no time had been given to examine it, or deny it, he lifted two candles from the table and flashed them in the face of the man he had accused; and as he did this thing he cried out in a voice like doom: ‘Gentlemen, behold the murderer!’ Shocked and terrified was the man, and like a foolish one he rushed from the room; and this cry of Aaron Burr’s the weary, excited jury took for the truth, and so then, Levi Weekes was declared ‘not guilty.’ Stupefied were all present, and before they could recover themselves from their astonishment Catherine Ring stood up. She was a Quakeress and to speak in public accustomed, and so, lifting her face and hands to heaven she refused the verdict; and gave the case ‘to the justice of God and the vengeance of the Dead!’

“I say plainly, every one was thrilled with awe and terror. Her voice was low and even, but straight to every heart it went; and those furthest away heard it clear and fateful as those close at her side. Mr. Hamilton began to put up his papers, but she stepped close to his side and said: ‘Alexander Hamilton, if there be justice in heaven, heaven will see that thee dies a bloody death; and thy helper shall help thee to it!’ At these words Burr rose, and looked at her with a smile, and she continued, ‘Take thy time, Aaron Burr. Thee need not hurry; thee will long for death, long before death will have thee. Nay, but thee shall be a dead man long before thee can hide thyself in the grave. And all that we have suffered in that long month of not knowing, thee shall suffer many times over. Dost thee think God had no witness in this room? Go thy way, Alexander Hamilton! Go thy way, Aaron Burr! There is one that follows after!’ She turned then to Judge Lansing, but he had left the bench. Then she touched her husband’s arm, and said: ‘Come, Elias, the unrighteous judge cannot escape the righteous one. Some day he will go out, and be heard of no more forever.’

“And here is the wonderful thing—all the time she was dooming these three great men not one soul moved or spoke. The entire audience sat or stood silent and motionless; and when out of the court-room they went, it was as if they were leaving a church. And Elias and Catherine Ring passed through them, and though they had the pity and respect of all there, no one spoke to them, and no one stayed them. For every word of doom Catherine Ring had uttered had been heard; and her inspired face spoke to the crowd; Elias walking at her side praying aloud as he walked.

“My son Gerardus was present during the entire trial; he heard all, he saw all, and he told me the story I have just told you. And what I say is the truth—Hamilton’s earthly doom has been fulfilled; Burr is yet learning the unpitying vengence of the dead. That insane idea of conquest, who drove him to it? Who, at the critical hour, turned his confederates against him? Who sent him to wander in Europe a degraded, desperate man? What a cup of shame and poverty he drank there, I and a few others know. Then, when reckless with his misfortune, back he comes to New York, and for a short time he is lifted up by the many old acquaintances who remember his abilities and his sufferings. But only to be cast down is he lifted up. In less than one month he hears of the death of his grandson, a beautiful, intelligent boy of twelve years old, on whom all his future hopes were built. A terrible blow it was, but only the beginning of sorrow. Six months afterwards his idolised daughter left Charleston for New York. She was heartbroken by the loss of her son, and was coming to her father to be comforted. She sailed on the thirtieth of December, 1811, A. D., and ought to have been in New York about the fifth of January. She did not come. She never came. She was never heard of again. It was then Catherine Ring’s promised retribution overtook him. Who can tell what agonies of suspense he endured? There was daily hope, and there was daily despair! Such nights of grief! Such days of watching! His worst unfriends pitied him. To have heard of the unhappy woman would have pleased every one; but no, no, never a word came. When some weeks were gone over, there was a report that the ship in which she sailed had been taken by pirates, and all on board murdered except Mr. Burr’s daughter. She, it was said, had been put on shore a captive. The miserable man! He would not, he could not, bear this idea. He said to me one morning, as I talked with him at the garden gate, ‘Theodosia is dead! If she were not all the prisons in the world could not keep her from me!’ Well, then, all of you must remember the loss of Theodosia Burr Alston?”

“I was in New Orleans at the time,” said Leonard. “I heard nothing there, or if so, have forgotten.”

“I also was in New Orleans,” said Achille. “I do not remember—no, not at all.”

“I do remember,” said Sappha. “Mother was very sorry for Mr. Burr. We often spoke of him.”

“You never told me about it, grandmother,” added Annette. “Why did you not?”

“Good reasons had I. So much was there to say that could not be talked about. A great many people had yet in mind Catherine Ring’s words, and so Aaron Burr’s long watch for the child that never came was quietly and pitifully passed over. Yes, people remember; and if they do not remember they feel—they feel, they know not what. I have watched. One by one, I have seen those that welcomed Aaron Burr home drop away from him. This day a man stops and greets him, to-morrow he passes him by. The unlucky, they only stick to him; because for a familiar they know him. Aaron Burr is a doomed man—haunted by the wraiths of those he has wronged—a doomed man, and nothing that he does shall ever prosper.”

She ceased speaking with these words, and after some desultory conversation on the subject, Sappha said, “she must go home.” Then Annette went upstairs with her, and Achille made an effort to continue the subject; but neither madame nor yet Leonard were disposed for discussion; and when Sappha returned to the parlour, cloaked and wrapped in furs, Leonard hastily assumed his street costume and went out with her. Then the conversation, the warmth, and the drowsy light, added to the unusual feeling which the Ring tragedy had evoked, produced an effect upon madame she did not anticipate—she gradually lost consciousness, and finally fell asleep. For a while Achille and Annette spoke in whispers, and Annette tried all her powers to win from her companion the secret madame made so much of. He dallied with it, but kept it inviolate; and she dropped her pretty head with a sense of defeat that the circumstance hardly seemed to warrant. Quiet and speechless she sat, and Achille held her hand and watched the shadow of disappointment obliterate the dimples and smiles, not always as becoming in his eyes as her graver deportment. The glow of the firelight, the stillness thrilled through and through with that old tragedy of love, the look of defeat in Annette’s pretty face, and her whole attitude of submission to it, pleased the young man. He thought her more womanly and exquisite than ever before; and he kissed the hand he held, and said in the softest, sweetest voice: “I cannot tell you madame’s secret, but I will tell you one of my own—Annette, beautiful Annette, I love you.”

And Annette behaved with the most amazing propriety. He felt the little hand he held tremble to his words, and he saw on her face the transfiguration of love, though she did not lift it, or answer him in any other way. But this coy reticence was exactly the conduct Achille approved; and in that dim room, where only sleep kept vigil, Achille asked Annette to be his wife, and Annette answered him as he desired.

“I shall speak to madame in the morning,” he said; “to-night it will be too much.”

“It is too much even for me,” answered Annette; “I never dreamed of being so happy.”

“Nor I,” answered the fortunate lover. He then surrendered himself to her charm. He forgot how often he had privately declared he would never do so; forgot how often he had told himself that Annette de Vries was a beauty with

a heart like a little glacier. As for Annette, she was satisfied. In the first days of her acquaintance with Achille St. Ange she had resolved to be his wife; and her resolve was now in process of accomplishment. And after all, it had not been a difficult end to attain; a little love, a little listening, a little patience, a little persistence, and the man was won. It was only another case of proving the folly of any resistance to invincible woman. For has not all experience proved that if a woman seriously determines to marry a certain man she is about as sure to accomplish her end as if, wishing to reach Washington, she entered a train bound for that city?

During this scene between Annette and Achille Sappha and Leonard Murray were walking in the clear, frosty starlight. They were lovers, but their conversation was too anxious to be loverlike. Sappha was entreating Leonard to cancel his engagement with Mr. Burr. She was sure if he did not her father would permit no engagement with his daughter. “You will have to choose,” she said, “between Mr. Burr and myself. You cannot take both into your life, Leonard; I am sure it is impossible.” She did not name the Ring tragedy. She was far less impressed by it than Leonard had been. It was her father’s opposition she feared.

Not so Leonard. He had inherited from his Scotch ancestors a vivid vein of supernatural tendency. His own clan had numerous traditions of posthumous revenge, so vindictive that Leonard’s first unconscious commentary on madame’s narrative was the whispered exclamation—only heard by Achille—“The vengeance of the dead is terrible!” But if there was this latent fear in his heart, mingled with the personal one that association might include him in that vengeance, the feeling was strongly combated by another inherited tendency, so vital as to be almost beyond reasoning with—the sentiment of loyalty to a person or a cause to which he had once given his allegiance. It had been a kind of insanity in his clan, for they had always gathered to the last man in the cause of their exiled kings, though they knew right well that to stand by the Stuarts was to stand by misfortune and death.

So, tossed between these two horns of a dilemma, Leonard could not make Sappha the unconditional promise she asked. He had given to Aaron Burr a fealty founded on an intense admiration for his great abilities and his great wrongs. The physical charm of the man had also fascinated Leonard, as it fascinated almost every one who came fairly under its influence; and thus, though warned by one ancestral strain to retire from some malignity he could not control, he was urged forward by another sentiment which put his word, his honour, his friendship, and his loyalty before all other considerations.

These underlying motives of action were but partially understood by Leonard, and were not comprehended in any measure by Sappha. But at eighteen years of age we do not need to know, in order to feel; we can feel without knowledge; and Sappha was certain that the association of her lover with a man so unfortunate as Mr. Burr would include both of them in its inimical proneness to calamity.

The mingling of these elements in Leonard’s nature must be recognised before we can understand how a lover, earnest and devoted, could hesitate about casting adrift a friendship so recent when it threatened a tie still fonder and more personal. But the most invulnerable sentiments a man has to conquer are those he brings with him from previous incarnations. Prejudices and opinions planted in his mind during last year, or the present year, will have a demonstrative vitality; but there is a stubborn quality about those we bring with us that is only gained by passing through the grave and tasting of immortality. If Sappha’s and Leonard’s love for each other was not of the past, then it was hardly one year old; yet she was demanding for it a sacrifice of feelings incorporate in Leonard’s nature from unknown centuries.