"Still I could not account for her forbearance to reveal everything
to you. You were still kind and affectionate to me as ever. I very
well knew that had she disclosed the secret, you were not the man
to submit to such an indignity as that of which I had been guilty.
It seems--so I infer from what you said this morning--that you knew
it all. If you did, your forbearance was equally unexpected and
merciful. Believing that she had kept my secret, my next conclusion
was inevitable. 'She is not altogether insensible to the passion
she inspires. Her strength is in her virtues alone. Her sympathies
are clearly mine!' These conclusions emboldened me. I haunted your
house nightly with music. Sheltered beneath your trees, I poured
forth the most plaintive strains which I could extort from my flute.
Passion increased the effect of art. I strove at no regular tunes;
I played as the mood prompted; and felt myself, not unfrequently,
weeping over my own strange irregular melodies.
"Your sudden determination to remove prevented the renewal of my
persecutions. I need not say how miserable I was made, and how much
I was confounded by such a determination. Explained by yourself
this morning, it is now easily understood; but, ignorant then of
the discoveries you had made--ignorant of your merciful forbearance
toward my unhappy parents--for I can regard your forbearance with
respect to myself as arising only from your consideration of them--it
was unaccountable that you should give up the prospect of fortune
and honors, which success, in every department of your business,
seemed certainly to secure you.
"The last night--the eve of your departure from C---, I resumed
my place among the trees before your dwelling. Here I played and
wandered with an eye ever fixed upon your windows. While I gazed,
I caught the glimpse of a figure that buried itself hurriedly behind
the folds of a curtain. I could suppose it to be one person only.
I never thought of you. Urged by a feeling of desperation, which
took little heed of consequences, I clambered up into the branches
of a pride of India, which brought me within twenty feet of the
window. I distinctly beheld the curtain ruffled by the sudden motion
of some one behind it. I was about to speak--to say--no matter
what. The act would have been madness, and such, doubtless, would
have been the language. I fortunately did not speak. A few moments
only had elapsed after this, when I heard a few brief words, spoken
in HER voice, from the same window. The words were few, and spoken
in tones which denoted the great agitation of the speaker. These
apprized me of my danger.
"'Fly, madman, for your life! My husband is on the stairs.' "Her person was apparent. Her words could not be mistaken though
spoken in faint, feeble accents. At the same moment I heard the lower
door of the dwelling unclose, and without knowing what I did or
designed, I dropped from the tree to the ground. To my great relief,
you did not perceive me. I was fortunately close to the fence,
and in the deepest shadow of the tree. You hurried by, within five
steps of me, and jumped the fence, evidently thinking to find me
in the next enclosure. Breathing freely and thankfully after this
escape, I fled immediately to the little boat in which I usually
made my approaches to your habitation on such occasions; and was
in the middle of the lake, and out of sight, long before you had
given over your fruitless pursuit. The next day you left the city
and I remained, the wasted and wasting monument of pas sions which
had been as profitlessly as they were criminally exercised.