LYSBETH by H. RIDER HAGGARD (best book club books for discussion txt) 📕

Lysbeth looked a question.

"I see you are wondering how I should know what you do or do not do. It is simple. I shall be the harmless but observant witness of your interview. Over this doorway hangs a tapestry; you will grant me the privilege--not a great one for a future husband--of stepping behind it."

"Never, never," said Lysbeth, "I cannot be put to such a shame. I defy you."

As she spoke came the sound of knocking at the street door. Glancing up at Montalvo, for the second time she saw that look which he had worn at the crisis of the sledge race. All its urbanity, its careless /bonhomie/, had vanished. Instead of these appeared a reflection of the last and innermost nature of the man, the rock foundation, as it were, upon which was built the false and decorated superstructure that he showed to the world. There were the glaring eyes, there the grinning teeth of the Spanish wolf; a ravening brute ready to rend and tear, if so he might satisfy himself with the meat his soul desired.

"Don't play tricks with me," he muttered, "and don't argue, for there is no time. Do as I bid you, girl, or on your head will be this psalm- singing fellow's blood. And, look you, don't try setting him on me, for I have my sword and he is unarmed. If need be a heretic may be killed at sight, you know, that is by one clothed with authority. When the servant announces him go to the door and order that he is to be admitted," and picking up his plumed hat, which might have betrayed him, Montalvo stepped behind the arras.

For a moment Lysbeth stood thinking. Alas! she could see no possible escape, she was in the toils, the rope was about her throat. Either she must obey or, so she thought, she must give the man she loved to a dreadful death. For his sake she would do it, for his sake and might God forgive her! Might God avenge her and him!

Another instant and there came a knock upon the door. She opened it.

"The Heer van Goorl stands below," said the voice of Greta, "wishing to see you, madam."

"Admit him," answered Lysbeth, and going to a chair almost in the centre of the room, she seated herself.

Presently Dirk's step sounded on the stair, that known, beloved step for which so often she had listened eagerly. Again the door opened and Greta announced the Heer van Goorl. That she could not see the Captain Montalvo evidently surprised the woman, for her eyes roamed round the room wonderingly, but she was too well trained, or too well bribed, to show her astonishment. Gentlemen of this kidney, as Greta had from time to time remarked, have a faculty for vanishing upon occasion.

So Dirk walked into the fateful chamber as some innocent and unsuspecting creature walks into a bitter snare, little knowing that the lady whom he loved and whom he came to win was set as a bait to ruin him.

"Be seated, cousin," said Lysbeth, in a voice so forced and strained that it caused him to look up. But he saw nothing, for her head was turned away from him, and for the rest his mind was too preoccupied to be observant. By nature simple and open, it would have taken much to wake Dirk into suspicion in the home and presence of his love and cousin, Lysbeth.

"Good day to you, Lysbeth," he said awkwardly; "why, how cold your hand is! I have been trying to find you for some time, but you have always been out or away, leaving no address."

"I have been to the sea with my Aunt Clara," she answered.

Then for a while--five minutes or more--there followed a strained and stilted conversation.

"Will the booby never come to the point?" reflected Montalvo, surveying him through a join in the tapestry. "By the Saints, what a fool he looks!"

"Lysbeth," said Dirk at last, "I want to speak to you."

"Speak on, cousin," she answered.

"Lysbeth, I--I--have loved you for a long while, and I--have come to ask you to marry me. I have put it off for a year or more for reasons which I hope to tell you some day, but I can keep silent no longer, especially now when I see that a much finer gentleman is trying to win you--I mean the Spanish Count, Montalvo," he added with a jerk.

She said nothing in reply. So Dirk went on pouring out all his honest passion in words that momentarily gathered weight and strength, till at length they were eloquent enough. He told her how since first they met he had loved her and only her, and how his one desire in life was to make her happy and be happy with her. Pausing at length he began to speak of his prospects--then she stopped him.

"Your pardon, Dirk," she said, "but I have a question to ask of you," and her voice died away in a kind of sob. "I have heard rumours about you," she went on presently, "which must be cleared up. I have heard, Dirk, that by faith you are what is called a heretic. Is it true?"

He hesitated before answering, feeling that much depended on that answer. But it was only for an instant, since Dirk was far too honest a man to lie.

"Lysbeth," he said, "I will tell to you what I would not tell to any other living creature, not being one of my own brotherhood, for whether you accept me or reject me, I know well that I am as safe in speaking to you as when upon my knees I speak to the God I serve. I /am/ what you call a heretic. I am a member of that true faith to which I hope to draw you, but which if you do not wish it I should never press upon you. It is chiefly because I am what I am that for so long I have hung back from speaking to you, since I did not know whether it would be right--things being thus--to ask you to mix your lot with mine, or whether I ought to marry you, if you would marry me, keeping this secret from you. Only the other night I sought counsel of --well, never mind of whom--and we prayed together, and together searched the Word of God. And there, Lysbeth, by some wonderful mercy, I found my prayer answered and my doubts solved, for the great St. Paul had foreseen this case, as in that Book all cases are foreseen, and I read how the unbelieving wife may be sanctified by the husband, and the unbelieving husband by the wife. Then everything grew clear to me, and I determined to speak. And now, dear, I have spoken, and it is for you to answer."

"Dirk, dear Dirk," she replied almost with a cry, "alas! for the answer which I must give you. Renounce the error of your ways, make confession, and be reconciled to the Church and--I will marry you. Otherwise I cannot, no, and although I love you, you and no other man" --here she put an energy into her voice that was almost dreadful-- "with all my heart and soul and body; I cannot, I cannot, I cannot!"

Dirk heard, and his ruddy face turned ashen grey.

"Cousin," he replied, "you seek of me the one thing which I must not give. Even for your sake I may not renounce my vows and my God as I behold Him. Though it break my heart to bid you farewell and live without you, here I pay you back in your own words--I cannot, I cannot, I cannot!"

Lysbeth looked at him, and lo! his short, massive form and his square- cut, honest countenance in that ardour of renunciation had suffered a change to things almost divine. At that moment--to her sight at least --this homely Hollander wore the aspect of an angel. She ground her teeth and pressed her hands upon her heart. "For his sake--to save him," she muttered to herself--then she spoke.

"I respect you for it, I love you for it more than ever; but, Dirk, it is over between us. One day, here or hereafter, you will understand and you will forgive."

"So be it," said Dirk hastily, stretching out his hand to find his hat, for he was too blind to see. "It is a strange answer to my prayer, a very strange answer; but doubtless you are right to follow your lights as I am sure that I am right to follow mine. We must carry our cross, dear Lysbeth, each of us; you see that we must carry our cross. Only I beg of you--I don't speak as a jealous man, because the thing has gone further than jealousy--I speak as a friend, and come what may while I live you will always find me that--I beg of you, beware of the Spaniard, Montalvo. I know that he followed you to the coast; I have heard too he boasts that he will marry you. The man is wicked, although he took me in at first. I feel it--his presence seems to poison the air, yes, this very air I breathe. But oh! and I should like him to hear me say it, because I am sure that he is at the bottom of all this, his hour will come. For whatever he does he will be paid back; he will be paid back here and hereafter. And now, good-bye. God bless you and protect you, dear Lysbeth. If you think it wrong you are quite right not to marry me, and I know that you will keep my secret. Good-bye, again," and lifting her hand Dirk kissed it. Then he stumbled from the room.

As for Lysbeth she cast herself at full length, and in the bitterness of her heart beat her brow upon the boards.

When the front door had shut behind Dirk, but not before, Montalvo emerged from his hiding place and stood over the prostrate Lysbeth. He tried to adopt his airy and sarcastic manner, but he was shaken by the scene which he had overheard, shaken and somewhat frightened also, for he felt that he had called into being passions of which the force and fruits could not be calculated.

"Bravo! my little actress," he began, then gave it up and added in his natural voice, "you had best rise and see me burn this paper."

Lysbeth struggled to her knees and watched him thrust the document between two glowing peats.

"I have fulfilled my promise," he said, "and that evidence is done with, but in case you should think of playing any tricks and not fulfilling yours, please remember that I have fresh evidence infinitely more valuable and convincing, to gain which, indeed, I condescended to a stratagem not quite in keeping with my traditions. With my own ears I heard this worthy gentleman, who is pleased to think so poorly of me, admit that he is a heretic. That is enough to burn him any day, and I swear that if within three weeks we are not man and wife, burn he shall."

While he was speaking Lysbeth had risen slowly to her feet. Now she confronted him, no longer the Lysbeth whom he had known, but a new being filled like a cup with fury that was the more awful because it was so quiet.

"Juan de Montalvo," she said in a low voice, "your wickedness has won and for Dirk's sake my person and my goods must pay its price. So be it since so it must be, but listen. I make no prophecies about you; I do not say that this or that shall happen to you, but I call down upon you the curse of God and the execration of men."

Then she threw up her hands and began to pray. "God, Whom