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CHAPTER XLII - FINIS
Man cannot prophesy. Love is no oracle. Fear sometimes imagines a
vain thing. Those years of absence! How had I sickened over their
anticipation! The woe they must bring seemed certain as death. I knew
the nature of their course: I never had doubt how it would harrow as
it went. The juggernaut on his car towered there a grim load. Seeing
him draw nigh, burying his broad wheels in the oppressed soil--I, the
prostrate votary--felt beforehand the annihilating craunch.
Strange to say--strange, yet true, and owning many parallels in life's
experience--that anticipatory craunch proved all--yes--nearly
_all_ the torture. The great Juggernaut, in his great chariot,
drew on lofty, loud, and sullen. He passed quietly, like a shadow
sweeping the sky, at noon. Nothing but a chilling dimness was seen or
felt. I looked up. Chariot and demon charioteer were gone by; the
votary still lived.
M. Emanuel was away three years. Reader, they were the three happiest
years of my life. Do you scout the paradox? Listen. I commenced my
school; I worked--I worked hard. I deemed myself the steward of his
property, and determined, God willing, to render a good account.
Pupils came--burghers at first--a higher class ere long. About the
middle of the second year an unexpected chance threw into my hands an
additional hundred pounds: one day I received from England a letter
containing that sum. It came from Mr. Marchmont, the cousin and heir
of my dear and dead mistress. He was just recovering from a dangerous
illness; the money was a peace-offering to his conscience, reproaching
him in the matter of, I know not what, papers or memoranda found after
his kinswoman's death--naming or recommending Lucy Snowe. Mrs. Barrett
had given him my address. How far his conscience had been sinned
against, I never inquired. I asked no questions, but took the cash and
made it useful.
With this hundred pounds I ventured to take the house adjoining mine.
I would not leave that which M. Paul had chosen, in which he had left,
and where he expected again to find me. My externat became a
pensionnat; that also prospered.
The secret of my success did not lie so much in myself, in any
endowment, any power of mine, as in a new state of circumstances, a
wonderfully changed life, a relieved heart. The spring which moved my
energies lay far away beyond seas, in an Indian isle. At parting, I
had been left a legacy; such a thought for the present, such a hope
for the future, such a motive for a persevering, a laborious, an
enterprising, a patient and a brave course--I _could_ not flag.
Few things shook me now; few things had importance to vex, intimidate,
or depress me: most things pleased--mere trifles had a charm.
Do not think that this genial flame sustained itself, or lived wholly
on a bequeathed hope or a parting promise. A generous provider
supplied bounteous fuel. I was spared all chill, all stint; I was not
suffered to fear penury; I was not tried with suspense. By every
vessel he wrote; he wrote as he gave and as he loved, in full-handed,
full-hearted plenitude. He wrote because he liked to write; he did not
abridge, because he cared not to abridge. He sat down, he took pen and
paper, because he loved Lucy and had much to say to her; because he
was faithful and thoughtful, because he was tender and true. There was
no sham and no cheat, and no hollow unreal in him. Apology never
dropped her slippery oil on his lips--never proffered, by his pen, her
coward feints and paltry nullities: he would give neither a stone, nor
an excuse--neither a scorpion; nor a disappointment; his letters were
real food that nourished, living water that refreshed.
And was I grateful? God knows! I believe that scarce a living being so
remembered, so sustained, dealt with in kind so constant, honourable
and noble, could be otherwise than grateful to the death.
Adherent to his own religion (in him was not the stuff of which is
made the facile apostate), he freely left me my pure faith. He did not
tease nor tempt. He said:--
"Remain a Protestant. My little English Puritan, I love Protestantism
in you. I own its severe charm. There is something in its ritual I
cannot receive myself, but it is the sole creed for 'Lucy.'"
All Rome could not put into him bigotry, nor the Propaganda itself
make him a real Jesuit. He was born honest, and not false--artless,
and not cunning--a freeman, and not a slave. His tenderness had
rendered him ductile in a priest's hands, his affection, his
devotedness, his sincere pious enthusiasm blinded his kind eyes
sometimes, made him abandon justice to himself to do the work of
craft, and serve the ends of selfishness; but these are faults so rare
to find, so costly to their owner to indulge, we scarce know whether
they will not one day be reckoned amongst the jewels.
* * * * *
And now the three years are past: M. Emanuel's return is fixed. It is
Autumn; he is to be with me ere the mists of November come. My school
flourishes, my house is ready: I have made him a little library,
filled its shelves with the books he left in my care: I have
cultivated out of love for him (I was naturally no florist) the plants
he preferred, and some of them are yet in bloom. I thought I loved him
when he went away; I love him now in another degree: he is more my
own.
The sun passes the equinox; the days shorten, the leaves grow sere;
but---he is coming.
Frosts appear at night; November has sent his fogs in advance; the
wind takes its autumn moan; but--he is coming.
The skies hang full and dark--a wrack sails from the west; the clouds
cast themselves into strange forms--arches and broad radiations; there
rise resplendent mornings--glorious, royal, purple as monarch in his
state; the heavens are one flame; so wild are they, they rival battle
at its thickest--so bloody, they shame Victory in her pride. I know
some signs of the sky; I have noted them ever since childhood. God
watch that sail! Oh! guard it!
The wind shifts to the west. Peace, peace, Banshee--"keening" at every
window! It will rise--it will swell--it shrieks out long: wander as I
may through the house this night, I cannot lull the blast. The
advancing hours make it strong: by midnight, all sleepless watchers
hear and fear a wild south-west storm. That storm roared frenzied, for
seven days. It did not cease till the Atlantic was strewn with wrecks:
it did not lull till the deeps had gorged their full of sustenance.
Not till the destroying angel of tempest had achieved his perfect
work, would he fold the wings whose waft was thunder--the tremor of
whose plumes was storm.
Peace, be still! Oh! a thousand weepers, praying in agony on waiting
shores, listened for that voice, but it was not uttered--not uttered
till; when the hush came, some could not feel it: till, when the sun
returned, his light was night to some!
Here pause: pause at once. There is enough said. Trouble no quiet,
kind heart; leave sunny imaginations hope. Let it be theirs to
conceive the delight of joy born again fresh out of great terror, the
rapture of rescue from peril, the wondrous reprieve from dread, the
fruition of return. Let them picture union and a happy succeeding
life.
Madame Beck prospered all the days of her life; so did Pere Silas;
Madame Walravens fulfilled her ninetieth year before she died.
Farewell.
Content of CHAPTER XLII - FINIS
-THE END-
Charlotte Bronte's novel: Villette
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