Ellen Percy; or, The Memoirs of an Actress — page 26: what you’re looking at

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ELLEN PERCY; OR, THE MEMOIRS OF AN ACTRESS. Gently disengaging her arms from about his form, Lady Frederick Ravenscliffe motioned me to follow her from the room. We proceeded into another apartment; and there she at once ex- claimed, with a singular expression of mingled joy and anguish upon her countenance, “ Thank God that you came, Ellen! It was heaven which sent you at that moment!” The shuddering conviction of what my unhappy friend meant, struck me; and I said earnestly and entreatingly, “I conjure you, Juliet, to rise supe- rior to this temptation !” “Oh! I pray to heaven to give me strength to do so!” she replied: “but there are moments when this dreadful curiosity becomes stronger than myself! Last night, Ellen, those hideous cries—they ring in my brain! they vibrate in my ears! I feel as if I were going mad! I am con- vinced too that my father entertains some ideas— some suspicions—though God knows what they are or can be: for how can the tale be by any pos- sibility otherwise than Frederick has represented it? Of what other interpretation or construction are the incidents themselves susceptible? It is this that bewilders me! [ think there must be something; and yet I know not what it can be. I seem to be catching at shadows—phantom forms, hideous and undefined, as they flit past in the gloomy obscurity of my soul! And that my father has his doubts and misgivings, I am con- vinced !—and these have only tended to aggravate mine! Oh, Ellen! it is dreadful—and you cannot wonder that a horrible resistless curiosity should sometimes seize upon me—especially when I am alone with him, when he is asleep, and I have naught to do but perform an act so slight, so brief, and so simple in itself as that of lifting the black fillet with my finger!” “No, Juliet,” I answered, “you must not do it—you must no more violate your husband’s will in this respect than you might open a letter which he had forbidden you to read, or peer amongst the contents of a writing-desk which he had forbidden you to touch.” “T will endeavour, my sweet friend,” answered Juliet, “ to obey your recommendation ! Oh, rest assured that I will strive my utmost to perform my duty in this respect! And now, that at the pre- sent moment, I feel myself strong—for your words, dear Ellen, inspire me with energy—I wonder at that weakness which almost betrayed me into error, and I am ashamed of myself! God grant that I shall not again experience such a failing of the moral courage, and that I shall not be com. pelled to make such painful and humiliating con- fessions to you, dear Ellen!” I was much pleased to listen to these words which came from Juliet’s lips, and all the more so because her countenance assumed a look which appeared to indicate that her soul was indeed re- covering some of its lost fortitude; and as she pressed my hand, she said, “ It is your friendship, dearest Ellen, that has nerved me in manya trial ; and it shall still prove equally effective! I will return to him—I will sit by his side. Be not afraid, dearest Ellen!—the dark mood will not some over me again !” Having thus spoken, Juliet sped back to the drawing-room, while I ascended to my own cham- ber for a little while. At the expiration of about Se 13 half-an-hour I thought I would again seek Juliet ; for as she assured me that my presence inspired her with courage, I deemed it better to leave her as little alone with her husband as possible. To the drawing-room I accordingly repaired: but at the very instant that I opened the door, a shriek smote my ears; and rushing in, I beheld Juliet with the black ribbon in her hand, and witha wild, horror-stricken countenance — while Lord Frederick, startled by that cry from his slumber, was thus suddenly wakened up to the conscious- ness that his terrible secret had at length become revealed to his wife ! ee CHAPTER LXXIII. THE BRANDED ONE. THE scene which now took place almost defies the power of language for its description, In my terror lest any of the servants should have hap- pened to hear that wild shriek and should speed to the apartment, { closed and locked the door behind me: then I sprang forward—and snatch- ing the black bandage from the hand of Juliet, I tossed it towards her miserable, guilty husband. Juliet was holding the ribbon with the firm grasp of convulsive tenacity,—that firmness which de- rived its energy from the strength of her anguish itself; so that it was with a certain degree of violence and with an abrupt jerk that I snatched the fillet from her. Then the unfortunate Juliet threw herself into my arms, and burst into a per- fect agony of weeping. At the same time Lord Frederick was giving way to the bitterest lamen- tations as he sat upon the sofa with a wild horror depicted on his ghastly countenance. And now for the first time since that fatal night on which the mark of Cain was impressed upon his brow, did I catch a glimpse of the hideous brand. It was a long mark of vivid scarlet, stretching lengthways almost entirely across the forehead ; and my blood ran cold within me as I quickly averted my eyes from the appalling spectacle. “My God! my God! what have I done?” moaned the wretched Juliet, her voice broken with convulsive sobbings. “ Accursed being that I am !” exclaimed Lord Frederick : “ how have I lived to meet this mo- ment which was inevitable !’—and with a species of frenzy he thrust both his hands into his hair and tore it as if he sought to wrench it out by the roots. “ O Ellen! you will despise me—you will hate me!” continued Juliet, in a tone of the most woful lamentation: “but the dark mood came over me again—it was irresistible——and I did it! Frederick!” she suddenly exclaimed, bursting from my arms and rushing towards him, “ I ad- jure you to tell me what means that dreadful mark !” There was frenzy in the looks of the wretched wife as she stood before him: there was frenzy likewise in the looks of the perhaps still more | wretched husband as he now gazed up at her | with a wild bewilderment. Oh, it was a dreadful scene! Full well did I know that behind that branded brow there was a maddening brain, racked | SS (C(O)