I only know, that, at the very moment when separation was madness, his
mandate went forth, prohibiting all farther intercourse between us, and
that it was obeyed. Not by me; for I was incapable of submission: but by
my gentle Harriet, who thought _herself_ incapable of disobeying.
We met no more where we had been wont to meet; and my young heart's
spring of happiness seemed for ever withered.
But here again, I began to reflect, my path was crossed--my hopes were
blighted--by my uncle. I heard, too, that his tongue had been free with
my name; that the blistering censure of his austere virtue had fallen
upon my actions. I writhed under the contumely. My wounded spirit was
insatiate for vengeance. I meditated, deeply, how I could inflict it, so
as to strike the blow where he was most vulnerable. I did not brood long
over my dark purpose. The love I still bore his daughter, was _now_
mingled with the hatred I bore towards himself; and I exulted in the
thought, that I should perhaps be able to gratify, at one and the same
moment, two of the fiercest passions of my nature--lust and revenge!
I SUCCEEDED!
In these two words let me shroud a tale of horror. Harriet was my
victim! Ask not how. _I_ triumphed! _She_ fell! An angel might
have fallen as she did, and lost no purity. But her stainless heart was
too proud in virtue to palter and equivocate with circumstances. She
never rose from what she deemed her bridal bed.
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