The Conqueror

III

Rachael had just eat­en the last of her six­teenth birth­day sweets when, at a ball at Gov­ern­ment House, she met John Michael Levine. It was her de­but; she was the fairest crea­ture in the room, and, in the id­iom of Dr. Hamil­ton, the men be­sieged her as were she Brim­stone Hill in pos­ses­sion of the French. The Gov­er­nor and the Cap­tain Gen­er­al had asked her to dance, and even the wom­en smiled in­dul­gent­ly, dis­armed by so much in­no­cent love­li­ness.

Levine, al­beit a Dane, and as colour­less as most of his coun­try­men, was her de­ter­mined suit­or be­fore the night was half over. It may be that he was mere­ly daz­zled by the re­gal po­si­tion to which the young men had el­evat­ed her, and that his cold blood quick­ened at the thought of pos­sess­ing what all men de­sired, but he was as im­me­di­ate and per­sis­tent in his suit as any ex­citable cre­ole in the room. But Rachael gave him scant at­ten­tion that night. She may have been in­tel­lec­tu­al, but she was al­so a girl, and it was her first ball. She was daz­zled and hap­py, de­light­ed with her con­quests, obliv­ious to the depths of her na­ture.

The next day Levine, strong in the pos­ses­sion of a let­ter from Mr. Pe­ter Lyt­ton,--for a fort­night for­got­ten,--pre­sent­ed him­self at Mis­tress Fawcett's door, and was ad­mit­ted. The first call was brief and per­func­to­ry, but he came the next day and the next. Rachael, sur­prised, but lit­tle in­ter­est­ed, and long­ing for her next ball, strummed the harp at her moth­er's com­mand and re­ceived his com­pli­ments with in­dif­fer­ence. A week af­ter his first call Mary Fawcett drove in­to town and spent an hour with the Gov­er­nor. He told her that Levine had brought him a per­son­al let­ter from the Gov­er­nor of St. Croix, and that he was wealthy and well born. He was al­so, in his Ex­cel­len­cy's opin­ion, a dis­tin­guished match even for the most beau­ti­ful and ac­com­plished girl on the Is­land. Pe­ter Lyt­ton had men­tioned in his let­ter that Levine pur­posed buy­ing an es­tate on St. Croix and set­tling down to the life of a planter. On the fol­low­ing day Levine told her that al­ready he was half a West In­di­an, so fas­ci­nat­ed was he with the life and the cli­mate, but that if she would favour his suit he would take Rachael to Copen­hagen as of­ten as she wished for the life of the world.

Mary Fawcett made up her mind that he should mar­ry Rachael, and it seemed to her that no moth­er had ev­er come to a wis­er de­ci­sion. Her health was fail­ing, and it was her pas­sion­ate wish not on­ly to leave her child en­cir­cled by the pro­tec­tion of a de­vot­ed hus­band, but to re­al­ize the high am­bi­tions she had cher­ished from the hour she fore­saw that Rachael was to be an ex­cep­tion­al wom­an.

Levine had not seen Rachael on the morn­ing when he asked for her hand, and he called two days lat­er to press his suit and re­ceive his an­swer. Mis­tress Fawcett told him that she had made up her own mind and would per­form that of­fice for Rachael at once, but thought it best that he should ab­sent him­self un­til the work was com­plete. Levine, promised an an­swer on the mor­row, took him­self off, and Mary Fawcett sent for her daugh­ter.

Rachael en­tered the li­brary with a piece of needle­work in her hand. Her mind was not on her books these days, for she had gone to an­oth­er ball; but her hands had been too well brought up to idle, how­ev­er her brain might dream. Mary Fawcett by this time wore a large cap with a frill, and her face, al­ways de­ter­mined and self-​willed, was grow­ing aus­tere with years and much pain: she suf­fered fright­ful­ly at times with rheuma­tism, and her ap­pre­hen­sion of the mo­ment when it should at­tack her heart rec­on­ciled her to the prospect of brief part­ings from her daugh­ter. Her eyes still burned with the fires of an in­di­min­ish­able courage how­ev­er; she read the yel­low pages of her many books as rapid­ly as in her youth, and if there was a speck of dust on her ma­hogany floors, pol­ished with or­ange juice, she saw it. Her ne­groes adored her but trem­bled when she raised her voice, and Rachael nev­er had dis­obeyed her. She ex­pect­ed some dis­sat­is­fac­tion, pos­si­bly a tem­per, but no op­po­si­tion.

Rachael smiled con­fi­dent­ly and sat down. She wore one of the thin white linens, which, like the oth­er wom­en of the Is­lands, she put aside for heav­ier stuffs on state oc­ca­sions on­ly, and her hair had tum­bled from its high comb and fall­en up­on her shoul­ders. Mary Fawcett sighed as she looked at her. She was too young to mar­ry, and had it not been for the haunt­ing ter­ror of leav­ing her alone in the world, the Dane, well cir­cum­stanced as he was, would have been re­pulsed with con­tu­me­ly.

“Rachael,” said her moth­er, gen­tly, “put down your tapestry. I have some­thing to say to you, some­thing of great im­port.”

Rachael dropped her work and met her moth­er's eyes. They were hard with will and def­inite pur­pose. In an in­stant she di­vined what was com­ing, and stood up. Her face could not turn any whiter, but her eyes were black at once, and her nos­trils spread.

“It can­not be pos­si­ble that you wish me to mar­ry that man--Levine,” she stam­mered. “I do not know how I can think of such a thing--but I do--it seems to me I see it in your eyes.”

“Yes,” said her moth­er, with some un­easi­ness. “I do; and my rea­sons are good--”

“I won't lis­ten to them!” shrieked Rachael. “I won't mar­ry him! His white­ness makes me sick! I know he is not a good man! I feel it! I nev­er could be hap­py with him! I nev­er could love him!”

Mary Fawcett looked at her aghast, and, for a mo­ment, with­out an­swer­ing; she saw her own will as­sert­ing it­self, heard it on those pierc­ing notes, and she knew that it sprang from stronger and more trag­ic foun­da­tions than had ev­er ex­ist­ed in her own na­ture; but be­liev­ing her­self to be right, she de­ter­mined to pre­vail.

“What do you know about men, my dar­ling?” she said sooth­ing­ly. “You have been dream­ing ro­man­tic dreams, and young Levine does not re­sem­ble the hero. That is all. Wom­en read­just them­selves mar­vel­lous­ly quick. When you are mar­ried to him, and he is your ten­der and de­vot­ed hus­band, you will for­get your prince--who, no doubt, is dark and quite splen­did. But we nev­er meet our princes, my dear, and ro­man­tic love is on­ly one of the things we live for--and for that we live but a lit­tle while. Levine is all that I could wish for you. He is wealthy, aris­to­crat­ic, and chival­rous­ly de­vot­ed.”

Her long speech had giv­en her daugh­ter time to cool, but Rachael re­mained stand­ing, and stared de­fi­ant­ly in­to the eyes which had re­laxed some­what with anx­ious sur­prise.

“I _feel_ that he is not a good man,” she re­peat­ed sul­len­ly, “and I hate him. I should die if he touched me. I have not danced with him. His hands are so white and soft, and his eyes nev­er change, and his mouth re­minds me of a shark's.”

“Levine is a re­mark­ably hand­some man,” ex­claimed Mis­tress Fawcett, in­dig­nant­ly. “You have trained your imag­ina­tion to some pur­pose, it seems. For­get your po­ets when he comes to-​mor­row, and look at him im­par­tial­ly. And can­not he give you all that you so much de­sire, my am­bi­tious lit­tle daugh­ter? Do you no longer want to go to Eu­rope? to court? to be _grande dame_ and con­verse with princes?”

“Oh, yes,” said Rachael. “I want that as much as ev­er; but I want to love the man. I want to be hap­py.”

“Well, _do_ love him,” ex­claimed her moth­er with en­er­gy. “Your fa­ther was twen­ty years old­er than my­self, and a French­man, but I made up my mind to love him, and I did--for a good many years.”

“You had to leave him in the end. Do you wish me to do the same?”

“You will do noth­ing of the kind. There nev­er was but one John Fawcett.”

“I don't love this Levine, and I nev­er shall love him. I don't be­lieve at all that that kind of feel­ing can be cre­at­ed by the brain, that it re­sponds to noth­ing but the will. I shall not love that way. I may be ig­no­rant, but I know that.”

“You have read too much Shake­speare! Doubt­less you imag­ine your­self one of his hero­ines--Juli­et? Ros­alind?”

“I have nev­er imag­ined my­self any­body but Rachael Fawcett. I _can­not_ imag­ine my­self Rachael Levine. But I know some­thing of my­self--I have read and thought enough for that. I could love some­one--but not this bleached re­pul­sive Dane. Why will you not let me wait? It is my right. No, you need not curl your lip--I am _not_ a lit­tle girl. I may be six­teen. I may be with­out ex­pe­ri­ence in the world, but you have been al­most my on­ly com­pan­ion, and un­til just now I have talked with mid­dle-​aged men on­ly, and much with them. I had no re­al child­hood. You have ed­ucat­ed my brain far be­yond my years. To-​day I feel twen­ty, and it seems to me that I see far down in­to my­self--much deep­er than you do. I tell you that if I mar­ry this man, I shall be the most hope­less wretch on earth.”

Mary Fawcett was puz­zled and dis­tressed, but she did not wa­ver for a mo­ment. The clever­est of girls could not know what was best for her­self, and the moth­er who per­mit­ted her daugh­ter to take her life in­to her own hands was a poor crea­ture in­deed.

“Lis­ten, my dear child,” she said ten­der­ly, “you have al­ways trust­ed in me, be­lieved me. I _know_ that this is a wise and promis­ing mar­riage for you. And--” she hes­itat­ed, but it was time to play her trump. “You know that my health is not good, but you do not know how bad it is. Dr. Hamil­ton says that the rheuma­tism may fly to my heart at any mo­ment, and I _must_ see you mar­ried--”

She had ejac­ulat­ed the last words; Rachael had shrieked, and flung her­self up­on her, her ex­cite­ment at this sud­den and cru­el rev­ela­tion burst­ing out in screams and sobs and a tor­rent of tears. Her moth­er had seen her ex­cit­ed and in brief un­govern­able tem­pers, but she nev­er had sus­pect­ed that she was ca­pa­ble of such pas­sion as this; and, much dis­turbed, she led her off to bed, and sent for her ad­vis­ers, Archibald Hamn and Dr. Hamil­ton.