“Susan, my dear Susan, is it indeed you that I have found? By what hazard art thou restored to me? But in what a place!”
“Oh God! You see in me a wretched creature who has experienced all the vicissitudes of fortune, nearly always exposed to her frowns, and forced to live in a condition that reason condemns, that the heart detests, but that necessity has rendered inevitable. I see you are impatient to hear the recital of my misfortunes? Can I give any other name to the life I have led since I lost you? Less sensible to the shame of pouring my sorrows into your ear, I will tell you without reserve all I have gone through. Shall I tell you the truth? You are in a great measure the cause of them; but my heart shares therein, and has indeed dug the pit into which I have fallen. Do you remember those happy days when you described to me your youthful passion? From that time, I have adored you; in telling you the adventures of Agatha, and laying before you our most secret mysteries, I meant to inflame you, to instruct you, and saw with pleasure the pleasant effect of my discourse. I was witness to your transports with Madame Dinville and your caresses were so many daggers thrust into my heart. When I took you to my chamber, I was devoured by a fire that you had not the power of quenching. That is the first epoch of my misfortunes. You never knew what caused the horrible noise that we heard; it was the Abbe Pilot, that miscreant vomited out of hell, and destined for the scourge of my existence.
“He had conceived a love for me that he was resolved to gratify at any cost. He had chosen that night for the execution of his purpose, and was concealed behind the bed. Alas! he had an easy victory over an unhappy girl that had fainted through fright; he did as he pleased. Revived by the pleasure, and deceived by my passion, I thought I was indebted to you for it, and did my utmost to increase the pleasure of a monster whom I overwhelmed with reproaches as soon as I recognized him. He tried to appease me by caresses, which I refused with loathing; he then threatened to reveal to Madame Dinville what I had been doing with you. The rascal employed those arms against me that I ought to have used against him; however he gained by his menaces what I had denied to his transports. In this manner I granted everything to a man whom I abhorred, and fate snatched me from the arms of the one I adored.
“I soon experienced the bitter fruits of my imprudence. I concealed my shame as much as I could, but I should have betrayed myself by a too obstinate seclusion. I had driven away the abbe, and he consoled himself in the arms of Madame Dinville. I was compelled to recall him; I told him how I was situated, and he pretended to sympathize with me. He offered to take me to Paris, promising to establish me there in the most comfortable manner, and added that he desired nothing for his service than that I would permit him to return them, I only cared for being in a place where I might get rid of my burden, not expecting anything further from him, excepting his influence to place me in a situation with some lady. His promises prevailed on me to accompany him, and I accordingly stared, having assumed the costume of an abbe as my traveling dress. “His attentions towards me on the road were the kindest possible, and little did I suspect what coldness of heart they were intended to conceal. The jolting of the carriage deceived my calculations, and I brought into the world at a village about a league from Paris the unhappy pledge of my miserable love. Everybody was astonished at the circumstance, and some not a little amused. My infamous fellow traveller disappeared, and left me to my grief and misery. A charitable lady took pity on my wretched condition, put me in a carriage, and brought me to Paris, and left me at an hospital. She only saved me from the arms of death to leave me in those of indigence. I should very shortly have felt the utmost horrors that awaited my hapless lot, if chance had not made me acquainted with a girl of the town, and my distress forced me to give way to my natural propensity.
“You need not ask anything further. My subsequent life has been nothing but a succession of pleasure and chagrin. If I have sometimes felt my heart enjoy a temporary happiness, it only served to show me in stronger colors the load of sorrow that overwhelmed me. Will this sorrow ever leave me? But now I have regained you, I ought not to complain. My dear brother, do not let me remain in suspense; have you left your convent? What chance brought you hither to Paris!”
“A misfortune, like your own,” answered I, “caused by your best friend.”
“My best friend!” cried she with a sigh; “have I one still left in the world? Ah, it can be no other than Agatha.”
“Exactly so,” I replied; “but let us now sup, my story will occupy too much time.”
Sitting by Susan's side, I made a most delicious repast. My desire to be alone with her, and her own anxiety to hear my story, made us rise from table immediately the meal was over. We retired to her chamber, where without witnesses, upon a bed worthy of the place where we were, and which had never before served for two such tender lovers, with Susan on my knees and my face pressed against her, I related my adventures from the day I first left the cottage of my supposed parents.
“Well, I am no longer your sister,” cried she when I had finished.
“Do not regret that; it is a quality that the blood confers but which the heart does not always sanction. If you are no more my dear sister, you will always be my idol. My dearest friend, let us forget our woes, and begin to reckon our existence from the day that has reunited us.”
As I uttered these words, I kissed her bosom, and was going to lay her down, having my hand already between her thighs, when she sprung from my arms and exclaimed, “Hold, hold!”
“Cruel one! What thanks have I to render to fortune if you thus repulse the proofs of my love?”
“You must overcome your passion,” said she; “I cannot listen to it without being criminal. Make an effort to suppress your desires, and I will set you the example.”
“Alas! Susan, you have but little love left if you advise me to suppress mine. And for what cause am I to do this, when nothing obstructs our happiness?”
“Nothing to oppose our happiness! How I wish you spoke the truth in saying so!” and she burst into tears, of which I asked the cause.
“Would you,” said she, “partake with me the sad consequences of my debauchery? And if you would, could I have the cruelty to consent to it?”
“Do you think to restrain me by so weak a reason? I would readily die with my Susan, and shall I shrink from sharing her misfortunes?” So saying I threw her down on the bed and prepared to prove by acts that I feared no dangers.
“Ah, Silas! You will destroy yourself.”
“If I do, it will be in your arms,” said I in a transport of passion.
She gave way to me, and I effected an entry: let me be permitted here to imitate the sagacious Greek, who, in his picture of the sacrifice of Iphigenia, after having exhausted on the countenances of the assistants every trait characteristic of the deepest grief, threw a veil over the face of Agamemmon, leaving it for the imagination of others to conceive what must be the immolation of an adored daughter. I leave you, dear reader, the pleasure of imagining; but I address myself to you only who have experienced all the crosses of love, and after long years of waiting, have seen your passion crowned by the beloved object of it. Recall your transports, stretch your imagination still farther, if possible, and still you will fall short of my ecstasies. But what demon, jealous of my tranquility, is continually holding up to my view the recollection which can almost make me shed tears of blood?
The day came before we were aware that the night had fled. I had forgotten my griefs, and everything else in the embraces of Susan.