Bressant

The old woman took fire as she spoke, and many of the signs of age were

for the time obliterated. Some of the power and brilliancy of her youth

shone again in her eyes; her form seemed to acquire a different and

statelier contour. In the earnestness of her speech, involuntary

gestures accompanied her words; free from all exaggeration, and so truly

and gracefully fitted to her meaning as to be virtually invisible. But

Bressant was not won by it: his expression grew more ugly and repellent

with every successive sentence.

"You fool!" said he, coming one heavy step nearer, and frowning down

upon her; "I warned you away; I told you to be silent. You've meddled

with what was no concern of yours; you've thrust yourself where you had

no right to come--"

"No right!" she interrupted, with an intensity of indignant emphasis

that seemed adequate to smite to the ground the towering figure that

faced her. Then, clasping her hands, and in a voice of yearning,

ineffable tenderness, she added, "Oh, I have prayed for you, and wept

for you, and loved you so! For your own sake, my darling, do not use

such words to me!" Here she held out her arms, and tears ran hot down

her faded cheeks. "Am I not your mother? Are you not my son?"

"No!" answered Bressant.

He threw so tremendous a weight of malignant energy into the utterance

of this single word, although not raising his voice higher than his

usual tone, that the moral effect upon the woman was as if he had dealt

her a furious blow on the breast. Completely stunned at first, she stood

as if dead, except that her body, upright and rigid, vibrated slightly

from side to side, like a column about to fall. So sudden, too, had been

the shock, that her arms still remained outstretched, and the track of

her tears still glistened upon her cheeks, tears shed so utterly in vain

as to acquire a trait of ghastly absurdity.

As sense and reflection began to dawn again, the first instinctive

defence she attempted was that of incredulity. It was to gain

breathing-space rather than from any hope in its efficacy. But

afterward, following the ability to hear and the capacity to comprehend,

the grim reality settled darkly down. Her life for the last twenty-five

years, then, had been a miserable blunder; her love, hopes, and fears

wasted, and turned to ridicule; her self-sacrifice, a wretched

self-deception, a throwing of all possibilities of happiness into the

bottomless pit, whence no return could ever come to her; every thought,

aspiration, and desire, which had visited her heart had been a

mockery--meaningless and empty. This was the reality to which she was

awakened. And, lest this should not be sufficient, here stood one before

whom she had abased and humbled herself, whose insolence she had borne

meekly and lovingly, whose feet she had set upon her neck. Here he

stood, insolent and unfeeling still; a false impostor, whom might God

refuse to pardon!