And allowing that, many, many years ago, in his early and reckless
youth, he had committed some one wrong act,--or that, even now, the
inevitable force of circumstances should occasionally make him do one
questionable deed among a thousand praiseworthy, or, at least,
blameless ones,--would you characterize the Judge by that one necessary
deed, and that half-forgotten act, and let it overshadow the fair
aspect of a lifetime? What is there so ponderous in evil, that a
thumb's bigness of it should outweigh the mass of things not evil which
were heaped into the other scale! This scale and balance system is a
favorite one with people of Judge Pyncheon's brotherhood. A hard, cold
man, thus unfortunately situated, seldom or never looking inward, and
resolutely taking his idea of himself from what purports to be his
image as reflected in the mirror of public opinion, can scarcely arrive
at true self-knowledge, except through loss of property and reputation.
Sickness will not always help him do it; not always the death-hour!
But our affair now is with Judge Pyncheon as he stood confronting the
fierce outbreak of Hepzibah's wrath. Without premeditation, to her own
surprise, and indeed terror, she had given vent, for once, to the
inveteracy of her resentment, cherished against this kinsman for thirty
years.
Thus far the Judge's countenance had expressed mild forbearance,--grave
and almost gentle deprecation of his cousin's unbecoming
violence,--free and Christian-like forgiveness of the wrong inflicted
by her words. But when those words were irrevocably spoken, his look
assumed sternness, the sense of power, and immitigable resolve; and
this with so natural and imperceptible a change, that it seemed as if
the iron man had stood there from the first, and the meek man not at
all. The effect was as when the light, vapory clouds, with their soft
coloring, suddenly vanish from the stony brow of a precipitous
mountain, and leave there the frown which you at once feel to be
eternal. Hepzibah almost adopted the insane belief that it was her old
Puritan ancestor, and not the modern Judge, on whom she had just been
wreaking the bitterness of her heart. Never did a man show stronger
proof of the lineage attributed to him than Judge Pyncheon, at this
crisis, by his unmistakable resemblance to the picture in the inner
room.
"Cousin Hepzibah," said he very calmly, "it is time to have done with
this."
"With all my heart!" answered she. "Then, why do you persecute us any
longer? Leave poor Clifford and me in peace. Neither of us desires
anything better!"
"It is my purpose to see Clifford before I leave this house," continued
the Judge. "Do not act like a madwoman, Hepzibah! I am his only
friend, and an all-powerful one. Has it never occurred to you,--are
you so blind as not to have seen,--that, without not merely my consent,
but my efforts, my representations, the exertion of my whole influence,
political, official, personal, Clifford would never have been what you
call free? Did you think his release a triumph over me? Not so, my good
cousin; not so, by any means! The furthest possible from that! No; but
it was the accomplishment of a purpose long entertained on my part. I
set him free!"