The Secret Picture.

At length the cloud seemed to clear away from the brow of her husband. He once more resumed his labors, and with an eagerness and an avidity which he had not betrayed before. His passion now amounted to intensity. He gave himself no respite from his labors. Late and early he was at his task—morning and night—without intermission, and with the enthusiasm of one who rejoices in the completion of a favorite and long-cherished study. Aurelia was not unhappy at this second change; to go back to his old engagements and tastes seemed to her to indicate a return to his former equanimity and waveless happiness. It was with some surprise, however, and not a little concern, that she was not now permitted to watch his progress. He wrought in secret—his studio was closed against her, as, indeed, it was against all persons. Hitherto it had not been so in her instance. She pleasantly reproached him for this seclusion, but he answered her—“fear not, you shall see all when it is done.” There was something in this reply to disquiet her, but she was in a state of mind easily to be disquieted. She was conscious also of a secret withheld from her husband—and her reproaches sunk back upon her heart, unuttered, from her lips. She could not, because of what she felt, declare to him what she thought; and she beheld his progress, from day to day, with an apprehension that increased momently, and made her appearance, in one respect, not unlike his own. She was now aware that he was the victim of a strange excitement, in which his present artist labors had a considerable share. He seemed to hurry to their prosecution with an eager impatience that looked like frenzy—and to return from his daily task with a frame exhausted, but with an eye that seemed to burn with the subtlest fires. His words were few, but there was a strange intelligence in his looks. His cheeks had grown very pale, his frame was thinned, his voice hollow, in the prosecution of these secret labors; and yet there was a something of exultation in his glance, which fully declared that, however exhausting to his frame might be the task he was pursuing, its results were yet looked to with a wild and eager satisfaction. At length the work was done. One day he stood before her in an attitude of utter exhaustion. “It is finished!” he exclaimed. “You shall see it to-morrow.”

“What is it?” she asked.

“Nay, to-morrow! to-morrow!”

He then retired to sleep, and rested several hours. She looked on him while he slept. He had never rested so profoundly since he had begun the labor from which he was now freed. The slumber of an infant had never been less disturbed, never been softer, sweeter, or purer. The beauty of Coelius was that of the most peaceful purity. She bent over him as he slept, and kissed his forehead with looks of the truest devotion, while two big tears gathered in her large eyes, and slowly felt their way along her cheeks. She turned away lest the warm drops falling upon his face might awake him. She turned away, and in her own apartment gave free vent to the feelings which his pure and placid slumbers seemed rather to subdue than encourage. Why, with such a husband—her first love—and with so many motives to happiness, was she not happy? Alas! who shall declare for the secret yearnings of the heart, and say, as idly as Canute to the sea, “thus far shalt thou go, and no farther—here shall thy proud waves be stayed.” Aurelia was a creature of fears and anxieties, and many a secret and sad presentiment. She was very far from happy—ill at ease—and—but why anticipate? We shall soon enough arrive at the issue of our melancholy narrative!

That night, while she slept—for grief and apprehension have their periods of exhaustion, which we misname repose—her husband rose from his couch, and with cautious footsteps departed from his dwelling. He was absent all the night, and returned only with the dawn. He re-entered his home with the same stealthy caution with which he had quitted it, and it might have been remarked that he dismissed his brother, with two other persons, at the threshold. They were all masked, and otherwise disguised with cloaks. Why this mystery? Where had they been—on what mission of mischief or of shame? To Coelius such a necessity was new, and scarcely had he entered his dwelling than he cast aside his disguises with the air of one who loathes their uses. He was very pale and haggard, with a fixed but glistening expression of the eye, a brow of settled gloom, from which hope and faith, and every interest in life seemed utterly to be banished. A single groan escaped him when he stood alone, and then he raised himself erect, as if hitherto he had leaned upon the arms of others. He carried himself firmly and loftily, his lips compressed, his eye eagerly looking forward, and thus, after the interval of a few seconds, he passed to the chamber of his wife. And still she slept. He bent over her, earnestly and intently gazing upon those beauties which grief seemed only to sadden into superior sweetness. He looked upon her with those earnest eyes of love, the expression of which can never be misunderstood. Still he loved her, though between her heart and his a high, impassable barrier had been raised up by the machinations of a guilty spirit. Tenderness was the prevailing character of his glance until she spoke. Her sleep, though deep, was not wholly undisturbed. Fearful images crossed her fancy. She started and sobbed, and cried, “Save, O save and spare him—Flavius, my dear Flavius!”—and her breathing again became free, and her lips sunk once more into repose. But fearful was the change, from a saddened tenderness to agony and despair, which passed over the features of Coelius as he listened to her cry. Suddenly, striking his clenched hands against his forehead, he shook them terribly at the sleeping woman, and rushed wildly out of the apartment.

——