Northanger Abbey and Angels and Dragons (42 page)

He was inclined to obey this request. For, though his heart was greatly relieved by such unlooked-for mildness, it was not just at that moment in his power to
say anything
to the purpose. Returning in silence to his seat, therefore, he remained for some minutes most civilly answering all Mrs. Morland’s common remarks about the weather and roads.

Catherine meanwhile—the anxious, agitated, happy, feverish Catherine—said not a word. But her glowing cheek and brightened eye made her mother trust that this good-natured visit would at least set her heart at ease. And gladly therefore did she lay aside the instructive volume for a future hour.

Desirous of Mr. Morland’s assistance (both in reassuring and in finding conversation for her guest, whose chagrin on his father’s account she earnestly pitied), Mrs. Morland dispatched one of the children to summon him.

But Mr. Morland was from home. And being thus without any support, in a quarter of an hour she had nothing to say.

After a couple of minutes’ unbroken silence, Henry—turning to Catherine
for the first time
since her mother’s entrance—asked her, with sudden alacrity, if Mr. and Mrs. Allen were now at Fullerton?

And obtaining (from amidst all her perplexity of words in reply) the meaning, which one short syllable would have given, immediately expressed his intention of paying his respects to them. With a rising colour, he asked her if she would have the goodness to show him the way.

“You may see the house from this window, sir,” said Sarah.

This produced only a bow of acknowledgment from the gentleman, and a silencing nod from her mother.

For Mrs. Morland—thinking it probable that he might have some explanation to give of his father’s behaviour which it must be more pleasant for him to communicate only to Catherine—would not on any account prevent her accompanying him.

They began their walk. And Mrs. Morland was not entirely mistaken in his object in wishing it. Some explanation on his father’s account he had to give; but his first purpose was to
explain himself.
And before they reached Mr. Allen’s grounds he had done it so well that Catherine did not think it could ever be repeated too often.

“Miss Morland,” began Henry, stopping his stride suddenly. “I must speak to you at last—”

Catherine stopped also, and observed his face taking on deep colour that in turn made her colour likewise.

“Miss Morland—Catherine—I know not where to begin. My father’s behaviour—it was duly unpardonable. But I need give reasons that may at least explain it in your eyes. And I must speak at last in more candour than I have ever done before. I—”

As he spoke, Catherine noticed how her own angels came to him, surrounding Henry and herself in a strange united circle, brighter than day. She watched their iridescent wings near his brow, their delicate movements like breaths upon his cheek. And then she knew she had to speak her own truth at last.

“Mr. Tilney—Henry. There is something I must also say to you, and I am afraid—I am terrified!”

“Dear child, oh, this is indeed the moment! Be not afraid now!”
exclaimed Lawrence, or possibly Maurice or Horace or Clarisse—oh goodness, it was all of them, speaking almost in unison!

“Not now, hush!” she quickly said to them.

But Henry saw her anxious gaze, and the direction of her speech. And he said, “It is that you
see
 . . . you
talk
to angels and other such beings, is it not?”

“Oh!” Catherine was stunned. “How did you
know?!
”

And Henry smiled. “I had noticed—Eleanor and I—for quite some time. And once, when in Northanger, we saw you speak outright, and we both knew for certain. You are different, and very dear and very
extraordinary,
Catherine. And you are
exactly
like our mother.
She
too could speak to the unseen world of beings all around us, and since childhood she had told us stories of the angels who sang her songs and told her secret wonders. One might not believe such a thing, but we saw it, observed it with our own eyes. And indeed, the
world
around our mother seemed to come
alive
. Ghosts and spirits appeared, and there were metaphysical wonders both dark and light, seemingly everywhere she went.”

“Your mother!” whispered Catherine, musing. “No wonder her spirit came to me!”

And Henry’s eyes were brilliant with liquid as he heard this. “She was a
treasure,
Catherine. Indeed, she was
the
treasure. For yes, there was—there
is
none other. The treasure is not gold or jewels or riches of coin, but a woman of light—one such as yourself.

“And thus, so are you.
You are the treasure, Catherine
.”

Suddenly then his eyes grew dark and hard as flints in strange passion, and he continued, “And as you well know, where there is treasure, there must be a
dragon
. My father was thus, the dragon to my mother’s treasure. He loved her perfectly, and she loved him, and they were happy and joyful even when he was stubborn and dominant, until she died.

“And then, the dragon too
changed
—as he must, when he loses the one thing in the world that gives him truth and life and sustenance.

“My father became hard and cold as stone and his heart turned to inviolate metal.”

“Oh!” said Catherine, beginning to understand many things at last. “Was
he
then, your father, the dragon that we saw in Bath that time we walked, and then at Northanger?”

“Yes. And now you must forgive me yet again, this time for my rudeness back then, when you had asked so many pointed questions about dragons and their nature and origins, and I would not answer to you or even speak of the dragon—for I could not in truth utter all this to you just then. Every morning, rising early (what you know as his constitutional walk), my father takes the dragon form and desperately flies the heavens, searching aimlessly for his treasure, now lost forever. He is compelled to do this unto eternity, and will be thus for years—indeed for immortal ages—until he either draws his last breath in battle or decides to face his loss and relinquish the falsehood of gold in favor of truth. Only then can he cease being the immortal dragon and return to being a mortal man, and one day die in peace.”

Henry paused, gathering himself for something, and took several steps back. Catherine put her hands to her face, in impossible dawning comprehension.

“And now—Open your eyes, Catherine, this must be seen. The dragons did not disappear, did not become extinct, nor did they ‘reappear’ suddenly in modern times. They are
here
among us, always. Dragons live in the hearts of men. A dragon emerges when there is the birth of perfect love—”

And saying this, Henry suddenly
changed
.

Catherine had no time to blink, but watched the mirage building in the air, as a strange unnatural wind came whirling to surround him, and it grew into a funnel, sending up leaves along the path and scattering blossoms in the grass . . . while the air in place of Henry thickened and he himself was momentarily
dissolved
into the fabric of the storm.

In his place was a great
white dragon
.

Catherine exclaimed, then held her hands to her lips and wordlessly cried.

It was the same one—
her
white dragon. It spread its wings that were like galleon sails on either sides of Catherine, and she held on to her bonnet and her dress and her very self, all rooted to the spot as the dragon unfurled itself to its full breadth and height and towered over her, pale and sparkling and glorious as the surface of a mirror in the sun.

“You are unhurt! You won the battle . . .” she whispered, through her tears.

And the dragon flexed its giant claws of white steel, moved its powerful limbs, and it blinked one great beautiful amber-golden eye at her in perfect silent communion.

And then it changed again . . . into her own beloved Henry.

“I am yours,” he said. “I am your dragon, for before
you
there was no dragon in my heart. And now there is one only for you—if you will have me. And even if you will not, the dragon will
serve you
always.”

And with a stifled cry Catherine came to him, throwing her arms about his neck in an embrace. And for long moments there were no words between them, no speech, only wonder.

“I had fought him, my father, and held him back from the final brink of madness,” he told her. “For, since the start he had pursued you in his confounded way, seeking you for the family on my behalf. Under a mistaken persuasion of your possessions and claims, he had courted your acquaintance in Bath, solicited your company at Northanger, and designed you for his daughter-in-law—thinking you an heiress, seeking in his confusion
material riches
, and never recognizing that the treasure he saw in you was of the truer kind.”

“I! An heiress!” exclaimed Catherine in amazement. “Why, that is so far from the truth, my family is hardly anything but simple, humble—”

“Ah, allow me to further explain to you the reasoning of my misguided father and the nature of things. As I say, he thought you wealthy to excess, and then, discovering otherwise, he first cast you
out
in a worthy fit of dragon passion, but then, the
dragon greed
took over, the dragon nature compelled, so he had to retrieve you, his last source of worldly treasure (as he mistakenly thought, partially correct as it was).”

“So he flew after the carriage, to have me return?”

“Yes and no—for even as he came after you his supernatural anger still boiled, and he was uncertain of anything but that you must not be allowed to slip away, for whatever
unknown value
you possibly held. I fought him, prevented him from hindering or hurting you, spoke truth into his heart and mind through the voiceless communion of dragonkind. He heard me, in his own maddened way, he
heard
me—thus, he still lives. But he is vanquished.

“And now, this needs be said: there are two types of dragon—the Dragon of Love and the Dragon of Gold. All dragons begin as creatures of love, pure and selfless. But if they experience the grave loss of this love, their nature changes, becomes perverted, from love to greed. And they harden and calcify and slowly approach the state of being stone and metal. In their slow ‘immortal death’ they must still hunger for treasure. But now they mistake
treasure of the spirit
for treasure of the material world. It is thus that history is filled with stories of ancient dragons, lying over hoards of priceless coin and jewels—heartless treasure of metal and stone—immortal and eternal, deep in the secret bowels of the earth. These are all the Dragons of Gold, dragons of despair and desolation, the only kind the world knows about, for they malinger here, having grown into monsters, refusing to
let go
.

“But the world knows little to nothing about the other kind of dragon, the original true kind, because such a creature is not ephemeral, and is not immortal—for it has no need to be. It loves and lives and dies in joy and sorrow of the fleeting moment along with its mortal love. And such a dragon thus passes into the ages unnoticed by the scholars or the natural scientists—for it appears rarely and hunts not at all, and when its time of loss comes, it gently relinquishes itself and passes on.

“I dearly hope to remain such a dragon,” ended Henry. “But of certainty one never knows—never knows what might happen were I to lose
you.
”

Their further revelations and divulging of the heart were placed on hold briefly, for now they had resumed walking and in moments were at the Allen’s house.

A very
short
visit to Mrs. Allen followed, in which Henry talked at random, without sense or connection, with fevered eyes and many secret looks of intimacy thrown in Catherine’s way. And Catherine, rapt in the contemplation of her own unutterable happiness, scarcely opened her lips. She had also had the occasion to learn from sentences artfully spoken on Mrs. Allen’s behalf, that he had openly “opposed his father on her behalf.”

And then, after they had quit the Allens’ residence and headed back, she had heard him say—in contrast to the previous revelatory supernatural explanation—in a more human and decidedly worldly manner, that
he now offered her his hand
.

“And now, as far as that mistaken notion of your great fortune—” said Henry.

And he proceeded to explain that the general had had nothing to accuse her of but her being the involuntary, unconscious object of a wicked
deception
which his dragon pride could not pardon, and which a better pride would have been ashamed to own.

Yes indeed, she was guilty only of being
less rich
than he had supposed her to be. And it was all because of John Thorpe!

“Oh, he is an odious horrid ogre!” exclaimed Catherine, unable to hold back. And Henry continued to tell his tale.

John Thorpe had first misled him. The general, perceiving his son one night at the theatre to be paying considerable attention to
a certain Miss Morland,
had accidentally inquired of Thorpe if he knew more of her than her name.

Thorpe, most happy to be on speaking terms with a man of General Tilney’s importance, had been joyfully and proudly communicative. At that time not only did he expect James Morland to engage Isabella, but he was likewise resolved upon marrying Catherine himself! And thus, his vanity induced him to represent the family as yet more wealthy than his vanity and avarice had made him believe them to be.