While Mellen stood on the veranda in front of the house, Mr. Rhodes came up the avenue. There was no hope of escape for him; he had not perceived the visitor until it was too late to retreat, and a voice called out:
"Oh, there you are, old fellow; I'm in luck after all. You see I walked over to my farm on the back road," he explained, "intending to take the half-past three train to New York, but I missed it. So I said to myself, 'I'll cut across the fields, down the hill, and stop at Mellen's, beg a dinner, and get him to send me over in time for the five o'clock train'—wasn't a bad idea, eh?"
"A very good idea on the contrary," Mellen answered, with a desperate attempt at hospitality, while the visitor wrung his hand again and burst into shouts of laughter, as if some wonderfully good joke lay in the affair. "And how is your good lady?" he asked. "And the pretty little sister—quite well, eh?"
"Tolerably so," Mellen answered; "complains of headache and that sort of thing."
He conducted his guest into the library, and meeting Dolf in the hall, directed him to inform his mistress of the arrival.
Mellen made an effort to be civil though the man was tiresome in the extreme; perhaps it was better to endure his society than to meet his wife that day without the restraint of a stranger's presence.
Indeed, without some of those social restraints to which all men are more or less slaves, it is doubtful if Mellen could have appeared so perfectly calm. As it was, the fire that consumed him raged unseen. Dolf carried his message upstairs, where it was received with a little shriek from Elsie, and blank dismay on the part of Elizabeth.
"I can't go down," she said; "Elsie, you must take my place at the table. Say that I am ill, fainting, anything."
"Indeed, I'll do nothing of the sort," returned Elsie; "if you don't go down I shall stay with you. I am nervous as I can be, and if you are not at the table I shall break down completely."
The girl was full of selfishness to the very last—not willing to yield her comfort in the slightest particular, but Elizabeth only sighed as she observed it, and said, quietly:
"After all, it is just as well—change your dress, Elsie."
These two women commenced the duties of a dinner toilet with heavy hearts, scarcely heeding what they put on.
But when the dinner hour approached, they entered the drawing-room together and almost smiling, Elsie looking exquisitely pretty in her dark blue silk, with those bright ringlets floating about her shoulders; her volatile spirits were already rising at the idea of an escape from that shadowy chamber where she had dragged through the day.
Elizabeth was calm and self-possessed as ever. To a casual observer she looked pale, but her heavy black dress might account for that, and the delicate contrast it gave to her complexion made amends for any lack of bloom.
Mellen sat watching her while she greeted Mr. Rhodes, and listened patiently to his labored compliments.
"Is she stone—ice?" he thought. "Is there no touch of nature about her that she can be so calm?"
If the man could have read her mind, he might have pitied her even in the midst of his anger and fearful doubts. What she suffered in putting that terrible restraint upon herself was almost beyond the power of belief; but woman-like, having formed her resolution, not all the tortures of the rack could have driven her from it.
Elsie had seated herself on a low stool at her brother's feet; he sat absently playing with her curls, and looking moodily into the fire, but he had no words even for her, though she tempted him with rather mournful smiles. But he had been so silent and sullen by times during the past week, that there was not change enough in his manner to be at all perceptible.
Sometimes Elizabeth glanced over at the pair, and then some sharp pain contracted her brows, but there was no other appearance of emotion; she would control even that instantly, and bending her head once more, listen patiently to her persecutor's verbiage.
Dolf announced dinner, and the party passed into the dining-room, Mr. Rhodes honoring the hostess with his arm. As Mellen and his sister followed, Elizabeth heard Elsie whisper in a low voice:
"Grant, dear, you are not cross with me?"
In the midst of Mr. Rhodes's uproarious laugh at one of his own jokes, she caught Mellen's answer:
"Never, darling, never! You are my one comfort—my only blessing."
With her head more proudly erect, a faint crimson beginning to burn on her cheeks, Elizabeth Mellen walked on and took her seat at the table, appearing so completely engrossed in Mr. Rhodes's conversation that she did not once meet her husband's eye.
To all but the guest, that dinner seemed interminable, but Mr. Rhodes was so busy with the delicacies Clorinda's skillful hands had prepared, and so full of himself, that he was in a perfect glow of content.
The lights danced before Elizabeth's eyes, every morsel she ate was swallowed with a pang, the wine was like a bitter drug on her lips, yet there she sat in patient endurance.
Occasionally Mellen glanced towards her, and her composure sent such a thrill of rage through his soul, that it was with difficulty he could keep from springing up and overwhelming her with the discovery he had made, on the spot.
The dinner was over at last, but tedious as it had seemed to Elizabeth, she would gladly have prolonged it: anything to lengthen the hours; to keep afar off the stillness of the night, when she must undertake that to which she had doomed herself.
But she would not think of that; she dared not; madness lay so near the dismal reflection that it must be swept from her mind.
They dragged through the evening; Elizabeth played cribbage with Mr. Rhodes, and Elsie gave snatches of desultory music at the piano; every time her fresh young voice rang out in joyous song Elizabeth started, as if an unseen dagger had struck her to the heart.
"You will all come and pass a day with us before long, I hope," Mr. Rhodes said, with exuberant hospitality, when the time came at last to order the carriage for his departure.
Elizabeth only answered with a wan smile. She could hardly stand. Mellen accompanied his visitor through the hall, and the instant they disappeared Elizabeth started for the door.
"Where are you going?" asked Elsie.
"To my room; I can't bear this."
"I'll go—"
"No, no, not yet; stay awhile, for heaven's sake let me rest alone one moment." She staggered through the dining-room and was gone; when Mellen entered the library again, Elsie sat alone by the fire, teasing the cat, looking cheerfully pretty and childlike.
The clock in Elizabeth's dressing-room had struck eleven, but there she sat desolately looking into the fire, just as she had sunk into her chair on first entering the chamber.
She heard her husband and Elsie ascend the stairs a full hour before, but Mr. Mellen went straight on towards his own apartments. He had not entered hers since the day the bracelet was found; she knew well that he would not intrude upon her then.
For two long hours she had been alone with her dismal thoughts, no sound broke the stillness, save the monotonous ticking of the clock or an occasional sob and moan from the half spent wind without.
There was too much anxiety and agony in her mind for any of the nervous terrors which had haunted her during the day. Then, as she thought what the coming of the night would bring her, the heart in her bosom shuddered. Now it stood still and seemed hardening into iron. If some spirit had appeared with an articulate warning, she could not have been more convinced that exposure and ruin were approaching her with rapid strides. She would do her best, but that, she knew in her innermost soul, would lead to destruction. She looked back on the past weeks, and tried to remember if her plans had failed through her own weakness.
Before Mellen's return it had seemed possible to carry them out, to bury the past utterly, and build a new palace of hope on its grave, but they had all failed. It was not her fault, she had borne up as bravely as any woman could have done under the circumstances, had been as circumspect and guarded as it was possible to be, but from the moment of his inopportune arrival, some untoward event had occurred to thwart every project she had endeavered to carry out for her own salvation.
"It is fate," she muttered, in a cold whisper; "it is fate! Oh, my God, help me, help me, for I have yet a right to pray!"
No, even the consolations of prayer were denied this most wretched woman; the words seemed to freeze upon her lips; she could only moan in that broken whisper:
"My God, help me, help me!"
As she sat there, the door opened and Elsie softly entered the apartment. She had taken off her evening-dress, and put on a loose white wrapper, and over that had thrown a crimson shawl, which made the pallor that had come over her face still more apparent.
There was no light in the chamber except that given by the fire.
Elizabeth had extinguished the lamps; the gloom and the shadows befitted her mournful thoughts.
"Bessie, Bessie?" called Elsie, unable at first to distinguish any object in the half light. "Are you there?"
"Here I am," was the hoarse answer; "come in."
"I was so afraid to be alone with Grant," continued Elsie; "I felt as if I should scream every moment."
"What did he say to you; what did my husband talk about?"
"Oh, nothing in particular; he said very little; he did not even ask where you were. I told him you had gone to bed with a headache, but he did not seem to hear. He sat and looked in the fire, as if he were reading something in the red hot coals; after a long time he asked me if I loved him, and kissed my forehead. That was all."
Elizabeth struck her hands hard together, choked back the groan which rose to her lips, and sat gazing into the fire, as if she too read something terrible in the scarlet caverns which were breaking up and forming in its midst.
"I'm so cold," shivered Elsie; "there isn't half enough coal in the grate."
Cold! The chill had crept into Elizabeth's very soul which no power of hers could warm, and close to her that weak creature crouched, moaning out her petty complaints!
Even then, up to the last, while the glittering hands of the clock were seen in the firelight, creeping swiftly over the dial, and its solemn tick measured off the awful minute on which Elizabeth had agreed with her own soul to go forth on her terrible errand, the wretched woman was compelled to pause in that dim chamber, worse than dead herself, to comfort and soothe the creature who lay like a wounded fawn on the hearth.
"What time is it, Bessie?"
She raised herself and looked at the clock.
"Half-past eleven," answered Elizabeth, solemnly. "My hour has come!"
"I thought it was later," groaned Elsie. "Will it never be morning?"
"Soon enough," whispered Elizabeth, "soon enough."
"I wonder if Grant has gone to bed; I asked him if he was sleepy, and he—"
"Well?"
"Oh, he only gave a queer sort of laugh, and said, 'Sensible people always are sleepy when it comes bedtime.'"
Elizabeth had said truly her hour had come, but she could not go yet; she must wait until all danger of discovery was over—stand there breathless while her husband forgot her and her agony in peaceful sleep. They were both silent for a time, then Elsie began to shiver again, like some young bird lost from its nest in a storm.
"Oh, if it would only come morning!"
"Soon enough, soon enough," repeated Elizabeth, as before.
"Do talk to me; I shall die if you don't!"
"What can I say, child? I can only wait—wait."
"Wait! What do you mean? Oh, I know—I know!"
The girl broke off with a more violent shudder and buried her face in her hands.
"What made you remind me?" she cried. "I shall go crazy now. Bessie! Bessie!"
But this time, when the girl clung to her, Elizabeth removed her hands, not impatiently, but with quiet firmness.
"You must control yourself," she said. "I have upon me all that I can bear now. Be still, Elsie!"
"I will! I will!" she sobbed. "Oh, wouldn't it be better to be dead?"
"Better! Yes, a thousand times; but it is not easy to die."
Elsie checked her sobs again, and caught at the hope with which she had sustained herself all day.
"This is the last of it," she said; "this night once safely over, and there is an end."
"One way or the other," muttered Elizabeth.
"What did you say?"
"Nothing—nothing."
It was worse than useless, to agitate the girl's weakness afresh with fears that lay so deep in her own mind. Whichever way the end came, Elsie was safe. Was the creature thinking that as she shut her eyes and leaned more closely against her sister?
"Yes, it will be all safe then," she went on. "The money is paid; we shall have the papers; there is nothing more to fear."
Elizabeth did not answer; she allowed her to think that the danger from that quarter was removed. It could do no good to fill her mind with added fears.
"There is the wind again!" cried Elsie. "Oh, if it would only stop!"
The sound recalled all that lay in the coming hours, and she was unnerved again.
"You are not frightened, are you, Bessie?" she asked.
"I suppose not; there is nothing to fear."
"To be alone with him and—and—Oh, I ought to go with you; I'll try—I'll try."
At that late hour some remorse woke in her mind for her unsisterly selfishness, but Elizabeth said very kindly:
"You will stay here; you could do no good."
"But I shall go mad while you are gone."
"You must get into bed again."
"How long shall you be away?"
"I can't tell. Stop—don't talk about it. I shall go through with it all; let me alone till then."
Elsie writhed to and fro in hysterical weakness.
"You must be quiet," Elizabeth said. "Suppose he should hear you?"
"Grant? Oh, I'll be still—I'll be still as death."
"What time is it?" Elsie asked again.
"Almost twelve; the clock will strike in a moment."
"How much longer shall you wait?" asked the girl in a whisper. "Did he answer your telegram?"
"I did not expect that he would, there was too much danger in it. But hush, I must discover if he is asleep."
"Grantley?"
"Yes."
"What was that noise?" Elizabeth exclaimed suddenly.
"I heard nothing," Elsie answered, lifting her head and allowing it to fall again on her sister's knee.
"It sounded like a step in the hall," said Elizabeth.
"It was only your fancy," returned Elsie. "This house is as still as the grave."
Elizabeth rose from her chair and walked to the window.
"You are not going?" cried Elsie.
"No; I only want to look. Be still!"
Elsie cowered down on the rug and muffled herself more closely in her shawl, lying quite still, with a sort of comfort in the feeling of warmth which began to creep over her.
Elizabeth pushed back the heavy curtains and looked out into the night. A stream of dim, silvery radiance shot into the room, and played like rippling water over the floor.
Elsie half started to her feet with a cry.
"What is that? What is that?"
"The moon is up," said Elizabeth, simply.
Elsie laid her head down again, Elizabeth stood leaning her hands on the window-sill, looking straight before her.
The moonlight was peculiarly clear, and millions of stars shone forth with the diamond radiance seen only in a frosty night. Every object was visible. Hoar frost shone up whitely from the crisp grass of the lawn, and long black shadows were cast downward by the trees, shaken like drapery when the wind tossed the branches up and down.
From where Elizabeth stood she could look out over the withered flower-beds and into the thicket beyond.
Suddenly her eye caught sight of a man standing under the cypress tree, which rose up gloomy and dark, its branches waving slowly to and fro, looking, to her excited fancy like spectral hands that beckoned her forth to her doom.
She uttered a faint sound and strained her eyes towards it with a chill feeling of horror. Elsie was roused again by the noise, and asked, quickly:
"What is the matter?"
"Nothing, nothing."
"What made you groan, then?"
"I am looking out," returned Elizabeth, in a low voice, leaning more heavily against the window for support, "he is there!"
"Come away, come away!" cried Elsie, muffling her face more closely in her shawl, as if to shut out some dreadful object. "Come back to the fire, Elizabeth, do!"
"Surely, if I can go out there to meet him," she said, "I have courage enough to look at the old tree."
Elsie only groaned anew. She sat upright and rested herself against the chair her sister had left.
"How does the night look, Bessie?" she asked, in a low, scared tone.
"The moonlight is so ghostly," returned Elizabeth; "it looks frightened. No wonder—no wonder!"
Elsie trembled more violently, but it seemed as if some power stronger than her own will forced her to continue these harassing questions.
"And the cypress, Bessie, how does it look?"
"Stern and dark—no wonder, sheltering him," cried Elizabeth. "It beckons to me; the branches look like giant arms tempting me to ruin. I must go—I must go!"
Her voice was little more than a whisper, but it sounded painfully sharp and distinct. Elsie buried her face in both hands, once more to shut out the images it conjured up.
"Come back!" she moaned; "Elizabeth, come back!"
"I must go. It is time."
"Wait—wait—just a moment! Don't go yet—don't leave me—I shall die here alone."
Elsie dragged herself along the floor to where Elizabeth stood, and caught her dress in a convulsive grasp.
"Wait a little—just a little?"
The very weakness of this girl seemed to give Elizabeth a sort of insane composure.
"Let go my dress," she said; "I must be gone."
"I can't stay here—I can't!"
"Be still—you must, and shall!"
She wrenched her garments from Elsie's hands, and the girl fell helplessly on the floor.
"Let me creep into bed first," she moaned; "I shall run mad if you leave me here. Oh, I'll go—I ought to go! What an unnatural creature I am! I'll go!"
"Don't talk—don't think—it is too late," whispered Elizabeth. "If you can pray, do it."
"I can't—I daren't! Help me up, Elizabeth—help me up."
But there was no response. Elizabeth was bending towards the window again, looking straight at the cypress tree; but the dread which had been in her face before was weak compared to the horror that convulsed it now.
"He is going there!" she cried, in an awful voice.
Elsie caught hold of her and raised herself so as to look out of the window.
"Who—who? What do you mean?"
"See—see!" continued Elizabeth. "Some one is creeping towards the cypress. He has a spade in his hand. Merciful God, it is too late!"
"Is it Grantley?" shrieked Elsie. "Is it Grantley?"
"There he goes! I told you I heard steps! My God! my God!"
She fell on her knees by the window, still staring out into the spectral light. Elsie gave one glance, saw her brother walking towards the cypress, and then sank back, unable to venture another look.
Alone in his room, Grantley Mellen had sat for hours with only stern thoughts for his companions, and they grew so black and fierce that the most terrible crisis would have been less hard to endure than that suspense.
He waited silent, immovable, till the last sound in the house died away; waited still for slumber to overtake every inmate of the dwelling, that he might carry out the plan he had formed.
He was going out to the cypress tree; he would discover if his wife's agitation, when he proposed digging about it, was in any way connected with the mystery which surrounded her. He believed that it was so, though in what manner it was impossible to divine. Perhaps there were letters hidden there—some condemning evidence against her which she had found no opportunity since his return to destroy. Whatever it was, he would discover it, drag it out, and with this fresh proof of her treachery in his hands, overwhelm her with a knowledge of her guilt.
He, too, sat watching the clock, counting the strokes as the hours sounded, but to him the time appointed did not arrive quickly. It seemed as if the hands scarcely moved; in his mad impatience he thought the appointed instant never would approach.
It was a terrible vigil that he kept; the strongest man could not for many hours have endured that strain of suspense, while tortured by such fiendish whispers as moaned in his ear.
The time came at last; the moonlight streamed pale and uncertain through the casement; no sound broke the stillness, even the wind had ceased its moaning. He could go forth now without fear of discovery.
He could go forth, but to what?
His very inability to form an idea of the discoveries he might make, increased the fever of his impatience. He could wait no longer—not a moment—not a second.
He opened the door and crept cautiously through the gallery, down stairs into the lower hall, undid the fastenings of the outer door and passed on to the veranda.
The garden tools were some of them in a closet in the area; he went down the steps, opened the door, took out a spade and hurried towards the cypress tree.
There he was, standing under the moaning branches, his head bare, digging wildly and aimlessly about the roots, peering at every lump of earth with his insane gaze, ready to believe that he had at last come upon that nameless thing for which he sought.
And while he dug furiously into the earth, Elizabeth Mellen knelt by the window-seat watching him; and Elsie lay upon the floor, so utterly prostrated that she could only cry out to Elizabeth at intervals in her sharp, discordant voice:
"Is he there yet—is he there?"
"Still there," she answered.
"What is he doing?"
"Digging, digging! He is on the wrong side of the tree."
Elsie gave a sigh of relief.
"No, no," continued Elizabeth; "he stops to throw the earth back—he is going farther round."
"Has he found the place—has he?"
"Not yet."
Elsie could not even groan; her breath came in quick gasps; her hands tore madly at the carpet, but Elizabeth leaned motionless against the window-sill, watching always with that strained gaze.
"Where is he now, Bessie?"
"He has not reached it—he is near! No! he is digging again—he has not found the place."
"If we could only stop him," cried Elsie, roused to new courage. "If I opened my window and called out."
"Too late, too late!"
"But he will find it—he will find it!"
"Then God help me, I can do no more!"
Elsie sprang up with another shriek.
"You'll tell—you'll tell! I know you will give way—and Grant will murder you—murder us all."
Elizabeth caught the frantic creature in her arms, and forced her back on the couch.
"Lie still," she said.
"Let me go, I say—let me go! I want to die—I won't live after he finds you out. I'll kill you, Elizabeth, if you don't let me go."
But Elizabeth held her firmly in spite of her insane struggles, crying out:
"It is nothing to you—you have no cause to fear. You are mad, mad! I tell you the trouble is mine; whatever comes falls on my head; be still, Elsie."
"You promise. Swear it—swear not to bring my name in."
"I have sworn and I will keep my oath," returned Elizabeth. "Disgrace, infamy, death—I will bear them all alone. What should I gain by dragging you down with me?"
She fell away from the girl as she spoke, but Elsie did not attempt to rise; she lay still now, exhausted by her recent violence, and reassured by Elizabeth's promise.
Again the woman leaned against the window-sill and looked out towards the tree. Mellen was at work still, more furiously than ever, throwing up great shovelsful of earth and dashing them down with frantic haste.
"Is he there yet?" called Elsie.
"Yes, yes! How he works—dig—dig—dig!"
She stopped suddenly: the silence raised wilder horror in Elsie's mind.
"Has he found it?"
"Not yet. He is standing still now, he is throwing the earth back."
"What now—what now?" called Elsie, when Elizabeth paused.
"He is looking about—he is puzzled. There is only that place left—he will miss it. The shadows are blackest there."
Another instant of intent watching, then a low cry.
"He is there—he is there!"
"Stop him!" shrieked Elsie. "Shout to him!"
Elizabeth whispered hoarsely:
"Too late! too late!"
"Is he digging?"
"Yes; wait—wait!"
She clutched the window-sill until her nails bent and broke against the woodwork.
"First on one side, then the other," she whispered. "He doesn't touch the right spot—I know it so well—night and day I have seen it——"
"Elizabeth! Elizabeth!"
She never heeded the mad cry, pressed closer and closer to the window-frame, staring out as if every energy of her nature was centred in that gaze.
"He has not found it! He stops again—he throws down the spade! He is stamping on the ground. Oh! once more!"
Then another pause, and at last Elizabeth cried in the same sharp whisper:
"He is throwing the earth back—he turns away!"
"Saved! saved!" shrieked Elsie.
Elizabeth watched her husband's movements still. He stood for some moments in quiet, then walked about the tree; she could feel the baffled rage that shook him.
He turned away at last and disappeared around the corner of the house. Then Elizabeth sprang to her feet.
"Where are you going?" cried Elsie.
"Lie still—don't speak, on your life!"
She ran to the door and locked it, then threw herself down by the fire.
"He might come in and find us," she whispered.
Elsie crept across the floor again, seeking protection at her side. There they waited, hushing their breaths, listening for the echo of his step on the stairs. It came at last, muffled and cautious, but terribly distinct to their strained senses. He half paused at the room where they were, passed on, the door of his chamber opened and shut.
"He has gone in," said Elizabeth.
"Saved! saved!" broke again from Elsie, but there was no answering echo from the woman by her side.
For a time they sat motionless, whether moments or hours neither of them ever could have told.
At last Elizabeth rose, moved noiselessly across the chamber, while Elsie raised her head to look.
"What are you going to do?" she asked.
"You know," Elizabeth answered.
"You won't—you can't! Oh, wait—wait!"
"And to-morrow have the whole household look on while the work is more thoroughly done!"
"Is there no other way?"
"None. This is the last hope; I shall try it."
There was no elation in her voice at the danger she had escaped, no hope rising up now that she might go through her task in safety, no dread either of what she had to do, only stern determination, the chill of utter despair, ready to struggle but not to hope. She wrapped a shawl about her without the slightest appearance of haste, and stood still a little longer, more like a marble statue endowed with the power of motion than a breathing, living creature.
"Are you going?" called Elsie.
"Yes; I shall not be long—not long."
But Elsie rushed after her and caught her in her arms.
"Every moment is worth a whole life," cried Elizabeth. "Let me go!"
She forced the girl to release her hold, and with one feeble wail Elsie fell senseless to the floor.
"Better so," muttered Elizabeth, "better so!"
The excitement she was laboring under gave this woman new strength. She raised the insensible girl, carried her through the vacant chamber, and laid her on the bed in her own room. She drew the bedclothes over her inanimate form and turned away.
"Now for the end," she murmured, "the bitter, bitter end."
She went back to her own room, closing the doors after her, then, without further delay, passed down the private staircase which led to the little entry off the library.
Once on the stairs she paused to listen, but there was no sound, and she hurried on noiseless as a spirit. One of the shutters was ajar, admitting a few gleams of light, by which she could see to unbolt the door.
She was out in the air at last; the first step was taken in safety—in her turn she flew towards the cypress tree. She was under its shadow, the branches writhed and moaned like living things, the moon shot in and out of the gathering clouds, and cast a flickering, uncertain light about that was more terrible than the deepest gloom.
As she stood in the depth of the shadows, a man came out from the thick darkness that lay under a neighboring clump of white pines, and drew close to her.
"I have been here some time," he whispered. "Everything is ready out yonder—rather rough work for a gentleman, but take it as a proof how ready I am to help you, even after all the money is paid in. But do you know that Mellen has been here?"
"I saw him—I know it; we have no time!"
"Fortunately, he will know why the earth is broken up, having done it with his own hands," said the man, with a suppressed laugh, that made Elizabeth shudder. "Better still, he has left the spade—threw it down in angry disappointment. That is fortunate, for mine was partly disabled out yonder: now show me the exact spot."
She had no need to search, only too well she knew the place. Night and day for weeks the dread spot had been with her, in every dream she had watched men digging, digging—digging with frantic haste; and, as in her dreams, all strength seemed to fail, and some unseen power to hold her back, so now, in that frightful reality, her arms fell half paralyzed, and she could not lift her hand to point out the spot.
To and fro the branches swayed above her head, beating themselves about, moaning like evil voices. The wind swept up chill and warningly.
Such a terrible face it was that confronted the man—such a pale terrified face, lighted up with those agonized eyes, that seemed to grow large and wild in the moonlight.
The man stood before her, leaning on his spade, waiting.
"It is there just in that line of moonlight," she said at last, pointing downward with her finger.
The man lifted the spade with all his fierce might, and struck it deep into the earth, which the cold nights had frozen, until it gave out a sharp ringing sound.
Elizabeth held her breath; what if that sound had reached the house!
Another firm downward thrust of the spade was scarcely heard. The crust was broken, the earth grew soft and yielding—the wretched woman remembered how carefully it had been packed down over the spot. For nights after, the hollow sound of the spade had rung in her ears, and nothing could dull its echo.
A horrible fear was coming over her, a supernatural, ghostly dread, that made her flesh creep and the hair rise on her temples.
Spadeful after spadeful of earth was thrown out, but still the bottom was not reached. She had not thought it deep—so deep. If it should be empty—if nothing was there!
What if the place had been searched before, if the least possibility of removing that terrible evidence was gone beyond her power!
The idea was too maddening, and she shook off the nightmare-like oppression which had been upon her, as the spade suddenly struck some substance harder than the earth, and rang out with a dull, heavy sound.
For one instant she started back. She was alone in the night, alone with that man, who uttered an exclamation of delight that his task was so near done. Elizabeth drew back. She dared not even peer into the cavity. It was choked up with shadows, and their blackness seemed to warn her off.
The mighty strength that had carried this woman forward till now, left her. The cold pierced her through and through; still she found strength to speak, and implored the man to complete his work. He took up the spade again, dropped it into the impalpable darkness of the hole and pressed it down, leaning his whole weight upon it.
She shivered violently now. A sharp pain ran through her chest, as if she, too, had been putting forth some great physical energy. Shadows from the disturbed cypress boughs were falling all about her, breaking and forming again in a thousand fantastic movements. But one shadow, dark, solid and still, fell across a gleam of moonlight at her feet, freezing her to the heart. She looked slowly up and saw her husband.
For several seconds the husband and wife remained looking at each other in utter silence; the moaning of the cypress boughs sounded louder and more weird; through the whirl of her senses Elizabeth heard it still.
"Come forward," she heard her husband's voice say at length, in the hard, icy tones of concentrated passion. "Come forward, woman, that I may see your face."
The words seemed to come from a great distance; looking over at him, it seemed as if that shallow trench between them was a bottomless abyss which no power could bridge over,—the gulf between them for ever and ever.
"Come forward, I say."
She staggered slowly into the moonlight; the warning was fulfilled; ruin, disgrace had come; yet there she stood speechless, motionless, unable even to give utterance to a moan.
The man who had been digging, flung down his spade with a smothered oath.
For a little time Mellen stood almost as still and helpless as herself. Suddenly, in a voice that sounded scarcely human, he turned upon this man.
"Take up the spade, and finish your work!"
With something between a laugh and an oath, North snatched the spade, plunged it into the grave, and pressed all his force upon it. Slowly the edge of a box appeared. That evil man seemed to triumph in his gloomy work: placed one foot on the handle of the spade to hold it firmly, bent down and dragged the box into the moonlight.
Pulling the spade up from the crumbling earth, he raised it on high, and was about to dash the box open. Elizabeth lifted her hands in mute appeal.
She hoped nothing from her husband's forbearance. The action was only an instinct of her whirling senses, such as makes a drowning man clutch at straws; but with it her limbs gave way, and she fell upon her knees by the box, still lifting her white face to that stem, determined countenance.
"Do you think to oppose me even now?" he exclaimed. "I wonder I do not kill you. Ask this man, this double dyed villain to dig deeper his pit, which has concealed your infamy, and bury you there alive,—that would be a mercy to us both."
"If you would only kill me," she moaned, "only kill me."
"Stand up," he cried again; "stand up, I say."
But she stretched out her hands over the box; some insane idea of still preserving it from his touch, rushed across her mind.
"Open it," he said, turning fiercely on North; "I will look on this dishonor with my own eyes."
"Don't open it; don't open it! Let us pass away from your sight for ever."
Mellen caught her arm and pulled her roughly away.
"You shall not touch the dead," she cried; "kill me but do not commit sacrilege."
Elizabeth struggled on to her knees, and wound her arms about him in a convulsive grasp: he shook her off with loathing, as if a poisonous reptile had brushed his garments.
North stood with an evil light in his eyes, looking on Mellen, snatched the spade from his grasp, and while a despairing cry died on Elizabeth's lips, dashed it upon the cover; again and again, till the frail board split, revealing a gleam of white underneath.
Elizabeth was lying on the ground—not insensible; no such blessed relief came to her—but incapable of a movement; watching her husband always with those insane eyes.
His passion had exhausted itself in this sacrilegious violence, and he stood over the shattered box, struck with remorseful awe. But the wind swept over it, lifting some folds of transparent muslin from a little face that Elizabeth had seen night and day in her thoughts and her dreams, since the dreadful night when that grave was dug under the cypress tree.
She saw the face; saw her husband looking down upon it; saw all the shuddering horror in his eyes. Still she could not move.
"This has been a murder!" he hissed through his clenched teeth. "I swear that the guilty ones, even if my own name is dragged down to infamy with them, shall be brought to judgment."
"No, no," she moaned; "not murder; not that."
He caught her arm again and lifted her up.
"Tell the truth," he cried; "I will hear it!"
She could only stare at him with an affrighted gaze.
"I will bring the whole neighborhood to look," he went on; "I will drag this secret guilt out in the face of day if you do not speak! I will give you no time; no chance of escape; speak, or I will rouse the whole house, and let them see you here with this vile man, at your guilty work."
"Wait," she shivered; "wait!"
"Do you know what this is?" he cried. "The murder of a child! Do you know that to-morrow may find you a criminal in the hands of justice—you, my wife! You, in whose care I entrusted not only my honor but the most innocent soul that ever lived. Speak then! Expect no mercy from me; not to save my own honor; not to keep my own soul would I lift one finger to help you! Think of it! Picture it to yourself!—The eager crowd gathering about this spot; the hootings and execrations that will follow you forth to prison! Think of the days and nights in your lonely cell; remember the trial! the sentence! the horrible death! you shall not escape! you shall not escape one of these things."
"Grantley! Grantley!"
"Not content with one crime, you have added murder; striving to hide your guilt with a deeper sin!"
"This child died," she moaned; "it was God's own mercy, not my crime!"
"Speak then, and tell the whole truth. Do it. But have no thought that even confession can save you; never hope for mercy from my weakness! You can have no enemy who will prove so relentless as I will; if there was a hope of your escape I would hunt you both down to utter disgrace—nay, to death itself!"
"It is only to die," she muttered; "only to die."
"Will you speak; will you confess? Tell me how you murdered it?"
"There was no murder."
"But you buried it; you and this fiend who shared your guilt? Speak that man's name; I will have it, and from your lips. But, oh, if you have degraded my sister with this secret; if you have blighted her innocence with a knowledge of your guilt——"
"Stop," she broke in; "stop! do not speak of her."
Even in that moment some recollections came upon her, and her face fell forward, bowed down to her marble bosom.
"Elsie knows nothing," she said; "for her sake spare me."
"If you wish to escape having your shame dragged before the whole world, tell me the truth."
"For her sake, for Elsie's, have mercy! I don't expect it—but, remember, disgrace to me reflects not only on you but her! Think of that—don't blight her whole future in crushing me!"
"I left her in your hands—she has been living in daily intercourse with you—you have stained her lips with your kisses—degraded her by your affection."
"I have not hurt her," she cried; "I tell you she never received harm from me."
There was only one thought in her mind, to preserve Elsie from his anger—the worst had come to her now. Her present agony was too great for dread—the shame of the world—the most loathsome prison—nothing could bring such pangs as this wrenching away of hope and happiness.
She sat upright on the ground, folding her hands in her lap. Weaker women would have fainted, perhaps gone mad, but when the first dizzy whirl had left her senses, she could see and think clearly.
"With this man you alone buried the child. Will you own it, or shall I charge the servants as your accomplices—will you carry out your guilt to the last, and let others suffer that you may escape?"
"No, no! I do not struggle. See, I do not defend myself. Let it fall on me! But no murder, do not charge me with murder. Oh, I am not so bad as that—I could not harm one of God's creatures."
"Is not your sin worse than murder? Why, the blackest criminal has white hands compared to yours! You whom I loved and trusted—you have dragged a man's soul through the depths of your sin."
"I have not, I have not!" she broke forth.
He pointed to the box—he turned his finger to the man who stood in the shadows, shrouded with blackness, like the fiend he was. What could she say—how could she deny with that evidence at her feet.
"Oh, my God, have mercy!" she groaned.
"Don't take his name on your lips—don't curse yourself more deeply by a prayer!"
She crouched lower on the ground, her wild eyes were raised to heaven, but there was no help—no aid.
"All the facts—I will hear them from your own lips—speak."
She was silent.
"I know—I have been on your track for days. It was not enough that you destroyed my life, trampled on my honor, but you must choose for the partner of your guilt the man who had most cruelly wronged me—the one foe I had on earth."
"No, no! I never saw that man—never!"
"Peace, woman! I tell you that man standing yonder with a grin of Satan on his lips, is William Ford."
She did cry out then—this was a horror of which she had not dreamed.
"I never knew it; I never knew it."
"And you love this wretch? Through him you shall suffer!"
"I hate him, loathe him!" she cried. "Oh, in this one thing believe me—I never knew it was Ford. The name was changed to deceive me."
"I would not believe a word from your lips though you brought an angel to witness it."
Then he looked down at the little coffin, and a fierce gust of insanity swept over him.
"I will send for some officer of justice."
She caught his arm and held him firmly.
"For Elsie's sake—don't overshadow her life with the shame you hurl on me. Let me go away—you shall never hear of me again—I will never cross your path! I do not ask for mercy, but for your sister's sake, for your own honored name, let me go away and die."
Lost and guilty as this woman was, there existed still one human virtue in her soul—even in his rage Mellen could feel that she spoke the truth—she was not asking mercy for herself—she was pleading for the innocent girl whose future would be destroyed were it known how vile the creature was with whom she had been the associate.
"Where will you go—what will you do?"
"Anything—anything! You shall never hear from me again."
"You are going with this man!"
"There is no life so horrible that I would not prefer it to his presence," she said; "no death so shameful that it would not be heaven compared to seeing his face again."
There was a brief pause then; Mellen grasped her by the arm.
She thought he was about to kill her. She sank on her knees and a broken prayer rose to her lips. She would not have struggled; she would have knelt there and received death patiently from his hands.
"Do you think me lost and vile as yourself?" he cried, reading her thoughts in this gesture. "I do not want your life—do with it what you will! For my innocent sister's sake I will spare you—but go—go where I never can hear your name—let me have no reason to know that you exist! If you cross my path again, nothing shall keep me from exposing you to the whole world."
All at once, North came out from the shadows that had concealed his face, and stood before the man he had so foully wronged.
"Grantley Mellen," he said, "for your own sake, believe me. If this woman will not speak, I am not coward enough to keep silent."
Elizabeth stepped forward, her head raised, her eyes flashing.
"But I charge you—North or Ford, I charge you, make no defence for me. At your hand, neither he or I, will accept it. There has been no murder, there must be none. If this most wronged man grants us the mercy of silence, it is enough."
"But I am not brute enough to——"
"Peace," said Elizabeth; "if you would serve me, obey him."
"Obey him," answered North, with a sneer. "I would do almost anything. Yes, and I will do even that; but you are the only woman on earth for whom I would so bend and creep to this man."
These words stung Mellen like vipers, but he would not allow those two criminals to know how his heart writhed.
"It is well," he said; "there is more to be done. Go and finish your work."
North took up the spade.
"Remember," he said. "It is for her sake."
Elizabeth made an effort to speak.
"Be still," said Mellen, "we need no more words."
North began throwing the earth back into the trench, Elizabeth sat still and watched him.
It seemed to her that she did not suffer—there was nothing in her mind save the blank feeling which one might experience sitting over the ruin an earthquake had made, after burying home, love, everything the soul clings to. North filled the chasm and smoothed the earth down over it carefully. Then, without a pause, he straightened the lid of the coffin—there was no haste, no recoiling—he drove back the nails that had been loosened, into their place—then he raised the box in his arms, saying, only:
"Come!"
Mellen walked forward, Elizabeth followed a little behind—she did not ask a single question, but moved slowly down the avenue towards the outer gates. They passed through, out into the high road, up the little hill, Mellen walking sternly on, and the woman following, North marching forward with long strides, bearing the coffin on his shoulder.
They reached the graveyard; the fence was broken in one place; Mellen wrenched off the picket and forced a passage. He passed through, and Elizabeth mechanically kept in his footsteps. At the lower end of the yard was a single grave, with the earth still fresh around it; not a tuft of grass had sprung on the torn soil, but dead leaves had drifted over it, and the frost crusted it drearily, turning its moisture to ice. Elizabeth might have recognised this grave as one that had been given to a fair woman who had perished in the late shipwreck, had she found any room for thought out of her great misery. But she only saw a dreary-looking grave, at which North paused. He set down the coffin and again raised his spade. Elizabeth stood by, silently turning to stone, as it were. She watched him dig a deep cavity, saw him lower the box down into it, then he began to fill up the gap.
"It is done, your sin is buried; we part, and forever," said Mellen.
"We part here!" echoed Elizabeth.
"I have no more to say," he went on; "if you can live, do so; but, remember, death comes at last—death and the judgment. I think, had your sin been other than it is, I could have promised you forgiveness in your last hour. But the horror of your crime in choosing that man——"
"I never knew it," she broke in. "Oh, believe that—do believe that! I ask nothing more—I have no right even to ask so much—but if you should one day hear that I am dead, believe that I have now told you the truth."
"You have the means of subsistence," he went on; "the stocks I settled upon you will be sufficient for your support. If you ever see this wretch again, it is because you are altogether bad."
"Only say that when I am dead you will pardon me—only say that, Grantley Mellen, for I have great need of one kind word."
"You will be careful that your name never reaches my ear," he went on, regardless of her appeal. "Hide yourself in some strange land, where no tidings of you may ever come near my home. I warn you, for your own sake."
"Give me your forgiveness in my dying hour; only that, Grantley, for I have loved you so!"
"I will not promise it. This mockery is worse than your sin!" he exclaimed. "If it were to keep your soul from eternal torture, I could not speak a pardoning word."
She fell forward upon the ground.
"Only for my death-bed—your pardon for my death-bed?"
"Never! Never!"
His voice rang out clear and sharp, as steel striking steel. It was like the sound of prison doors shutting out the last gleam of light and hope from a condemned criminal.
"Don't be found here," he said; "nor be heard of again. We are parting now forever. Take the shelter of my roof for the rest of this miserable night. I will not send you forth in darkness—go, but we meet no more!"
He turned and walked away; she watched him threading his path among the graves, and it seemed as if she must die when her eyes lost him.
He had reached the palings, he was passing through. She raised herself, her last expiring energy went out in one agonized appeal:
"Your pardon—for my death-bed—Grantley—husband!"
He never turned, never paused—perhaps he did not hear—but walked steadily and firmly on.
Elizabeth looked up at the cold sky; the moon was partially hidden, the dawn was struggling up gray and chilled in the east, the wind moaned faintly among the graves, and rustled her garments like the stirring of a shroud; there she stood among the graves of her world, as utterly helpless and lost as if eternity swept between her and the past, and there she remained during some minutes that lengthened out like years, with the wind moaning around her and dead leaves crackling under her feet. She could see her old home through the naked trees, with the dull smoke curling in clouds above the chimneys, and the great trees sweeping their naked branches over it. Oh, how her heart yearned towards it, how wistfully her eyes watched all those signs of her forfeited life through the leafless grove and the drifting leaves!
"Can I help you, can I do anything?"
Elizabeth lifted her dreary eyes. It was North. The desolation of that poor woman smote him with remorse, his voice trembled with human pity.
"The money—you shall have part of that."
Elizabeth shook her head; she had no strength for resentment. All pride was crushed within her.
"Go," she said, "leave me here alone; I want nothing."
"But I cannot leave you so—I will not."
Elizabeth arose and stood upright among the graves.
"I am going somewhere—this way, I think. One cannot rest here, you know," she said, with a wan and most pathetic smile. "You and I have been too much in company—the world is wide—oh, misery, misery, how wide—but you can go that way and I the other. No one will ask for me."
Was the woman dropping into piteous insanity?
North thought so, and made another effort to arouse her, but she only entreated him to go away, and at last he went; afraid that the daylight would find him there.
Grantley Mellen turned back to the miserable grandeur of his home. The proud heart ached in his bosom. What if, from fear or weakness, Elizabeth did not return to the house? What if she remained there among the cold graves, or wandered off in terror of his wrath?
The graveyard was full half a mile from the spot where this thought struck him. He turned at once and went back, feeling how unmanly it was to leave the miserable creature stricken with such anguish, alone with that man. He remembered how her uncovered head had drooped under his denunciations in the moonlight, that the cold wind had lifted the waves of her hair and revealed the dead marble of a face in which all hope was quenched. Notwithstanding his wrongs, notwithstanding the ache at his heart, he would go back and take her home for that one night—only for that one night.
He walked rapidly towards the graveyard, more eager now to find Elizabeth than he had been to separate from her only a brief time before. He looked to the right and left in search of her, but the moon was obscured now by thin gray clouds, and a fog drifting up from the ocean was fast obliterating the crowd of golden stars that had been so brilliant when he went forth.
Mellen walked on, growing more and more anxious, till he came in sight of the graveyard, then he paused under a clump of cedars; for he saw his unhappy wife forcing her way, in desperate haste, through the broken pickets of the fence, with her face turned homewards. The gray woollen shawl was floating loosely around her, giving a weird ghostliness to her appearance.
Mellen turned and went back, sheltering himself under the cedar trees. When he saw that she was safe, a revulsion came upon his feelings; a sense of the wrong she had done him returned with bitter force, and when she passed along the outskirts of the cedars, making her way down the hill, he retreated deeper into the shadows, recoiling from contact with her.
"She will go home," he said, gloomily, "no one is more familiar with the paths through the woods. Thank heaven she does not know that I am weak enough to care for her safety! Let her reach the house first, we shall be less likely to meet."
With these thoughts in his mind he lingered in the cedars till Elizabeth was out of sight. The wind was dying away in low sobs now, smothered down by the fog, through which he could hear the moaning of the ocean afar off.
Mellen left the woods, and made the best of his way home, believing that his wife had already found a shelter there.
The house was dark and still as the grave when he entered it again. Instinctively he trod with caution along the halls and crept stealthily upstairs, for in the depths of his heart he was anxious to conceal Elizabeth's movements that night from the servants, and, above all, from Elsie. He paused and listened a moment in the square passage that led to her rooms, hoping to hear some movement by which he could be certain that she had reached home in safety. But there was no sound, and he turned away sighing, for compassion and the tender pity which every generous man feels for a fallen woman whom he has once loved, was turning the bitterness of his rage into intense pain.
Hearing nothing, and with vague uncertainty at his heart, the unhappy man entered his own dark chamber, threw off his clothes and flung himself into bed, wretched beyond any power of my pen to describe.
But he could not sleep, could not even rest, the very effort at repose drove him wild. He got up again, dressed himself and sat down by the open window, looking out into the darkness. All at once he started and leaned far out of the window. Was it fancy, or had some wailing voice pronounced his name? Something gray and weird seemed floating from his sight through the gathering fog. At first it had the form of a human being, then it seemed as if a pair of wings unfurled and swallowed it up. Was it his wife? Could that winglike envelopment be her gray woollen shawl, tossed by the wind? Had her voice been engulfed in the far-off moan of the ocean? In this dreary state the unhappy and most wronged man remained all the rest of that gloomy night.