"Good-by!" In the starlight she turns deathly white.
"Yes," he responded cheerily; "good-by; and as our lives lie so widely apart in all probability, this time forever. I shall certainly return here at Christmas, but you may have gone before that. To-morrow morning I start for St. Louis, where a branch of our house is established, and where I am permanently to remain. It is an excellent opening for me—my salary has been largely advanced, and I am happy to say the firm think me competent and trustworthy. I return, as I said, at Christmas; after that it becomes my permanent home. You know, of course," he says with a laugh, "why I return—Trix has told you?"
So completely has she forgotten Trix, so wholly have her thoughts been of him, that she absolutely does not remember to what he alludes.
"Trix has told me nothing," she manages to answer, and she wonders at herself to find how steady is her own voice.
"No?" Charley says, elevating his eyebrows; "and they say the age of wonders is over! Trix in the new roll of keeping her own secrets! Well, I very naturally return forthewedding—ourwedding. It's extraordinary that Trix hasn't told you, but she will. Then—my Western home will be ready by that time, and we go back immediately. My mother goes with me, I need hardly say."
Still so absolutely wrapped up in her thoughts ofhim, so utterly forgetful of Trix, that she does not understand.Ourwedding—he means his own and Nellie Seton's of course. His Western home, the home where she will reign as his wife. In the days that have gone, Edith thinks she has suffered—she feels to-night that she has never suffered until now! She deserves it, but if he had only spared her,—only left it for some one else to tell. It is a minute before she can reply—then, despite every effort, her voice is husky:
"I wish you joy, Charley—with all my heart"
She cannot say one word more. Something in the words, in her manner of saying them, makes him look at her in surprise.
"Well, yes," he answers coolly; "a wedding in a family is, I believe, a general subject of congratulation. And I must say she has shown herself a trump—the bravest, best girl alive. And you"—they are drawing near a hotel—"may I venture to ask your plans, Lady Catheron? how long do you think of remaining in New York?"
"I shall leave at once—at once," she replied in the same husky tone. To stay and meet Nellie Seton after to-night is more than she is able to do. They are close to the hotel now. Involuntarily—unconsciously, she clings to his arm, as the drowning may cling to a straw. She feels in a dull, agonized sort of way that in five minutes the waters will have closed over her head, and the story of her life have come to an end.
"Here we are," his frank, cheery voice says—his voice, that has yet a deeper, more earnest tone than of old. "You don't know, Edith, how glad I am of this meeting—how glad to hear you never in any way blamedme."
"I blame you! oh, Charley!" she says with a passionate little cry.
"I rejoice to hear, that with all its drawbacks, you don't regret the past. I rejoice in the knowledge that you are rich and happy, and that a long, bright life lies before you. Edith," he takes both her hands in his strong, cordial clasp, "if we never meet again, God bless you, and good-by."
She lifts her eyes to his, full of dumb, speechless agony. In that instant he knows the truth—knows that Edith loves him—that the heart he would once have laid down his life almost to win, is his wholly at last!
The revelation comes upon him like a flash—like a blow. He stands holding her hands, looking at her, at the mute, infinite misery in her eyes. Someone jostles them in passing, and turns and stares. It dawns upon him that they are in the public street, and making a scene.
"Good-by," he says hastily once more, and drops the hands, and turns and goes.
She stands like a statue where he has left her—he turns a corner, the last sound of his footsteps dies away, and Edith feels that he has gone out of her life—out of the whole world.
Miss Nellie Seton came early next morning to see her friend, Mr. Charley Stuart, off. He is looking rather pale as he bids them good-by—the vision of Edith's eyes upturned to his, full of mute, impassionate appeal, have haunted him all night long. They haunt him now, long after the last good-by had been said, and the train is sweeping away Westward. Edith loves him at last. At last? there has never been a time when he doubted it, but now he knows he has but to say the word, and she will lay her hand in his, and toil, and parting, and separation will end between them forever. But he will never, say that word—what Edith Darrell in her ambition once refused, all Lady Catheron's wealth and beauty cannot win. He feels he could as easily leap from the car window and end it all, as ask Sir Victor Catheron's richly dowered widow to be his wife. She made her choice three years ago—she must abide by that choice her life long.
"And then," he thinks rather doggedly, "this fancy of mine may be only fancy. The leopard cannot change his spots, and an ambitious, mercenary woman cannot change her nature. And, as a rule, ladies of wealth and titledon'tthrow themselves away on impecunious dry goods clerks. No! I made an egregious ass of myself once, and once is quite enough. We have turned over a new leaf, and are not going back at this late day to the old ones. With her youth, her fortune, and her beauty, Edith can return to England and make a brilliant second marriage."
And then Mr. Stuart sets his lips behind his brown mustache, and unfolds the morning paper, smelling damp and nasty of printer's ink, and immerses himself, fathoms deep, in mercantile news and the doings of the Stock Exchange.
He reaches St Louis in safety, and resumes the labor of his life. He has no time to think—no time to be sentimental, if he wished to be, which he doesn't.
"Love is of man's life a thing apart," sings a poet, who knew what he was talking about. His heart is not in the least broken, nor likely to be; there is no time in his busy, mercantile life, for that sort of thing, I repeat. He goes to work with a will, and astonishes even himself by his energy and brisk business capacity. If he thinks of Edith at all, amid his dry-as-dust ledgers and blotters, his buying and selling, it is that she is probably on the ocean by this time—having bidden her native land, likeChilde Harold, "One long, one last, good-night." And then, in the midst of it all, Trixy's first letter arrives.
It is all Edith, from beginning to end. Edith has not gone, she is still in New York, but her passage is taken, and she will leave next week. "And Charley," says Trix, "don't be angry now, but do you know, though Edith Darrell always liked you, I fancy Lady Catheron likes you even better. Not that she ever says anything; bless you! she is as proud as ever; but we women can tell. And last night she told ma and me the story of her past, of her married life—or rather herun-married life—of her separation from Sir Victor on their wedding-day—think of it, Charley!on their wedding-day. If ever anyone in this world was to be pitied, it was he—poor fellow! And she was not to blame—neither could have acted other than they did, that I can see. Poor Edith! poor Sir Victor! I will tell you all when we meet. She leaves next Tuesday, and it half breaks my heart to see her go. Oh, Charley! Charley!whyneed she go at all?"
He reads this letter as he smokes his cigar—very gravely, very thoughtfully, wondering a great deal, but not in the least moved from his steadfast purpose. Parted on their wedding-day! he has heard that before, but hardly credited it. It is true then—odd that; and neither to be blamed—odder still. She has only been Sir Victor's wife in name, then, after all. But it makes no difference to him—nothing does—all that is past and done—she flung him off once—he will never go back now. Their paths lie apart—hers over the hills of life, his in the dingy valleys—they have said good-by, and it means forever.
He goes back to his ledgers and his counting-room, and four more days pass. On the evening of the fourth day, as he leaves the store for the night, a small boy from the telegraph office waylays him, and hands him one of the well-known buff envelopes. He breaks it open where he stands, and read this:
"NEW YORK, Oct. 28, '70. "Charley: Edith is lying dangerously ill—dying. Come back at once. BEATRIX."
He reads, and the truth does not come to him—he reads it again.Edith is dying. And then a grayish pallor comes over his face, from brow to chin, and he stands for a moment, staring vacantly at the paper he holds, seeing nothing—hearing nothing but these words: "Edith is dying." In that moment he knows that all his imaginary hardness and indifference have been hollow and false—a wall of pride that crumbles at a touch, and the old love, stronger than life, stronger than death, fills his heart still. He has left her, and—Edith is dying! He looks at his watch. There is an Eastward-bound train in half an hour—there will be barely time to catch it. He does not return to his boarding house—he calls a passing Mack, and is driven to the depot just in time. He makes no pause from that hour—he travels night and day. What is business; what the prospects of all his future life; what is the whole world now? Edith is dying.
He reaches New York at last. It seems like a century since that telegram came, and haggard and worn, in the twilight of the autumn day, he stands at last in his mother's home.
Trix is there—they expect him to-night, and she has waited to receive him. She looks in his face once, then turns away and covers her own, and bursts into a woman's tempest of tears.
"I—I am too late," he says in a hoarse sort of whisper.
"No," Trix answers, looking up; "not too late. She is alive still—I can say no more."
"What is it?" he asks.
"It is almost impossible to say. Typhoid fever, one doctor says, andcerebro spinal meningitissays the other. It doesn't much matter what it is, since both agree in this—that she is dying."
Her sobs breaks forth again. He sits and gazes at her like a stone.
"There is no hope?"
"While there is life there is hope." But it is in a very dreary voice that Trix repeats this aphorism: "and—the worst of it is, she doesn't seem to care. Charley, I believe she wants to die, is glad to die. She seems to have nothing to care for—nothing to live for. 'My life has been all a mistake,' she said to me the other day. 'I have gone wrong from first to last, led astray by my vanity, and selfishness, and ambition. It is much better that I should die, and make an end of it all.' She has made her will, Charley—she made it in the first days of her illness, and—she has left almost everything to you."
He makes no reply. He sits motionless in the twilit window, looking down at the noisy, bustling street.
"She has remembered me most generously," Trix goes softly on; "poor, darling Edith! but she has left almost all to you. 'It would have been an insult to offer anything in my lifetime,' she said to me; 'but the wishes of the dead are sacred,—he will not be able to refuse itthen. And tell him not to grieve for me, Trixy—I never made him anything but trouble, and disappointment, and wretchedness. I am sorry—sorry now, and my last wish and prayer will be for the happiness of his life.' When she is delirious, and she mostly is as night draws on, she calls for you incessantly—asking you to come back—begging, you to forgive her. That is why I sent."
"Does she know you sent?" he asks.
"No—it was her desire you should not be told until—until all was over," Trix answered with another burst of tears; "but Icouldn'tdo that. She says we are to bury her at Sandypoint, beside her mother—not send her body to England. She told me, when she was dead, to tell you the story of her separation from Sir Victor. Shall I tell it to you now, Charley?"
He makes a motion of assent; and Trix begins, in a broken voice, and tells him the sad, strange story of the two Sir Victors, father and son, and of Edith's life from her wedding-day. The twilight deepens into darkness, the room is wrapped in shadow long before she has finished. He never stirs, he never speaks, he sits and listens to the end. Then there is a pause, and out of the gloom he speaks at last:
"May I see her, and when?"
"As soon as you come, the doctors say; they refuse her nothing now, and they think your presence may do her good,—if anything can do it. Mother is with her and Nellie; Nellie has been her best friend and nurse; Nellie has never left her, and Charley," hesitatingly, for something in his manner awes Trix, "I believe she thinks you and Nellie are engaged."
"Stop!" he says imperiously, and Trixy rises with a sigh and puts on her hat and shawl. Five minutes later they are in the street, on their way to Lady Catheron's hotel.
One of the medical men is in the sick-room when Miss Stuart enters it, and she tells him in a whisper that her brother has come, and is waiting without.
His patient lies very low to-night—delirious at times, and sinking, it seems to him, fast. She is in a restless, fevered sleep at present, and he stands looking at her with a very sombre look on his professional face. In spite of his skill, and he is very skilful, this case baffles him. The patient's own utter indifference, as to whether she lives or dies, being one of the hardest things he has to combat. If she only longed for life, and strove to recruit—if, like Mrs. Dombey, she would, "only make an effort." But she will not, and the flame flickers, and flickers, and very soon will go out altogether.
"Let him come in," the doctor says. "He can do no harm—he may possibly do some good."
"Will she know him when she awakes?" Trix whispers.
He nods and turns away to where Miss Seton stands in the distance, and Trix goes and fetches her brother in. He advances slowly, almost reluctantly it would seem, and looks down at the wan, drawn, thin face that rests there, whiter than the pillows. Great Heaven! and this—thisis Edith! He sinks into a chair by the bedside, and takes her wan, transparent hand in both his own, with a sort of groan. The light touch awakes her, the faint eyelids quiver, the large, dark eyes open and fix on his face. The lips flutter breathlessly apart. "Charley!" they whisper in glad surprise; and over the death-like face there flashes for a second an electric light of great amaze and joy.
"Humph!" says the doctor, with a surprised grunt; "I thought it would do her no harm. If we leave them alone for a few minutes, my dear young ladies, it will dousno harm either. Mind, my young gentleman," he taps Charley on the shoulder, "my patient is not to excite herself talking."
They softly go out. It would appear the doctor need not have warned him; they don't seem inclined to talk. She lies and looks at him, delight in her eyes, and draws a long, long breath of great content. For him, he holds her wasted hand a little tighter, and lays his face down on the pillow, and does not speak a word.
So the minutes pass.
"Charley," she says at last, in a faint, little whisper, "what a surprise this is. They did not tell me you were coming. Who sent for you? When did you come?"
"You're not to talk, Edith," he answers, lifting his haggard face for a moment—poor Charley! "Trix sent for me." Then he lays it down again.
"Foolish boy!" Edith says with shining eyes; "I do believe you are crying. You don't hate me, then, after all, Charley?"
"Hate you!" he can but just repeat.
"You once said you did, you know; and I deserved it. But I have not been happy, Charley—I have been punished as I merited. Now it is all over, and it is better so—I never was of any use in the world, and never would be. You will let me atone a little for the past in the only way I can. Trix will tell you. And, by and by, when you are quite happy, and she is your wife—"
The faint voice breaks, and she turns her face away. Even in death it is bitterer than death to give him up.
He lifts his head, and looks at her.
"When she is my wife? whenwhois my wife?" he asks.
"Nellie—you know," she whispers; "she is worthy of you, Charley—indeed she is, and I never was. And she loves you, and will make you hap—"
"Stop!" he says suddenly; "you are making some strange mistake, Edith. Nellie cares for me, as Trix does, and Trix is not more a sister to me than Nellie. For the rest—do you remember what I said to you that night at Killarney?"
Her lips tremble—her eyes watch him, her weak fingers close tightly over his. Remember! does shenot?
"I said—'I will love you all my life!' I have kept my word, and mean to keep it. If I may not call you wife, I will never call, by that name, any other woman. No one in this world can ever be to me again, what you were and are."
There is another pause, but the dark, uplifted eyes are radiant now.
"At last! at last!" she breathes; "when it is too late. Oh, Charley! If the past might only come over again, how different it all would be. I think"—she says this with a weak little laugh, that reminds him of the Edith of old—"I think I could sleep more happily even in my grave—if 'Edith Stuart' were carved on my tombstone!"
His eyes never leave her face—they light up in their dreary sadness now at these words.
"Do you mean that, Edith?" he says bending over her; "living or dying, would it make you any happier to be my wife?"
Her eyes, her face, answer him. "But it is too late," the pale lips sigh.
"It is never too late," he says quietly; "we will be married to-night."
"Charley?"
"You are not to talk," he tells her, kissing her softly and for the first time; "I will arrange it all. I will go for a clergyman I know, and explain everything. Oh, darling! you should have been my wife long ago—you shall be my wife at last, in spite of death itself."
Then he leaves her, and goes out. And Edith closes her eyes, and lies still, and knows that never in all the years that are gone has such perfect bliss been hers before. In death, at least, if not life, she will be Charley's wife.
He tells them very quietly, very resolutely—her father who is there from Sandypoint, his mother, sister, Nellie, the doctor.
They listen in wordless wonder; but what can they say?
"The excitement will finish her—mark my words," is the doctor's verdict; "I will never countenance any such melodramatic proceeding."
But his countenance does not matter it seems. The laws of the Medes were not more fixed than this marriage. The clergyman comes, a very old friend of the family, and Charley explains all to him. He listens with quiet gravity—in his experience a death-bed marriage is not at all an unprecedented occurrence. The hour fixed is ten, and Trixy and Nellie go in to make the few possible preparations.
The sick girl lifts two wistful eyes to the gentle face of Nellie Seton. It is very pale, but she stoops and kisses her with her own sweet smile.
"You will live now forhissake," she whispers in that kiss.
They decorate the room and the bed with flowers, they brush away the dark soft hair, they array her in a dainty embroidered night-robe, and prop her up with pillows. There is the fever fire on her wan cheeks, the fever fire in her shining eyes. But she is unutterably happy—you have but to look into her face to see that. Death is forgotten in her new bliss.
The bridegroom comes in, pale and unsmiling—worn and haggard beyond the power of words to tell. Trix, weeping incessantly, stands near, her mother and Mr. Darrell are at one side of the bed. Nellie is bridesmaid. What a strange, sad, solemn wedding it is! The clergyman takes out his book and begins—bride and bridegroom clasp hands, her radiant eyes never leave his face. Her faint replies flutter on her lips—there is an indescribable sadness in his. The ring is on her finger—at last she is what she should have been from the first—Charley's wife.
He bends forward and takes her in his arms. With all her dying strength she lifts herself to his embrace. It is a last expiring effort—her weak clasp relaxes, there is one faint gasp. Her head falls heavily upon his breast—there is a despairing cry from the women, cold and lifeless, Charley Stuart lays his bride of a moment back among the pillows—whether dead or in a dead swoon no one there can tell.
At first they thought her dead—but it was not death. She awoke from that long, death-like swoon as morning broke—so near unto death that it seemed the turning of a hair might weigh down the scale. And so for days after it was—for weary miserable days and nights. The great reaction after the great excitement had come, all consciousness left her, she lay white and still, scarcely moving, scarcely breathing. The one beloved voice fell as powerless on her dulled ears now as all others, the dim, almost lifeless eyes, that opened at rare intervals, were blank to the whole world. She lay in a species of stupor, or coma, from which it was something more than doubtful if she ever would awake. The few spoonfuls of beef-tea and brandy and water she took they forced between her clenched teeth, and in that darkened room of the great hotel, strangely, solemnly quiet, Life and Death fought their sharp battle over her unconscious head.
And for those who loved her, her father, her friends, and one other, nearer and dearer than father or friend, how went those darkest days forthem? They could hardly have told—all their after life they looked back, with a sick shudder, to that week.
For Charley Stuart he never wanted to look back—never to the last day of his life will he be able to recall, to realize the agony of those six days—days that changed his whole nature—his whole life.
They watched with her unceasingly—death might come at any moment. There were times when they bent above her, holding their own breath, sure that the faint thread had already snapped—times when they held a mirror to her lips to be sure she breathed at all. For her new-made husband, he never left her except when nature succumbed to the exhaustion of ceaseless vigil, and they forced him away. He forgot to eat or sleep, he sat tearless and still as stone by the bedside, almost as bloodless, almost as wan and hollow-eyed as the dying bride herself. The doctors stood gloomily silent, their skill falling powerless here.
"She needed only the excitement of this most preposterous marriage to finish her," one of them growled; "I said so at the time—I say so now. She had one chance for life—perfect quiet—and that destroyed it."
On the fourth day, a letter from England, in a woman's hand, and deeply bordered with black, arrived. Edith, in the first days of her illness, had told Trix to open all her letters. She would have passed the power over to her brother now, but he waved it away impatiently. What did it matter whom it was from—what it contained—what did anything matter now?
His haggard eyes went silently back to the marble face lying among its pillows, so awfully still.
Trixy opened and read it. It was from Inez Catheron, and announced the death of her aunt, the Lady Helena Powyss.
* * * * *
"Her end was perfect peace," said the letter; "and in her will, she has left her large fortune divided equally between you and me. If possible it would be well for you to return to England as speedily as may be. If wealth can make you happy—and I hope at least it will aid—my dearest Edith, you will have it. For me, I join a charitable Sisterhood here in London, and will try to devote the remainder of my life to the relief of my suffering and poor fellow-creatures. As to the rest, if you care at all to know, my brother reigns at Catheron Royals now! He is, in all respects, a changed man, and will not, I think, be an unworthy successor of him who is gone. His wife and children are all that can be desired.
"Farewell, my dear cousin. When you return to London come to the enclosed address, and see me. No one will welcome you more gladly than,
* * * * *
So another large fortune had been left Edith—she was rich now beyond her wildest dreams. Rich! And yonder she lay, and all the gold of earth, powerless to add a second to her life. What a satire it seemed. Youth, beauty, and boundless wealth were hers and all were vain—vain!
The seventh night brought the crisis.
"This can hold out no longer," the physician said; "before morning we will know the end, whether it is to be life or death."
"Then—there is hope yet?" Trix breathed, with clasped hands.
He looked at her gloomily and turned away, the meaningless formula on his lips:
"While there is life there is hope."
"It will be little less than a miracle if she lives, though," the other added; "and the days of miracles are over. Hope if you like—but—"
"You had better not lethimsit up to-night," said the first physician, looking compassionately at Charley; "he won't be able to stand it. He is worn out now, poor fellow, and looks fit for a sick-bed himself."
"He knows it is the crisis," Trixy answered; "he won't go."
"He has watched the last two nights," Miss Seton, interposed: "hemustgo, doctor; leave me an opiate—I will administer it. If—if the worst comes, it will be but a moment's work to arouse him."
The doctor obeyed.
"I will return at day dawn," he said, "if she be still alive. If not—send me word."
The twilight was falling. Solemn and shadowy it crept into the sombre, silent room. They went back to the bedside, pale and tearless; they had wept, it seemed, until they could weep no more. This last night the two girls were to watch alone.
She lay before them. Dead and in her shroud she would never look more awfully death-like than now. He sat beside her—ah, poor Charley! in a sort of dull stupor of misery, utterly worn out. The sharp pain seemed over—the long, dark watches, when his passionate prayers had ascended for that dear life, wild and rebellious it may be, when he had wrestled with an agony more bitter than death, had left their impress on his life forever. He could not let her go—he could not! "O God!" was the ceaseless cry of his soul, "have mercy—spare!"
Nellie Seton's cool, soft hands fell lightly on his head—Nellie's soft, gentle voice spoke:
"Charley, you are to leave us for a little, and lie down. You must have some rest, be it ever so short; and you have had nothing to eat, I believe all day; you will let me prepare something, and take it, and go to your room."
She spoke to him coaxingly, almost as she might to a child. He lifted his eyes, full of dull, infinite misery, to hers.
"To-night?" he answered: "the last night! I will not go."
"Only for an hour then," she pleaded; "there will be no change. Formysake, Charley!"
All her goodness, all her patience, came back to him. He pressed her hand in his own gratefully, and arose.
"For your sake, Nellie, then—for no other. But you promise to call me if there is the slightest change?"
"I promise. Drink this and go."
She gave him a glass of mulled wine, containing the opiate. He drank it and left the room. They listened breathlessly until they heard his door, further down the passage, open and shut—then both drew a deep breath.
"Thank Heaven," Trix said; "I couldn't bear to see him here to-night.Nellie, if she dies it will kill him—just that."
The girl's lips quivered. What Charley had been to her—how wholly her great, generous, loving heart had gone out to him, not even Trix ever knew. The dream of her life's best bliss was at an end forever. Whether Edith Stuart lived or died, no other woman would ever take her place in his heart.
The hours of the night wore on. Oh! those solemn night watches by the dying bed of those we love. The faint lamp flickers, deepest stillness reigns, and on his bed, dressed as he was, Charley lies deeply, dreamlessly asleep.
It was broad day when he awoke—the dawn of a cloudless November day. He sat up in bed suddenly, for a moment, bewildered, and stared before him. Only for a moment—then he remembered all. The night had passed, the morning come. They had let him sleep—it seemed hecouldsleep while she lay dying so near. Dying! Who was to tell him that in yonder distant room Edith was not lying dead. He rose up, reeling like a drunken man, and made for the door. He opened it, and went out, down the passage. It was entirely deserted, the great household was not yet astir. Profound stillness reigned. Through the windows he could see the bright morning sky, all flushed, red and golden with the first radiance of the rising sun. And in that room there what lay—death or life?
He stood suddenly still, and looked at the closed door. He stood there motionless, his eyes fixed upon it, unable to advance another step.
It opened abruptly—quickly but noiselessly, and Nellie Seton's pale, tired face looked out. At sight of him she came forward—he asked no questions—his eyes looked at her full of a dumb agony of questioning she never forgot.
"Charley!" she exclaimed, coming nearer.
The first ray of the rising sun streaming through the windows fell full upon her pale face, and it was as the face of an angel.
"Charley!" she repeated, with a great tearless sob, holding out both hands; "Oh, bless God! the doctor says we may—hope!"
He had braced himself to hear the worst—not this. He made one step forward and fell at her feet like a stone.
They might hope? The night had passed, the morning had come, and she still lived.
You would hardly have thought so to look at her as she lay, deathly white, deathly still. But as the day broke she had awakened from a long sleep, the most natural and refreshing she had known for weeks, and looked up into the pale anxious face of Trix with the faint shadow of a smile. Then the eyelids swayed and closed in sleep once more, but she had recognized Trix for the first time in days—the crisis was over and hope had come.
They would not let her see him. Only while she slept would they allow him now to enter her room. But it was easily borne—Edith was not to die, and Heaven and his own grateful happy heart only knew how infinitely blessed he was in that knowledge. After the long bitter night—after the darkness and the pain, light and morning had come. Edith would live—all was said in that.
"There are some remedies that are either kill or cure in their action," the old doctor said, giving Charley a facetious poke. "Your marriage was one of them, young man.Ithought it was Kill—it turns out it was Cure."
For many days no memory of the past returned to her, her existence was as the existence of a new-born babe, spent alternately in taking food and sleep. Food she took with eager avidity after her long starvation, and then sank back again into profound, refreshing slumber.
"Let her sleep," said the doctor, with a complacent nod; "the more the better. It's Nature's way of repairing damages."
There came a day at last when thought and recollection began to struggle back—when she had strength to lie awake and think. More than once Trix caught the dark eyes fixed in silent wistfulness upon her—a question in them her lips would not ask. But Miss Stuart guessed it, and one day spoke:
"What is it, Dithy?" she said; "you look as if you wanted to say something, you know."
"How—how long have I been sick?" was Edith's question.
"Nearly five weeks, and an awful life you've led us, I can tell you! Look at me—worn to skin and bone. What do you suppose you will have to say for yourself when Angus comes?"
Edith smiled faintly, but her eyes still kept their wistful look.
"I suppose I was delirious part of the time, Trixy?"
"Stark, staring crazy—raving like a lunatic at full moon! But you needn't look so concerned about it—we've changed all that. You'll do now."
"Yes," she said it with a sigh; "you have all been very kind. I suppose it's only a fancy of the fever after all."
"What?"
"I—Trixy! don't laugh at me, but I thought Charley was here."
"Did you?" responded Trix; "the most natural thing in life. Heishere."
Her eyes lighted—her lips parted—a question trembled upon them, but she hesitated.
"Go on," said Miss Stuart, enjoying it all; "there's something else on your mind. Speak up, Edie! don't be ashamed of yourself."
"I am afraid youwilllaugh this time, Trixy—I know it is only a dream, but I thought Charley and I were—"
"Yes," said Trixy; "were—what?"
"Married, then!" with a faint little laugh. "Don't tell him, please, but it seems—it seems so real, I had to tell you."
She turned her face away. And Trixy, with suspicious dimness in her eyes, stooped down and kissed that thin, wan face.
"You poor little Dithy!" she said; "youdolike Charley, don't you? no, it's not a dream—you were married nearly a fortnight ago. The hope of my life is realized—you are my sister, and Charley's wife!"
There was a little panting cry—then she covered her face with her hands and lay still.
"He is outside," went on Trix; "you don't know what a good boy he has been—so patient—and all that. He deserves some reward. I think if you had died he would have died too—Lord Lovel and Lady Nancy, over again. Not that I much believe in broken hearts where men are concerned, either," pursued Trix, growing, cynical; "but this seems an exceptional case. He's awfully fond of you, Dithy; 'pon my word he is. I only hope Angus may go off in a dead faint the first time I'm sick and get better, as he did the other day. We haven't let him in much lately, for fear of agitating you, but I think," says Trixy, with twinkling eyes, "you could stand it now—couldn't you, Mrs. Stuart?"
She did not wait for a reply—she went out and hunted up Charley. He was smoking downstairs, and trying to read the morning paper.
"Your wife wants you," said Miss Stuart brusquely; "go! only mind this—don't stay too long, and don't talk too much."
He started to his feet—away wentTribuneand cigar, and up the stairs sprang Charley—half a dozen at a time.
And then Miss Stuart sits down, throws her handkerchief over her face, and for the next five minutes indulges in the exclusively feminine luxury of a real good cry.
* * * * *
After that Mrs. Charles Stuart's recovery was perfectly magical in its rapidity. Youth and splendid vitality, no doubt, had something to do with it, but I think the fact that shewasMrs. Charles Stuart had more to do still.
There came a day, when propped up with pillows, she could sit erect, and talk, and be talked to as much as she chose, when blinds were pulled up, and sunshine poured in; and no sunshine that ever shone was half so bright as her happy face. There came still another day, when robed in a pretty pink morning-dress, Charley lifted her in his arms and carried her to the arm-chair by the window, whence she could look down on the bright, busy city street, whilst he sat at her feet and talked. Talked! who is to tell of what? "Two souls with but a single thought—two hearts that beat as one," generally find enough to say for themselves, I notice, and require the aid of no outsiders.
And there came still another day—a fortnight after, when looking pale and sweet, in a dark-gray travelling suit and hat, Mrs. Charles Stuart, leaning on her husband's arm, said good-by to her friends, and started on her bridal tour. They were to spend the next three weeks South, and then return for Trixy's wedding at Christmas.
Christmas came; merry Christmas, sparkling with snow and sunshine, as Christmas ever should sparkle, and bringing that gallant ex-officer of Scotch Grays, Captain Angus Hammond—captain no longer—plain Mr. Hammond, done with drilling and duty, and getting the route forever, going in for quiet, country life in bonnie Scotland, with Miss Beatrix Stuart for aider and abettor.
Charley and his wife came to New York for the wedding. They had told Mr. Hammond how ill Edith had been, but the young Scotchman, as he pulled his ginger whiskers and stared in her radiant, blooming face, found it difficult indeed to realize. She had been a pretty girl—a handsome woman—happiness had made her more—she was lovely now. For Charley—outwardly all his easy insouciance had returned—he submitted to be idolized and made much of by his wife, after the calm fashion of lordly man. But you had only to see him look once into her beautiful, laughing face, to know how passionately she was beloved.
Mr. and Mrs. Angus Hammond had a splendid wedding; and to say our Trixy looked charming would be doing her no sort of justice. And again Miss Seton was first bridesmaid, and Mrs. Stuart, in lavender silk, sniffed behind a fifty dollar pocket handkerchief, as in duty bound. They departed immediately after the ceremony for Scotland and a Continental tour—that very tour which, as you know, Trixy was cheated so cruelly out of three years before.
Mr. and Mrs. Stuart went back South to finish the winter and the honeymoon among the glades of Florida, and "do," as Charley said, "Love among the Roses." Mr. Darrell returned to Sandypoint. Mrs. Stuart, senior, took up her abode with Nellie Seton, pending such time as her children should get over the first delirium of matrimonial bliss and settle quietly down to housekeeping. After that it was fixed that she was to divide her time equally between them, six months with each. Charley and his wife would make England their home; Edith's ample fortune lay there, and both loved the fair old land.
In May they sailed for England. They would spend the whole of the summer in Continental travelling—the pleasant rambling life suited them well. But they went down to Cheshire first; and one soft May afternoon stood side by side in the old Gothic church where the Catherons for generations had been buried. The mellow light came softly through the painted windows—up in the organ loft, a young girl sat playing to herself soft, sweet, solemn melodies. And both hearts bowed down in tender sadness as they stood beforeonetomb, the last erected within those walls, that of Sir Victor Catheron. Edith pulled her veil over her face—the only tears that had filled her eyes since her second wedding-day falling quietly now.
There were many remembrances of the dead man. A beautiful memorial window, a sombre hatchment, and a monument of snow-white marble. It was very simple—it represented only a broken shaft, and beneath in gold letters this inscription:
SACRED TO THE MEMORY OFSIR VICTOR CATHERON, of Catheron Royals, Bart.DIED OCT. 3, 1867, in the 24th year of his age."His sun set while it was yet day."