What if at last the long anguish had destroyed the fair mind? What if a dull horror was to swamp their hopes for ever? If—if—She dared not look this last woe in the face. Impulsively she pressed on, her trembling limbs endowed with a new strength, her young heart breathing out its resolves upon the night: "I will save her—I. Great God, in Thy mercy help me."
She had come to a turn in the road. Rounding it, she made an eager bound forward, for there through the darkness she could distinguish at last the outlines of Margaret's form.
Pressing her hands to her head, Adèle tried to think. Ifonly the old nurse had been with her, or their landlady! How was she to act? how in her single strength to arrest and bring back the fugitive?
Yet there was something in Margaret's gliding movement which made the girl think rather of somnambulism than of delirium. If this should be the cause of her flight Adèle knew that a sudden awakening might possibly be dangerous to health or reason.
Struggling with her terror, trying to come to some right conclusion, she at last reached her friend. Close by was a little path which Adèle and Margaret know well. It led off from the road, through a wilderness of stunted grass and tangled weeds, to the sea.
Here Margaret paused a moment, as if in hesitation. During that moment's pause Adèle looked at her fixedly. The young girl's last suspicion had been true. By the wide-open, sightless eyes, by the groping of the hands, by the soft, continuous murmuring of the lips, she saw her friend was asleep.
Straining her ears, she distinguished through the moaning wind and sobbing sea some of the words that were falling from Margaret's lips. "Which way?" And then groping forward, with that blind, pitiful movement of the hands, "To the sea? Cold, so cold, but," with a smile that made Adèle weep, "Maurice is there."
As she spoke, Margaret turned into the winding path, and Adèle shivered. What awful dream was bewildering her brain?
Throwing her arm gently round the sleeper, she tried to draw her back to the road.
"Maurice is here," she said in a tone as dreamy as her own; "come."
To her intense relief, Margaret obeyed her guidance, the shore was left behind, they were passing on to their quiet home; but the relief was transient. Scarcely had they lost sight of the sea before Margaret stopped—the bewildered look returned to her face—there began that dark, dreary groping of the hands. "I have lost him," she cried in a voice pitiful as a child's wail, and turning once more she pressed forward to the sands with a swift-gliding step. What could the younggirl do? In her powerlessness the tears rolled down her face.
Her arms were still round her friend, but she did not dare to constrain her. "Margaret," she whispered pleadingly, her lips close to her friend's ear.
Quietly Margaret turned her pale face, over which a strange, sweet smile was beaming. "Coming, my beloved," she answered softly.
They had left the grass and tangled weeds behind them; they were treading the soft yellow sands; behind them was the warm earth, touched by the light of a young crescent moon, set like a silver bow in the parting clouds; before them, dark and hungry, roaring evermore like a monster chained, lay the awful sea.
Adèle groaned. If indeed a conflict were before them, she wished it had taken place above, while those terrible waters were comparatively distant, and Margaret was now pressing forward as thoughtheywere her goal. "Margaret, my darling! for pity's sake awake!" she cried in her desperation.
But Margaret only answered the voice of her dream. Again came that strange, sweet smile—again her lips moved: "Coming, Maurice, coming." Then, as Adèle with all her force tried to drag her back to the path, "Patience, my beloved!" and as she spoke the young girl felt in her quiet resistance the strength of madness.
Lifting up her heart in a passionate prayer for help to the one Being who seems in these awful moments near and real to weak humanity, Adèle made another effort. "Margaret!" she cried, and the ring of her young voice sounded clear above the tumult of wind and waves—"Margaret, listen to me."
Had she been understood at last? Was the terrible moment over? Certainly her voice had pierced the films of sleep. Into the fixed eyes came a sudden meaning. Margaret shivered, and pausing in her mad flight looked before her wildly. But not yet was the danger over—rather it was prolonged and intensified. The quiet somnambulism had given place to the worst kind of delirium.
With a shriek Margaret threw her hands above her head and tore herself free from the detaining grasp. "Maurice!"she cried in the strange exaltation of this madness. "I saw him there—they shall keep me from him no longer. Beloved, wait for me; I am coming."
One despairing glance Adèle threw around her; no human being was in sight; she felt numb and powerless, while the frail being, the faint pulsations of whose ebbing life they had been watching through those anxious nights and days, seemed endowed suddenly with a giant's strength. Sobbing convulsively, Adèle threw herself upon Margaret, and seizing her by the waist dragged her backward with all her remaining strength. A moment of struggle; then she felt herself being borne along the sands, her arms still round Margaret, but all her weight as nothing in comparison with this fierce energy of disease. Cooler and damper blew the wind, nearer and nearer came the sound of beating waves; at last the light foam began to sprinkle their faces; yet the faithful girl would not loosen her grasp—rather she would die with her friend.
A moment, and memory, grown acute in the death-agony, showed her pleasant scenes and soft home-pictures, children's faces, blazing fires, fair poetic dreams of beauty and use, Arthur and the to-come which was to have been so bright,—all to pass away for ever in the pitiless suction of those on-creeping waves.
Another moment, and she felt the crawling foam about her; a wave fell thundering even at their feet, throwing over them its cold salt spray; and the young girl moaned. There would still be time to escape, to return to life and its warm beauty. Would she draw back? A thousand times no. In the numbing of every faculty, in the passing away of every joy, that grasp of the slender arms grew only the mightier. She would save her friend if she could. If not, all she had left was to die with her. Like a black cloud that wave hung over them. What delayed its onward sweep? Adèle used to say afterward that it was a miracle, for if it had fallen they were lost, beyond the possibility of salvation.
But while they stood, their feet in the foam and that ominous cloud above them—for Margaret's impetuous rushing had ceased, and Adèle lacked power to drag her backward—there was a shout, a cry. Another of those long moments, and a strong arm was extended; they were drawn on to thedry sands, and even as they stood there shivering the mighty wave fell, sucking back into the watery waste that lay beyond the treacherous foam where their feet had been. Margaret fell back unconscious, while Adèle for the moment scarcely thought either of her or their preserver.
As she felt the solid ground beneath her feet and the cool air around her she fell on her knees. "Saved, saved!" she cried, and the labored hysteric sobs showed how terrible her excitement had been.
But then came other thoughts. Had they escaped the sea only to meet worse dangers? Who was this deliverer? She turned round to look at him. By the light of the moon, which still struggled through the clouds, she was able to see his face. There was about it a wildness that seemed to confirm her worst fears, and his arms were about Margaret—he was gazing into her face.
She did not seem to be aware of it. She was all but inanimate, for, although not alive to the terrible danger of her situation, Margaret had been exhausted by the struggle.
The sight aroused Adèle. Though her knees were trembling under her from fatigue and exhaustion, though her bosom was heaving with sobs that refused to be choked down, the brave little champion had still a work to do. Her friend was helpless; she must defend her.
Adèle got up, and showing a pale but resolute front touched the stranger on the arm. He turned to her with a sudden start and muttered apology for his neglect; he did not seem to have been aware of her presence, and as she caught a nearer view of the dark face, lined with suffering, convulsed with emotion, some suspicion of the truth began to dawn upon her mind.
A flutter of hope, more exciting than all the previous agitation, nearly choked her; the dignified little sentence in which she had intended, while thanking him for his timely assistance, to rebuke his presumption and recall him to a sense of his duty as a man and a gentleman, died away on her lips; she could only stammer out incoherently, "Who are you? For pity's sake tell me!"
The dark eyes which had been scanning the pale calm beauty of Margaret's face were turned on her. "I am herhusband," he said simply; his voice trembled, he spoke with difficulty. "And you have saved her," he added softly. But this Adèle scarcely heard. She had turned away. She was passing as fast as her wearied limbs could carry her along the path that led to the road. She would leave them alone together, and—the cottage held her Arthur.
They were united at last. By the shores of the surging sea, the desolate night around them, they stood together, and at first, so overpowering were the emotions that swept over the man's soul, he could think only of this—that they were together, that she was in his arms, safe from harm and danger—that once more he was gazing into her face—a face so calm and pure that even in this moment Maurice cursed himself for not having understood better the strong purity, the beauty, the loveliness of the soul it revealed.
After the delirium which had so nearly been fatal a great calm had fallen upon Margaret. With the touch of Maurice's hand, with the encircling of his arms, the unrest seemed to have fled. She did not look up, apparently she did not know him; but her eyes closed, her breathing became soft and regular, she lay back in his arms contentedly, like a weary child that has found its resting-place.
In times of intense feeling a life seems to be condensed into a moment. Scarcely more than a moment had Maurice been holding her to his throbbing heart before he recovered from his stupor to a knowledge of the necessity for immediate action.
The winds of the wintry night were beating about his darling. She was ill, unconscious, it might be dying. Her clothes were drenched with the sea-foam that had besprinkled them in their wild flight, her hair, damp with the night vapors, was clinging about her face, the shoes in which she had started from the cottage had been carried out to sea, the delicate lavender dress and soft lace ruffles with which she had adorned herself that she might look fair in the eyes of the husband she had gone out to meet in her delirium, were torn in the struggle that had taken place, were bespattered withmud and sea-sand. It was not in such a plight as this that Margaret had thought of presenting herself to the long-absent. But when does anything in this world correspond with those same dreams and ideas of ours? In Maurice's eyes she was fair—perhaps all the fairer for her weakness. Hastily he took off his fur-lined cloak and wrapped it round her, then he raised her in his arms to carry her up the road.
This time the horse had been tethered. Maurice had caught sight of the light dresses in the moonlight just at the moment when Adèle had succeeded in arousing Margaret from the dangerous sleep, and there had been a moment's hesitation. Totally unprepared for the impetuous rush upon the sea, he had taken the precaution, before following the fugitives on foot, of tying up the horse, that it might be ready for any emergency.
He was glad he had done so, for the emotion of that evening seemed to have affected his physical power. Under the weight of his wife, his recovered treasure, he staggered and almost fell.
Margaret remained unconscious, and Maurice fervently hoped that for the moment she would continue in the same state. He was fearful of the effect upon her mind of a sudden awakening in his arms: but it was not to be. Just as they reached the point of junction between the path and high-road a faint tremor convulsed her; she opened her eyes and turned them on the dark face that was stooping over her.
Maurice was afraid the delirium was about to return; but gazing at her anxiously he saw, to his astonishment, that there was no bewilderment in her eyes; only, as she met her husband's gaze, she glided from his arms, and before he knew what she meant to do she was kneeling at his feet on the moonlit road. Her hands were clasped, her pale face looked haggard in its earnestness. "Maurice! Maurice, forgive me!" she cried.
At the sight of her husband the memory of that one moment of weakness had flashed over her soul with such a bitter force that until his forgiveness had been gained, she could not forgive herself.
But Maurice! If an angel had knelt to him he could scarcely have been more astonished. In his agitation heseized her almost roughly, and raising her from the ground pressed her once more to his breast, while the hot tears fell on her face and neck.
"Margaret, you will kill me! Beloved, it is I who should kneel—I who should make my life one long repentance."
Then she twined her arms about his neck and laid her head upon his shoulder, but she was not altogether satisfied. To the craving of her weakness his answer was like an evasion: she persisted in her demand: "You are good to me, dear, but you have not answered. Tell me, tell me! Is my miserable folly forgiven?"
"Margaret, for pity's sake—" he began.
But she stopped him, and in her look and tone there was some of the wildness of disease. "I see how it is," she moaned; "he is too kind to say it, but I know my folly was beyond forgiveness. Have I not felt it? O God! O God! pity!" Her voice sank into a moan. Her head fell heavily on her breast: she began to cry plaintively, like a child that has been crossed in its whim.
They were close now to the spot where the horse had been tethered; the moon shone brightly above them; their dark shadows made a blot on the whiteness of the moonlit road. Maurice paused a moment, and the drops of agony stood on his brow.
He felt the urgent necessity for getting her home with as little delay as possible, but in the state in which she was he dared not put her out of his arms. He bowed his head over her till his cheek touched hers: "Be comforted, my wife, my own—mine now and for ever. Forgive you?—yes, yes." And then looking up he turned his pale face to the skies, as if calling Heaven for a witness to his extremity: "I have forgiven her—I who wronged her, who tortured her, who vexed her pure soul by mistrust! God preserve my reason!"
But Margaret took his answer to her heart. She smiled again, the wildness left her eyes, and a deep, restful calm took its place. She said no more, but for the first time since their meeting by the waters she pressed her lips to his.
Without demur she allowed him to lift her into the saddle and to support her with his one hand, while with the other he took the bridle and led the horse at a quick walk to the cottage,which was about half a mile distant from the little path that led down to the sea.
Before they had gone very far Margaret had relapsed into total unconsciousness, and Maurice was obliged to mount the horse himself, taking her before him on the saddle.
Meanwhile, Adèle had reached the cottage, just in time to stop Arthur and the old nurse from starting on another fruitless search.
As the horse with its double burden paced along the road, she and her cousin, their arms lovingly intertwined, stood at the gate of the cottage-garden waiting for its approach out of the shadows. They were together and alone—Nurse Martha and the landlady being busy indoors, making everything ready in Margaret's room, for the young girl had told her tale of horrors, and they feared it would be impossible for Margaret to survive so much.
But Adèle had seen her calm face, and she answered the doleful prophecies of the nurses by a smile: "You'll see, nurse; our Margaret will soon be better now."
They had been extremely anxious to seize the young girl, after her breathless entry and thrilling tale, and put her to bed as an invalid, but Adèle decidedly refused submission. The sight of Arthur was like a tonic to her trembling nerves. She would only allow her poor little wet feet to be dried and warmed by the parlor fire, close to which the children were still sleeping, and her wet clothes to be changed. As to shutting herself out from Arthur when she had just found him, it was simply cruel to ask it.
She was the heroine of the moment, for although her own tale had barely done justice to the self-forgetfulness with which that terrible struggle had been conducted, they yet heard enough to know that in her faithful devotion she had risked her own life, and Arthur, the old woman, the landlady looked upon the young girl with a new respect.
"What did you think of, Adèle," asked her cousin as, wrapped up warmly, she stood clinging to him by the garden-gate—"what did you think of when that ugly wave was so close to you?" Doubtless, Arthur knew what the answer would be. Of course the heroine had thought about her hero. How could it possibly have been otherwise?
"Dear," she replied softly, and the ready tears flowed down her cheeks, "I thought of you, and how miserable and lonely you would be. Margaret gone, and—and—"
"My Adèle gone," he said very softly, filling up the pause.
And then—ah yes—and then all kinds of foolish things no doubt were said and done, for these young people were, as it will be seen, very young, and what is more very much in love; and as we all know the kind of things, perhaps it is scarcely necessary to put them down in black and white.
Black and white is not the dress for lovers' nothings, especially the sweet almost childish nothings that would flow from lips like Adèle's and Arthur's. They should be written in such colors as the blushing east can give, inscribed by the pen of one of God's angels.
For young as Adèle and Arthur were, they knew what they were doing. They had passed through the hand of the Great Instructor, so terrible in His aspect, so wise, even loving, in His ways of dealing with weak humanity. In the furnace of suffering their hearts had been tried, and they knew how to value their happiness, how to prize one another.
O wind!If winter comes, can spring be far behind?
Everything was ready in Margaret's room—warm blankets, steaming cans of water, hot fomentations, cordials of many a different kind—for her nurses were afraid that the unconsciousness of which Adèle had spoken might, after her previous excitement, be very difficult to conquer. They were surprised, then, when Maurice at last carried her in and laid her down, to find that she bore every appearance of being wrapped in a quiet, healthy sleep; indeed, so convinced was her husband that this, and this only, was the cause of her unconsciousness, that he would allow no means to be used forher restoration, at least until the morning, when the doctor from the neighboring town had already promised to look in upon them.
Nurse Martha shook her head. There was something mysterious about it all. "Who ever heard," she asked Jane in whispers, "of a body sleeping awa' that gait, and she in a dangerous fever that had wellnigh ta'en her life?"
But in spite of protest Maurice's wishes were obeyed, Margaret's wet things were removed as quietly as possible by the experienced old woman, and she only stirred once during the process. Her husband watched her sleep that night. Kindly but peremptorily he sent everyone away, and sat himself by his wife's side, counting the very pulsations of her heart as the hours of the night passed by. The old nurse and the landlady (they had insisted upon sending the younger people to bed) watched by turns during the night in the little parlor adjoining the bedroom, for neither of them had much belief in the efficiency of this new care-taker. But no sound came from the room where the husband was watching the death-like repose of her he had wronged and deserted, the woman who was suffering, as he told himself bitterly, for his uncomprehending folly. Once or twice during that long watch he grew alarmed, the rest was so deep; but putting his ear to her heart he heard the pulsations, faint yet regular, and he was comforted.
So the night went by, and in the morning he could no longer keep his treasure to himself; they would all come in to know how she was, to watch and wonder. The little Laura was the first to creep into the room. She had been told on the preceding night that her mother had been found, but was too ill to see her—that she would doubtless be better in the morning. Submitting to the inevitable had become a habit with Laura. She had allowed herself to be undressed and put to bed, but very early, in night-dress and bare toes, she made a voyage of discovery to find out where her mamma could be.
When, as she softly opened the door of Margaret's room, the little child saw her father sitting dressed on a chair by the bedside, and her mother, so white and silent, in the bed, she stopped suddenly, trembling from head to foot. Laurahad heard of death, though she had never seen it, and this solemn hush, this silent watching, struck like a chill upon her heart; she turned very pale, and seemed half afraid to cross the room, but her father called her: "Mamma is asleep, darling; come here and see her." He took her up and laid her down on the bed beside Margaret, telling her to be very still. Laura scarcely required the warning. She crept close to her mother. The strange child could not have spoken at that moment, she was so absolutely content. And Maurice had to turn away from her searching gaze; he would not have his child see that tears were gathering in his eyes at the sight of them together—the mother and child united one to the other, given back to his arms.
But still that sleep went on, and all but Maurice grew uneasy. The doctor came in at a tolerably early hour, but went away again after giving utterance to a few commonplaces. It was evident that he was puzzled. He asked repeatedly whether any narcotic had been given to her, and when he was answered in the negative shook his head ominously. She had better, he said, be left to herself; it might possibly be dangerous to arouse her. Nature in some cases was the best guide; he would call again.
The hours of the day passed by—morning, noon, evening, and still Maurice watched, and still he hoped, while still there was no cessation of that death-like trance. Evening passed into night, and all but Maurice gave up hope. They were allowed to come into the room and share the watch, for there was not one in the little house who did not enter deeply into the anxiety. The night deepened, and still no sign of life from the sleeper. Adèle's cheeks became pale and her eyes red with frequent weeping; this seemed so desolate an ending to their hopes and anxieties. On the child's young face the shadow deepened. She had found her mother, but that mother was deaf to her little one's voice, unconscious even of her presence; the old nurse's gestures grew more and more mysterious, only Maurice retained his quiet confidence.
The hours of the night passed by; none of them would go to bed. If those eyes were ever again to open, each one wished to be the first to hear the joyful news. The night waned, and even Maurice grew restless. His face resumedthe old haggard look; oftener and oftener he applied to her lips the testing mirror, which still at each trial gave the answering dimness. The night passed into morning, the night-lamp showed a yellow flame, the white dawn began to struggle with the darkness; only Laura and her father were in the room. The child was watching her mother's face, Maurice had turned away to draw up the blind; perhaps the breaking of the morning-light might arouse the sleeper; they were afraid as yet to use stronger means. Suddenly the child gave a cry. He looked hastily at the bed; Margaret was in the same position. There was the same death-like immobility of face, the same rigidity of attitude.
But Laura's eyes were rapt and eager. "Mamma moved, she will soon awake," she cried, and before her father could stop her she had danced out of the room to proclaim the joyful news.
Adèle was dozing on the parlor sofa, Arthur was pacing the room restlessly. He saw the light in the little one's eyes and stopped. Laura to Arthur was a kind of prophet, a superior being.
"Mamma will soon awake," she said, and passed on to tell the old nurse, who was in the kitchen preparing restoratives of various kinds, for she had made up her mind that some means would have to be used to break this death-like sleep.
Adèle had heard the child's voice. She started from the sofa. "Let us go to her," she cried, and Arthur and she went into the room together.
They were joined after a few moments by the child, the nurse, the landlady, all eager to find the happy news confirmed.
The child was right. Margaret was certainly waking. The death-like stillness had gone from her face, her hands moved, she sighed now and then.
Maurice hung over her, breathless in his anxiety; he would meet her first glance. Adèle and Arthur stood together at the foot of the bed; the child had crept on to it, and lay very silent close beside her mother. It seemed a long time that they waited there together, but when the end came it was like a shock to them all.
A shiver convulsed her, her eyelids quivered; slowly sheraised them, and first fixed her eyes upon her husband, then looked in a bewildered, half-frightened way about the room.
Maurice raised her on his arm. "Margaret," he whispered, and she looked at him again.
"Is it morning?" she asked, and when he had answered in the affirmative, "I knew it would come," she said, then lay silent, smiling calmly.
Evidently as yet she did not know where she was, and Maurice was perplexed.
Adèle came to the rescue. Motioning to him to give up his place, she stooped over her friend. "Margaret darling," she whispered, "Maurice has come, and little Laura and Arthur."
The familiar face and well-known voice seemed to arouse her. "It is not a dream, then," she said. "No," for the little Laura's clasping arms were about her neck, "my child is here, and Maurice; I thought I saw him last night and that he forgave me. Was it true, Adèle?"
Her voice sank, for she was very weak, but the old nurse came forward with a cordial, which restored her so much that her mind began gradually to take in all that had happened.
Later in the day they dressed her and laid her down once more on the parlor sofa. Until then she had not spoken much, she had been in a quiet, passive state, but with the familiar surroundings a full sense of the reality of her dream-like happiness seemed to come to her. The first person for whom she asked was Arthur.
In his boyish timidity he had vanished as soon as ever he had become certain that she was really awake. Adèle found him and brought him into the room. Margaret held out her hand. "How can I ever thank you, my best, my most untiring friend?" she said.
And then—for he seemed as if he did not know how to answer—she drew Adèle toward her and joined their hands.
"You will be happy," she said smiling—"perhaps all the happier for this. Maurice"—he was sitting close beside her, his arm round her shoulders—"we shall be happier too, for if God will we shall understand better." Her voice sank, she looked dreamily over the sea: "Morning is all the fairer for the black night that goes before. Dear, we should thank Him even for our darkness."