Father Cameril laid down the "Life of St. Dunstan" and sighed. "He was strong, he was faithful," muttered the good Father. "Alas!" and he sighed again.
He took a photograph from his pocket and gazed long upon the pictured features. "Dr. Hicks did it," he murmured. Then he replaced the photograph and went forth, going toward the sea, until at last, by many a devious way, he came into the grounds of Stormpoint, and there, by Eliphalet's Tomb, he saw a woman. "'Tis fate," he muttered. The woman turned; Father Cameril started. He was face to face with Natalie.
He stammered awkwardly, being wholly taken by surprise, that he had thought she was Miss Lynford; then, after some conventional references to the weather, he escaped. Natalie watched him as he walked away, then fell into bitter musings, in which he had no part.
Two years had passed since Leonard's flight. With the fall of her hero, the light of the life of Miss Claghorn had been extinguished, and though, with grim courage, she had striven to bear the heavy hand of the Lord, laid thus upon the House of Claghorn, the knowledge that another of the race, the brightest and the best, was doomed, was too heavy a burden. Other Claghorns would be born and would live their little day, but for whom could hope be cherished after such a fall as this? She passed from life sure of her own salvation, but with the knowledge that the elect race was no more to be reckoned as of the favored minority. She refused to leave any message for Leonard; since the Lord had closed the gates of glory upon him, it was for her to close her heart. She charged her estate with a liberal annuity for Tabitha Cone, leaving her fortune, otherwise unincumbered, to Natalie, who, with Tabitha, continued to reside at the White House.
A further untoward result of the catastrophe was the derangement of the political plans of Mrs. Joe. The use of her cheque, given to Leonard, as trustee, his unfulfilled promise of a large donation from an anonymous lady (who could be no other than the lady of Stormpoint), his curt resignation sent to the Seminary authorities from New York, the separation from his wife, her seclusion, the crushing grief of Miss Claghorn, the perturbation of Mrs. Joe, shared by Mark—these were all parts of a puzzle eagerly put together, and so far successfully, that the fact of the misuse of the cheque was established, at least to the satisfaction of the multitude. And this involved an explanation from Mrs. Joe, and the making known of her change of mind in respect of the donation, which again involved some reflection upon the god and the Confession revered by the Seminary, wherefrom was emitted a spark of resentment, not allayed by Mark's openly expressed indignation with those who professed to discover something parlous with regard to the change of mind of his mother, in respect to the once-intended bounty. The upshot of all this confusion was the lassitude, not to say, disgust, evinced by Mark for the political prospects held out by Hampton, and Mrs. Joe's recognition of the need of acting upon the shrewd advice of Mr. Hacket, which was to "lie low till the pot stopped boiling," a consummation not fervently hoped for by the adviser.
With eyes fixed upon where the sun, a fiery ball, fast sank in the distant waters, Natalie, standing where Father Cameril had left her, recalled the days of her girlhood and their dreams. Her life, short as it had been as yet, had been full of trouble. Were all lives thus? Her glance fell upon the tomb; she wondered if the man at rest these two centuries and more had in death resolved the deep mystery of living; or was he, in fact, not yet at rest, but wandering still in other spheres, the toy of a destiny he could neither shape nor fathom? She recalled the day upon which she had seen the handsome American boy in the Odenwald, and she thought of the ruin of his life with unutterable sadness. She remembered how she had prattled with her father as the two dusty travelers had entered the garden, and she recalled her bright visions of the days to come. The days were here! The crumbling ruins of her air-castles lay about her, and in the great upheaval that had caused their fall a life had been wrecked. She looked out upon the waters, hearing the ceaseless moan of the surge, and remembered how the kindly fury of the waves had striven to rescue that life from shame and degradation. Better, ah! how much better, had Leonard never returned from that desperate plunge, but had gone a hero to whatever lay beyond!
She remembered the day—it was not a day to be forgotten—that she had taken the early walk to the cemetery; and how, as she had then looked out upon the waves, a truth that during all the days of her wedded life had lain at the bottom of her heart, had confronted her unbidden, demanding recognition. She had refused to see it, until in the awakening that had come to her in the cemetery she had, with high resolve, determined to defy it and make of it a lie—and within an hour had forgotten her resolution, and had dreamed her dreams which had their birth in the pressure of lips to which she had no right. On the morrow of that darkest day of her life she had found her husband's letter to herself, a letter whose words were burned in upon her memory: "Natalie, in your heart you never loved me." He had added more, the justification of the wretched confession, now defiant, now maudlin, which followed; much of it sadly false; but she remembered it all, and the true text of his miserable story stood out before her as though lettered in the air. The words condemned her. It was not true, and she made a gesture as though repelling an accusation—it was not true that in the truth of Leonard's words lay the underlying motive of the course of life she had resolved upon. She denied this in her thoughts with almost frantic vehemence; yet, urgent in her wish to find palliation for her husband's sin, and seeing with clear vision the folly of the frightful dogma which she now knew that in very truth he could not have believed, but which, if believed, must of her own wrong have made a virtue, she grew confused, and could find but one utterance to express the truth—"I have sinned."
She drew from the bosom of her dress a letter which she had received but a few hours before. It was from Leonard, written from New York, and repeating that accusation which she confessed as true. In the letter the writer expressed his surprise that he had not found, on his return to America, that she had taken steps to rid herself of ties which must be hateful to her. This, he claimed, was an added injury to him, since it prevented the course which his conscience required, and which he was in honor bound to take for the sake of one who had loved him sufficiently to sacrifice herself for him (meaning, though Natalie was ignorant of the fact, Mademoiselle Berthe). He had added that if, within a given time, his wife did not avail herself of the legal right to secure her freedom, he would, actuated by the high considerations suggested, be compelled to take measures to satisfy his conscience and his sense of honor. And he concluded the epistle by setting forth with sufficient distinctness the fact, that the law would recognize the validity of the grounds on which he would, if it became necessary, base his application for divorce.
Heretofore she had resented the urgency of every friend (except one who refrained from advice) to take the step to which she saw now she would be driven. Mark alone had been silent, and her heart had often fluttered, knowing his reason. But she had not dwelt upon a thought upon which she knew she must not linger; rather had she prayed that Leonard might return, and she be enabled to carry out the resolve she had so often made, and in which she had so often failed, to be in all things a true wife; thus earning the forgiveness which she craved by according that which was due from her. Perhaps she had persuaded herself that such a course would be possible—even so—she knew that in the letter she held in her hand, she saw not the insult to herself, not the base attitude of its writer, but the dawning of another day, and the promise of a happiness which hitherto she had not dared contemplate, and which she tried hard not to contemplate now.
When Father Cameril had found Natalie at Eliphalet's tomb, expecting to find Paula, he had received a greater shock than the incident would seem to have required.
He had said to himself it was Fate; but had found that it was not fate that determined a step which he desired to be compelled to take.
That vow of celibacy had been made in ignorance. He was sure, having examined the authorities closely as to this, that a vow taken in ignorance was not binding. Turks were in the habit of vowing enmity to the truth, yet could a Turk do a more praiseworthy deed than break such a vow? He had supposed that celibacy was a good things for priests. He had been wrong. It was a very bad thing. Ought he to continue a wrong course in deference to a vow taken under a misconception? The underlying motive of the vow was the desire to live worthily; since life lived in accordance therewith would be passed less worthily than in opposition to it, the only honest course was to disregard the vow. So argued Father Cameril, unaided by fate, and hence, compelled to fall back on logic.
But fate was to be more propitious than he had feared. Seated on a rock in a distant portion of the grounds, gazing out upon the setting sun, he came upon Paula.
He took the hand she offered and which, as had lately been the case, lingered a little within his own. Then he sat down beside her.
"How beautiful it is," she observed.
"Paula," he said, "I love you. Will you be my wife?"
"Oh!" exclaimed Paula.
Perhaps it was not very reassuring. But it was not a refusal. Her face was rosier than he had ever seen it. Her heart was beating wildly.
"I wanted to be a nun," she faltered.
"I know it," he replied; "and I——"
"Vowed celibacy."
"It is true," he admitted.
And then they sat and looked at where the sun had been.
After awhile Paula arose and said she must go to the house.
He offered his hand.
"May I kiss you?" he said, in a low tone, his face very pale.
"Father Cameril!"
He hung his head. "You despise me," he said, after awhile. "You are right. I despise myself. It is very hard."
"I don't despise you; and you are not to despise yourself," she stammered. "You perplex and confuse me. You astonish me."
"I knew I would," he answered hopelessly. "It is very natural. I wish I had not been born."
"I beg you not to say dreadful things, not to have dreadful thoughts," she exclaimed.
"But I can't help them. If you knew how awful they are sometimes. Dr. Hicks did it, Paula."
"Don't let us talk of it."
"Let us think about it."
"I couldn't."
"Don't you love me?"
"I love everybody. You, and everybody."
"Yes, you are a saint. I am not. I only love you. I only think of you. Morning, noon and night. At Mass; everywhere——"
"Do you, really?" she interrupted.
"I do, really."
She looked at him curiously. It was very nice, indeed, to know that a good man was in the habit of thinking of her so continuously. But——
"You should not think of me in church," she said.
"Of course not. I wouldn't if you were my wife. As it is, you creep into all my thoughts. You are in the prayer-book, in the Bible, in the Life of St. Dunstan, and of St. Thomas (of Canterbury), too. You are everywhere."
"Oh!" said Paula again. This was love indeed.
"But your vow?"
"I can explain that. Vowing under a misconception is not binding. That was the way I vowed."
"On purpose?" she asked, horrified.
"Oh, no. I thought I was doing right."
"Perhaps you were," she said. "If you were, this must be wrong."
"I have examined my own heart closely, very closely."
"Have you been to confession?"
"To whom can I go? The Bishop would not hear me. He is benighted——"
"There's your friend, Father Gordon."
"Oh, Paula, he's only twenty-three."
"But he's a priest."
"Buthe'sunder a vow. How can he understand?"
A rapid footstep was heard. "There's Mark!" exclaimed Paula.
Father Cameril tripped quickly away. "You here!" exclaimed Mark, as he came upon Paula. "Isn't it dinner time?"
"It must be," she said, slipping her hand into the arm he offered.
"It was Father Cameril, Mark," she said, after a pause.
"Of course," he replied.
"Why, of course?" she asked, with slow utterance.
He looked down into her face a little quizzically. "Is it not of course?" he asked.
"I—don't—think so," she answered slowly.
"Paula!" He stood confronting her suddenly.
"Well, Mark?"
He laughed, yet looked at her rather seriously. "I thought you were going to be a nun?"
"I am; do you object?"
"I shall be sorry to see it. But——"
"But what?"
"There are other things I would regret more."
She looked into his face. It was a quick, questioning glance, but long enough for him to note her beauty. They went on to the house in silence, but Paula's heart fluttered.
In Hampton Cemetery there stands, and will stand for the sympathetic admiration of future ages, an imposing monument, which apprises him who meditates among the tombs that it was "Erected to the Memory of Jeremiah Morley, by his Sorrowing Widow." At the date of the construction of this expensive evidence of grief, the cost whereof had been provided by testamentary direction—for the late Jeremiah had not been the man to stake a testimonial to his worth upon anything less binding—the stone-cutter, as one versed in the prevailing fashion of monumental inscriptions, had suggested the conventional reference to the usual "Hope of a Joyful Resurrection"; but the widow, her conscience already strained by the legend agreed upon, had objected. Yet the inscription which strained her conscience had the merit of truth; for the man beneath the stone had left her sorrowing, as she had sorrowed nearly every day since she had been pronounced his wife; but, being strictly Hamptonian in her views, her long intimacy with the deceased had rendered her incredulous of his joyous resurrection.
Years before the erection of the monument, while Easthampton was still a port known to mariners, the warehouses since pulled down by Mrs. Joe having hardly commenced to rot, a certain Jerry Morley who, so far as he or anybody else knew, had no legitimate right to name or existence, had sailed from the harbor in the capacity of third mate of the barque "Griselda," a trim vessel manned by a crew of blackguards, not one of whom could approach the mate either in hardihood or in villainy. At that time Mate Jerry had been scarcely more than a boy, ragged, unkempt and fierce-eyed; when he returned, which he did by stage (for the barque had disappeared from the ken of man), he was a smooth-shaven, portly gentleman, hard and domineering; but strict in his walk (to all appearance), and rich. The voice of detraction is never absolutely silent, and though Mr. Morley possessed all the ingredients which go to the making of a "Prominent Citizen," and played that role successfully for many years; yet occasional whispers were heard as to mutiny, murder, seizure of the "Griselda," and a subsequent career as a slaver; whispers, confined mostly to the ancient mariners who smoked and basked about the decaying docks of Easthampton, and which, in due time, were heard no more. Mr. Morley purchased a fine residence in Hampton, was munificent to the Seminary, married the fair daughter of a prominent theologian, and, in short, appeared to the eyes of the world as a clean, pompous, very wealthy and highly respected citizen and church member. Few beside his wife knew that, in fact, he was a brute, given over to secret vices. He had possessed a brain incapable of either excitation or ache. Never sober, no man had ever seen him (to the observer's knowledge) drunk. Few suspected his secret indulgence, but at the age of sixty, liquor, aided by other sly excesses known only to himself, struck him down, as a bullet might have done, relieving a once rarely beautiful woman of a great load, and granting her a few years of comfort as a set-off against many years of hidden misery.
From this grandfather Leonard had inherited more than one unsuspected trait, but not the iron constitution which had succumbed only after years of abuse. Berthe still had her adorable one, but her adoration was gone; her man had become an object of compassionate disgust. The brilliant theologian was a sot.
His fall had been from so great a height to so low a depth, that in his own eyes his ruin was accomplished before his case was hopeless. He was not hurried to his doom by late awakened appetites alone; he had hardly abandoned his home before regret, if not repentance, became a burden too heavy for endurance. The mournful echoes of his days of virtue, the visions of his past of honor, were ever in his ears and before his eyes. Remorse, the hell of sinners, was ever present; and from its constant pangs was no relief except in plunging deeper into sin, inviting greater horrors, and ever beckoned by them. To such miseries were added the fear of that unending life beyond the grave; the life of torment, which all his days he had been taught to contemplate as the doom of souls abandoned by their Maker. The knowledge that he was one of those "passed by" and left for the fires of hell—this knowledge hourly increased the anguish of his spirit. Who among men shall too hardly judge a ruined fellow-creature, abandoned by his God, who in debauchery can find forgetfulness; or who, in the hazy mists of drunkenness alone, can see some rays to cheer the gloom of ruin?
They had at first gone to Paris, and there he had plunged into dissipation with an ardor that had startled and angered his companion, whose good sense had been revolted. True, she had shown him the way, recognizing his need of distraction; but she had not counted on reckless excess, and had at first welcomed the change when he showed a disposition to concentrate his attention upon liquor alone. She was to learn that this slavery was the most debasing of all.
The woman had loved her victim in her own way, and for awhile she honestly strove to raise him from the foul abyss in which he seemed doomed to settle, but her efforts had been vain. She had long been possessed of the common purse, and though her prudence had husbanded the proceeds of Mrs. Joe's cheque, she saw the necessity of reasonable economy; so she got her man to London, where he, by this time, exhausted from dissipation, was content to live frugally, so long as his decanter of gin was kept supplied. The woman often gazed furtively at him, and was troubled. She commenced to consider the future. "Leonard," she said one day, "you ought to marry me."
He was neither startled nor repelled. "It would be the first step in the right direction," he answered. "Perhaps then I could overcome the craving for drink." She was touched by the hope which for one moment gleamed in his dull eyes. It aroused an answering hope in her bosom. Ah! If it could be! If she could become his lawful wife, an honest woman; and he the man he had been before she had led him to ruin! The passing vision of purer days lured both.
A nobler desire than mere acquisitiveness was awakened in her. She knew that probably no such marriage would be legal; it might even be dangerous. But, it would bind him to her so that there could be no escape. And so the matter came to be discussed between the two. Both were aware of the possible criminality of the act, though both hoped that Leonard's wife had procured a divorce; but, notwithstanding some misgiving, the marriage was finally accomplished. Berthe had her own reasons for not waiting until they could revisit America; and perhaps in the loneliness of his wrecked life, Leonard's object was like the woman's, to bind her to himself with hooks of steel. Perhaps it was but the result of influence of a stronger will upon a fast decaying mind.
Thus it had come about that the two had returned to America, and, on their arrival, had concocted the letter to Natalie, by whom it had been submitted to Mr. Ellis Winter. That gentleman advised that Natalie take up her residence in New York, and he engaged to notify Leonard that his demand for divorce would be accorded, as soon as the needful legal requisites could be complied with. Natalie was to make her application on the ground of abandonment, and to refuse to ask for alimony.
And now, alone with Tabitha in a big hotel, without occupation, except such as was afforded by recollections which could not be other than bitter; in the gloom of the days and the miserable object of her present existence, Natalie allowed herself to see the rays of hope illumining a future upon which she looked, shyly, and with a sense of guilt. Yet who would not contemplate the alluring tint of fruit as yet forbidden, but ripening for us before our eyes?
During this period of isolation she saw Mark once, his visit having the ostensible excuse of business. Leonard had, by the hand of his legal adviser, written to Mrs. Joe, suggesting that she purchase the Morley mansion, so that out of the proceeds of the sale he could repay his debt. While the lady would have been as well content that the debt remain unpaid, it was believed by all who still hoped that Leonard might be won back to respectability, that the suggestion was a good one. To carry it into effect the consent of Natalie was, of course, necessary, and also that the transfer be effected before the institution of divorce proceedings. The consent was immediately given.
"And, Mark," said Natalie, as she handed him the deed, "if you see Leonard, say to him that I hope for his forgiveness."
"His forgiveness!"
"Ah, Mark! I wronged him; I ought never——"
He knew what was on her lips, but which she could not say to him—that she ought never to have married Leonard. He took her hand and drew her, unresisting, toward himself; her head drooped upon his shoulder. They stood thus, for a moment, and then he left her. Words of love remained unspoken, but the heart of each was full of that which was unsaid.
There was a long and dreary interval, but at length came the day when Natalie was made free. She learned the fact in the afternoon, but concealed it from Tabitha. That evening she was melancholy, and Tabitha essayed in vain to cheer her; and so the next day passed. But the day after that Tabitha noticed a change; a tremulous fluttering, some tendency to tears, but more to smiles. And Tabitha discovered that she was being petted. She must have a drive—and had it; special delicacies at luncheon were ordered for her delectation, including a share of a pint of champagne, which Tabitha averred was sinful, though she sinned with satisfaction. A beautiful gold watch was given her to replace the fat-faced silver bulb, precious in Miss Cone's eyes as once the property of the long-drowned mariner, but which of late years had acquired the eccentric characteristics of the famous time-piece of the elder Weller; and at last when the time came to say "good-night," Tabitha must be kissed and hugged. But the last proceeding was too much for the maiden's discretion. "What is it?" she asked.
"Oh, Tabby, I'm so happy." And then, ashamed, and afraid of having said too much, Natalie escaped to her own room.
And there read again the letter which she had received that morning, and which she had furtively read many times during the day. She knew it by heart, but she liked to read the words written by her lover's hand.
"Dear Natalie—The decree is granted. The words, 'I love you' have been on my lips so long, that they must find utterance. I repeat them, if not with lips, yet in my heart every moment of the day. Write or telegraph me the date of your arrival at the White House. I would rather have a letter; in a letter you can say that you love me. Shall it be a letter?"Mark."
"Dear Natalie—The decree is granted. The words, 'I love you' have been on my lips so long, that they must find utterance. I repeat them, if not with lips, yet in my heart every moment of the day. Write or telegraph me the date of your arrival at the White House. I would rather have a letter; in a letter you can say that you love me. Shall it be a letter?
"Mark."
To this she had answered by telegraph: "I write to-night." He was in Philadelphia, and until the evening of the following day she would be unable to leave for home. He would receive her letter in time to get to Stormpoint soon after her arrival in Easthampton. He desired a letter; he should have a letter.
Yet it was hard to write. It had been easy to whisper to herself such phrases as "Mark, dear Mark, I love you, I love you"; but it was less easy to set those words down on paper, though there was a joy in it, too. The difficulty of writing them vanished when they were for her own eye only, not to be mailed. And so she scribbled over sheet after sheet of paper: "Mark, Dear Mark, My Love, My Own, My Lover"—such words and many others she wrote, blushing, smiling; at times not seeing what she wrote for the tears in her eyes. At last she roused herself from this foolish play and wrote a proper letter.
"Dear Mark—How good you have always been! I shall arrive home on Saturday morning. I long to see you. Dear Mark, I love you."
"Dear Mark—How good you have always been! I shall arrive home on Saturday morning. I long to see you. Dear Mark, I love you."
The last phrase was hurriedly written and had required resolution, but she was happier for having written it. She sealed the letter that she might not be tempted in the morning to substitute another. Then she went to bed, and all the night through her face was the mirror of her pleasant dreams. No shadow of the future was upon her as she slept smiling.
And awoke with the smile upon her face, and in a low voice sang while dressing. Her toilet concluded, she took her letter from the table, kissed it shyly, and placed it in her bosom. She would mail it as she went downstairs.
A knock at her door and the announcement of a visitor—a lady who had business of importance. Natalie ordered that the lady be shown into her sitting-room.
On entering the sitting-room she found Berthe.
Natalie saw all things through the halo of the rosy hopes that now encompassed her. "Berthe!" she exclaimed, both hands extended in welcome, "I thought you had gone to France. Mrs. Leon told me so—but, how is this? You look pale and ill?"
Pale and ill she was, but no illness would have deterred her from making the appeal she had come to make.
Since his return to America, Leonard had indulged in drink more recklessly than ever, and Berthe, though conscious of the value to herself of the divorce, had dreaded the granting of the decree. For the prospect of being bound to this lost creature filled her with aversion.
Conscience makes cowards of us all, and Berthe feared the man. Not that he had shown any inclination for violence toward her, though he had long been irritable and disposed to quarrel on slight provocation. She did not fear his hand; it was his presence. The sodden spectacle was becoming a weight upon her soul, an accusation beyond her strength to bear. She had loved him, loved him even now, and her guilty conscience cried incessantly, "Behold your handiwork!"
On the day when Natalie had petted Tabitha, she had for the first time lived in fear, even of his hand. Early that morning she had noticed that his speech was tremulous and uncertain, though he drank less than usual. He dozed constantly, often waking with a cry of terror; and then his whole frame would tremble as he gazed with eyes of hate and horror at herself, or at some invisible yet dreadful object near her, muttering incoherent phrases indicating fear. Again he would doze, again awake and the scene would be repeated. With each new seizure his action became more violent, while the nameless horror that was upon him communicated itself to her. At last she sent for a physician, but not until there had been a wild outbreak. He had clutched her by the throat: "Devil!" he shouted, "you shall not take me to hell; I am of the elect, a Claghorn! Down, fiend!" She had cowered in fear, and he had saved her life by fainting.
The doctor easily diagnosed the case. Berthe's willingness to pay for the services of two male nurses, and the fear that any disturbance might entail a frantic outbreak and death, were the considerations that restrained the physician from ordering the patient's removal to a hospital.
The convulsions of the stricken man were frightful; his shrieks, his wailing prayers for deliverance from hell—these appalled the woman, filling her with apprehension akin to that of the raving victim. His calls for Natalie were most piteous, wails of anguish that pierced the heart of the woman that had loved him, and whose moans answered his incessant repetition of the name of one, lacking whose forgiveness he must face the horrors of the damned. The unending utterance of the name, never ceasing even when at last he sank into the stupor of exhaustion and of opiates, attracted the attention of the physician, who told Berthe that while he believed the case hopeless, possible good might be effected by the presence of the person without whom it seemed as though the man could not even die.
The awful fear that he would die, his last wish ungratified, wherefore, in her belief, his restless soul would haunt all her future days; this, added to the pity for the man she still loved, who had rescued her from misery, whose head had lain upon her bosom, nerved her to carry out the resolve she had taken. She knew that no messenger could effect the purpose; she must assume the task herself. It was not without a pang that she determined upon a mission which, if successful, must involve her desertion of the dying man; but, though she did not forget such jewels as she possessed or to collect all the money that remained, her flight was nevertheless intended as such expiation as she could make.
She hoped, though she could not be sure, that her identity as Leonard's companion was not known to Natalie; but she assumed that Mrs. Leon had given information as to other misconduct, and she expected to be met with cold disapproval, if, indeed, she were received at all. But instead of disapproval she was encountered with outstretched hands and their friendly pressure; and, as with this reception there came upon her the recollection of the sweet graciousness of her former mistress, and with it the consciousness of her requital of the kindness of past days, her heart was like to fail.
"I bring you a message," she gasped, "from your husband."
"My husband!" For the moment Natalie forgot that she had no husband. Then the recollection came upon her, and with it a premonition of evil. She was as pale as Berthe, as she stood, looking at her visitor, bewildered and afraid.
"Stop!" she exclaimed, as Berthe was about to speak. "What can you know of him you call my husband? He left me, abandoned me for a wicked woman. He wrote me confessing his shame, but not his fault. Again he wrote, insinuating wicked deeds of me, and threatening me. Since two days he is no more my husband; I can receive no message."
"He is dying!"
The red flush which had displaced the pallor of Natalie's cheek disappeared. Again her face grew pale; she stared at Berthe.
"Listen," faltered the Frenchwoman. "He wronged you, yet he loved you always, has loved you till this hour, and cannot die without your forgiveness."
"Take it to him——Dying! Leonard, Leonard!" She covered her face.
"I was maid to the woman he went away with," continued Berthe, "and so I came to know his story. The woman has been kind to him—let her pass, then"—seeing that her listener shuddered. "The man is dying. He moans and wails for you—for you. The woman herself begged me to come for you. He fears" (her face grew whiter) "he fears the fires of hell, but he will not have a priest. Only you can rescue him—your pardon—he cannot die without it." She broke down. All else she might have borne upon her conscience; but she could not bear that he should go unshriven.
At the mention of the fires of hell Natalie was conquered. "Take me to him," she said.
"Follow me in half an hour," Berthe rose as she spoke, handing a written address to Natalie.
"But no time must be lost——"
"In half an hour," repeated Berthe. "Give her—the woman—time to get away." And then she passed out of the room.
"Natalie." He stirred uneasily, muttering the word, which since her coming he had not uttered; then, as she lightly pressed the hand she held, he slept again. So she had sat for hours beside his bed.
The physician had prepared her for the sight that had met her eyes. From Tabitha, who was with her, he had gleaned some knowledge of the facts. Tabitha, still ignorant of the granting of the decree, had assured him that the visitor was the wife of Leonard Claghorn.
"Poor woman, she will need her courage," he said. "The other one has gone. As for the wife, if she can bear it, I would have her sit beside him so that he can see her when he wakes."
So there she had taken her place, beside the man whom the law had decreed was no more to her than any other. But death mocks law. Dying, he was so much to her that no hand but hers should smooth his pillow.
Perhaps the nature of the disease, perhaps the deep exhaustion, had made a great change in his appearance. The bloated aspect of his face was gone, and even a greater beauty than the beauty of his youth and innocence was apparent. But it was the beauty of ruin. The face was marble, yet lined with the deep furrows of sorrow and remorse. The hair was gray at the temples, the cheeks were hollow and the mouth was drawn. It was Leonard, the man whose head had lain upon her bosom, the father of her child—the same, yet oh, how changed!
"Natalie!"
She bent toward him. He essayed to lift her hand to his lips; she placed it on his brow.
"I have had a dream," he whispered, "a dreadful dream!"
"Hush, Leonard. You must sleep."
He feebly raised his arm and tried to draw her to him. Slowly she bent toward him, falling on her knees beside the bed. His arm was now about her neck; he drew her cheek to his.
"My wife!" He uttered the words with a long-drawn sigh, of such sweet content that in that sigh she believed he had breathed his life out. Soon he spoke again. "Now I can sleep," he said, and freed her from his embrace. She rose gently and stood watching him; he slept without the stertorous breathing of before. Looking up, she saw the physician in the doorway. He beckoned to her. She rose and quietly left the room.
"Madam," said the doctor, "this is wonderful. That natural sleep may portend recovery."
"Then I can go," she said.
The doctor looked at her gravely, not approvingly. But it was not as he supposed; she was not hard-hearted; but the woman! Leonard had written that his conscience and his honor demanded that he marry the woman. If he were to live, there was no place at his bedside for her, who had once been his wife.
"Mrs. Claghorn," said the doctor, "your companion, Miss—ah—Miss Cone, has informed me of the existing relations between you and your husband. As a stranger I can give no advice, can only tell you that the woman who has been his companion has left your husband forever."
"Left him to die!" she exclaimed.
"Precisely. It need not surprise you. It is barbarous; but such women are barbarous. I shall be surprised if one who has displayed so much magnanimity should fail now. Pardon me, Mrs. Claghorn, but your place is by your husband's side. One woman has basely left him to die. Should you leave him now, you repeat the act."
The doctor silently withdrew. Natalie sank into a chair. Her mind was confused. Her place by her husband's side! Had she then a husband? The scenes in which she had been an actor had numbed her faculties, strained by the long watch by the bedside she had left. A feeling of suffocation was stealing over her; instinctively she loosened her dress at the throat. The letter she had written to Mark fell upon the floor, and she sat staring at it, dumb.
It became evident that her husband, as all in the house believed him to be, would live. Over and over again the doctor congratulated her on the wonderful influence of her presence upon the sick man. Naturally, he was glad to have rescued a patient from the very jaws of death; and though, since he had learned more of her history from Tabitha Cone, he had slight sympathy for the man, yet he believed that even under the untoward circumstances existing, forgiveness and reconciliation was the course which promised most for future happiness.
"It is the best thing for her," he said to Tabitha. "She will withdraw the divorce proceedings and forgive him. She can never be happy unless she does."
Tabitha, though sure that she herself would never have forgiven her mariner under similar circumstances, which, however, she admitted were unthinkable in that connection, agreed with the physician.
"He will be long in getting well," said the physician; "if, indeed, he ever recovers completely. If he has the heart of a man he must appreciate what she has done for him; literally brought him back to life."
"He was a good man, once," observed Tabitha, her eyes filling. "Oh, Doctor! The most beautiful, the sweetest; the most frank and loving boy——"
"And a brilliant theologian, you tell me. Well, well, Miss Cone, in my profession we learn charity. It is astounding what an evil influence some women can gain over men. And this one was not even beautiful."
"The hussy!"
"Quite so. Ah, Miss Cone, our sex must ever be on guard," and the doctor laughed a little. He was feeling triumphant over the recovery of his patient.
Yet in watching that recovery his face was often very grave. Natalie was sharp-eyed. "Is your patient getting well?" she asked.
"He improves hourly," was the answer, but the tone was not cheerful. He looked at Natalie anxiously.
"Physically, yes. His mind, Doctor?"
"His mental faculties are failing fast."
"How long has this been going on?" He was surprised at her equable tones. Evidently she had nerved herself for this disclosure.
"A brave woman," he thought.
"That is a hard question to answer."
"Do you think it the result of drink? He had never touched liquor two years since."
"I should hardly ascribe it to liquor entirely. Doubtless, over-indulgence of that nature has been a force, a great force. The delirium in which you found him may be directly ascribed to drink."
"If he had been greatly harassed, say two years since, having been up to that time a good man—if then he had suddenly fallen into evil—would you ascribe such a fall to the mental strain consequent upon the worry I have suggested?"
"She seeks every palliation for him," thought the doctor. "Madam, I should say that in the case of a man, such as you have pictured, a sudden lapse into evil courses, courses which belied his training and previous life——"
"Yes?" She was looking steadfastly at him. He little knew the resolve that hung upon his words.
"I should say he was not wholly responsible. I should attribute much to the worry, the vexations, to which you have alluded."
With all her firmness she shrank as from a blow. Thinking to comfort her, he had driven a knife into her heart.
"And now, my dear Mrs. Claghorn, since we are upon this subject—a subject from which I admit I have shrunk—let me tender you some advice. You have saved your husband's life; let that be your solace. It will not be for his happiness that you sacrifice your own."
"Go on," she said, seeing that he hesitated.
"After awhile—not now," he said, "but after your presence is less necessary to him, you must let me aid you to place him in an establishment where he will have every care——"
"An asylum?"
The doctor nodded.
"I will never leave him, so help me God in heaven! Never, never, Mark, my darling, for I, and only I, brought him to this pass!" She cried these words aloud, her hand upraised to heaven.
Mark Claghorn, standing by the window of that room at Stormpoint which was especially set aside as his own, but which, in its luxurious fittings, bore rather the traces of the all-swaying hand of the mistress of the mansion, gazed moodily out toward the tomb, speculating, perhaps, as to the present occupation of the soul that had once been caged in the bones that crumbled there.
To whom entered Mrs. Joe, who silently contemplated him awhile, and then, approaching, touched his shoulder. He turned and smiled, an act becoming rare with him. "Mark," she said, "I am getting old."
"You look as young as my sister might," he said.
"That's nonsense," but she smiled, too. Barring some exaggeration, she knew that his words were true.
"Even so," she urged seriously, "you have wandered enough. You might stay here for my sake."
"Mother, I will stay here for your sake."
"Only that, my son? You know I want more than that."
"Yes," he said, "you want too much. Let us have it out. Believe me, your pleasant dream of a political career for me is hopeless. Granted that I could buy my way to high office—though I do not think so—could I ever respect myself, or command respect? Where, then, would be the honor?"
"I never thought of buying."
"No, not in plain terms. But at my age, together with the fact that I am a stranger, at least a newcomer, in this State, money would be my only resource—perhaps a hopeless one, in any case. The rich man must learn his lesson, which is, that wealth bars the way to honor."
"Our senior Senator is rich."
"I do not speak of moderately rich men. Suspicion is even directed (unjustly, I believe) against such men. But the whole State knows that, politically, our Senator has risen from the ranks. Perhaps he has been compelled to buy that which is his due—who can tell? But all know that at least he has earned the distinction he has won."
"And could you not earn it?"
"No. I am not merely moderately rich. I should be 'held up' by every rogue that glories in the name of politician. If I refused to buy, and refuse I must, I should have no chance whatever. Gold besmirches many things. A rich man is of necessity defiled, let him keep his hands as clean as he can."
Mrs. Joe sighed.
"You have not been willing to realize the facts which influence my life," he went on. "We must look facts in the face. Political distinction is not for me. For your sake I would try, were I not assured that your disappointment would be inevitable. He laid his hand upon her shoulder. He spoke very kindly.
"Mark," she said—there were tears in her eyes—"I wish you were happy."
"If I am content——"
"But you are not. Oh, Mark, seek happiness. Marry."
He smiled grimly. "I wish I could," he said.
"Mark, you say my dream is hopeless. I surrender it. Is yours less hopeless? You wear your life away. Is it worthy to wait for a man to die?"
He made no answer.
"Dear," she said, and the word moved him deeply, for though he knew how much he was beloved of his mother, a term of tenderness was rare from her lips—"Dear, you know what she wrote me."
"You showed me the letter. She gave me the same advice long ago."
"It is the right thing to do. Paula loves you. Natalie is lost to you. You do not know where she is; she does not intend that you shall know. She will not marry you now, even though death were to free her from the bonds she has assumed. She is right. Mind, Mark, I say no word of censure. I believe in her purity as I do in Paula's—but the world will talk. That which she has done cannot be kept secret, but her motive must remain a secret. Had the man died——"
"Enough!" he said sternly. "You say you believe in her as you do in Paula. No shadow of suspicion can ever cross my mind or yours. We need not consider the world——"
"But, my son, she will consider it. She does consider it. Her letter to me shows it. That letter was no easy one for a woman to write. Do you think she would even indirectly have disclosed your secret to me, except that she believed it necessary for your good? I do not doubt, Mark, that she has renounced your love even to you. Is it not unworthy to——"
"To love without hope? Perhaps it is. But since the fact is not generally known—here, as in some other things, the sin consists in being found out." He laughed. "You know you didn't find out; you were told."
"Yes; in the hope, I verily believe, that the disclosure would wound you and so kill your love."
"It wounded, certainly," he said bitterly. "Perhaps, if you give it time, the wound may yet be as fatal as you wish—as she wished." He laughed again very grimly. "Strange creatures, women," he said. "Their self-sacrifice includes the sacrifice of every one but self."
"That is cruel! From no possible point of view can her life be a happy one."
"How you quarrel about a man and cling together against a man!" he said, smiling down upon the lady, who had no other answer than the shrug which, when it moves feminine shoulders, implies that masculine density is impenetrable. His smile broke into laughter.
It aroused her secret indignation; but encouraged her, too. If he could laugh, her case was not hopeless.
"Mark, let us be sensible. You should marry and have children. What else is open to you, the rich man? You have no faith in the world, none in friendship, none in love. Consider what your life must be if, at this age, all purer sources of feeling are dried up! In marriage you will find them all reopened. Your family will be your world. You need children. I need them. We are rich; yes, horribly rich. What is all this worth to us? You are the last of a race, honorable since the tenant of yonder grave first set foot upon this soil; honorable before that time. Shall that race die in you? My son, that old-world notion of Family is estimable. This country needs that it be cherished. The wealth will not be so new in the next generation. Your sons will not be strangers in the land of their fathers. You shall so train them that in them you shall reap the distinction denied to you. You say I am yet young. I am not old, and may still live to see my grandsons honored by their fellow men. By your own confession nothing remains to you but marriage. Love is offered you daily, by one most sweet and most lovable. Paula——"
He stopped her by a gesture. Her unwonted energy had impressed him. She had spoken well. "You have uttered many truths," he said, "but what you say of Paula is not kind, nor do you know——"
"Mark! on my honor as a woman, I believe that Paula loves you." Then she left him.
He remained long musing. Why should he not make his mother happy? It was true, waiting for a man to die was a pitiful occupation. And even should the man die there would be no hope for him. It was a year since Natalie had hidden herself with her burden and Tabitha Cone. Hidden herself, as he well knew, from him. She had written both him and his mother. She had not feared to again acknowledge her love; but she had prayed him to forget her. And she had told him that Paula loved him; she had shown him that his duty required him to love Paula in return; finally, she had, almost sternly, bade him cease to hope.
Perhaps his mother was right. Perhaps Paula loved him—as much as she could love. He loved her in the same cool fashion. He was used to her. She was very beautiful, completely amiable, kind and gentle. Not very brilliant, yet if simple-minded, not a fool. Marriage would bring out all there was of Paula, and that might be much more than was generally suspected. And whatever it was it would be lovable. He knew he was living the life of a fool. Why live that life consciously? Why not make his mother completely happy; Paula and himself happier; as happy as they could be?
He turned to his desk and opened a hidden drawer therein. From this he took a small packet of papers. "A man about to die or marry should set his house in order," he muttered, as he spread the papers open. There was the first letter Natalie had ever written him; a reply to his letter of condolence concerning her father's death. He glanced over it and slowly tore it into fragments. He did the same with the few others written by her, all except the last he had received. This was in answer to a letter into which he had thrown all the strength of his soul, lowering, if not completely breaking down, the last barriers of reserve behind which those who feel deeply hide their hearts.
He could not complain that in her answer she had not been equally frank. "From the innermost depths of my soul I love you, and if more can be, I honor you still more—and because I so love and honor you I must not see you again. I have loved you since the day I first saw you in the Odenwald. I loved you when I became the betrothed of another. I hoped then you would find a way to free me from the promise I had given. I aver before Heaven that I tried with all my strength to be a faithful wife. I loved my husband; alas! not as I know now, with a wife's love, but I believed it. Yet—let me confess it—at the very bottom of my heart slept my love for you, not dead as I had thought it. I have sinned against you, against him who was my husband, against myself. We must all suffer for my sin. You are strong. I must gather all the strength I can for the duty that my guilt has laid upon me—to bear my fate and to make a ruined life as endurable as unremitting care can make it. My sin was great. Consider my expiation! I must always see before my eyes my handiwork.
"You love me. Do you think that ever a doubt of your love crosses my mind? You will always love me. I know it. But, if you see me no more that love will, in time, become a tender reminiscence—not worth a tear, rather a smile—of pity let it be, for the lives that are wrecked. But from this day forth let your own life present a fair ideal to be realized. One has grown up beside you whose fate is in your hands. The fashioning of her destiny lies with you. To be a happy wife and mother, the lot for which nature intended her, or to live the barren life of a religious devotee; and knowing her as I do, I know that for you, embittered and distrustful by reason of your burden of inordinate wealth, she is supremely fitted to make your life serene and cheerful in return for the felicity you will bring to her.
"Adieu, for the last time. I shall not forget you, but shall love you as long as I live, and as warmly as I love you now. But deliberately, and with unalterable resolve, I have chosen my lot. Nothing, not even the hand of death, can render me fit to be more to you than the memory of one who has lived her life."
He slowly tore the letter into fragments as he had torn the others. Perhaps his mouth twitched as he did so. He looked upon the little heap of paper on his desk. "The Romance of a Rich Young Man," he muttered, and smiled at the conceit. Then he gathered the fragments in his hand and strewed them upon some tinder in the chimney and applied a match. "Gone up in Smoke," he said aloud.
"Did you speak?" asked his mother, who had entered the room.
"I repeated the title of a novel I am going to write," he said. "I wanted to hear how it would sound."
"You must live a romance before you can write one, Mark."
"True," he answered dryly. "I need experience. Where is Paula?"
"Oh, Mark!"
He kissed her. "Yes," he said, "I will do what I can to make you happy, and—gain experience."
Mrs. Joe's eyes beamed through her tears.
"She is in the library."
Leaving the room by the window, which opened upon a veranda, he walked toward the library, the windows of which opened upon the same veranda.
The library windows were divided in the centre, like doors. They were open now, and the thick French plate reflected like a mirror. In the open window pane he saw, as in a mirror, a portion of the interior. Paula was there, and Paula's head nestled against the breast of Father Cameril, and the good Father's arm encircled her while his lips pressed hers.
Mark stole silently away.
He found Mrs. Joe awaiting him in the room he had left. "Be very kind to her, mother," he said. "She will have something to tell you."
"But you have been so quick——"
He smiled. "I shall not be the hero of the tale. Father Cameril is the lucky man. After all, it is better. I could not have made her happy as she deserves to be. I am glad I was prevented from offering her——" He hesitated.
"Your heart," said Mrs. Joe.
"An insult," he answered curtly, as he left the room, strolling toward Eliphalet's tomb.
And at Eliphalet's tomb he recognized that Natalie had been wise. Now that it was lost to him he knew that his last long-neglected chance for happiness was gone. Happiness! Perhaps the word meant too much, but in Paula's companionship he could at least have found, in time, contentment and cheerfulness, and are these not happiness, the highest happiness? What now was left him? Money, heaps of money! It barred the way to honorable ambition; its heavy weight lay on his heart, breeding therein suspicion of the love or friendship of all men and women. For him life must be a solitude. He could never lie beside a wife assured that he had won her for himself. He knew that the deadly poison of distrust must ever and ever more thoroughly taint his being, distorting his vision and rendering the aspect of all things hateful. Yet how many thousand men, whose clothes and dinners were assured them, would be glad to change places with him! "But all I have are clothes and food," he muttered.
"We are all poor critters!" Deacon Bedott had spoken words of wisdom. "But the poorest of all is the Rich Man, Deacon," he said.
And then bethought him that by this time Paula and Father Cameril would have made their great announcement. "Little Paula!" he murmured. "Well, she shall have joyous wedding bells, at least, and smiling faces. For the rest let the fond Father look to it!"
The summer sun beat pitilessly upon the burnished cobble stones, driving from the crooked street all except the geese, and even these only languidly stretched their necks, hissing inhospitably at the heels of the dusty wayfarer, the sole object of interest to the landlord of the Red-Ox, who stood in the gateway of his hostelry and blinked in the glare of the sun. "Too old for a student," he muttered, "and no spectacles. Perhaps an artist." As the pedestrian came nearer a puzzled gleam, half of recognition, spread over his features. The dusty traveler stopped. "And so you are here yet!" and he slapped the broad shoulder of the host.
"Here yet, and hope to be for many a year to come," answered the fat host; "and you are here, not for the first time, I dare swear; but who you are, or when you last were here——
"That you can't recall. Why should you?"
"Ein Amerikaner!Astudiosus juris, of the Pestilentia.Ein alter Burschof ten years back! Remember? Surely, all but the name."
"And what's in a name?" shaking the offered hand of the landlord. "Mine is a mouthful for you—Claghorn."
"Herr DoktorClokhorn. That's it. Not so great a mouthful after all." He led the way into the well-remembered garden. "Many a schoppen have you had here," he said; "and many a time sung 'Alter Burschen Herrlichkeit' at this very table, and many trout——"
"Devoured," interrupted Mark. "That pastime will bear repetition. As for singing, one loses the desire."
"Not so," observed the fat host. "I am sixty, but I lead the Liederkranz to-day. Wine, woman and song—you know what Luther said——"
"I remember. But not even the Great Reformer's poetry is to be taken too literally. We'll discuss the point later on. Now some trout, then a pipe and a gossip."
When the host departed to attend to the order, Mark unstrapped his knapsack and looked about him.
He had come thousands of miles to see this garden! He admitted the foolish fact to himself, though even to his mother he would have denied it. The fat host was right; he had drunk many a flask of wine in this place, roared in many a chorus, had danced many a waltz with village maidens on yonder platform; but of these various scenes of his student days he had not thought until his host recalled them. They were memories, even memories with some of that tender sadness which renders such memories pleasant, but such as they would never have drawn him here.
And now that he was here, so sharp a pain was in his heart that he recognized his folly. The wound was yet too new. He should have waited a decade or more. Then he might have found solace in recalling her to his mind, here where first he had seen her; he, in all the arrogant pride of youth; she, with all the fresh beauty of a school girl. Now no effort was needed to recall her to his memory—she was ever present.
Nevertheless, he enjoyed his fish and his wine. "A superlative vintage," said the host, who had had time to recall his guest more distinctly, and who remembered that in past daysStudiosus Clokhornhad dispensed money with a liberal hand.
"And so the inn has been enlarged," said Mark, looking about him. "That means prosperity."
"Forellenbach is becoming a resort," replied the host. "We have parties that remain for days. We have strangers here at this moment."
"Ah!" was the sleepy comment.
"Yes; three ladies. Or rather, two ladies and a maid. Mother and daughter—English."
"Ah!" said Mark again.
At this point the host, rather to the relief of his guest, was called away, and Mark adjusted himself upon the bench and dozed. A long tramp, and perhaps the superlative vintage, had made him sleepy.
When he awoke, sunset shadows were about him. He was vexed, having intended to walk on to Heidelberg, which now he must do in part after dark. However, a walk by night might be pleasanter than had been the tramp under the sun. Before leaving he would look about. It was not likely that he would ever again see a place which would dwell always in his memory.
As he neared the cave where the echo dwelt he saw the slender figure of a woman. Her back was toward him, but the garb and mien proclaimed one, not a permanent resident of the village. "One of mine host's guests," he murmured, "agnädige Frauof artistic taste and economical practice." He paused, unwilling to disturb feminine meditation. The stranger stood at the entrance to the cave, on the spot where first he had seen the girl who, later, had become the one woman in the world to him. There was something in her attitude, bent head and arms hanging listless, that interested, even moved him. She, too, looked like some lonely being, saying a last farewell at a shrine where love had been born; and then, as she strolled away, hidden by overhanging boughs of trees and the slowly deepening evening shadows, he smiled at his conceit.
He strolled on to where she had been standing, for, though he smiled cynically at his foolishness, the spot was to him a sacred one. If sentimental folly had brought him a thousand leagues, it might well control a few steps more.
As he reached the place he came face to face with another woman, whose old but sharp eyes recognized him instantly. "Mr. Mark!"
"Tabby!" He was so astonished that he could say no more for a moment. Then he found words: "Was that Natalie?"
Miss Cone, though slightly hysterical from pleasure and surprise, explained that Natalie had just left her. "But what brings you here?" she added.
"Heaven or fate," was the answer. And then he was for following Natalie at once. But Tabitha restrained him. "Let me prepare her," she urged, and to that plea she found him willing to listen.
Then she told him the story of their wanderings. They had brought Leonard to Europe, principally for the voyage, which, however, had been of no benefit. They had remained in Ireland, near Londonderry, where they had first landed. He had never been able to move, but passed his life in a wheeled chair. His mind had been that of an infant, though before he died he seemed to have gleams of intelligence, and had once in an old churchyard expressed a wish to be buried there, or so Natalie had interpreted his babbling. And there he had slept for a year. "And so," sobbed Tabitha, "the poor boy's weary life is over at last. God bless him!"
"Amen to that," said Mark. "Tabitha! It has been a grief to me, God knows. So heavy a sorrow that I have thought I could not bear it; yet, at this moment I can say that I am glad that Natalie forgave him and cherished him till he died."
Tabitha looked up. Her hard, worn old face was softened by her tears. "Those words," she said, "will win her for you; if words can win the heart already yours."
At the appointed hour Tabitha led him to Natalie, who was waiting for him. He could see the swaying of her form as she rose to greet him. He took her in his arms.
"My darling, my darling." He could say nothing else. Her arm had crept upward about his neck; he held her close.
"Why are you here?" he asked, at length, then added: "Bless God that you are here."
"To say good-bye to a place that has often been in my thoughts. And, since heaven has permitted it, to say good-bye to you."
"That you shall never say. I vow before God never to leave you. You and I shall live our lives together, whatever your answer to the petition I now make. Will you be my wife?"
"Mark, I am not——"
"Stop!" he said. "You once declared that as you loved me, so you honored me. I now, with all solemnity, declare that you are honored as you are loved by me. If I do not estimate the fault which you have expiated as you do, I respect and admire the expiation. If you believe me to be a truthful man, learn now that I approve your care of him who was your husband. Let that suffice. And now, once more I swear that I will never leave you. Will you be my wife?"
"Mark, I love you."
"Then the wedding bells shall ring, and Forellenbach shall rejoice." Their lips met, and in the kiss they forgot the years that had passed since last they saw Forellenbach.