"The wounds of earth," the Father Superior said gravely, "are the joys of heaven."
Maurice stood an instant with a keen desire to reply, to break down this icy statue of religion; then he drew back.
"I will not trouble you longer," he said. "Good-by."
"Good-by, Mr. Wynne," the other responded with the manner of one addressing a stranger.
Maurice went to his chamber thoroughly aroused and excited. The restraint which he had put on himself during the talk with Father Frontford brought now its reaction. He rehearsed in his mind the telling and caustic things which he might have said, then laughed at himself for his unnecessary fervor. He packed his belongings, and, leaving them to be called for, set out for the house of his cousin. To go out from the Clergy House seemed to him like the ending of a life.
Mrs. Staggchase was fortunately at home. It seemed to Maurice that her keen eyes took in the whole story from his secular dress. He blushed as she gave him her hand.
"Well, my dear boy," she observed, "you have come to luncheon, I suppose, because the fare at the Clergy House is so poor in Lent. Sit down, and give me an account of your doings last night. I trust that you saw Mrs. Wilson safe home."
"I left her in the church."
"Ah! And what did you do then?"
"I went home and fought it out with myself. You were right in saying that things were not concluded when I became a deacon. I have given up the whole thing."
"What do you mean by the whole thing?"
"I mean," he returned earnestly, "that I found out that I was acting a part. That I didn't believe even the first principles of the religion I was getting ready to teach. I have broken down in the temptation, Cousin Diana."
She looked at him closely. The buoyancy of his morning mood was gone, and it was hard for him to endure her searching look. It came over him that he was an apostate; one who had abandoned all that he had vowed to uphold; his vanity smarted at the thought that she must think him weak and unstable as water.
"I am only what I was," he went on. "The difference is that I have discovered what you probably saw all the time, that I don't believe the things I have been taught. I am as free from the old creeds as you are. I don't even pretend to know that there is a God."
"My dear boy," she responded, shrugging her shoulders, "you run into extremes like a schoolgirl. I beg you won't talk as if I could be so vulgar as not to believe in a deity. Don't rank me with the crowd of common folk that try to increase their own importance by insisting that there's nothing above them. Really, an atheist seems to me as bad as a man who eats with his knife."
He changed countenance, but her words left him speechless. He could not hear her speak in this way without being shocked. He might be without creed, but his temper was still devout.
"If you've thrown overboard all your old dogmas," she went on with unruffled face, "you'd better go to work to get a new set. I've just heard of some sort of a society got up by women out in Cambridge, where they deduce the ethnic sources of prophetic inspiration—whatever that means!—from the 'Arabian Nights' and 'Mother Goose.' You might find something there to suit you."
He could not answer her; he could only wonder whether she disapproved of what he had done, or if she were vexed with him for coming to her.
"It's possible," she went on mercilessly, a fresh note of mockery in her voice, "that Berenice might help you. Very often a woman wins converts where a priest fails. After last night"—
He came to his feet with a spring.
"Don't!" he exclaimed. "I can't stand any more. Do you think that it's been easy for me to find out the truth about myself; to have to own that I've been a cheating fool, without honesty enough to know my own mind? As for Miss Morison"—
His voice failed him. He was unnerved; the reaction from his long vigil, from his interview with Father Frontford, overcame him. The simple mention of the name of Berenice made him choke, and he stood there speechless. His cousin rose and came to him softly. Before he knew what she was doing, she bent forward and kissed his forehead.
"You poor boy," she said in a voice half laughing, yet so gentle that he hardly recognized it, "don't take my teasing so much to heart. You are only finding out like the rest of us that it is impossible not to be human."
He could answer only by grasping her hand, ashamed of the weakness which had betrayed him, and touched deeply by her kindness.
"Come," Mrs. Staggchase said, moving to the bell, and speaking in her natural tone. "I have helped you to break your life into bits; I must try to help you to put the pieces together into something better. You must stay here for a while, and we'll consider what is to be done next. Will you tell Patrick how to get your things from the Clergy House? Take your old room. I'll see you at luncheon."
And as the servant appeared at one door she withdrew by another.
PARTED OUR FELLOWSHIPOthello, ii. 1.
Berenice had abundant leisure to reflect upon her attitude toward her lovers, for Mrs. Frostwinch was soon so seriously ill that it was evident to all that the end was at hand. Berenice devoted herself to the invalid, although there was little that she could do. The sick woman did not suffer; she seemed merely to be fading out of life; to have lost her hold upon something which was slipping from her loosened grasp.
"The fact is, Bee," Mrs. Frostwinch said one day, "that the doctors say I'm dead. I'm beginning to believe it myself, and when I'm fully convinced, I suppose that that'll be the end."
"Oh, don't joke about it, Cousin Anna," cried Bee. "It is too dreadful."
"It won't make it any less dreadful to be solemn over it," the other answered. "However, death should be spoken of with respect; even one's own."
Berenice longed to know what had taken place between her cousin and Mrs. Crapps, but she hardly liked to ask. That there had been a disagreement of some kind, and that Mrs. Frostwinch had lost faith in the woman, she knew; but beyond this she was in the dark. One afternoon, however, her cousin explained matters.
"It is so humiliating, Bee, that I can hardly bear to think of it, the way things turned out. My conscience will be easier, though, if I tell you the whole of it. It is so vulgar that it makes me creep. We were at Jekyll's Island, and she had an ulcerated tooth."
"I thought she couldn't have such things?"
"She thought or pretended that she couldn't. I must say that she fought against it with tremendous pluck; but the face kept swelling, and the pain got to be more than she could bear. When she gave out she went to pieces completely. She literally rolled on the floor and howled. I couldn't go on believing in her after that. She'd actually made herself ridiculous."
"But," began Berenice, "I should think"—
"If it had been something dangerous, so that I had had to think of her life," went on her cousin, not heeding, "I could have borne it; but that common thing! Why, her face looked like a drunken cook's! I can't tell you the humiliation of it!"
"But if she could help you, why not herself?"
Mrs. Frostwinch smiled wanly.
"I've tried to think that out," answered she. "It was always said of the old witches, you know, that they couldn't help themselves. It is faith in somebody else that is behind the wonders they do. I've grown very wise in the last few weeks, Bee. I don't pretend that I understand all the facts, but I do know pretty well what the facts are. I believed in Mrs. Crapps, and that belief kept me up. When I couldn't believe in her, that was the end of it."
There seemed to Berenice something uncanny and monstrous in this calm acquiescence. She could not comprehend how her cousin could give up the struggle for life in this fashion, after having succeeded so long in holding death at bay.
"But surely," she protested, "you can't be willing to let everything depend upon her. You've proved the possibility"—
"I've proved the possibility of depending upon somebody else; that's all."
"Then find another woman that you can believe in."
"It is too late. I can't have the faith over again. I should always be expecting another humiliating downfall of my prophetess."
She was silent a moment, and then continued:—
"Do you know, Bee, it seems to me after all that my experience is like almost all religion. There are a few men and women who believe in themselves in that self-poised way that makes it possible for them to get on with just ethics; and there are those who can take hold of unseen things; but for the rest of us it's necessary to have some human being to lean on. I hope I don't shock you. I lie awake in the night a good deal, and my mind seems clearer than it used to be. All the religions seem to have a real, tangible human centre, a personality that human beings can appreciate and believe in. Mrs. Crapps was so real and so near at hand that I could have faith in her; now that that is gone there isn't anything left for me. I can't believe in her, and she has destroyed the Possibility of my believing in anybody else."
Berenice put out her hand in the growing dusk, caressing the thin fingers of the sick woman.
"But—but," she hesitated, "she hasn't destroyed your faith in—in everything, has she?"
"No, dear; she hasn't touched my belief in God; but it makes me ashamed to see how different a thing it is to believe in what we see and touch, from having a genuine faith in what we do not see. I have a faith in my soul still; the other was only a faith of the body. Perhaps it had only to do with the body, and it is not so bad to have lost it."
"Oh, Cousin Anna," Berenice murmured, tears choking her voice, "I can't bear to see you getting farther and farther off every day, and to feel so helpless."
"There, there, Bee," responded the other with tender cheerfulness, "you are not to agitate yourself or to excite me. I've lived half a year more now than the doctors allowed me, and I've enjoyed it too. Besides, think of the blessedness of not having any pain. Do you know, the night after Mrs. Crapps had that scene in the hotel, I was in a panic of terror lest my old agony should come back; but it didn't. Then I said to myself: 'Of course I couldn't suffer; I'm really dead!' You can't think what a comfort it was."
"Oh, don't, don't!" cried Bee. "I can't bear to have you talk like that."
"Well, then, we won't. There's something else I want to speak to you about while I am strong enough. Do you realize that when I am gone you'll be a rich woman?"
"I haven't thought about it. I've hated to think."
"Yes, dear, I understand; but when you are older you'll come to realize that half of the duty of life is to think of things which one would rather forget."
"But it could do no good to think of this."
"Perhaps not; but I want to ask you something. I know you'll forgive me. It's about Parker Stanford."
"You may ask me anything you like, of course, Cousin Anna. As for Parker Stanford, he's nothing more than the rest of the men I know, only he's been more polite. We are very good friends."
"No more?"
"No more; and we never shall be."
"But he surely wished to be?" The day had darkened until the room was lighted only by the flames of the soft coal fire which sputtered in the grate. The cousins could hardly see each other's faces; but in the dim light Berenice turned frankly toward Mrs. Frostwinch.
"That is all over now," responded she. "Of course to anybody else I shouldn't own that there ever was anything; but whatever there may have been is ended. He understands that perfectly."
For some minutes Berenice sat smoothing the invalid's hand, the firelight glancing on her face and hair.
"How pretty you are, Bee," Mrs. Frostwinch said at length. Then without pause she added: "Is there anybody else?"
Bee sank backward into the shadow with a quick, instinctive movement, dropping the hand she held.
"Who should there be?" she returned.
Her cousin laughed softly.
"You are as transparent as glass," she said. "Come, who is it?"
Berenice hesitated an instant, then threw herself forward, bending over the hand of her companion until her face was hidden.
"There isn't really anybody; and besides I've insulted him so that he never could help hating me. No, there isn't anybody, Cousin Anna; and there never will be. I know I should despise him if he wasn't angry; and besides," she added with the air of suddenly recollecting herself, "I hate him for what he said."
"That is evident," the other assented smilingly. "I could see at once that you hated him. But who is it?"
"Why, there isn't anybody, I tell you. Of course I thought about him after he saved my life, but"—
"Oh," interrupted Mrs. Frostwinch. "Then it is Mr. Wynne. But I thought"—
"He isn't a priest any more," Berenice struck in, replying to the unspoken doubt as if it had been in her own mind. "I heard yesterday that he has left the Clergy House for good, and is staying with Mrs. Staggchase."
"Have you seen him lately?"
"He overtook me on the street yesterday."
Mrs. Frostwinch put out her hand with a loving gesture.
"Bee," said she tenderly, "I want you to be happy. You've been like a daughter to me ever since your mother died, and I've thought of you almost as if you were my own child. If this is the man to make you happy"—
But Bee stooped forward and stopped the words with kisses.
"I can't talk of him," she said, "and he will never be anything to me.He is angry, and he has a right to be. He"—
The entrance of the nurse interrupted them, and Berenice made haste to get away before there was opportunity for further question. In her anxiety to know something more of Mr. Wynne, Mrs. Frostwinch sent for Mrs. Staggchase, who came in the next day.
Mrs. Staggchase found her friend weak and frightfully changed. The high-bred face was haggard, the nostrils thin, while beneath the eyes were heavy purple shadows. A ghost of the old smile lighted her face, making it more ghastly yet, like the gleaming of a candle through a death-mask. The hand extended to the visitor was so transparent that it might almost have belonged to a spirit.
"My dear Anna," Mrs. Staggchase exclaimed, "I hadn't an idea"—
"That I was so near dying, my dear," interrupted the other. "I am worse than that, I am dead, really; but it doesn't matter. I want to talk to you about Bee."
"About Bee?" echoed the other, seating herself beside the bed. "What about her?"
"I should have said that I want to ask you about Mr. Wynne. Do you know anything about his relations to her?"
"The only relation that he has is that of a perfectly desperate adorer. He worships the ground she walks on, but he doesn't cherish anything that could be decently called hope."
"Then he does care for her?"
"My dear Anna, it almost makes me weep for my lost youth to see him. He has so wrought upon my glands of sentiment that this morning I actually examined my husband's wardrobe to see if the maid darns his stockings properly. Fred would be perfectly amazed if he knew how sentimental I feel. I even thought of sitting up last night to welcome him home from the club, but about half past one I came to the end of my novel and felt sleepy, so I gave that up."
Mrs. Frostwinch smiled with the air of one who understands that the visitor is endeavoring to furnish a diversion from the dull sadness of the sick chamber.
"But Bee said he was angry with her."
"The anger of lovers, my dear, is legitimate fuel for the flame. That's nothing. She's been amusing herself with him, and if she thinks he resents it, so much the better for him."
"But is he"—
She hesitated as if not knowing how best to frame her question.
"He is a handsome creature, as you know if you remember him," the visitor said, taking up the word. "He is well born, he is well bred, if a little countrified. He's been shut up with monks and other mouldy things, and needs a little knocking about in the world; but I am very fond of him."
"Then you think"—
"I think that whoever gets Bee will get a treasure; but I am not sure that she is any too good for my cousin. He hasn't much money, unless he gets a little fortune that ought to have been his, and which he has some hope of. I mean to give him something myself one of these days, if he behaves himself; but of course he hasn't any idea of that."
"Bee will have all the Canton money, and can do as she likes."
Mrs. Staggchase looked down at the carpet as if studying the pattern.
"Perhaps," she returned.
"What do you mean by that?"
"If I know Maurice Wynne, the fact that she has money will make him very slow to speak. Besides, he has a silly crotchet in his head now. He thinks that if he tried to marry her it would look as if he had given up his religion for her."
"Did he?"
"Bless you, no. He was simply led into the Clergy House by being fond of a friend; one of those men that young men and old women fall in love with. Maurice never belonged there at all. I saw that the first day he came to stay with me at the beginning of the winter. I was abroad while he was in college, so I never knew him except most casually before."
"But if he really cares for her he'll get over those obstacles."
"If she cares for him, he must be made to."
"I am convinced that she does," Mrs. Frostwinch said. "I am so glad you speak well of him. I do so want Bee to be happy."
There was a long silence in the chamber. The two friends sat wrapped in thought. They had seen so much of life, they had had so many blessings of fortune, culture, position, wealth, that there was a grim irony in their sitting here helpless in the face of coming death. To their reverie, moreover, the mention of love could not but give color. No woman has ever come to speak of love entirely unmoved, though her heart may have been deadened or crushed beyond the power of thrilling or quickening at any other thought. These two, who had led lives so happy, so protected, so rich, sat there silent before the possibilities which lay in the love of a girl; until at last both sighed, whether with regret or tenderness perhaps they could not themselves have told. Perhaps both remembered their youthful days; remembered how one had lost her first love by death and the other parted from hers in anger, making a marriage which seemed more a matter of affronting the man discarded than of affection for the man she chose. They knew each other's history so completely that there could be no disguise between them. Their eyes met, and for an instant there was a suspicion of wistfulness in the glance. Then Mrs. Frostwinch shook her head, and smiled sadly.
"At least," she said, "I shall be spared the pain of growing old."
"After all," the other responded, "the bitterness of growing old is to feel that one has never completely been young."
The sick woman regarded her with burning eyes.
"But we have been young, Di," she said eagerly. "Surely we had all that there was."
"Anna," Mrs. Staggchase murmured, leaning toward her, "we know each other too well not to say things that most women are afraid to say. We both married well, and we have cared for our husbands and been happy. But we both know that there was deep down a memory"—
"No, no, Di," her friend interrupted excitedly, "you shall not make me think of that! I have forgotten all that; and I am dying comfortably. You shall not make me think of him! Only, dear Di, I want you to help Bee to marry the man she loves with her whole heart; that she loves as we might have loved if"—
Mrs. Staggchase kissed her solemnly.
"I promise, Anna."
Then she rose, her whole manner changing.
"Do you know, my dear," she observed, in a tone gayly satirical, "that I believe that Elsie Wilson is going to be beaten in her bishop steeplechase?"
"Do you mean that Father Frontford won't be elected?"
"I mean just that. However, things are still uncertain. It will be amusing to see what Elsie will do if she is defeated. She is capable of setting up a church of her own."
"There are two or three men with whom I have some influence that will go over to Mr. Strathmore if I am not here to look after them. I must write to them to-morrow and get them to promise to hold by our side."
But that night Mrs. Frostwinch died quietly in her sleep, and the letters were not written.
HOW CHANCES MOCK 2 Henry IV., iii. 1.
Maurice had seen Berenice only once since his encounter at the ball. He had hoped and dreaded to meet her, but for more than a week after his leaving the Clergy House he had failed. One morning he saw her walking before him on Beacon Street; and while he instantly said to himself that he trusted that she would not discover him, he hurried forward to overtake her. His feet carried him forward even while he told himself that he did not wish to go. He was beside her in a moment, and as he spoke she raised those rich, dark eyes with a glance which made him thrill.
"Good-morning," he said with his heart beating as absurdly as if the encounter were of the highest consequence.
"Good-morning, Mr. Wynne," she responded, with a manner entirely abstract.
She had started and blushed, he was sure, on perceiving him; but if so she had instantly recovered her self-possession. He was disconcerted by the coldness of her manner, and began to wish in complete earnest that he had not overtaken her.
"I beg your pardon for intruding," he said, his voice hardening, "but"—
"The public street is free to anybody, I suppose," she returned, with an air of studied politeness. "I don't claim any exclusive right to it."
"I didn't apologize for being on the street, but for speaking to you."
"Oh, that," answered Berenice carelessly, although he thought that he detected a spark of mischief in her eye, "is a thing of so little consequence that it isn't worth mentioning."
"I venture to speak to you," he said, ignoring the thrust, "because I have wanted to beg your pardon for my rudeness when I saw you last."
She turned upon him quickly, her cheeks aflame.
"Your rudeness?" she exclaimed. "Your brutality, I think you mean!"
It was his turn to grow red.
"My brutality, if you choose. I beg your pardon for whatever offended."
"It was unpardonable! It was a thing no woman could ever forgive!"
Maurice turned pale. He stopped where he stood.
"In that case," he said, bowing with formality, "I have no business to be speaking to you now."
He turned and was gone before she could add a word.
This interview probably made neither of the young persons happy; and Maurice it left entirely miserable. He was not without a proper pride, however, and in his present frame of mind was ready to call it to his aid. He bore a brave outward front. He resolved not to think of his love; yet he was not without the hardly confessed hope that if he could find the lost will he might be taking a step in the direction of the realization of his desires. He tried to forget Berenice in the very means he was taking to bring himself nearer to her.
He set out for Montfield one bright February day, amused at himself for the difference in his attitude toward the world from the mere fact that he had discarded the ecclesiastical garb. It gave him a fresh and delightful sensation to be traveling on business in clothing like that of other men. He had no longer any wish to be separated by his dress, and thought with contemptuous amusement of the lurking self-consciousness which had always attached itself in his mind to the fact that he was in a costume apart. He realized now that he had from this derived a certain satisfaction, half simple vanity and half the gratification of his histrionic instinct. He felt as if he had been like a child pleased to attract attention by a feather stuck in his cap, or a toy sword girt at his side. Now that the whole experience was past he could smile at it, but he had small patience with those who still retained the clerical garb. Men have usually little tolerance for the fault which they have but newly outgrown; and Maurice thought with a sort of amazement of his late fellows at the Clergy House, and of their manifest satisfaction in the dress they wore. It was almost with a sensation of self-righteousness that he enjoyed the habiliments of ordinary civilized man.
As the train sped on, and the scenery became more familiar as he approached nearer to Montfield, Maurice naturally fell to thinking, in an irregular, detached fashion, of his youth. Both Wynne's parents had died in his childhood, and there had been little to keep firm the bonds of family. Alice Singleton he had known, however, both as a girl and as the wife of his half brother, but he had known only to dislike and avoid her. He began now to wonder how she would receive him, and whether she would allude to the scene at Mrs. Rangely's when he had broken up her spiritualistic deception.
The train of thought into which reminiscence had plunged him carried him over his whole life. He realized for the first time that his religious experiences had been little more than a reflection of those of Philip. It was Ashe who had interested him in spiritual things, who had led him into the church, who had practically determined for him that he should become a priest. For the first time, and with profound amazement, Maurice realized how completely his theological life had been the growth of the mind of Ashe rather than of his own. The thought brought with it a sense of weakness and self-contempt.
"Haven't I any strength of character?" he asked himself. "In everything practical Phil has always relied on me. It was always Phil I cared for, not the church."
Imperfectly as he was able to phrase it, Maurice was not in the end without some reasonably clear conception of the fact that in his life Philip had represented the feminine element. It was by love for his friend that he had been led on. Now that his reason was fully awake this emotional yielding to the thought of another was no longer possible; now that his heart was filled with a passion for Berenice his nature no longer responded to the appeal of the feminine in Ashe.
Maurice was half aware that his was a character sure to be influenced greatly by affection; but he felt that it would never again be possible for him so to give up to another the guidance of his life as he now saw that he had yielded it to his friend. He had learned his weakness, and the lesson had been enforced too sharply ever to be forgotten.
He was coming now into the region of his old home. The forests were beginning faintly to show the approach of spring; the treetops were dimly warming in color, the branches thickening against the sky. Here and there Maurice looked down on a brook black with the late rains and with the floods from the snow-drifts still melting on the distant hills. Now he caught a far flash of the river where he had skated in winters almost forgotten, so fast does time move, where he had fished and bathed in summers so long gone that they seemed to belong to the life of some other. Yet once more and a distant hill, duskily blue against the bluer heavens, wakened for him some memory of his boyhood, seeming to challenge him to renew the old joys and to revel in the by-gone fervors.
All these things softened the mood in which Maurice came back to the old town, and as he walked up the village street, so well remembered yet so strange, he had a sense of unreality. The very homely familiarity of it all made it appear the more like a dream. He felt his heart-beats quicken as he approached the Ashe place, wondering if he should see Mrs. Ashe. He had always, with all his affection, felt for Philip's mother a sort of awe, as if she were more than a simple human creature. He found it difficult to understand that Mrs. Singleton should be staying with her, so incongruous was the association in his mind of two such women. With Mrs. Ashe, Alice must at least be at her best.
He walked up to the house, passing under the leafless lilac bushes with a keen remembrance of how they were laden with odors in June. He wondered if the tansy still grew under the sitting-room window, and if the lilies-of-the-valley flourished on the north side of the house as of old. Then he knocked with the quaint old black knocker, and with the sound came back the present and the thought that he had before him an interview which might be neither pleasant nor easy.
Mrs. Singleton herself opened the door.
"I saw you coming," she greeted him, "and there is nobody at home but me."
Maurice tried not to look disappointed.
"Then Mrs. Ashe is not at home?"
"No; she is out, and the girl is out. Will you come in? You probably didn't come to see me."
"But I did come to see you."
She led the way into the long, low sitting-room, with its many doors and its wide fireplace, so familiar that he might have left it yesterday.
"I can't imagine what you want of me," Mrs. Singleton said, waving her hand toward a chair. "The last time I saw you you didn't seem very fond of me."
She seated herself by the side of the fire in a great old-fashioned chair covered with chintz and spreading out wings on either side of her head.
"You are still angry, Alice, I see," he rejoined. "Well, I can't help that. I did what was right. How in the world could you make up your mind to fool those people so?"
"They wanted to be fooled; why not oblige them?"
He regarded her with astonishment. He had expected her to deny that her deception was deliberate, to claim that the manifestations were real. Her frank and cynical speech disconcerted him. He had no reply. She broke into a sneering laugh.
"There," she said, "you didn't come here to talk about that séance.What did you come for?"
"I came to ask you if you still have Aunt Hannah's desk."
She regarded him keenly.
"The little traveling desk?"
"Yes."
"What if I have?"
"But have you?"
"Oh, I don't mind telling you that. I don't see that it can do you any good to know that I have it. I always carry it round with me. It's so convenient."
"Will you sell it to me?"
"Certainly not. If you didn't want it, I might give it to you; but if you do you can't have it."
Maurice began to feel his anger rising. He felt helpless before this woman, with her innocent, baby face, this woman with the guileless look of a child and a child's freedom from moral scruples, who faced him with a smile of pleased malice. It might be unwise to tell his real errand, but she surely could not do any harm greater than to be disagreeable. There must be some method, he reflected, of getting at the thing legally; but what it was he was entirely ignorant; and now that he had shown a desire for the desk he was confident that Mrs. Singleton would persist until she had discovered the truth. He could think of nothing to do but to make a clean breast of the whole matter. He nerved himself to the task, and told her of the finding of Norah and of what followed.
"Have you ever discovered that the desk had a false bottom?" he asked in conclusion.
"No, brother Maurice. The spirits hadn't revealed it to me. But then I never asked them about that."
There was an air of triumphant glee in her manner, an open and mocking sneer, which dismayed him. He was sure that he had erred in telling her his secret; yet he reflected that he could hardly have done otherwise, and that she surely would not dare to refuse to give up a legal document so important.
"Will you let me examine the desk?"
"I am so happy to oblige you," she returned. "Though whether your story is true or not must depend, you know, upon the unsupported testimony of the medium—I mean of the speaker."
Maurice rose and went toward her, facing her squarely.
"I understand, Alice," he said, "that you don't love me, and I haven't come to ask favors. This is a matter of simple honesty. I certainly don't think you would willfully keep me out of my property."
"Thank you for drawing the line somewhere. It was so noble of you to interfere at Mrs. Rangely's! You didn't in the least mind robbing me of my good name, and them of the comfort of believing it was real. Besides, I did see things! I swear to you that I did! I am a medium in spite of whatever you say. I can call up spirits!"
Her voice rose as she went on, and he feared lest she should work herself into one of her furies of excitement and temper which he had seen of old.
"Why should we go back to that?" he said, as gently as he could. "That is past, and I only did what I thought was my duty."
"Oh, you did your duty, did you?" she sneered.
"Well, I'll do mine now. Stay here, while I go and empty that old desk.I'll match you in doing my duty!"
She hurried tumultuously from the room, leaving Maurice in anything but an enviable frame of mind. He began to walk up and down, assailed by old memories at every turn, yet so disturbed by Mrs. Singleton's words and manner that he could not heed the recollections. The minutes passed, and Alice did not return. It seemed to him that she took a long time to remove her papers from the desk. Then he smiled to himself in bitter amusement and impatience. Of course his sister-in-law was trying to discover the secret of the double bottom. She would probably persevere until she had gained the precious document of which he had come in search. She would read it, and then—He broke off in his reverie with an exclamation of impatience. What a fool he had been to attempt to deal with this woman alone! He had, it was true, expected to find Mrs. Ashe, but he should have sent a lawyer. What did he, a puppet from the Clergy House, know of managing the affairs of life? He felt that he had failed in his match with Mrs. Singleton; and he had almost made up his mind to go in search of her, when he heard her returning.
She came in with her face flushed, her eyes shining, and an air of triumph which struck dismay to the heart of Maurice.
"I am sorry to have kept you waiting so long," she said, "but I had to light a fire in the parlor, I was so cold. However, I have something to show you that will interest you."
"Is it the will?" he asked eagerly.
She answered with a laugh, but led the way across the narrow front entry into the parlor. The pleasant noise of a crackling fire sounded within, and as he entered the room he saw that the fireplace was filled with a ruddy blaze. Then he rushed forward with a cry. There on the top of the blazing logs were the unmistakable remains of the desk, eaten through and through by tongues of red flame. He seized the tongs, and dragged the burning mass to the hearth, but even as he did so he saw that he was too late.
"It is kind of you to want to save my old desk, Maurice," jeered his companion; "but I had the misfortune to put the poker through the bottom of it before I called you, so that I'm afraid it really isn't worth saving."
He saw that the wood had indeed been punched through and through, and that it was reduced almost to a cinder. It was easy to see that the bottom had been double, and burned flakes of paper were visible among the remains; whether of the will or not it was obviously impossible now to discover. He looked at the burned bits of board falling into ashes and cinders at his feet, realizing that here was an end to all his dreams of regaining his aunt's fortune; that with this dream ended, too, his visions of being in a position to offer Berenice—His wrath blazed up in an uncontrollable force.
"You are a fiend!" he cried, facing the woman who smiled beside him."You are a thief, a shameless, deliberate thief!"
She stood the image of mirthful, innocent girlhood, her smooth forehead unclouded, her eyes gleaming as if with the merriment of a child.
"It is a pretty fire, isn't it, Maurice?"
Then her whole expression changed. Into her dark, dewy eyes came a look of rage, visible murder in a glance.
"You called me a liar, there in Boston," she said hissingly. "I am not surprised to have you add thief now. I have only done what I chose with my own property; but I would have been cut into little bits before you should have had that will through me!"
He could not trust himself to reply. He felt that if he spoke he might break out into curses, and he was conscious of an unmanly longing to strike her, to mar that beautiful, false face, childlike and pure in every line,—for the expression of rage had melted as quickly as it had come,—to feel the joy of seeing her limbs slacken and her red lips grow white. He clinched his hands and turned resolutely away.
"I'm sure I don't know that there was anything there that you had any interest in," she pursued lightly. "I tried as long as I dared to get the bottom open, and I couldn't, so I decided that it wasn't any of my business. Only when I put the poker through there seemed to be papers there."
Maurice could endure no more. He started toward her so fiercely that she recoiled, a sudden pallor blanching her rosy loveliness. Then he turned abruptly away again, and got out of the house.
NOW HE IS FOR THE NUMBERSRomeo and Juliet, ii. 4.
Interest in the question who would be bishop increased as Lent waned and the time for the meeting of the convention approached. The general public could not be expected to be greatly concerned about a matter so purely ecclesiastical, but the wide popularity of Mr. Strathmore gave to the election a character of its own. The question was generally held to be that of the prevalence of liberal views. Many who cared nothing about the church were interested in seeing whether new or old ideas would prevail. The age is one in which there is a keen curiosity to see what course the church will take. It is partly due, undoubtedly, to the inherited habit of being concerned in theology; it is perhaps more largely the result of unconscious desire for a liberalism so great that it shall justify those who have been so liberal as to lay aside all religion whatever.
The papers had entered into the discussion with an alacrity quickened by the fact that at this especial season there was not much else in the way of news. Rangely wrote for the "Daily Eagle" a glowing editorial in which he urged the choice of Strathmore on the ground that the new bishop should be not the representative of a faction, but of the whole church, and as far as possible of the people. It insisted that only a man liberal himself could have breadth to understand and sympathize with all shades of feeling. Others of the secular press had taken up the discussion, and Mrs. Wilson declared that the devil was contributing editorials to the papers in his keen fear that Father Frontford would be elected.
Lent wore at last to an end, and the festivities which follow Easter came in with all their usual gayety. One evening, about a week before the election, a musicale was given at the house of Mrs. Gore. Mr. and Mrs. Strathmore were present, the tall figure of the former being conspicuous in the crowd which after the music surged toward the supper-room and later eddied through the parlors. Fred Rangely came upon the clergyman at a moment when he had detached himself from the admiring women who usually surrounded him, and taken refuge in the shadow of a deep window.
"Good-evening, Mr. Strathmore," Rangely said. "Are you making a retreat? I thought Lent was the time for that."
The other smiled with that kindly benevolence which was characteristic.
"Ah, Mr. Rangely," he responded, extending his hand. "I am glad to see you. Will you share my retirement?"
"Thank you," Rangely answered, stepping into the recess. "A retreat is especially grateful to a journalist. We get so tired that even a moment of respite is welcome."
Mr. Strathmore smiled more genially than ever.
"Yes; you journalists are expected to know everything, and it must be wearing to have to learn all that there is to know."
"Oh, it's easy enough to learn instead how to appear to know."
The clergyman regarded him with a quizzical look.
"Is that the way it is done? I've often wondered at the infallibility of your guild."
"A trick, of the trade, I assure you. We have to seem to be infallible to secure any attention at all, you see; and we soon learn the knack of it."
The clergyman, as if unconsciously, drew back a little farther into the shadow of the heavy draperies veiling the nook in which they stood.
"I dare say," he observed, as if speaking at random, "that one of your clever professional writers would be able, for instance, to give the reader quite an inside view even in church matters."
Rangely's face changed, and he in turn altered his position by leaning his elbow against the heavy middle sash of the window. The two men were thus not only concealed from the passing crowd, but stood with faces screened from each other by the shadow.
"Oh, even that might be possible," Rangely returned lightly.
"There is so much interest in church matters now," the other continued dispassionately. "I noticed that the 'Churchman' had rather a striking article two or three weeks ago on a layman's point of view of the bishop question. Did you see it?"
"I seldom see the 'Churchman,'" Rangely replied in a voice not wholly free from constraint.
"It is a pity you didn't see this, it was so well done. It is true that it proved me to be all sorts of a heretic; but if I am, of course it should be known."
There was a pause of a moment. Outside in the drawing-room rose the constant babble of speech, unintelligible and confusing. Then above it Rangely laughed softly.
"The wisdom of the journalist," he remarked, "is as nothing compared to that of the clergy. How did you discover that I wrote it?"
"Discover? Isn't that a word applied to finding things by seeking?"
"What of that?"
"I was merely thinking that you give me credit for more leisure and more curiosity than I possess if you suppose me to have tried to find out about that article."
Rangely laughed again.
"Mr. Strathmore," he said with a new resolution in his tone, "will you pardon me if I am frank? I want to ask you what I can do to help you to secure the election."
"Don't think I am given to word-splitting, Mr. Rangely, but I've no wish tosecureit. If the church needs me—but, after all, we need not quibble. Will you pardon me if I say that your question is rather remarkable coming from the author of the 'Churchman' paper."
"Although I wrote the 'Churchman' article, I wrote also the 'Eagle' editorial," was the reply. "I see things in a different light. The fact is that I was trapped into writing that stuff for the 'Churchman,' and now I'm anxious to undo any harm I may have done."
"I am glad that you do not really think me as bad as that article made me out," Strathmore said. "There have been some queer things about this election. Mrs. Gore has a letter that a woman has written which illustrates how injudicious some of those interested have been."
"What sort of a letter?"
"A letter that is amusing in a way. Of course I only mention the thing confidentially. Very likely, though, Mrs. Gore might be willing to let you see it if you are interested. It was written to a clergyman in the western part of the State by Mrs. Wilson."
"Mrs. Wilson?"
"Mrs. Chauncy Wilson. Of course you know that she is much interested in the matter. It isn't a very discreet document. I shall be much relieved when the whole thing is settled. It causes too much excitement, especially for us who have been named in connection with the office."
"It can't be pleasant," Rangely assented.
"It is not, I assure you. Now it is my duty to be talking to ladies and helping Mrs. Gore. She told me that she depended on me."
He moved forward as he spoke, and the two were soon in the company again. Rangely weltered through the crowd to Mrs. Gore and asked about the letter.
"It is a trump card," she said. "I am glad you spoke about it. I was wondering how it could be used to the best advantage. Mr. Strathmore talks about its being a private letter, but I have a shrewd suspicion that he wouldn't mind if somebody else used it. Come in to-morrow about five, and we'll talk it over."
Maurice Wynne was naturally not entirely at home in this sort of a gathering. He had not overcome his shyness and want of familiarity with social usages, so that he was especially relieved when he found himself comfortably seated in a corner with Mrs. Herman, to whom he could talk freely.
"Isn't there something that can be done for Phil, Mrs. Herman?" he asked earnestly. "I haven't seen him since I left the Clergy House. I had to come away without saying good-by to him, and in answer to my letter he says that Father Frontford advises him not to see me for the present."
Mrs. Herman sighed, playing with her fan.
"Life is hard for a nature like his," answered she. "He is born to be a martyr. He has the martyr temperament. It's part of our inheritance from Puritanism, I suppose."
Maurice smiled, looking up impulsively.
"I can't see why you lay so much stress on Puritanism," he said. "What has Puritanism resulted in? Its whole struggle has come to an end in doubt and agnosticism and flippancy. Intellectual curiosity has taken the place of spiritual stress; ethical casuistry or theological amusements seem to me to stand instead of religious conviction."
Mrs. Herman regarded him with an inquiring smile.
"You make me feel old," she interposed; "it is so long since I went through that stage. Will you pardon me for saying that you are not quite a disinterested observer?"
"It is the eyes newly open that see most clearly," he responded, throwing back his head with a little laugh. "The Puritan came into the wilderness to establish a city of God. Time has shown that he dreamed an impossible dream. The result of that effort has been the establishment of a religious liberty"—
"One might almost say a religious license, I own," she interpolated.
"A religious liberty or license as you like, but at any rate something that would have seemed to them appallingly wicked,—a thousand times worse than anything they fled from into the desert."
Mrs. Herman was silent a moment while he waited for her answer. Her eyes grew darker, and the color flushed in her cheeks.
"It is odd enough for me to be the champion of Puritanism," she said at length, "and yet it seems to me that after all they did their work well, and that it was permanent. They left on the land the stress of sincerity and earnestness. Creeds fall away just as leaves drop from the trees, but each leaf has helped. Religions decay, but the salvation of the race must depend upon human steadfastness to conviction."
"Then I suppose that you think Phil is nearer to the heart of things than I am."
"Not in the least. The difference between you is superficial rather than real so long as you are both true to your convictions."
"But it seems to me," Maurice objected, "that Phil is looking at truth as a sort of fetish. He seems to feel that the root of the matter is in a dogma, and a dogma is only the fossil remains of a truth that is gone by."
She laughed appreciatively.
"Have you caught the fever for making epigrams? I'm afraid there's a good deal of truth in what you say about Cousin Philip. He can't help looking at religion as an end rather than a means."
"Has it ever struck you that he might finish by going over to theCatholics?"
"No," she answered, "I confess I'd never thought of it; but I see what you mean."
"It will seem to him a moral catastrophe, a sort of ecclesiastical cataclysm," Maurice continued, "if Father Frontford isn't elected; and as far as I can judge there isn't much chance of that."
"No," she assented, "I don't think there is much chance."
"He said to me one day," added Maurice thoughtfully, "that in the Catholic Church there never could have been any danger of the election of a heretic bishop. I am afraid this will decide him."
Mrs. Herman regarded him with a smile, studying him as if she were reading the working of his mind.
"You think that a misfortune," she commented. "You feel that it is a step farther into the darkness."
"It is to narrow rather than to broaden his horizon, is it not?"
She played with her fan a moment, smiling to herself in a way which he did not understand, and looking down as if considering some old memory. Then she met his glance with a look at once kind and wistful.
"It isn't of much use to argue the matter, I suppose," were her words. "It seems to me as if in talking to you I see my old mental self in a mirror, if you'll pardon me for saying so. When we come out from any conviction, and most of all from a religious belief, it seems to us a profound misfortune that any man should still believe what we have decided is false. By and by I think you will see that the chief point is that a man shall believe. What he believes doesn't so much matter. It must be the thing that best suits his temperament."
"Then to outgrow a dogma is to weaken our power. It certainly weakens our faith in general."
"Yes," she assented, "that is the price we must pay for freedom; but if Philip can still believe, I have long ago passed the place where I should regret it. Perhaps he is to be envied."
Maurice shook his head.
"We may feel like that in some moods," he concluded with a smile, "but certainly nothing would induce you to change places with him." "Oh, no," she cried; "certainly not. But that is mere womanly lack of logic!"
A MINT OF PHRASES IN HIS BRAINLove's Labor's Lost, i. 1.
The disappointment of Maurice at the failure of his effort to secure his aunt's fortune was perhaps rather more than less keen because the property had never tangibly been his. The title of the fancy is that of which men are most tenacious, and the thing which has been held in fee of the imagination is precisely that which it is most grievous to lose. Maurice returned to Boston completely overcome by the result of his expedition, his mind overflowing with chagrin and anger.
It was not only the money which he had missed, but he had to his thinking lost also the hope of being in a position to press his suit with Berenice. However intangible might be his plans for winning her, they none the less filled his mind. He refused to regard her coldness as enduring. He had in his thoughts imagined so many tender scenes of reconciliation in which he magnanimously forgave her for the sharpness of the repulse of their last meeting or humbly besought pardon for his own offenses, that he came to feel as if all misunderstanding had really been done away with. It had been in his mind that if he were but in a position to meet Berenice on equal terms in regard to fortune all might be well; and to be deprived of this hope was infinitely bitter.
Meanwhile he had before him the problem of reshaping his life. It was necessary that he decide what should take the place of the profession which he had laid down. Fortunately the decision was not difficult, as former inclination had practically settled the matter. The definite shaping of his plans came one day in a talk which he had with his cousin.
"It isn't exactly my affair, Maurice," Mrs. Staggchase said, "but I want to know, and that always makes a thing her affair with a woman,—what are you going to do with your life now that you have pulled it out of the mouth of the church?"
"It is good of you to care to ask," he answered. "I suppose I shall study law."
"May I talk with you quite frankly?" she asked. "Fred does me the honor to say that for a woman I have a reasonably clear head."
"You may say whatever you like, Cousin Diana. I shall only be grateful."
"Well, then, in the first place, how much have you to live on?"
"I've about a thousand dollars a year. What was left of the estate at mother's death amounts to about that. I wanted to give it all to the church when I went into the Clergy House."
"Why didn't you?"
"Father Frontford wouldn't allow it. He said that a continual sacrifice meant more than an act that stripped me of power to decide, and which might be regretted."
"That was a noble temper," Mrs. Staggchase remarked thoughtfully. "A priest is a strange being. As for you, you say you have never believed, and yet you would have given up everything you possessed."
Maurice flushed, and looked a little shamefaced.
"I never did believe, so far as I can see now; but I thought I did, if you see the difference. My wanting to give up everything wasn't belief; it was a sort of instinctive desire to play fair. If I were to do the thing at all, my impulse was to do it thoroughly. It isn't in my blood to do a thing half way. I'm afraid the explanation doesn't speak very well for my common sense; but so far as I can understand myself that's the way of it."
"But if you didn't believe what were you there for?"
"I was there because Phil was. I don't pretend to understand why I, who led Phil in everything else, who did all sorts of things that he couldn't and had to decide everything else for him, should have followed his lead so in religion; but I did. It was part of my caring for him. It would have hurt him so much if I hadn't, that of course I had to."
Mrs. Staggchase regarded him keenly. He turned away his eyes, thinking of his friend and of the wide gulf which had opened between them, so that he but half heard and did not understand the comment she made softly.
"Theewigweiblichein masculine shape," she murmured, smiling to herself. "When the real came, it couldn't hold its power any longer."
"What?" he asked.
"Nothing. I was speaking in riddles. To come back to business,—you say you've decided upon the law."
"Yes. That was always my choice. I read a good deal of law while I was in college. It wasn't till I graduated two years ago that I fell into theology. It's two years wasted."
"Oh, perhaps, and perhaps not. After all, experience in youth is generally worth what it costs, little as we think so when we pay the price. Well, then, you can easily live on your income if you choose. Mr. Staggchase and I will be glad to have you make this your home, and"—
"But, Cousin Diana," he interrupted in astonishment, "there is certainly no reason why you should burden yourself with me. Not that I am not a thousand times obliged to you, but"—
"Be as obliged as you like," interrupted she in turn, "only don't be foolish. Fred and I are not exactly sentimentalists, and we both know what we wish. He likes to have you to talk with, and when you have learned to smoke you will find him a very clever and agreeable companion after dinner. He knows the world, and he'll teach you a great many things that you'd be slow to find out for yourself. As for me, you amuse me, let us say. The gods have spared us the bother of children; but the gifts of the gods are always to be paid for, and we begin to feel as if there were a sort of loneliness ahead of us with nobody to be especially interested in. To have somebody younger to care for is a luxury when you are young yourself, but it's a necessity to age. I assure you that we shouldn't have you here if we didn't want you, and that we shall turn you out without scruple when we are tired of you."
"Very well, then," he responded with a laugh, "I am rejoiced to remain to be a blessing."
They looked into the fire a little time as if they were considering what effect upon the future this new arrangement would have; then Mrs. Staggchase glanced up with a smile.
"Just now," she remarked, "before you are plunged in the study of the law, you may do escort duty for me. I am going to call on Berenice Morison."
"On Miss Morison?"
"Yes. Her grandmother is staying with her. Mr. Frostwinch has gone abroad, you know, and as the old house belongs to Bee, she is staying on there."
"But—but she won't care to see me."
"Very likely not," assented his cousin coolly, "but she'll endure you for my sake."
"I don't like being endured," he retorted, between fun and earnest."Besides, she's so much money"—
"You are not such a cad as to be afraid of her money, I hope."
"Not in one way, but don't you see now that she has so much, and I have lost Aunt Hannah's"—
"Really, Maurice," she interrupted brusquely, "you must learn not to speak your thoughts out like that! I'm not asking you to go to propose to Bee. You have the theological habit of taking things with too dreadful seriousness. Come with me for a call, and don't bother about consequences and possibilities."
Maurice blushed at his own folly in betraying his secret scruples, but his cousin spared him any farther teasing, and they went on their way peacefully. It seemed to him when he entered the stately Frostwinch house that it had somehow been transformed. Everything was much as it had been in the lifetime of Mrs. Frostwinch, yet to his fancy all looked fresher and more cheerful. He smiled to himself, feeling that the change must simply be the result of his knowledge that this was now the home of Berenice; yet even so he could not persuade himself that the alteration was not actual. He felt joyously alert as he followed Mrs. Staggchase to the library, where Bee was sitting with old Mrs. Morison.
He had never been in this apartment before. It was high, and heavily made, with an open fire on the hearth, and enough books to justify its name. Berenice came forward to meet them, and Mrs. Morison remained seated near the fire.
"I am so glad to see you, Mrs. Staggchase," Bee said cordially. "It is just one of those dreary days when it proves true courage to come out."
"And true friendship, I hope," the other answered, passing on to Mrs. Morison. "My dear old friend, I wish I could believe you are as glad to see me as I am to see you."
Berenice in the mean time gave her hand to Maurice graciously, but with a certain grave courtesy which he felt to put them upon a purely ceremonious footing.
"It is kind of you to come," she said. "Grandmother will be glad to see you."
Maurice tried hard to look unconscious, but he could not help questioning her with his eyes. She flushed under his eager regard, and drew back a little.
"I am very glad of the chance to see—Mrs. Morison," he answered.
Bee flushed more deeply yet. Then she turned mischievously to Mrs.Morison.
"Grandmother," she said, "it seems that Mr. Wynne came to see you and not me."
The old lady greeted him kindly.
"I am glad to see you looking so well, Mr. Wynne," she said. "I hope that your arm does not trouble you at all."
"Not at all. I was too well taken care of at Brookfield."
Mrs. Staggchase laughed, spreading out her hands.
"There," said she gayly, "you see! He has only been in my hands a few weeks, but I call that a very pretty speech."
"He probably has a natural gift for pleasing speeches," Berenice remarked meaningly.
Maurice crimsoned, but his education had not proceeded far enough for him to have any reply.
"Well, take him away, Bee, and give him tea or gossip. I want to talk to your grandmother about old friends, and you young people won't understand."
"He may have tea if he is tractable," responded Bee. "We are evidently not appreciated, Mr. Wynne. Will you ring the bell over there, please."
He did as he was directed, and then followed her to the tea-table at a little distance from the fire. He was full of a troubled joy, the mingled delight of being with her and the consciousness that he had firmly determined in his own mind that he had no right to show her his feelings. He said to himself that he could bear anything else better than that she should think of him as a fortune-hunter. Her wealth loomed between them as a wall which it were dishonorable even to attempt to scale. His brain was busy phrasing things which he longed to say to her, words seemed to seethe in his head, yet he found himself strangely tongue-tied and awkward. When most of all he desired to appear at his ease, he was most completely uncomfortable and self-conscious.
A servant came with the tea, and he was able to cover to some extent his uneasiness by serving the ladies. When this was done, and he sat nervously stirring his own cup, he found himself searching his mind in vain for those things which it would be safe to say. His brain was full of things which must not be said. He could think only of things which it was not safe to utter; and his discomfiture increased as he saw Miss Morison watching him with a half-veiled smile.
"By the way," she said at length, when the silence was becoming too marked, "I fulfilled your request."
"My request?" he echoed, unable to remember that he had made any.
"Yes. Have you forgotten that you came to ask me"—
He put out his hand impulsively.
"Please don't!" he interrupted. "It is bad enough to remember what an unmitigated idiot I was without the humiliation of thinking that you remember it too."
"I remember," she responded, with a sparkle in her eye, "that you did not seem to relish the mission on which you were sent. However, I accepted the intention, and I have promised the men a continuance of their stipends." Her face grew suddenly grave, and she added: "I can't joke about it, though. I really did it because Cousin Anna would have wished it."
They were silent now because they had come so near a solemn subject that neither of them cared to speak. The thoughts of Maurice went back to the day he had come to do the errand of Father Frontford, and his cheek grew hot.
"I hope you will believe," he said eagerly, "that I had really no idea of how very ill your cousin was. She seemed so well when I saw her that it was all unreal to me. I wish I could tell you how sorry I have been for you. I have thought of you."