|Santley and Edith walked along for some time without a word. At last,
after looking round nervously to see that they were not observed or
followed, the clergyman broke the silence.--:
“It is horrible! It is insufferable!” he cried. “I shall be ruined by
your indiscretion.”
She looked at him in amazement. It was too dark to see his face, but his
whole frame, as well as his voice, trembled with anger.
“My indiscretion!” she echoed.
“Yes.”
“But I have done nothing.”
“I found you talking to that creature, and it is evident that she knows
our secret. I shall be ruined through you. What have you told her?”
“Nothing. I met her by accident, and she spoke to me; that is all.”
There was a pause. Then Santley stopped short, saying in a whisper--
“Go home now. After to-day we must not be seen together.”
But she clung to his arm, weeping.
“Charles, for Gods sake, do not be so unkind!”
“I am not unkind,” he said; “but I am thinking of your good name, as
well as of my own reputation. What that woman knows others must know.
It will be the talk of the place. Edith, think of it. We shall both be
lost. Go home, I entreat you.”
“Charles, listen to me!” exclaimed the weeping girl. “If there is any
scandal it will kill me. But there need to be none. You have only to
keep your word, as you have promised, and then----”
“What? and marry you?”
“Yes.”
“I cannot--at least, not yet.”
“Why not? Oh, Charles, have I not been patient? There is nothing
but your own will to come between us. Make me your wife, as you
have promised, before it is too late. Even my aunt begins to suspect
something. My life is miserable--a daily falsehood. I have loved you
next to God. For your sake I have even forgotten Him. I thought there
was no sin; you yourself told me there was no sin--that we were man and
wife in God’s sight.. But now I am terrified. I cannot sleep,’ I cannot
pray. Sometimes I feel as if God had cast me out. And you----”
She ceased, choked with tears, and, placing her head upon his shoulder,
sobbed wildly. He shrank from her touch, and sought to disengage
himself, gazing round on every side and searching the darkness; in dread
of being watched.
“Control yourself. If we should be seen!”
But she did not seem to hear, and his anger increased in proportion to
her terror.
“Do you want to compromise me?” he cried. “I begin to think you have no
discretion, no respect for yourself--I hate these scenes. They make me
wish that we had never met.”
“If I thought you wished that from your heart,” she sobbed, “I would
not live another day.”
“There, again. You are so unreasonable, so violent. When I attempt to
reason, you talk of suicide or some such mad thing. If you really loved
me, as you say, you would be willing to make some sacrifice for my sake.
But no; you have only one cry--marriage, marriage!---till I am sick of
the very word. Cease crying. Dry your eyes, and listen to me. Go home
tonight, and I will think it over. Yes, I will do what I can--anything,
rather than be so tormented.”
She obeyed him passively, and tried to stifle her deep sorrow. Child
as she was, and loving him as she did, she could not bear his words of
blame; and her soul shuddered at the strange tones of the voice that had
once been so kind. For it was as she had said. She had made an idol
of this man, next to God. She had offered up to him, at his passionate
request, her young life, her purity of heart, her very soul. He had been
God’s voice and very presence to her; ah! so beautiful! She had been
content to lie at his feet, to obey him like a slave, to accept his will
as law, even when the law seemed evil. And now he was so changed. Not
base--ah! no, she could not bear to think him base; not base--still
good, but cruel. Was she losing him? Was she destined to lose him for
ever, and, with him, surely her immortal soul?
“Good night,” she moaned. “I will go home.”
And she held up her face for his kiss; then, as he kissed her, she
yielded again to her emotion, and clung, wildly crying, about his neck.
“Oh, Charles, be true to me! I have no one in the world but you.”
With that fond appeal she left him, turning her tearful face homeward.
On reaching the cottage she found the door ajar, stole quietly up to her
room, and locked herself in. A few minutes afterwards her aunt knocked.
“Are you there, Edith? Supper is ready.”
“I have a headache, and am going to bed,” she replied, stifling her
sobs.
“May I not come in?” said the old lady. “I want to speak to you.”
“Not to-night. I am so tired.”.
She heard the feeble feet descending the stairs, and again resigned
herself to sorrow. Presently, when she had grown a little calmer, she
arose, lit a candle, and proceeded to undress.’ The moon, which had
newly risen, shone through the cottage window, with its white blinds,
and the faint rays, creeping in, mingled with the yellow candle-light.
The room was like a white rose, all pale and pure; and the girl herself,
when she was undressed and clad in her night-dress, seemed the purest
thing there. But the night-dress felt like a shroud, and she felt ready
for the grave.
She knelt by the bed to say her prayers.
How long she remained on her knees she knew not. While her lips
repeated, half aloud, the prayers she had learned as a child, and those
which, in later years, she had framed to include the name of the man.
she loved, her tears still fell, and with her long hair streaming over
her shoulders, and her little hands clasped together, she sobbed and
sobbed. The moonlight crept further into the room, and touched her like
a silver hand--not tenderly, not pityingly; ‘nay, it might have been the
very hand of the Madonna herself, bidding her arise to face her fate.
She arose shivering; and at that very instant there came to her a
warning, an omen, full of nameless terror. It seemed to her as if faces
were flashing before her eyes, voices shrieking in her ears; her heart
leapt, her head went round, and at the same moment she felt her whole
being miraculously thrilled by the quickening of a new life within her
own.
With a loud moan, she fainted away upon the floor.
When she returned to consciousness, she was lying, nearly naked, by
the bedside, and the moonlight was flooding the little room. She arose,
dazed, stupefied, and appalled. Her limbs shook beneath her, and she
had to clutch the bedstead for support. Then she tottered to the
dressing-table, and holding the candle, looked into the mirror.
Reflected there was a face of ghastly whiteness, with two great
despairing eyes, wildly gazing into her own.