Three days later, when they were on the outward-bound steamer, Miss
Rosa Blair crossed the corridor between her state-room, which she
occupied with her maid, to Maria's, and stood a moment looking down
at the girl lying in her berth. Maria was in that state of liability
to illness which keeps one in a berth, although she was not actually
sea-sick.
"My dear," said Miss Blair. "I think I may as well tell you now. In
the night's paper before we left, I saw the death-notice of a certain
Maria Edgham, of Edgham, New Jersey. There were some particulars
which served to establish the fact of the death. You will not be
interested in the particulars?"
Maria turned her pale face towards the port-hole, against which
dashed a green wave topped with foam. "No," said she.
"I thought you would not," said Miss Blair. "Then there is something
else."
Maria waited quiescent.
"Your name is on the ship's list of passengers as Miss Elizabeth
Blair. You are my adopted daughter."
Maria started.
"Adelaide does not remember that you were called Miss Ackley," said
Miss Blair. "She will never remember that you were anything except my
adopted daughter. She is a model maid. As for the others, Louise is a
model, too, and so is the coachman. The footman is discharged. When
we return, nobody in my house will have ever known you except as
Elizabeth Blair." Miss Blair went out of the state-room walking
easily with the motion of the ship. She was a good sailor.
The next afternoon Maria was able to sit out on deck. She leaned back
in her steamer-chair, and wept silently. Miss Blair stood at a little
distance near the rail, talking to an elderly gentleman whom she had
met years ago. "She is my adopted daughter Elizabeth," said Miss
Blair. "She has been a little ill, but she is much better. She is
feeling sad over the death of a friend, poor child."
It was a year before Maria and Miss Blair returned to the United
States. Maria looked older, although she was fully as handsome as she
had ever been. Her features had simply acquired an expression of
decision and of finish, which they had not before had. She also
looked more sophisticated. It had been on her mind that she might
possibly meet her step-mother abroad, but she had not done so; and
one day Miss Blair had shown her a London newspaper in which was the
notice of Ida's marriage to a Scotchman. "We need not go to
Scotland," said Miss Blair.
The day after they landed was very warm. They had gone straight to
Miss Blair's New York house; later they were to go to the sea-shore.
The next morning Maria went into Miss Blair's vanity room, as she
called it, and a strange look was on her face. "I have made up my
mind," said she.
"Well?" Miss Blair said, interrogatively.
"I cannot let him commit bigamy. I cannot let my sister marry--my
husband. I cannot break the laws in such a fashion, nor allow them to
do so."
"You break no moral law."
"I am not so sure. I don't know where the dividing-line between the
moral and the legal comes."
"Then--?"
"I am going to take the train to Amity this noon."
Miss Blair turned slightly pale, but she regarded Maria
unflinchingly. "Very well," said she. "I have always told you that I
would not oppose you in any resolution which you might make in the
matter."
"It is not because I love him," said Maria. "I do love him; I think I
always shall. But it is not because of that."
"I know that. What do you propose doing after you have disclosed
yourself?"
"Tell the truth."
"And then what?"
"I shall talk the matter over with Wollaston and Evelyn, and I think
they can be made to see that a quiet divorce will straighten it all
out."
"Not as far as the man's career is concerned, if he marries your
sister, and not so far as your sister is concerned. People are prone
to believe the worst, as the sparks fly upward."
"Then they will," Maria said, obstinately. "I have made up my mind I
dare not undertake the responsibility."
"What will you do afterwards, come back to me?" Miss Blair said,
wistfully. "You will come back, will you not, dear?"
"If you wish," Maria said, with a quick, loving glance at her.
"If I wish!" repeated Miss Blair. "Well, go if you must."
Maria did not reach Amity until long after dark. Behind her on the
train were two women who got on at the station before Amity. She did
not know them, and they did not know her, but they presently began
talking about her. "I saw Miss Maria Stillman at the Ordination in
Westbridge, Wednesday," said one to the other. This woman had a
curiously cool, long-reaching breath when she spoke. Maria felt it
like a fan on the back of her neck.
The other woman, who was fat, responded with a wheezy voice. "It was
queer about that niece of hers, who taught school in Westbridge,
running away and dying so dreadful sudden, wasn't it?" said she.
"Dreadful queer. I guess her aunt and sister felt pretty bad about
it, and I s'pose they do now; but it's a year ago, and they've left
off their mourning."
"Of course," said the other woman. "They would leave it off on
account of--"
Maria did not hear what followed, for a thundering freight-train
passed them and drowned the words. After the train passed, the fat
woman was saying, with her wheezy voice, "Mr. Lee's mother's death
was dreadful sudden, wasn't it?"
"Dreadful."
"I wonder if he likes living in Amity as well as Westbridge?"
"I shouldn't think he would, it isn't as convenient to the academy."
"Well, maybe he will go back to Westbridge after a while," said the
other woman, and again her breath fanned Maria's neck.
She wondered what it meant. A surmise came to her, then she dismissed
it. She was careful to keep her back turned to the women when the
train pulled into Amity. She had no baggage except a suit-case. She
got off the train, and disappeared in the familiar darkness. All at
once it seemed to her as if she had returned from the unreal to the
real, from fairy-land to the actual world. The year past seemed like
a dream to her. She could not believe it. It was like that fact which
is stranger than fiction, and therefore almost impossible even to
write, much less to live. Miss Rosa Blair, and her travellings in
Europe, and her house in New York, seemed to her like an Arabian
Night's creation. She walked along the street towards her aunt's
house, and realized her old self and her old perplexities. When she
drew near the house she saw a light in the parlor windows and also in
Aunt Maria's bedroom. Aunt Maria had evidently gone to her room for
the night. Uncle Henry's side of the house was entirely dark.
Maria stole softly into the yard, and paused in front of the parlor
windows. The shades were not drawn. There sat Evelyn at work on some
embroidery, while opposite to her sat Wollaston Lee, reading aloud.
In Evelyn's lap, evidently hampering her with her work, was a
beautiful yellow cat, which she paused now and then to stroke. Maria
felt her heart almost stand still. There was something about it which
renewed her vague surmise on the train. It was only a very few
minutes before Wollaston laid down the paper which he had been
reading, and said something to Evelyn, who began to fold her work
with the sweet docility which Maria remembered. Wollaston rose and
went over to Evelyn and kissed her as she stood up and let the yellow
cat leap to the floor. Evelyn looked to Maria more beautiful than she
had ever seen her. Maria stood farther back in the shadow. Then she
heard the front door opened, and the cat was gently put out. Then she
heard the key turn in the lock, and a bolt slide. Maria stood
perfectly still. A light from a lamp which was being carried by some
one, flitted like a will-o'-the-wisp over the yard, and the parlor
windows became dark. Then a broad light shone out from the front
chamber windows through the drawn white shade, and lay in a square on
the grass of the yard. The cat which had been put out rubbed against
Maria's feet. She caught up the little animal and kissed it. Then she
put it down gently, and hurried back to the station. She thought of
Rosa Blair, and an intense longing came over her. She seemed to
suddenly sense the highest quality of love: that which realizes the
need of another, rather than one's own. The poor little dwarf seemed
the very child of her heart. She looked up at the stars shining
through the plumy foliage of the trees, and thought how many of them
might owe their glory to the radiance of unknown suns, and it seemed
to her that her own soul lighted her path by its reflection of the
love of God. She thought that it might be so with all souls which
were faced towards God, and that which is above and beyond, and it
was worth more than anything else in the whole world.
She questioned no longer the right or wrong of what she had done, as
she hurried on and reached the little Amity station in time for the
last train.
THE END