THE VOICE FROM THE PAST
Though the doctor left the church with Shirley and her mother, he did
not drive to Rosewood, but to his office. There, alone with Mrs.
Dandridge while Shirley waited in the carriage, he unlocked the little
tin box that had been the major's, with the key Mrs. Dandridge gave him,
and put into her hands a little packet of yellow oiled-silk which bore
her name. He noted that it agitated her profoundly and as she thrust it
into the bosom of her dress, her face seemed stirred as he had never
seen it. When he put her again in the carriage, he patted her shoulder
with a touch far gentler than his gruff good-by.
At Rosewood, at length, alone in her room, she sat down with the packet
in her hands. During the long hours since first the little key had lain
in her palm like a live coal, she had been all afire with eagerness. Now
the moment had come, she was almost afraid.
She tried to imagine that letter's coming to her--then. Thirty years
ago! A May day, a day of golden sunshine and flowers. The arbors had
been covered with roses then, too, like those whose perfume drifted to
her now. Evil news flies fast, and she had heard of the duel very early
that morning. The letter would have reached her later. She would have
fled away with it to this very room to read it alone--as she did now!
With unsteady fingers she unwrapped the oiled-silk, broke the letter's
seal, and read:
"_Dearest_:
"Before you read this, you will no doubt have heard the thing
that has happened this sunshiny morning. Sassoon--poor Sassoon!
I can say that with all my heart--is dead. What this fact will
mean to you, God help me! I can not guess. For I have never
been certain, Judith, of your heart. Sometimes I have thought
you loved me--me only--as I love you. Last night when I saw you
wearing my cape jessamines at the ball, I was almost sure of
it. But when you made me promise, whatever happened, not to
lift my hand against him, then I doubted. Was it because you
feared for him? Would to God at this moment I knew this was not
true! For whatever the fact, I must love you, darling, you and
no other, as long as I live!"
When she had read thus far, she closed the letter, and pressing a hand
against her heart as if to still its throbbing, locked the written pages
in a drawer of her bureau. She went down-stairs and made Ranston bring
her chair to its accustomed place under the rose-arbor, and sat there
through the falling twilight.
She and Shirley talked but little at dinner, and what she said seemed to
come winging from old memories--her own girlhood, its routs and picnics
and harum-scarum pleasures. And there were long gaps in which she sat
silent, playing with her napkin, the light color coming and going in her
delicate cheek, lost in revery. It was not till the hall-clock struck
her usual hour that she rose to go to her room.
"Don't send Emmaline," she said. "I shan't want her." She kissed Shirley
good night. "Maybe after a while you will sing for me; you haven't
played your harp for ever so long."
In the subdued candle-light Mrs. Dandridge locked the door of her room.
She opened a closet, and from the very bottom of a small haircloth
trunk, lifted and shook out from its many tissue wrappings a faded
gown of rose-colored silk, with pointed bodice and old-fashioned
puff-sleeves. She spread this on the bed and laid with it a pair of
yellowed satin slippers and a little straw basket that held a spray of
what had once been cape jessamine.
In the flickering light she undressed and rearranged her hair,
catching its silvery curling meshes in a low soft coil. Looking almost
furtively about her, she put on the rose-colored gown, and pinned the
withered flower-spray on its breast. She lighted more candles--in
the wall-brackets and on the dressing-table--and the reading-lamp on
the desk. Standing before her mirror then, she gazed long at the
reflection--the poor faded rose-tint against the pale ivory of her
slender neck, and the white hair. A little quiver ran over her lips.
"'Whatever the fact,'" she whispered, "'... you and no other, as long as
I live.'"
She unlocked the bureau-drawer then, took out the letter, and seating
herself by the table, read the remainder:
"I write this in the old library and Bristow holds my horse by
the porch. He will give you this letter when I am gone.
"Last night we were dancing--all of us--at the ball. I can
scarcely believe it was less than twelve hours ago! The
calendar on my desk has a motto for each leaf. To-day's is
this: 'Every man carries his fate on a riband about his neck.'
Last night I would have smiled at that, perhaps; to-day I say
to myself, 'It's true--it's true!' Two little hours ago I could
have sworn that whatever happened to me, Sassoon would suffer
no harm.
"Judith, I could not avoid the meeting. You will know the
circumstances, and will see that it was forced upon me. But
though we met on the field, I kept my promise. _Sassoon did not
fall by my hand._"
She had begun to tremble so that the paper shook in her hands, and from
her breast, shattered by her quick breathing, the brown jessamine petals
dusted down in her lap. It was some moments before she could calm
herself sufficiently to read on.
"He fired at the signal and the shot went wide. I threw my
pistol on the ground. Then--whether maddened by my refusal to
fire, I can not tell--he turned his weapon all at once and shot
himself through the breast. It was over in an instant. The
seconds did not guess--do not even now, for it happened but an
hour ago. As the code decrees, their backs were turned when the
shots were fired. But there were circumstances I can not touch
upon to you which made them disapprove--which made my facing
him just then seem unchivalrous. I saw it in Bristow's face,
and liked him the better for it, even while it touched my
pride. They could not know, of course, that I did not intend to
fire. Well, you and they will know it now! And Bristow has my
pistol; he will find it undischarged--thank God, thank God!
"But will that matter to you? If you loved Sassoon, I shall
always in your mind stand as the indirect cause of his death!
It is for this reason I am going away--I could not bear to look
in your accusing eyes and hear you say it. Nor could I bear to
stay here, a reminder to you of such a horror. If you love me,
you will write and call me back to you. Oh, Judith, Judith, my
own dear love! I pray God you will!"
She put the letter down and laid her face upon it. "Beauty! Beauty!"
she whispered, dry-eyed. "I never knew! I never knew! But it
would have made no difference, darling. I would have forgiven you
anything--everything! You know that, now, dear! You have been certain
of it all these years that have been so empty, empty to me!"
* * * * *
But when the faded rose-colored gown and the poor time-yellowed slippers
had been laid back in the haircloth trunk; when, her door once more
unbolted, she lay in her bed in the dim glow of the reading-lamp, with
her curling silvery hair drifting across the pillow and the letter
beneath it, at last the tears came coursing down her cheeks.
And with the loosening of her tears, gradually and softly came
joy--infinitely deeper than the anguish and sense of betrayal. It poured
upon her like a trembling flood. Long, long ago he had gone out of the
world--it was only his memory that counted to her. Now that could no
longer spell pain or emptiness or denial. It was engoldened by a new
light, and in that light she would walk gently and smilingly to the end.
She found the slender golden chain that hung about her neck and opened
the little black locket with its circlet of laureled pearls. And as she
gazed at the face it held, which time had not touched with change, the
sound of Shirley's harp came softly in through the window. She was
playing an old-fashioned song, of the sort she knew her mother loved
best:
"Darling, I am growing old.
Silver threads among the gold
Shine upon my brow to-day;
Life is fading fast away.
But, my darling, you will be
Always young and fair to me."
Outside the leaves rustled, the birds called and the crickets sang their
unending epithalamia of summer nights, and on this tone-background the
melody rose tenderly and lingeringly like a haunting perfume of pressed
flowers. She smiled and lifted the locket to her face, whispering the
words of the refrain:
"Yes, my darling, you will be
Always young and fair to me!"
The smile was still on her lips when she fell asleep, and the little
locket still lay in her fingers.