She was crying as she finished the letter, and the tears were hot on her
cold cheeks. She tried not to let them fall on the paper, for she did
not want Vanno to know how she suffered. If he realized that her heart
was breaking for him, he might search for her. She was afraid of herself
when she thought what it would be like to resist the pleading of his
voice, his arms, his eyes--"those stars of love," as Marie had said.
The best way to prevent Vanno from guessing where she had gone would be
to have her letter posted by Lord Dauntrey in Monte Carlo to-morrow. And
instead of sending it to Rome, she would address it to him at Cap
Martin. Then he would not have it until he came back to Angelo's house;
and if he meant to disobey and look for her, days must pass before he
was likely to learn of her whereabouts. She believed that no one who
knew her face had seen her in the carriage, driving to Italy. She was
more safely hidden than if she had come to the Château Lontana by train;
and she had told Vanno and others that she disliked the idea of living
in Hannaford's house. Before any one thought of this place, she would
perhaps have gone; and though when she began Vanno's letter she had not
decided where to go, before she finished her mind was made up. The one
spot in which she could endure to live out the rest of her life was the
Convent of St. Ursula-of-the-Lake.
"I ought never to have come away," she said. Yet not at the price of
twice this suffering--if she could suffer more--would she blot out from
her soul the experience life had given her. Maybe, she thought, the blow
that shattered her love-story and her happiness was a punishment for
weakness in longing for the world. Yet if it were a punishment she was
ready to kiss the rod, since she might hold forever the memory of Vanno
and his love.
She fastened up her letter to him lest she should be tempted to add
other words to those which might on second reading seem cold. God knew
if she were cold! But Vanno might suffer less if he believed her so.
By and by, when something like calmness came to her again, she began
another letter. It was to Reverend Mother at the convent. The last time
Mary wrote she had told of her engagement, and her happiness. Reverend
Mother had written back, forgiving and understanding her long silence--a
loving letter, rejoicing in her joy; and it was in Mary's writing case
at this moment, for she had intended to keep it always. But she could
not have borne the pain of rereading it now, over the dead body of her
happiness. She wrote quickly, not pausing between words and sentences,
as in writing to Vanno. She told Reverend Mother nothing of the story,
but said that she was ending her engagement with Prince Giovanni Della
Robbia. "It is not because I don't love him," she explained, "but
because I love him so dearly I want to do what is best for his whole
life. I know that I shall love him always. I can no more forget him than
I can forget that I have a heart which must go on beating while I live.
But if you don't think a love like this--expecting, hoping for no
return--too worldly, oh, Reverend Mother, will you let me come back to
you and take the vows after all? I feel the convent is the only home for
me; and I believe I am capable of higher, nobler aims because of what I
have been taught by a great love. I yearn to be with you now, I am so
homesick! I will go through any penance, even if it be years long, if at
the end you will accept me for your daughter. I beg of you to write at
once, and say if you will have me again. If your answer be yes, I will
start immediately. I can hardly wait."
As she folded the letter she remembered how Hannaford had told the story
of Galatea, likening her to the statue which had been given life without
knowledge of the world. It was almost as if his voice spoke to her now,
in this room he had loved, answering when she asked what became of
Galatea in the end. "She went back to be a statue." "That is what I
shall do," Mary said. "I shall go back into the marble."
* * * * * * *
All night long the mistral blew; and "out of the fall of lonely seas and
the wind's sorrow," the lullaby Hannaford had desired for his ashes was
sung under the rock where, already, his urn was enshrined.
At dawn the wild wailing ceased suddenly, as if the wind had drowned
itself in the ocean; and Mary went out on to her balcony, in the dead
silence which was like peace after war. The hollow bell of the sky,
swept clear of clouds by the steel broom of the mistral, blazed with
blue fire, and the sea was so crystal pure that it seemed one might look
down through violet depths into the caves of the mer-people. The still
air was very cold; and it seemed to Mary that if the joy of life were
not exhausted for her, she might have felt excited and exuberantly
happy, alone with the lovely miracle of this new day. As it was, she
felt curiously calm, almost resigned to the thought that her heart, like
a clock, had run down at the last hour of its happiness. She said to
herself that Nemesis had brought her to this house, and there made her
lay down her hopes of love. She had accepted much from Captain
Hannaford, and had thought of him hardly at all. Now, it was almost as
if she were offering this sacrifice to him. "It is Destiny," she said,
as Eve Dauntrey had said a few hours ago.
The tired sea had gone to sleep, and was breathing deeply in its dreams,
but to Mary it was not the same happy sea that she had looked out upon
from her window at Rose Winter's, and at the Villa Mirasole. The little
mumbling, baby mouths of the breathing waves bit toothlessly upon the
rocks. Mary pitied the faintly heaving swells because they were to her
fancy like wretched drowning animals, trying vainly forever to crawl up
on land, and forever falling back.
"When I am in the convent, if Reverend Mother will take me in, I shall
never look at the sea again," she thought, "yet I shall always hear it
in my heart, remembering last night and to-day. After this I shall be
only a hollow shell full of memories, as a shell is full of the voice of
the sea."
Lady Dauntrey dared not let her husband take Mary's letters to the post
until she had steamed the envelopes, and read what the girl had to say.
If she had herself dictated those farewell words to Prince Vanno, they
could not have suited her better; and there was nothing objectionable in
the appeal to Reverend Mother at the Scotch convent. Only, perhaps it
would be as well to keep back that letter for a day or two. The one to
Vanno Lord Dauntrey carried with him to Monte Carlo, and posted it there
according to Mary's wish.