sands of eternity sweep past us. So much is yours and mine, out of all
that is past and to come."
"As you wish," she responded. Then, after another pause, she said:
"Don't you want to read to me?"
Rosemary, dumb and hopeless, saw them sit down, close together, and lean
against the rock, where the sunlight made an aureole of Edith's hair.
He slipped his arm around her, and she laid her head upon his shoulder,
with a look of heavenly peace upon her pale face. Never had the contrast
between them been more painful than now, for Edith, with love in her
eyes, was exquisite beyond all words.
[Sidenote: The Red Book Again]
Alden took a small red book out of his pocket. With a pang, Rosemary
recognised it. Was nothing to be left sacred to her? She longed to break
from her hiding-place, face them both with stern accusing eyes, snatch
the book which meant so much to her--ask for this much, at least, to
keep. Yet she kept still, and listened helplessly, with the blood
beating in her ears.
In his deep, musical voice, Alden read once more: _Her Gifts_. "That,"
he said, softly, "was the night I knew."
"Yes," Edith answered. "The night I found the book and brought it home."
Rosemary well remembered when Edith had found the book. Her strange
sense of a dual self persisted, yet, none the less, her heart beat hard
with pain.
He went on, choosing a line here and there as he turned the marked
pages, but avoiding entirely some of the most beautiful sonnets because
of their hopelessness. At last, holding her closer, he began:
[Sidenote: Suiting the Action to the Word]
"On this sweet bank your head thrice sweet and dear
I lay, and spread your hair on either side,
And see the new-born woodflowers bashful-eyed
Look through the golden tresses here and there.
On these debatable borders of the year
Spring's foot half falters; scarce she yet may know
The leafless blackthorn-blossom from the snow;
And through her bowers the wind's way still is clear."
"Oh!" breathed Rosemary, with her hands tightly clenched. "Dear God,
have pity!"
Heedlessly, Alden went on:
"But April's sun strikes down the glades to-day;
So shut your eyes upturned, and feel my kiss
Creep, as the Spring now thrills through every spray,
Up your warm throat to your warm lips; for this----"
He dropped the book, lifted Edith's chin and kissed her throat, then her
mouth. She laid her hand upon his face. "Dear and lonely and
hungry-hearted," she said; "how long you wanted me!"
"Yes," he murmured, "but I've found you now!"
How long they sat there, Rosemary never knew, for her senses were
dulled. She did not hear their preparations for departure, but saw the
boat swinging out into the current, with the sunset making golden glory
of the river and of Edith's hair. When the sound of the oars ceased, she
rose, numb and cold, and came out into the open space. She steadied
herself for a moment upon the rock against which they had leaned.
[Sidenote: Another Thought]
"Service," she said to herself, "and sacrifice. Giving, and not
receiving. Asking--not answer." Yet she saw that, even now, this could
be neither sacrifice nor denial, because it was something she had never
had.
She laughed, a trifle bitterly, and went on home, another thought
keeping time with her footsteps. "The appointed thing comes at the
appointed time in the appointed way. There is no terror save my own
fear."
XVII
The Last Tryst
[Sidenote: A Double Self]
The shrill voices in the sitting-room rose higher and higher. Since the
day Grandmother had read the article upon "Woman's Birthright" to
Matilda, the subject of Mrs. Lee's hair had, as it were, been drowned in
cucumber milk. When Rosemary came in from the kitchen, they appealed to
her by common consent.
"Rosemary, have you ever heard of anybody taking a stool and a pail and
goin' out to milk the cucumbers before breakfast?" This from Aunt
Matilda.
"Rosemary, ain't you seen the juice of wild cucumbers when they spit
their seeds out and ain't it just like milk, only some thicker?" This
from Grandmother.
"I don't know," Rosemary answered, mechanically. The queer sense of a
double self persisted. One of her was calm and content, the other was
rebellious--and hurt.
"Humph!" snorted Grandmother.
"Humph!" echoed Aunt Matilda
[Sidenote: Going for the Paper]
"It's Thursday," Grandmother reminded her, "and I heard the mail train
come in some time ago. You'd better leave the sweepin' an' go and get my
paper."
"Yes, do," Aunt Matilda chimed in, with a sneer. "I can't hardly wait
for this week's paper, more'n the other sufferin' five million can.
Maybe there'll be a pattern for a cucumber milkin' stool in this week's
paper; somethin' made out of a soap-box, with cucumber leaves and
blossoms painted on it with some green and yellow house paint that
happens to be left over. And," she continued, "they'd ought to be a pail
too, but I reckon a tin can'll do, for the cucumbers I've seen so far
don't look as if they'd be likely to give much milk. We can paint the
can green and paste a picture of a cucumber on the outside from the seed
catalogue. Of course I ain't got any freckles, but there's nothin' like
havin' plenty of cucumber milk in the house, with hot weather comin'
on."
Grandmother surveyed Matilda with a penetrating, icy stare. "You've got
freckles on your mind," she said. "Rosemary, will you go to the
post-office and not keep me waiting?"
The girl glanced at her brown gingham dress, and hesitated.
"You're clean enough," Grandmother observed, tartly. "Anybody'd think
you had a beau waitin' for you somewheres."
[Sidenote: Young People's Calls]
She flushed to her temples, but did not speak. Her face was still red
when she went out, wearing a brown straw hat three Summers old.
"The paper says," Grandmother continued, "that a blush is becomin' to
some women, but Rosemary ain't one that looks well with a red face. Do
you suppose she has got a beau?"
"Can't prove it by me," Matilda sighed, looking pensively out of the
window. "That Marsh boy come to see her once, though."
"He didn't come again, I notice, no more'n the minister did."
"No," Matilda rejoined, pointedly, with a searching glance at
Grandmother, "and I reckon it was for the same reason. When young folks
comes to see young folks, they don't want old folks settin' in the room
with 'em all the time, talkin' about things they ain't interested in."
"Young folks!" snorted Grandmother. "You was thirty!"
"That ought to be old enough to set alone with a man for a spell,
especially if he's a minister."
"I suppose you think," the old lady returned, swiftly gathering her
ammunition for a final shot, "that the minister was minded to marry you.
I've told you more 'n once that you're better off the way you are.
Marriage ain't much. I've been through it and I know."
[Sidenote: Face to Face]
With that, she sailed triumphantly out of the room, closing the door
with a bang which had in it the sound of finality. Poor Miss Matilda
gazed dreamily out of the window, treasuring the faint, fragrant memory
of her lost romance. "If Rosemary has got a beau," she said to herself,
"I hope she won't let Ma scare him away from her."
At the post-office, Rosemary met Alden, face to face. She blushed and
stammered when he spoke to her, answered his kindly questions in
monosyllables, and, snatching _The Household Guardian_ from the
outstretched hand of the postmaster, hurried away.
Presently he overtook her. "Please, Rosemary," he said, "give me just a
minute. I want to talk to you. I haven't seen you for a long time."
"Yes?" She stopped, but could not raise her eyes to his face.
"I can't talk to you here. Come on up the hill."
"When?" The girl's lips scarcely moved as she asked the question.
"Now. Please come."
"I'll--I'll have to go home first, with this," she replied, indicating
the paper. "Then I'll come."
"All right. I'll go on ahead and wait for you. Shall I tie the red
ribbon to the tree?" He spoke thoughtlessly, meaning only to be
pleasant, but the girl's eyes filled. She shook her head decisively and
neither of them spoke until they reached the corner where she must turn.
[Sidenote: Waiting for Rosemary]
"Good-bye," she said.
"Auf wiedersehen," he replied, lifting his hat. "Don't be long."
Always, before, it had been Rosemary who waited for him. Now he sat upon
the log, leaning back against the tree, listening to the chatter of the
squirrels and the twitter of little birds in the boughs above him. It
was not yet noon, and the sunlight made little dancing gleams of
silver-gilt on the ground between the faint shadows of the leaves. He
waited for her in a fever of impatience, for in his pocket he had a
letter for Edith, addressed in a dashing masculine hand.
Not so long ago, in this same place, he had asked Rosemary to marry him.
Now he must ask her to release him, to set him free from the bondage he
had persisted in making for himself. He made a wry face at the thought,
unspeakably dreading the coming interview and, in his heart, despising
himself.
Rosemary did not keep him waiting long. When she came, she was flushed
and breathless from the long climb--and something more. She sank down
upon the seat he indicated--her old place.
[Sidenote: The Hour of Reckoning]
"It's been a long time since we were here last," Alden observed,
awkwardly.
"Has it?" The grey eyes glanced at him keenly for a moment, then swiftly
turned away.
"I've--I've wanted to see you," Alden lied.
"I've wanted to see you," she flashed back, telling the literal truth.
Alden sighed, for there was tremulous passion in her tone--almost
resentment. He had treated her badly, considering that she was his
promised wife. She had been shamefully neglected, and she knew it, and
the hour of reckoning had come.
For the moment he caught at the straw the situation seemed to offer him.
If they should quarrel--if he could make her say harsh things, it might
be easier. Instantly his better self revolted. "Coward!" he thought.
"Cad!"
"I've wanted to see you," Rosemary was saying, with forced calmness, "to
tell you something. I can't marry you, ever!"
"Why, Rosemary!" he returned, surprised beyond measure. "What do you
mean?"
The girl rose and faced him. He rose, too, awkwardly stretching out his
hand for hers. She swerved aside, and clasped her hands behind her
back.
[Sidenote: It's All a Mistake]
"I mean what I said; it's plain enough, isn't it?"
"Yes," he answered, putting his hands in his pockets, "it's perfectly
plain. If I've done anything to hurt or offend you in any way, I--I'm
sorry." So much was true. He was sorry for Rosemary and had never been
more so than at that very moment. "You'll give me a reason, won't you?"
he continued.
"Reason?" she repeated, with a bitter laugh. "Oh, I have plenty of
reasons!" His heart sank for a moment, then went on, evenly. "It's all a
mistake--it's never been anything but a mistake. I couldn't leave
Grandmother and Aunt Matilda, you know. They need me, and I shouldn't
have allowed myself to forget it."
"Yes," Alden agreed, quickly, "I suppose they do need you. I was
selfish, perhaps."
Hot words came to her lips but she choked them back. For an instant she
was tempted to tell him all she had seen and heard a few days before, to
accuse him of disloyalty, and then prove it. Her face betrayed her
agitation, but Alden was looking out across the valley, and did not see.
In his pocket the letter for Edith lay consciously, as though it were
alive.
"It isn't that you don't love me, is it?" he asked, curiously. His
masculine vanity had been subtly aroused.
[Sidenote: They Part]
Rosemary looked him straight in the face. She was white, now, to the
lips. "Yes," she lied. "It is that more than anything else."
"Why, my dear girl! I thought----"
"So did I. We were both mistaken, that is all."
"And you really don't love me?"
"Not in the least."
Alden laughed--a little mirthless, mocking laugh. It is astonishing,
sometimes, how deeply a man may be hurt through his vanity. Rosemary had
turned away, and he called her back.
"Won't you kiss me good-bye?" he asked, with a new humility.
Then Rosemary laughed, too, but her laugh was also mirthless. "No," she
answered, in a tone from which there was no appeal. "Why should I?"
Before he realised it, she was gone.
He went back to the log and sat down to think. This last tryst with
Rosemary had been a surprise in more ways than one. He had been afraid
that she would be angry, or hurt, and she had been neither. He had come
to ask for freedom and she had given it to him without asking, because
she could not leave Grandmother and Aunt Matilda, and because she did
not love him. He could understand the first reason, but the latter
seemed very strange. Yet Rosemary had looked him straight in the face
and he had never known her to lie. He had a new emotion toward her; not
exactly respect, but something more than that.
[Sidenote: A Letter for Edith]
Then, with a laugh, he straightened his shoulders. He had what he
wanted, though it had not come in the way he thought it would. If he had
been obliged to ask her to release him, he would have felt worse than he
did now. The letter in his pocket, heavy with portent, asserted itself
imperiously. He hurried home, feeling very chivalrous.
Edith, cool and fresh in white linen, with one of the last of the red
roses thrust into her belt, was rocking on the veranda, with a book in
her lap which she had made no pretence of reading. Two or three empty
chairs were near her, but Madame was nowhere to be seen. Alden handed
her the letter. "I'm free!" he said, exultantly.
Edith smiled, then, with shaking hands, tore open the letter. Alden
eagerly watched her as she turned the closely written pages, but her
face was inscrutable. She read every word carefully, until she reached
the signature. Then she looked up.
"I'm not," she said, briefly. She tossed the letter to him, and went
into the house. He heard her light feet upon the stairs and the rustle
of her skirts as she ascended. Perfume persisted in the place she had
just left--the rose at her belt, the mysterious blending of many sweet
odours, and, above all, the fragrance of Edith herself.
[Sidenote: Alden Reads the Letter]
"It's nonsense," he murmured, looking after her. All her quixotic
notions of honour would eventually yield to argument--of course they
would. Yet his heart strangely misgave him as he read the letter.
"My dear Edith," it began.
"Your letter has somewhat surprised me, and yet I cannot say I feel that
I don't deserve it. Since you have been away I have been doing a good
deal of thinking. Of course you and I haven't hit it off very well
together, and, as I can see no point where you have failed me, I realise
that it must be my fault and that I have failed you.
"I wish you had talked to me about it, instead of going away, and yet,
even as I write the words, I see how impossible it would have been, for
we haven't been in the habit of talking things over since the first year
we were married. Gradually the wall of silence and reserve has grown up
between us, but while you, with the quicker insight of a woman, have
seen it growing, I haven't realised it until it was completed.
"Your offering me my freedom has made me wonder what my life would be
without you. No one has ever filled your place to me, or ever will. I
may have seemed careless, thoughtless--indeed, I have been both, and
constantly, but always in the background has been the knowledge that you
were there--that I could depend upon you.
[Sidenote: The Husband's Point of View]
"It may seem like a trite and commonplace thing to say, but upon my word
and honour, Edith, I haven't meant to fail you, as I see I have in a
thousand ways. I'm sorry, deeply sorry, but I know that the words will
not mean much to you.
"Since I first saw you, there's never been any woman in the world for me
but you, and there never will be, even though you should cast me off as
I deserve. If you can make up your mind to come back to me and let me
try again, I'll do my best to make you happy--to consider you instead of
myself.
"Men are selfish brutes at the best, and I don't claim to be any better
than the average, but all I'm asking for now is a chance to make myself
worthy of you--to be the sort of husband a woman like you should have.
"Please let me hear from you very soon.
"Your loving husband,
"W. G. L."
Alden read it again, though he did not need to--he had understood every
word of it the first time. Then he folded it, slowly and precisely, and
put it into the torn envelope. He tapped on the arm of the chair for a
moment with the edge of the envelope, then, mechanically, put it into
his pocket.
[Sidenote: Effect upon Alden]
A robin, in a maple tree beyond him, piped his few notes with unbearable
intensity. Discordant chirps assailed his ears from the lattice where
the climbing rose put forth its few last blooms. Swaying giddily in a
crazy pattern upon the white floor of the veranda, was the shadow of the
rose, the plaything of every passing wind. He remembered the moonlight
night which might have been either yesterday or in some previous life,
as far as his confused perceptions went, when Edith had stood with the
rose in her hand, and the clear, sharply-defined shadow of it had been
silhouetted at her feet.
All his senses seemed mercilessly acute. Some of the roses were almost
dead and the sickening scent of them mingled with the fragrance of those
that had just bloomed. It made him dizzy--almost faint.
The maid announced luncheon, but food, or the sight of his mother were
among the last things he desired, just then. Affecting not to hear, he
went out, got a boat, and rowed far up the river alone.
When he was utterly exhausted, he shipped the oars and let himself drift
back, pushing out from shore now and then when the current brought him
too near. He knew, with crushing certainty, that Edith would not be
swerved from her chosen path by argument--but he could at least try.
[Sidenote: A Silent Function]
White-faced and weary, he went to his room when he reached home, lay
down, and tried to sleep, but sleep would not come. He seemed to have
come to a point of absolute bodily suspension, neither to hunger nor
thirst nor sleep again. It was, in a way, like a clock, that ticks
steadily, though the hands are definitely fixed at a certain hour and
will not move.
He forced himself to dress for dinner and to go down at the proper time.
Madame was waiting, but Edith was late. When she appeared, she was in
the white linen gown she had worn all day, with the withered rose in her
belt. It was the first evening she had not dressed for dinner and she at
once apologised to Madame.
"I'm sorry," she said, "but it seemed impossible to make the effort
to-night. You'll forgive me, won't you?"
"Of course," Madame returned sweetly.
"Of course," Alden echoed. His voice sounded distant and his eyes were
dull.
As dinner bade fair to be a silent function, Madame turned to Edith with
the first question that came into her mind.
"What have you been doing all the afternoon?"
"Packing," replied Edith, with dry lips.
[Sidenote: Nothing to Say]
"Or rather, getting ready to pack." She did not look at Alden, but at
Madame, with a wan little smile that made the old lady's heart suddenly
very tender toward her.
"My dear! We'll miss you so."
"I know," Edith murmured, "and I shall miss you--more than words may
say, but I have to go." She drained the glass of water at her plate,
then added: "My husband wants me to come back. He has written to say
so."
"Then," said Madame, "I suppose you will have to go."
"I suppose so," repeated Edith, parrot-like.
Alden's eyes never swerved from Edith's white face. In their depths was
the world-old longing, the world-old appeal, but never for the fraction
of an instant did Edith trust herself to look at him.
When they rose from the table, Edith went back to her room immediately,
murmuring an excuse. Alden watched her despairingly until the hem of her
white gown was lost at the turn of the stairs. Then he sat down with the
paper, but he could not read, for the words zig-zagged crazily along the
page.
Madame understood and sincerely pitied them both, but there seemed to be
nothing to say. She leaned back in her chair, with her eyes closed,
pretending to be asleep, but, in reality, watching Alden as he stared
vacantly at the paper he held in his shaking hands.
[Sidenote: Poor Comfort]
At last he rose and went out upon the veranda. Madame started from her
chair, then forced herself to lean back again, calmly. She heard the
scraping of his chair as he moved it along the veranda, out of the way
of the light that came through the open window. For a long time there
was silence.
Longing to comfort him and unable to endure it longer, Madame went out,
softly. He did not hear her step, for his head was bowed upon his hands.
From a room above Edith's light streamed out afar into the sweet
darkness, drawing toward it all the winged wayfarers of the night.
Madame slipped her arm around his shoulders, and bent down to him.
"Dear," she said brokenly, "she's married."
Alden drew a quick, shuddering breath, and freed himself roughly from
the tender clasp. "I know it, Mother," he cried, in a voice vibrant with
pain. "For God's sake, don't remind me of that!"
XVIII
Starbreak
[Sidenote: Edith's Failure]
Through the long night Edith lay awake, thinking. Her senses were
blindly merged into one comprehensive hurt. She was as one who fares
forth in darkness, knowing well the way upon which he must go, yet
longing vainly for light.
Her path lay before her, mercilessly clear and distinct. A trick of
memory took her back to what Madame had said, the day after she came:
"The old way would have been to have waited, done the best one could,
and trusted God to make it right in His good time." She remembered, too,
her bitter answer: "I've waited and I've done the best I could, and I've
trusted, but I've failed."
Keenly she perceived the subtlety of her punishment. Attempting to bind
the Everlasting with her own personal limitations, her own desires, she
had failed to see that at least half of a rightful prayer must deal with
herself. She had asked only that her husband might love her; not that
she might continue to love him.
[Sidenote: Out of Harmony]
Now, with her heart and soul wholly in the keeping of another man, the
boon had been granted her, in bitterness and ashes and desolation. He
had said, in his letter, that her coming away had made him think.
Through her absence he had seen the true state of affairs between them,
as she could never have made him see it if she had remained at home.
This, then, was God's way of revelation to him, but--to her?
The truth broke upon her with the vividness of a lightning flash. It was
the way of revelation to her also, but how? She sat up in bed, propping
herself back against the pillows, her mind groping eagerly for the clue.
During the past six years she had endeavoured constantly for a certain
adjustment. Now it had come, but she herself was out of harmony. Were
her feet to be forever set upon the ways of pain? Was there nothing at
all in the world for her?
Alden, too, was awake and thinking. She felt it, through the darkness,
as definitely as though he had been in the same room, with his face full
in the light. He also was conscious of the utter hopelessness of it and
was striving to see his way clearly.
Until then, she had not known how far his argument had swayed her, nor
how much she had depended upon the thought that her husband would gladly
accept the release she offered him. Her principles had not changed, but
his possible point of view had not been considered before.
[Sidenote: Irrevocably Bound]
"'Until death do us part,'" said Edith, to herself. "Not 'until death or
divorce do us part'; nor yet 'until I see someone else I like better';
not even 'until you see someone else you like better,' And, again,
'forsaking all others keep thee only unto me so long as we both shall
live.'"
Suppose he had violated his oath, consented to accept freedom at her
hands, and gone his way? Would not the solemn words she had spoken at
the altar still be binding upon her? She saw, now, that they would be,
and that whatever compromise he might have been able to make with his
own conscience, to be legally justified later, she was irrevocably
bound, until death should divide them one from the other.