Although she had returned so ardently to the faith of her childhood,
Myra Henshawe never changed the clause in her will, which requested
that her body should be cremated, and her ashes buried “in some
lonely and unfrequented place in the mountains, or in the sea.”
After it was all over, and her ashes sealed up in a little steel box,
Henshawe called me into her room one morning, where he was packing
her things, and told me he was going to Alaska.
“Oh, not to seek my fortune,” he said, smiling. “That is for young
men. But the steamship company have a place for me in their office
there. I have always wanted to go, and now there is nothing to
hold me. This poor little box goes with me; I shall scatter her
ashes somewhere in those vast waters. And this I want you to keep
for remembrance.” He dropped into my hands the necklace of carved
amethysts she had worn on the night I first saw her.
“And, Nellie----” He paused before me with his arms folded, standing
exactly as he stood behind Modjeska’s chair in the moonlight on
that New Year’s night; standing like a statue, or a sentinel, I had
said then, not knowing what it was I felt in his attitude; but now
I knew it meant indestructible constancy ... almost indestructible
youth. “Nellie,” he said, “I don’t want you to remember her as she
was here. Remember her as she was when you were with us on Madison
Square, when she was herself, and we were happy. Yes, happier than
it falls to the lot of most mortals to be. After she was stricken,
her recollection of those things darkened. Life was hard for her, but
it was glorious, too; she had such beautiful friendships. Of course,
she was absolutely unreasonable when she was jealous. Her suspicions
were sometimes--almost fantastic.” He smiled and brushed his forehead
with the tips of his fingers, as if the memory of her jealousy was
pleasant still, and perplexing still. “But that was just Molly
Driscoll! I’d rather have been clawed by her, as she used to say,
than petted by any other woman I’ve ever known. These last years it’s
seemed to me that I was nursing the mother of the girl who ran away
with me. Nothing ever took that girl from me. She was a wild, lovely
creature, Nellie. I wish you could have seen her then.”
* * * * *
Several years after I said good-bye to him, Oswald Henshawe died in
Alaska. I have still the string of amethysts, but they are unlucky.
If I take them out of their box and wear them, I feel all evening
a chill over my heart. Sometimes, when I have watched the bright
beginning of a love story, when I have seen a common feeling exalted
into beauty by imagination, generosity, and the flaming courage of
youth, I have heard again that strange complaint breathed by a dying
woman into the stillness of night, like a confession of the soul:
“Why must I die like this, alone with my mortal enemy!”
[Illustration: (Page number illustration)]
_This book is set in a type called Scotch. There is a divergence of
opinion regarding the origin of this face, some authorities holding
that it was first cut by Alexander Wilson & Son of Glasgow in 1833.
Whatever its origin, it is certain that the type was widely used in
Scotland where it was called Modern Roman, and since its introduction
into America has been known as Scotch._
_The format, decorations and illustrations were made by W. A.
Dwiggins and the book manufactured under the supervision of the
Pynson Printers of New York. The press work and binding were done
by the Plimpton Press, Norwood, Mass., and the paper made by the
H. C. Chalfant Mill._