"Why, yes," said I; "that was the bush."
His dear eyes were gazing into mine; I could not look away again.
There came a tremor over all my body; my love for him swept over me
in throbbing waves of pain; I fell towards him, stifling a cry
against his breast. And he, wrapping his arms about me, strained me
to him with great force.
"Emilia!" he cried, "I love you very much; I have never told you how
much I love you!"
I knew it to be the last cry of his conscience, but, as I lay there
listening to the beat of his heart, there fled from me what little
yet remained of my conquered spirit's strength and noble purpose.
Only the woman in me cried aloud, "I cannot!"
I tried to speak, but the words came almost as a sob. Quickly I
threw my arms about his neck and, bending his face towards me,
kissed him of my own accord as he smiled; then, breaking from him,
would have run homewards.
But he held me by the hand.
"When shall I come to-morrow?" asked he, hoarsely.
"Not at all," said I. "Go, Gabriel! God help me; I love you too
much!"
And so we did not meet next day, and the next we were married.
* * * * *
For many months I made believe that we were happy. Ah! it was not
all make-belief! I have had great joys.
Never was the game of happiness easier to play at than it was for
Gabriel and me in the first year of our marriage. He was very much
attached to me, and I loved him.
It was the first time he had been out of England; the sights he saw
filled him with rapture and insatiable curiosity, to appease which I
led him from place to place until I had shown him all I knew, and
still we went onwards, covering new ground together.
We never stayed very long in the same spot; a certain weariness
crept over me at times, but I saw that it was best for him to keep
continually on the wing; and indeed, having no desire on earth but
his happiness, I was ready, for his sake, to wander my whole life
away. Moreover, as he was not working at all the while, I looked
forward to a day when inspiration might set in, together with
satiety, when he too might yearn, as I did, to sit in peace beside a
hearth of his own.
Constance wrote to us occasionally, and I to her. Her letters to me
were the same as of old, full of love and sweetness; she nearly
always mentioned Gabriel, but not in such a way as to denote
preoccupation. My letters to her were not as they had been; I felt
this at the time. On rereading them just now I burned them
all,--there was no breath in them.
Mrs. Rayner had taken Fairview, the nearest house to Fletcher's
Hall, soon after my marriage, and set her cap at Uncle George with
so much persistence that he engaged himself to her the following
summer. So my sweet girl stayed on at Graysmill. Grandmamma's
letters, and Aunt Caroline's, were always full of her, of the
comfort her sunny presence brought them; my father-in-law and Jane
had the same tale to tell.
For many months I never even contemplated the possibility of
returning to England with my husband. There is no knowing how long
our wanderings might have been, but for my illness. Gabriel and I
were passing through Pisa at the end of June, on our way to Lerici,
whither we were bent on pilgrimage, when I fell ill.
That was the end of many dreams. The wheel could turn no more; the
swift and restless life of day to day, that fled the past and hung
back from the morrow, was checked abruptly, completely.
But, lying in that little bed of painted wood, staring at the net
curtains and green shutters, at the lozenge pattern on the wall, at
the cornucopiæ on the ceiling, a clear and sober sight returned to
me. The body having failed, the spirit found its strength.
Our sudden halt had worked swiftly on Gabriel also. He set to work;
the restlessness died out of him, but, alas! the lightness, too. He
became very still, silent and self-absorbed. In the cool of evening,
the time of day when I was strongest, I used to turn my kind little
nun out of the room, and then Gabriel came and read to me.
At first he had tried to finish the long poem begun in the days of
our betrothal, but he soon laid that aside, and another sprang
forward with extraordinary rapidity. Perhaps he himself was hardly
aware of the sorrow of that poem; perhaps he thought I would judge
it so entirely as a work of art that I should not take note of its
deep gloom, of its hopeless melancholy. But nothing was lost upon me
now. I read it in every line,--he suffered; something failed
him,--perhaps he knew not what, perhaps he knew. A terrible
loneliness was in his heart,--and I had given him all I had to give.
On the fifteenth of July, I awoke with a sense of something fresh
and sweet; a bunch of roses lay upon my pillow, and Gabriel stood
beside my bed. The shutters were still closed.
"What?" said I, "have you been out already? How dear of you this is!
Is the sun shining?"
And he answered:
"Of course, what should it do but shine on our wedding-day?"
Then he sat down on the edge of the bed, and took both my hands in
his.
"Emilia," said he, "you have made me very happy."
But I, sitting up, bent my head low over his hands and kissed them;
my loose hair fell forward, he did not see the tears that stood in
my eyes. I knew that he had lied.
From that day I began to think with a purpose. I had already gained
sufficient mastery over myself, sufficient calm and strength of
spirit to be able to do so.
I can hardly call it a struggle that followed. I copied out and laid
under my pillow the words of the covenant we had made the day after
our betrothal; daily I read it through, and recognised how we had
failed towards each other, and towards our best beliefs.
We had both failed; but, whereas he had erred merely, I knew that I
had sinned; in the fulness of my remorse, my only thought was now to
offer reparation. Nor was it only for Gabriel's sake that I was now
possessed by the desire of atonement. In the blindness of human
passion, I had sinned against my better self, my noblest purposes,
my most firm and high beliefs; that passion conquered, I determined
to make amends for my great transgression by following, regardless
of pain and danger, the highest path that lay within the range of my
vision, regardless of pain to myself, regardless of that fear of the
world which so often leads us to accept its canons, even in sight of
a nobler righteousness.
Therefore I resolved to set him free; I believed this to be
possible, although my sight was clear, my spirit calm. But he who
beholds only the aerial pathway of an ideal right may stumble and
fall on the stones of the world. It was only given me later to
realise, through grief too terrible for words, that, given the world
as the world is, there are wrongs that are irrevocable, lies that,
once lied, no truth can ever wipe away.
* * * * *
Meanwhile, health returned to me. We stayed at Pisa until I was
convalescent, then moved to the sea. His poem and my thoughts
occupied us severally; they were good and peaceful days. Now and
again the heart rebelled against the severity of the spirit, but,
take it all in all, a great calm was upon me.
One evening in September, Gabriel and I were leaning out of my
window; it was almost dark; the occasional footfall of a passenger
fell on the stones of our quiet street; some men were singing in the
trattoria round the corner; we two leant there in silence, counting
the stars as they came.
"Gabriel," said I, "I have had a letter from Constance. I am afraid
she is not very happy at Graysmill; her mother worries her; she
sounds lonely and not over well. Shall we go home a while?"
Gabriel shifted his feet, and turned the latch of the shutter round
and round.
"No," he replied; "I think not;" I mean, if you feel you want to see
Constance, go, Emilia, only don't leave me too long. I had rather
stay here. I have been thinking it over of late, and I see no reason
why I should ever return to England."
"But, dearest one," said I, "your father!"
"I have thought of that. I long to see him, and Jane, too. You go
home, Emilia, and bring them back with you. We four can live out
here in Italy forever, live and die here."
"But Constance?" said I, then.
There was a long silence. The latch of the shutter whirled round and
round.
"Oh, Constance," said he; "yes, it's hard on Constance. She will
have to live with her mother and your step-uncle, I suppose."
"No," I replied; "I should never allow that. But we can arrange
about Constance when we see her; we can talk it over together. I
cannot go without you, Gabriel. There is no reason why we should
stay there long,--only come with me you must."
He held out for some days, but in the end I conquered. We passed
through Florence on the way, and there beside my mother's grave I
put forth the first, the only prayer I ever made,--a wordless
yearning towards the Inconceivable, a prayer for strength and the
Light of Truth.
* * * * *
We reached Graysmill on the nineteenth of September. My impatience
was so great that, in spite of Gabriel's displeasure at what he
called my rashness, I would not stay in London on the way, but we
travelled straight down, reaching Fletcher's Hall at midnight.
Aunt Caroline was down to receive us, for I had sent a telegram from
Dover; upstairs, my dear old woman was sitting up in bed with sweet,
wrinkled smiles beneath her frilled night-cap. I was very glad to be
home again; my heart felt warm.
I sent Aunt Caroline to bed, much against her will, and then Gabriel
and I sat down to drink the tea he had wished for, beside the fire
in the breakfast-room. Gabriel was very white, his eyes shone all
too brightly; again and again I saw him put his hand to his brow, a
trick he had when he was nervous.
"Dear," said I, "don't drink so much tea; it's very bad for you, you
will never sleep tonight."
"No," said he; "I am sure I couldn't sleep anyway. I think I shan't
stay here, Emilia, if you don't mind. I feel very impatient to see
my father; the night is fine, I shall walk over to the Cottage, and
take him by surprise."
I was just looking at him, wondering how to meet this mood, when
there came a light tap at the window, a French window that opened on
to the lawn.
"Hark!" said I.
We listened; again it came, again; and then a little voice calling,
"Emilia! Emilia!"
"It is Constance!" I cried, and, springing to my feet, I flung open
curtain and shutter and window.
There she stood in the dark, with the light of the room upon her.
She was in black, with a dark shawl wrapped round her head; I could
see nothing clearly save the white, outstretched hands, the pale
sweet face, with its halo of burnished curls.
She sprang towards me with a little sob, and we laughed and cried
together as I clasped her to me, covering her beloved face with
kisses. I was still holding her fast when she perceived Gabriel;
from the stronghold of my arms, with her head still resting on my
bosom, she turned towards him and held out her hand. I looked
neither at him nor at her, but, bending away, laid my cheek upon her
curls.
And it was thus they met again.
Of the days that immediately followed, there is not much to tell.
Any doubt I might have entertained as to the continuance of their
mutual passion vanished swiftly and entirely. The path of duty lay
very clear before me.
I saw more of Constance than of Gabriel in those days; we were
almost always together, and he avoided us. Richard Norton, who had
greatly aged in the year of our absence, was so happy in his son
that Gabriel had every excuse for spending the greater part of his
time at the Cottage. Indeed, he usually left me directly after
breakfast, and did not return until supper-time.
He wrote a great deal, out in the woods and in his old room. The
poem was approaching completion, and this, in fact, was the reason
why for fifteen days I deferred the execution of my purpose.
The sufferings we all three experienced daily at this time, when it
was impossible to entirely avoid each other's presence, were
endurable to me, and I sought to help Constance to bear them. To him
they were, so to speak, a source of inspiration; and I therefore
determined to let things run their course until the last line should
be written.
On the fourth of October,--it was Saturday,--I, having a headache,
did not get up to breakfast, and Gabriel left before nine o'clock
for the Thatched Cottage. My sweet Constance spent the entire
morning with me. She had brought a hat to trim, but the work did not
proceed. It was a black felt hat, I remember, and I trimmed it for
her. She herself was in one of her childlike moods, winsome and gay
atop of the sorrow that had made her pale cheek paler, and set blue
rings about her dear eyes.
I was alone all the afternoon, and copied out for the last time a
letter to my husband, on which I had lately expended many hours. I
felt strong and sure of myself; it was not cowardice that led me to
write to him instead of saying to his face all that I had to say.
But there was no telling in what mood I should find him, were I to
speak. He might refuse to listen; he might move me to momentary
indecision by manner, look, or words; I preferred to write it all
down clearly, to make sure that what I had to say would not run the
risk of being left unsaid through the interposition of unforeseen
and incalculable emotions.
At the approach of supper-time, I dressed and went into the
drawing-room. We were expecting Constance and Mrs. Rayner, the
vicar, and Uncle George. My old dears and I had half an hour to
ourselves before any of them came. Gabriel was very late; our last
guest had already arrived when I heard him come in and rush up to
our room.
When he came down, he was pale in the extreme, and his eyes danced
in his head. I went up to him and drew him aside, towards the
window.
"Well?" said I, softly, "what's the matter with him?"
He flushed and took my hands, pressing them nervously.
"Finished!" he whispered. "I have done, Emilia,--the last line is
written."