LUCY.
Hours had gone by, and the clock hands pointed to twelve, ere Maddy
compelled herself to hear the story Guy had come to tell. She had
thrust him from her at first, speaking to him of Lucy, his wife, and
Guy had answered her back: “I have no wife—I never had one. Lucy is in
heaven,” and that was all Maddy knew until the great shock had spent
itself in tears and sobs, which became almost convulsions as she tried
to realize the fact that Lucy Atherstone was dead; that the bridal robe
about which she had written, with girlish frankness, proved to be her
shroud, and that her head that night was not pillowed on Guy’s arm, but
was resting under English turf and beneath an English sky. She could
listen at last, but her breath came in panting gasps; while Guy told
her how, on the very morning of the bridal, Lucy had greeted him with
her usual bright smile, appearing and looking better than he had before
seen her look since he reached her mother’s home; how for an hour they
sat together alone in a little room sacred to her, because years before
it was there he confessed his love.
Seated on a low ottoman, with her golden head lying on his lap, she had
this morning told him, in her artless way, how much she loved him, and
how hard it sometimes was to make her love for the creature second to
her love for the Creator; told him she was not faultless, and asked
that when he found how erring and weak she was, he would bear with her
frailties as she would bear with his; talked with him, too, of Maddy
Clyde, confessing in a soft, low tone, how once or twice a pang of
jealousy had wrung her heart when she read his praises of his pupil.
But she had conquered that; she had prayed it all away, and now, next
to her own sister, she loved Maddy Clyde. Other words, too, were
spoken—words of guileless, pure affection, too sacred even for Guy to
breathe to Maddy; and then Lucy had left him, her hart-bounding step
echoing through the hall and up the winding stairs, down which she
never came again alive, for when Guy next looked upon her she was lying
white as a water lily, her neck and dress and golden hair stained with
the pale red life current oozing from her livid lips. A blood vessel
had been suddenly ruptured, the physician said, and for her, the fair,
young bride, there was no hope. They told her she must die, for the
mother would have them tell her. Once, for a few moments, there rested
on her face a fearfully frightened look, such as a harmless bird might
wear when suddenly caught in a snare. But that soon passed away as from
beneath the closed eyelids the great tears came gushing, and the
stained lips whispered faintly: “God knows best what’s right. Poor
Guy!—break it gently to him.”
At this point in the story Guy broke down entirely, sobbing as only
strong men can sob.
“Maddy,” he said, “I felt like a heartless wretch—a most consummate
hypocrite—as, standing by Lucy’s side, I met the fond, pitying glance
of her blue eyes, and suffered her poor little hand to part my hair as
she tried to comfort me, even though every word she uttered was
shortening her life; tried to comfort me, the wretch who was there so
unwillingly, and who at this prospect of release hardly knew at first
whether he was more sorry than pleased. You may well start from me in
horror, Maddy. I was just the wretch I describe: but I overcame it,
Maddy, and Heaven is my witness that no thought of you intruded itself
upon me afterward is I stood by my dying Lucy—gentle, patient, loving
to the last. I saw how good, how sweet she was, and something of the
old love, the boy love, came back to me, as I held her in my arms,
where she wished to be. I would have saved her if I could; and when I
called her ‘my darling Lucy,’ they were not idle words. I kissed her
many times for myself, and once, Maddy, for you. She told me to. She
whispered: ‘Kiss me, Guy, for Maddy Clyde. Tell her I’d rather she
should take my place than anybody else—rather my Guy should call her
wife—for I know she will not be jealous if you sometimes talked of your
dead Lucy, and I know she will help lead my boy to that blessed home
where sorrow never comes.’ That was the last she ever spoke, and when
the sun went down death had claimed my bride. She died in my arms,
Maddy. I felt the last fluttering of her pulse, the last beat of her
heart. I laid her back upon her pillows. I wiped the blood from her
lips and from her golden curls. I followed her to her early grave. I
saw her buried from my sight, and then, Maddy, I started home; thoughts
of you and thoughts of Lucy blended equally together until Aikenside
was reached. I talked with Mrs. Noah; I heard all of you there was to
tell, and then I talked with Agnes, who was not greatly surprised, and
did not oppose my coming here tonight. I could not remain there,
knowing you were alone. In the bridal chamber I found your bouquet,
with its ‘Welcome to the bride.’ Maddy, you must be that bride. Lucy
sanctioned it, and the doctor, too, for I told him all. His own wedding
was, of course, deferred, and he did not come home with me, but he
said: ‘Tell Maddy not to wait. Life is too short to waste any
happiness. She has my blessing.’ And, Maddy, it must be so. Aikenside
needs a mistress; you are all alone. You are mine—mine forever.”
The storm had died away, and the moonbeams stealing through the window
told that morning was breaking, but neither Guy nor Maddy heeded the
lapse of time. Theirs was a sad kind of happiness as they talked
together, and could Lucy have listened to them she would have felt
satisfied that she was not forgotten. One long, bright curl, cut from
her head by his own hand, was all there was left of her to Guy, save
the hallowed memories of her purity and goodness—memories which would
yet mold the proud, impulsive Guy into the earnest, consistent
Christian which Lucy in her life had desired that he should be, and
which Maddy rejoiced to see him.