SALOME CONTINUES HER STORY.
“All this has been a test, at any rate,” Salome continued, after a few
moments of thoughtful silence. “We are both sure that no unworthy motive
has influenced us. We know that we preferred each other to wealth. I
fled from my home rather than be driven into a marriage with one whom I
was not sure I could love, while you insisted upon marrying me without
regard to the fortune which you believed you were forfeiting.”
“Yes, it has been a test, as you say. Still I cannot be reconciled to
our long separation. Oh, my darling, I have been very desolate without
you! Just think of all the precious time that we have lost!” Dr.
Winthrop said, with a quiver of pain in his tones.
“It has not been wholly lost, dear,” Salome returned, lifting her tender
face upon which there glowed a holy light, “for I believe we have both
tried to do some good in the world; out of our own sorrow, we have tried
to be helpful to others. True we have suffered,” and she shivered
slightly; “but I am sure we shall both appreciate the joy of the future
far more on account of it. I know,” and her voice grew gravely sweet,
“that I have helped to smooth and cheer the last of life for one, who,
for many years, had led a very bitter and sorrowful existence; besides,
I trust that I have won no mean victory over my own heart during my
experiences here in Paris.”
Dr. Winthrop bent and touched her brow almost reverently with his lips.
“Dear heart, I understand you,” he said with emotion. “You have rewarded
evil with good by saving the lives of those who have injured you; you
have been an angel, my Salome!”
“No, True, I did not mean that,” she replied, smiling faintly and
flushing. “I am far from being angelic, I assure you. But I confess
there was much of bitterness in my heart; I am afraid that I was almost
revengeful. Even when you asked me to go to the chateau, I had quite a
struggle with myself before I could conquer; but now while I feel that I
may have been instrumental in doing some good, I know that I have reaped
a hundredfold in the conquest over self.”
Dr. Winthrop could not speak for a few moments. He folded her in a close
embrace, and marvelled at the beautiful spirit that could be so gentle
and forgiving toward those whose only object had been to crush her. For
himself, he felt that he never could forgive his mother and sister for
their treacherous scheming, their heartlessness and ill-will. He could
see that they had been determined to separate them from the first, and
he wondered how they would feel when they should learn the truth.
“Did madam—your mother write you about my meeting a strange man one
day?” Salome questioned, breaking in upon these reflections.
Madam’s threat had suddenly recurred to her, and she wished to learn
just how much her husband had been told.
“Yes, dear, but I wrote her in reply that I trusted my wife implicitly.
Evelyn, she said, had been an eye-witness of the meeting, and they were
both evidently very curious. But I felt sure that there had been nothing
wrong in it—that if anything had occurred which I ought to know, you
would yourself explain it to me upon my return,” Dr. Winthrop replied.
“Thank you, dear True, for your confidence in me,” Salome said, as she
lifted her lips and touched his in a grateful caress—one which her
husband doubly appreciated, since it was the first one she had
voluntarily given him. “There was nothing suspicious or wrong in the
meeting, on my part, although it may have seemed so to her,” she
continued. “The man was the same one whom I met in London; as I told
you, he had been a servant in our family—he went abroad with us to wait
upon my father, attend to our baggage, and make himself generally
useful. He had always pretended to be very fond of me, and though this
may have been all very well when I was a child, it became very annoying
as I grew older. When I was about nineteen, he one day boldly made love
to me. I went to my father and told him at once of the insult, and he
discharged the man on the spot. He was very angry, and vowed that he
would be avenged upon us. He did not leave the country, but continued to
follow us about from place to place. Although this was not pleasant, we
did not fear him, or imagine that he would dare do us any injury. He
must have known about my father’s death, and of my subsequent flight—he
even traced me to London, though what possible good he could have
expected to gain by so doing I cannot understand. I do not think he
could have known of my sailing for America, for I never saw him again
until we met in New York that day. I was greatly annoyed and frightened,
for it seemed to me then that he was bent upon doing me some injury, and
I cannot tell you how I longed for you, True, to protect me from him and
his further insults. His name was William Brown, and he was a very
smart, capable man in certain ways, but I sincerely hope I shall never
see him again.”
Dr. Winthrop’s lip curled with scorn as he thought how his sister had
played the spy upon his pure-minded, innocent wife. How utterly
contemptible it seemed to him, and how simple the circumstances of the
meeting, although, as his mother had represented it, there had seemed to
be something perplexing and suspicious connected with it.
“I blame myself very much, Salome, for leaving you behind when I was
called abroad to my father,” he said regretfully. “If I had only
listened to your pleadings and taken you with me, I could have saved you
all these wretched experiences. But I feared the voyage for you in the
dead of winter, for you were far from strong. I knew if you took cold
and were ill again it would go hard with you; so, though it nearly
unmanned me to refuse you and leave you, I believed it was the only
right thing for me to do.”
“I know you acted as you thought best, True, and I never thought of
blaming you,” Salome answered. “The only thing that I rebelled against
and questioned, was your apparently harsh judgment of me in sending me
from your home, as if you regretted having ever brought me there; but
now, knowing that you never received my letter, and understanding why
you sent me away, I can see that I misjudged you.”
“It is not strange at all,” Dr. Winthrop said, feeling that she had been
very lenient in her estimate of his apparent injustice. Then he added,
with some curiosity:
“How do you account, Salome, for the fact that Miss Rochester has been
masquerading under your name and position.”
“That is very easily explained,” the young wife answered. “They were
excessively alarmed after I ran away from them, for of course they
realized that upon me depended the hope of their ultimately coming into
the possession of the income of the fifty thousand dollars mentioned in
my father’s will. All this, you understand, I learned from them during
my illness at the chateau. They believed me to be dead—they had seen a
notice in a London paper, shortly after my disappearance, of the death
of a girl bearing my name and answering to my description, a friendless
girl, who had met with an accident, and been carried to the Home for the
Friendless—and Mrs. Rochester conceived the plan of representing Sarah
as the Rochester heiress, marrying her to the Hamilton heir, and thus
securing, a fine position and great wealth for her daughter, besides the
handsome income referred to in my father’s will for herself. Sarah was
very readily changed to Sadie, and to inquisitive people, who had known
that there were two Miss Rochesters, it was easy to say that she had
lost her own daughter, and her only companion was now her husband’s
child. We had been abroad for years, consequently had grown out of the
remembrance of our old acquaintances, and no one would be the wiser for
the deception. It was a very cunning plot and very cleverly developed,
as you know, while if they had failed in making you their victim, they
would still have had the fifty thousand dollars, provided I never made
my appearance to claim it. The first intimation they had that I was not
the girl who had died in London, was upon being told whom you had
married by Madame Winthrop, but they thought they were safe again upon
hearing that I had lost my life in that fire, and they believed that if
they could secure you they would never have anything to fear hereafter.
You can perhaps imagine their astonishment and dismay when, upon
removing my cap and spectacles, after I had fainted before their door,
in the chateau, they discovered who I was. Of course they recognized me
instantly, and when they found I was too ill to be removed, they planned
to conceal me in Sarah’s room until I should be well enough to be
secretly sent away. Even then, I did not know that you were the heir of
my father’s friend. Your mother and sister had represented to me that
you had been pledged to some one else at the time of our marriage, but
they did not tell me to whom, and I had no idea that you were in any way
concerned until Sarah Rochester herself told me, on the day that she
discovered my identity. It seemed as if the knowledge must kill me—as if
everything in my life had gone at cross purposes. I was already the wife
of the man whom my father had willed I should marry—the man whom I had
fled from because I feared he would be odious to me, but whom fate had
decreed that I should love with my whole soul. It seemed to me then as
if I had recklessly thrown my life and my happiness away, for if I had
remained quietly with Mrs. Rochester, you would ultimately have come to
us, we should have been mutually attracted, and there would have been
nothing to interfere with our future happiness. Of course, when they
told me this, I understood all their plot at once. I knew why Sarah’s
name had been changed to Sadie—why they were travelling with you, and
the end they hoped to attain. I could understand, too, what a marplot
they must regard me—that they must fear that I would betray their secret
and spoil all their plans. It would be a terrible thing for Mrs.
Rochester, after having carried her deception so far to be obliged to
confess that she had been palming off her own daughter as the child of
her husband, just to get his money and secure her a brilliant position
in life. When they discovered, however, that I had no intention of
revealing my identity to you, they recovered themselves somewhat, but I
did not dream that they were plotting to shut me up in that dreadful
place.”
“They are a couple of hardened criminals, and they shall be made to
suffer for their wrong-doing; I will not spare them,” Dr. Winthrop said
sternly.
“Ah! but they have been foiled in it—that will be a terrible punishment
to them; and—and we are happy, True; I cannot wish anybody any ill,”
Salome responded, as she laid her soft cheek against her husband’s with
a trustful, contented air, that touched him deeply.
“That is true; but such people deserve to be dealt with to the extent of
the law. When I think how they have tried to divorce us, and almost
tricked me into this hated marriage, I feel as if nothing could be too
bad for them,” he replied with a frown.
“I do not mind anything now, that I know you love me,” Salome said, with
gleaming eyes. “The cruellest pang I suffered was when I believed you
loved her—Sarah. O True, I was desperate enough then to do anything; you
must know I was, or I never could have signed that letter to the New
York lawyer.”
“The more I think of it, the more amazed I grow at the daring of those
scheming women. I am almost tempted to believe that Sarah Rochester
would have married me, even if she had failed to secure the decree, to
gain her point,” Dr. Winthrop said, with a shrug of repulsion. “I begin
to believe that people will do anything to attain wealth; truly, ‘the
love of money is the root of all evil.’ But their consigning you to Dr.
Arnot’s mad-house was the worst of all, and I swear that Mrs. Rochester
shall be made to answer for that horrible crime. Oh, my darling, what if
I had never gone there!”
Salome shuddered and clung to him. She could hardly persuade herself,
even now, that the blessed present was not, after all, a mere dream or
vision, and that she should not awake by and by, to find herself back in
that wretched place, and surrounded by the hapless beings who had been
her companions for so long.
“Do not let us talk of it any more, True; I do not want to think of
anything now, but that I am safe, and belong wholly to you once more,”
she sighed, a thrill of deep joy running through all her tones.
Dr. Winthrop’s heart bounded within him at her words, for they had told
him how entirely she belonged to him.
“My wife! my wife!” he murmured fondly.
Salome lifted her arms, and twined them about his neck, drawing his face
down to hers until their lips met.
It was the first time she had ever given such free expression to her
affection for him, and it told him that her last doubt of his love—her
last fear that he had married her from a sense of gratitude or duty had
vanished forever, and that henceforth only the most perfect trust would
exist between them.
Just at that moment there came a tap upon the door.
Harriet was very discreet, and had taken this way to warn the supposed
lovers of her approach.
Salome released herself from her husband’s embrace and bade her come in;
but the lovely flush upon her cheeks, the light of the perfect happiness
that beamed from her eyes told their own story even before she said:
“Harriet, my good friend, it is but right that I should confide in you
now. Dr. Winthrop is my husband. We were married nearly two years ago.”
The woman looked amazed for a moment, then recovering herself,
responded, with a wise smile:
“I knew he was something to you, Miss Salome, the moment I saw you
together; but I’m bound to confess I’d no idea that you got along quite
so far. I’m sure I wish you both a great deal of joy. But—dinner’s
ready,” she concluded practically, “and you’d both better come and have
something to eat.”
Dr. Winthrop laughed heartily at this sudden descent from sentiment to
the realities of life; but drawing Salome’s arm through his, they
followed the woman to another room, where they found a tempting repast
awaiting them.
Harriet refused to join them at the table, resolutely insisting that she
should feel more at home if she served them.
After the meal was over Dr. Winthrop led Salome again into the cozy
parlor, and then said:
“Now, love, I am going at once to send my cable message, and I shall not
return again until I receive a reply. It may take a good many hours, but
I shall make as quick and as thorough a business as possible of it, you
may be very sure. But meantime,” he added, looking a trifle envious,
“shall you feel quite safe to be left here over night?—shall you not
feel lonely?”
“Oh, no; Harriet and I have been here many a night by ourselves, and
besides there is a passage by which we can gain an entrance to the
convent—we have only to pull a bell, and some one will come to us at
once,” Salome replied confidently.
“Then I shall feel easy about you,” her husband said, his face clearing.
“But,” he added with a smile, as he touched her coarse, gray serge
dress, “when I come back to join you to-morrow I shall want to find my
wife in some more fitting garb than this.”
“I have no longer any need of a disguise, and I shall be very glad to
don some more becoming apparel,” Salome said, smiling, as she lifted her
lips for his parting caress.
Even then she let him go with reluctance. She followed him to the door,
and let him out with her own hands, while she told him with a shy smile
and blush, that the time would seem long until he returned.
Then she went back to Harriet, who could no longer restrain the delight
which the beautiful, happy face afforded her, and who caught her in her
strong arms and gave her a vigorous hug.
“Bless your dear heart, Miss Salome!” she cried; “it does my old soul
good to see that light on your face, and to know that you are happier
than any queen on her throne. Now I am just dying to know the whole
story. Sit down, and tell me all about it, while I eat my dinner.”
Salome obeyed, and sitting opposite the faithful creature, gave her a
brief history of all that we already know.
“I knew those women were a couple of dev—fallen angels,” Harriet dryly
remarked, when Salome told her how Mrs. Rochester had plotted to get her
into the asylum. “It didn’t take me long to find that out when I went to
nurse them through the cholera, for all they were so sweet when Dr.
Winthrop was around. And to think that you were his wife and he never
suspected it all the time you were taking care of him! No wonder you
grew white and thin, with all the care, and with all you’ve suffered
since. Bless my heart! but I don’t envy his mother and sister when they
find out who was so good to them, when they were near dying with the
plague. I hope they’ll never get over the shame of it—never!”
“And I hope, Harriet, that it will prove to be the one thing that will
break down their pride and make them love me,” Salome responded, with
grave sweetness.