THE LETTER.
Phil’s last letter had been addressed to his mother from Rome, and in it
he had written that he was to start for India the next day with a young
man whose acquaintance he had made on the voyage from New York to Havre,
and who had persuaded him to go for a week or two to Madras, where his
father was living. Since that time nothing had been heard from Phil,
until the young man whose name was William Mather, wrote from Madras, as
follows:
“MR. AND MRS. ROSSITER:—_Respected Friends_: I do not think I am an
entire stranger to you, for I am very sure your son Philip wrote of me
to you in some of his letters. We were together in the same ship,
occupied the same state-room, and, as we were of the same age, and had
many tastes and ideas in common, we soon became fast friends. I have
never met a person whom I liked so much upon a short acquaintance as I
did Philip Rossiter. He was so genial, so kind, so unselfish, and let
me say, with no detriment to him as a man, so like a gentle, tender
woman in his manner toward every one, that not to like him was
impossible.
“My parents are American by birth, but I was born in Madras, where my
father has lived for many years. Seeing in your son a true artist’s
love and appreciation for everything beautiful, both in nature and
art, I was anxious for him to see my home, which I may say is one of
the most beautiful places in Madras. So I begged him to accompany me
thither before going on to Calcutta, and he at last consented. I was
the more anxious for this as he did not seem quite well; indeed, he
was far from being well, although his disease, if he had any, was more
mental than physical. Frequently during the voyage he would go away by
himself and sit for hours looking out upon the sea, with a look of
deep sadness on his face, as if brooding over some hidden grief, and
once in his sleep, when he was more than usually restless, he spoke
the name _Queenie_—whom he said he had lost, but in his waking hours
he never mentioned her. I think, however, that he wrote to her from my
father’s house at the same time he wrote to you. Probably you have
received his letter ere this. He was delighted with my home, and
during the few days he was with us improved both in health and
spirits. He was very fond of the water, and as I have a pretty
sailing-boat and a trusty man to manage it, we spent many hours upon
the bay, going out one morning fifteen or twenty miles along the coast
to a spot where my father has some gardens and a villa. Here we spent
the day, and it was after sunset when we started to return, full of
anticipated pleasure in the long sail upon the waters, which at first
were so calm and quiet. Gradually, however, there came a change, and a
dark cloud which, when we started, we had observed in the west, but
thought nothing of, increased in size and blackness and spread itself
over the whole heavens, while fearful gusts of wind, which seemed to
blow from every quarter, tossed and rocked our boat as if it had been
a feather. I think now that Jack, our man, must have drank a little
too much at the villa, for he seemed very nervous and uncertain, and
as the storm of wind increased, and in spite of all our efforts
carried us out to sea instead of toward the coast, which we tried to
gain, he lost his self-possession entirely and when there came a gust
stronger than any previous one, he gave a loud cry and a sudden
spring, and then we were struggling in the angry water with the boat
bottom side up beside us.
“I seized your son’s arm, and with my other hand managed to get a hold
upon the boat, which Mr. Rossiter and Jack also grasped, and there in
the darkness of that awful night we clung for hours, constantly
drifting farther and farther away from the shore, for the gale was
blowing from the land, and we had no power to stem it. Far in the
distance we saw the lights of vessels struggling with the tempest, but
we had no means of attracting the attention of the crew, and our
condition seemed hopeless, unless we could hold on until morning, when
we might be discovered and picked up. For myself, I felt that I could
endure it, but I feared for my friend. He was breathing very heavily,
and I knew his strength was failing him, besides his position was not
so easy as mine, as he had a smoother surface to cling to.”
“‘If you can get nearer to me,’ I said, ‘I can support you with one
hand. Suppose you try it.’
“He made a desperate effort to reach me, while I held my hand toward
him, and then—oh, how can I tell you the rest—there came a great wave
and washed him away.
“I heard a wild cry above the storm, and by the lightning’s gleam I
caught one glimpse of his white face as it went down forever. Of what
followed, I am scarcely conscious, and wonder how I was enabled to
keep my hold with Jack upon the boat until the storm subsided, and the
early dawn broke over the still angry waves, when we were rescued from
our perilous situation by a small craft going on to Madras. I cannot
express to you my grief, or tell to you my great sorrow. May God pity
you and help you to bear your loss. If there is a _Queenie_ in whom
your son was interested, and you know her, tell her I am certain that,
whether waking or sleeping, she was always in the mind of my dear
friend, and that a thought of her was undoubtedly with him when he
sank to rise no more. Indeed, I am sure of it, for his last cry which
I heard distinctly, was for her, and Queenie was the word he uttered
just before death froze the name upon his lips. You can tell her this,
or not, as you see fit.
“Again assuring you of my heartfelt sympathy,
“I am, yours, most respectfully,
“WILLIAM J. MATHER.”
And this was the letter the Rossiters had received and read, and wept
over—the mother going from one fainting fit into another, and refusing
to be comforted, because her son Philip was not. And then they sent it
to Queenie, who read it with such bitter anguish as few have ever known,
for in her heart she felt that with her cruel words and taunts she had
sent him to his death. She was his murderer, and she felt as if turning
into stone as she finished the letter and stood clutching it tightly,
with no power to move or even to cry out. It was like that dreadful
phase of nightmare when the senses are alive to what is passing around
one, but the strength to stir is gone. There was a choking sensation in
her throat, as if her heart had leaped suddenly into her mouth, and if
she could she would have torn the collar from her neck in order to
breathe more freely.
When Margery came in she rallied sufficiently to pass the letter to her,
and that broke the spell and set her free from the bands which had bound
her so firmly. At first no words of comfort came to Margery’s lips. She
could only put her arms around her friend, and, leading her to her room,
make her lie down, while she stood over her and rubbed her hands and
bathed her face, which though white as marble, was hot to the touch,
like faces burning with fever.
“You won’t go? You will not leave me?” she said to Margery, who replied:
“Of course I shall not leave you. You staid with me, and I must stay
with you.”
Later in the day Mr. Beresford, who had heard the dreadful news, came to
Hetherton Place, bringing the letter which poor Phil had written to
Queenie from Madras, and which, together with one for his mother, had
come in the same mail which brought the news of his death.
When Queenie heard he was below asking for her she started from her
pillow, where she had lain perfectly motionless for hours, and said to
Margery:
“Yes, I will see him. I must vent these horrible feelings on some one,
or I shall go crazy! Show him up at once.”
Years ago Margery had seen Queenie in what she called her “moods,” when
her evil spirit had the ascendant, and she fought and struck at anything
within her reach, but of late these fits had been of rare occurrence,
and so she was astonished, on her return to the room with Mr. Beresford,
to see the girl standing erect in the middle of the floor, her nostrils
dilated and her eyes blazing, as they flashed upon Mr. Beresford, whose
heart was full of sorrow for his loss, and who went toward her to offer
his sympathy. But Queenie repelled him with a fierce gesture of both
hands, striking into the air as if she would have struck him had he been
within her reach.
“Don’t speak to me, Arthur Beresford,” she cried, and there was
something awful in the tone of her voice. “Don’t come near me, or I may
do you harm. I am not myself to-day, I’m that _other_ one you have never
seen. I know what you are here for without your telling me. You have
come to talk to me of Phil, to say you are sorry for me, sorry he is
dead, but I will not hear it. You, of all men, shall not speak his name
to me, guilty as you are of his death. _I_ sent him away. _I_ murdered
him, but you were the first cause; you suggested to me the cruel words I
said to him, and which no man could hear and not go away. You talked of
_Sardanapalus_, and effeminacy, and weakness, and lack of occupation,
and every word was a sneer, because, coward that you were, you thought
to raise yourself by lowering him, and fool that I was, when he came to
me and told me of a love such as you are incapable of feeling, I spurned
him and cast your words into his teeth and made him loathe and despise
himself and made him go away, to seek the _occupation_, to build up the
_manhood_ you said he lacked; and now he is dead, drowned in those far
off eastern waters, my Phil, my love, my darling. I am not ashamed to
say it now. There is nothing unmaidenly in the confession that I love
him as few men have ever been loved, and I wish I had told him so that
night upon the rocks; I wish I had trampled down that scruple of
cousinship which looks to me now so small. But I did not, I broke his
heart, and saw it breaking, too; I knew it by the awful look upon his
face, not a look of disappointment only; he could have borne that; few
men, if any, die of love alone; but there was on his face a look of
unutterable shame and humiliation as if all the manliness of his nature
had been insulted by my taunts of his womanish habits and ways. Oh,
Phil, my love, my love; if he could know how my heart is aching for him
and will ache on forever until I find him again somewhere in the other
world! Don’t speak to me” she continued, as Mr. Beresford tried to say
something. “I tell you I am dangerous in these moods, and the sight of
you who are the first cause of my anguish, makes me beside myself. You
talked some nonsense once about waiting for my love. I told you then it
could not be. I tell it to you now a thousand times more strongly. I
would rather be Phil’s wife for one second than to be yours through all
eternity. Oh, Phil, my love, if I could die and join him; but life is
strong within me and I am young and must live on and on for years and
years with that death-cry always sounding in my ears as it sounded that
awful night when he went down beneath the waters with my name upon his
lips. Where was I that I did not hear it, and know that he was dying? If
I had heard it I believe I, too, should have died and joined him on his
journey through the shades of death. But there was no signal; I did not
hear him call, and laughed on as I shall never laugh again, for how can
I be happy with Phil dead in the sea?”
She was beginning to soften; the mood was passing off, and though her
face was pale as ashes, the glitter was gone from her eyes, which turned
at last toward Margery, who had looked on in utter astonishment.
“Oh, Margie, Margie, help me. I don’t know what I have been saying. I
think I must be crazy,” she said, as she stretched her arms towards
Margery, who went to her at once, and leading her to the couch made her
lie down while she soothed and quieted her until a faint color came back
to her face, and her heart-beats were not so rapid and loud.
Across the room by the window Mr. Beresford was still standing, with a
troubled look upon his face, and seeing him Queenie called him to her,
and putting her icy hand in his, said to him very gently:
“Forgive me if I have wounded you. I am not myself when these moods are
upon me. I don’t know what I said, for my heart is with Phil, and Phil
is in the sea. Now go away, please, and leave me alone with Margie.”
Mr. Beresford bowed, and pressing the hand he held, said, in a choking
voice:
“God bless you, Queenie, and comfort you, and forgive me if anything I
said was instrumental in sending Phil away. He was the dearest friend I
ever had, the one I liked the best and enjoyed the most, and I never
shall forget him or cease to mourn for him. Good-by, Queenie;
good-afternoon, Miss La Rue.”
He bowed himself from the room, and was soon riding slowly homeward,
with sad thoughts in his heart of the friend he had lost and who seemed
to be so near him that more than once he started and looked around as if
expecting to meet Phil’s pleasant face and hear his well-remembered
laugh. Mr. Beresford belonged to that class of men, who, without exactly
saying there is no God and no hereafter, still doubt it in their hearts,
and by trying to explain everything on scientific principles, throw a
vail over the religion they were taught to hold so sacred in their
childhood. But death had never touched him very closely, or borne away
that for which he mourned with a very keen or lasting sense of loss and
pain. His father had died when he was a boy, and though his mother lived
till he was a well-grown youth, she had not attached him very strongly
to her. He had been very proud of her as an elegant, fashionable woman
who sometimes came in her lovely party dress to look at him before going
out to some place of amusement, but he had never known what it was to be
petted and caressed, and when she died his sorrow was neither deep nor
lasting, and in his maturer manhood, when the seeds of skepticism were
taking root, he could think without a pang that possibly there was
beyond this life no place where loved ones meet again and friendships
are renewed; nothing but oblivion—a long, dreamless sleep.
But now that Phil was dead—Phil, who had been so much to him—Phil, whom
he loved far better than the cold, unsympathetic elder brother who had
died years ago, he felt a bitter sense of loss, and pain, and
loneliness, and as he rode slowly home in the gathering twilight of that
wintry afternoon, and thought of that bright young life and active mind
so suddenly blotted out of existence, if his theory was true, he
suddenly cried aloud:
“It cannot be; Phil is not gone from me forever. Somewhere we must meet
again. Death could only stupefy, not quench, all that vitality. There is
something beyond; there is a rallying point, a world where we shall meet
those whom we have loved and lost. And Phil is there, and some day I
shall find him. Thank God for that hope—thank God there is a hereafter.”