For, in this moment fraught with such consequences to all concerned, she
averted her head at yet a greater angle. The implant of the osculation
was destined for her cheek. It reached her nose--the tip of her nose
only.
I do not plead this circumstance in partial extenuation. The intent had
been plain, the deed was consummated. I had practically kissed her.
She leaped to her feet, as I to mine. Her eyes, alight with an
inscrutable expression, looked into mine; her cheeks became diffused
with the crimsoned glow of righteous indignation; her form was
convulsed; she quivered from head to feet. For a moment this scene
endured. Then ere my lips, but lately contracted for the chaste but
unbidden salute, could frame the first stammered syllable of an
apology, she buried her ensanguined face in her hands, and hysteria
assailed her--a hysteria so acute and so violent that not tears but an
outburst resembling laughter--laughter wild, startling and most
distressing to hear--came from her. She turned and dashed from the room.
My heart paused in its quick beating. In one mad moment of indiscretion
I had destroyed her confidence in me, had brought down in crashing ruins
my hopes, my dreams, my new-found joy.
I felt that I must go hence--that I must quit that domicile forever, and
the sooner the better. With my brain in a whirl, I looked about me for
my hat and my umbrella.
A loud and a compelling voice spoke behind me. I faced about. In the
doorway through which she had just fled stood a fearsome apparition. It
was her uncle, that man so given to carnage among the beasts and birds
of the field, that unerring, that unfailing marksman. He was in his
shirt sleeves, his arms bared to his elbows. Upon his face was a fixed
grin of demoniac determination--the look of one who smiles even as he
slays his prey. And in his hands--ah, dreadful final detail of this
dreadful picture--he held outstretched, extended and presented in my
general direction, a double-barrelled fowling piece, enormous in size
and glittering with metal ornamentation.
"Young man," he cried out, "have one look at this!"
In times of the most extreme peril the thoughts clarify with
inconceivable rapidity. In a flash I comprehended all. She had told him
of the insult to her maidenly modesty, and for it he meant to have my
heart's blood. I was about to become an extinct and bleeding corse. But
before he could raise the hideous instrument of death to his shoulder an
expedient occurred to me. I would save myself from slaughter and
coincidentally save him from the crime of dyeing his hands with the gore
of a fellow being. A low window at the west side of the room,
immediately adjacent to the couch whereon I had been seated,
providentially stood open. I would leap from it and flee. Without a
moment's hesitation I did so.
In such emergencies one does not choose with care one's means of exit.
One departs by the egress most convenient to one. As I plunged through
the opening I remembered that a considerable distance intervened between
the window I had chosen and the sward below. Even as I bounded forth
into space I thought of this. But when one is in mid-air one does not
turn back; a law of physics involving the relation of solid bodies to
the attraction of gravitation prevents. Nor did I indeed desire to turn
back. My one desire was to go. I dropped and dropped, as though for
miles. I struck with terrific force upon a grass-covered but hard and
unyielding surface. A pang of agony, poignant in its intensity, darted
in an upward direction through my lower right limb and I dropped
prostrate upon the earth.
But now in the window above stood my would-be destroyer, a wild gleam in
his wide open eyes and that awful lethal object still in his grasp. His
eyes roved this way and that into the darkness without, seeking to find
the victim. The light from behind shone full upon him. Thwarted for the
moment tho' he had been, his purpose was all too plainly revealed.
Heedless of the pain, I leaped to my feet and darted away into the
sheltering night. Somehow, I know not how, I scaled the fence. There was
a gate, but what time had I to seek out gates? I staggered adown the
street. I reached the corner below and there I fell, unable to proceed
another rod be the consequences what they might. Merciful
unconsciousness succeeded. I knew no more.
When after a lapse I recovered my senses familiar objects surrounded me,
and faces well known to me yet for the time wearing a strange aspect,
bent over me. I remember my first words.
"Where am I?" I uttered feebly, and would have started up had not those
close at hand restrained me with gentle force.
I was in my own room. While my swoon continued Samaritans had borne me
hither. Gentle hands soothed my brow; a physician was preparing
wrappings for the injured limb, my right ankle being in a severely
sprained state. I learned that I had been discovered lying mute and
insensible upon the public highway. My lineaments had been recognised;
assistance had been summoned; I had been removed to my quarters; friends
now ministered to me. One and all, they assumed that, walking in the
darkness, I had encountered some obstacle and, being thus injured, had
fallen unconscious. Weak as I was and incoherent though my thoughts, I
did not undeceive them. Nor have I yet done so.
I sought to know more, but the physician bade me be silent. His task
completed, he administered a sleeping draught and anon I sank into deep
slumber.
That was the night of the day before yesterday. Upon yesterday and again
this morning I made fervent inquiry of my nurse as to whether any person
other than those connected with Fernbridge had called. Each time I was
told that Mr. Hector Hamm had come to enquire regarding my condition and
to express a desire to have private conversation with me at the very
earliest moment when I might receive visitors. Therefore, it is plain
that he has been here at least twice, but each time--oh, fortunate
circumstance--has been turned away from the door. 'Tis I and I alone who
know his implacable object. His lust for vengeance is not assuaged. He
will accept no defence, will pause not to hearken to my prayers for
mercy. Even now he may be lurking without seeking opportunity to destroy
me utterly.
Infirmity chains me to my couch, but when the injured limb may bear my
weight I shall flee, even as the hind before the huntsman. Should I
escape I shall, in different surroundings far, far from here, take up
anew the shattered threads of my existence, a broken-hearted wretch,
seeking by good deeds done under an assumed name to atone for this, the
one blot upon the fair escutcheon of my life. Should I fall before his
fatal aim this confession, written during the temporary absence of my
nurse from the chamber of invalidism, will be found among my
belongings.
Even though as I pen this, perchance my last declaration, I am strangely
torn between two all-consuming wishes. I desire above all things to be
gone ere it is too late. And yet above all things, I desire to look
again upon the face of my adored one. But alas, that may not be! 'Twould
be folly multiplied upon folly to dare attempt it. I cannot think upon
her. I must think upon her uncle.
Hildegarde, farewell, a long, a last, a fond farewell! I have sorely
sinned, but 'twas for love of you! Adieu, adieu, all that I hold dear.
* * * * *
THREE HOURS LATER.--Oh, Little Diary! O Great Joy!
In a transport of delight I add this postscript. She has been
here--Hildegarde--my Hildegarde. All is explained, all is atoned for.
But an hour agone she came. She burst in upon me. Heedless of the
presence of others, she threw herself upon my breast. I found her arms
entwined about me, my arms entwined about her. With her head hidden
upon my bosom, in sweet confusion, and with tears of thanksgiving
coursing adown her cheek, she made it clear to my understanding--oh, so
sweetly clear--that I, most woefully, had been misled. As yet my
delighted intellect can scarce grasp the purport of her disclosures, but
from the rest these salient, these soothing, these beautiful facts stand
out:
I was deceived. The kiss I would have impressed upon her countenance was
not to her displeasing. Rather it was the circumstance of its being
misdirected which caused her to be overcome, not with the hysteria of
indignation but with mirth. Why mirth at such a moment, I know not. But
are not the ways of a maiden past finding out?
Hurrying from my presence to stifle her laughter, she entered the
adjoining room, to come upon her uncle engaged in the, to him, congenial
occupation of oiling a newly purchased firearm of augmented calibre. A
waggish inspiration leaped into her mind. It would appear by her own
admissions that she has oft been given to the practice of practical
joking; but because of the glorious consequences I find it in my heart
to forgive her.
"Uncle," she said, "Doctor Fibble wants to see your new gun!"
With no murderous desires in his heart and actuated only by
gratification and friendliness, he entered. Yet under the circumstances,
how natural, how inevitable, that I should misread his expression and
his gesture, misinterpret his motives. I saw the window near by,
offering a possible avenue of escape. I leaped. You, diary, and you
alone, know what has ensued from that moment until now.
But there is more to tell. She believed my limb was shattered--in fact,
broken. She blamed me not at all; it was herself she blamed. Until she
could bear the separation no longer, she remained away. Then
impetuously, remorsefully, lovingly she came. She loves me--she herself
has told me so--Hildegarde loves me. And stranger still, she has known
for weeks that I loved her, even though I myself remained in complete
ignorance of being in that enraptured state. How wonderful is woman's
intuition!
She has foresworn practical joking. We have exchanged vows. We have
plighted our troth. She is mine and I am hers. She has gone from me to
win her uncle's consent and to invoke his blessing upon our banns. Soon
she will return to me.
In her absence I fondly dwell upon her words. "Dearest," she said, "you
need some one to take care of you. And I am going to take the job."
Sweet child! In her confusion she twisted her meaning. She meant of
course that she had need of me to care for her.
"And now," she said a moment later, "and now I'm going to teach you how
to kiss a girl."
Under this head I shall say naught, except that she has taught me. There
are things too sacred, too beautiful to be described in detail in the
written word. Suffice it to say she has taught me!
And then she called me Fibbey. Oh, precious diminutive! Evermore I shall
be her Fibbey!
With one final statement I close this recital of the crowning chapter of
my life. Our union is to be consummated at an early date in this dear
spot.
O well-named town of Lover's Leap, New Jersey.
For I, too, have taken the lover's leap, not to death upon the cruel
rocks but to happiness everlasting.
Her Fibbey!
My Hildegarde!
* * * * *
Transcriber's Notes:
Obvious punctation errors repaired.
Varied spelling of Shakespeare-Shakspere was retained.
Page 47, "acoutrements" changed to "accoutrements" (and other
accoutrements)
Page 208, "primleigh" changed to "Primleigh" (Primleigh, our
mathematics)
Page 237, "Botanised" changed to "Botanized" to match rest of usage in
text (Botanized alone this)