One Sunday afternoon he got off at the little station. From one of the
rustic loungers on the platform he learned that old Ezra and Martha had
gone the year before to live with a son in a distant State, and that
their scant acres had been absorbed in the convent domain.
Slowly he took his way across the sombre fields. Once more he reached
the brown foot-path and the edge of the pale, thin corn. Once more the
summoning whistle of the quail came sweet and clear from the depths
of a neighboring thicket. Silently in the reddening west were rising
the white cathedrals of the sky. It was on yonder hill-top he had
first seen her, standing as though transfigured in the evening light.
Overwhelmed by the memories which the place evoked, he passed on
towards the convent. The first sight of it in the distance smote him
with a pain so sharp that a groan escaped his lips as from a reopened
wound.
It was the hour of the vesper service. Entering the church he sat where
he had sat before. How still it was, how faint the autumnal sunlight
stealing in through the sainted windows, how motionless the dark
company of nuns seated on one side of the nave, how rigid the white
rows of novices on the other!
With sad fascination of search his eyes roved among the black-shrouded
devotees. She was not there. In the organ-loft above, a voice, poor and
thin, began to pour out its wavering little tide of song. She was not
there, then. Was her soul already gone home to Heaven?
Noiselessly from behind the altar the sacristine had come forth and
begun to light the candles. With eyes strained and the heart gone out
of him he hung upon the movements of her figure. A slight, youthful
figure it was--slighter, as though worn and wasted; and the hands which
so firmly bore the long taper looked too white and fragile to have
upheld aught heavier than the stalk of a lily.
With infinite meekness and reverence she moved hither and thither about
the shrine, as though each footfall were a step nearer the glorious
Presence, each breath a prayer. One by one there sprang into being,
beneath her touch of love, the silvery spires of sacred flame. No angel
of the night ever more softly lit the stars of heaven. And it was thus
that he saw her for the last time--folded back to the bosom of that
faith from which it was left him to believe that he had all but rescued
her to love and happiness, and set, as a chastening admonition, to tend
the mortal fires on the altar of eternal service.
Looking at her across the vast estranging gulf of destiny,
heart-broken, he asked himself in his poor yearning way whether she
longer had any thought of him or longer loved him. For answer he had
only the assurance given in her words, which now rose as a benediction
in his memory:
"If He will deign to hear the ceaseless, fervent petition of one so
erring, He will not leave you unhappy on account of that love for me
which in this world it will never be allowed me to return."
One highest star of adoration she kindled last, and then turned and
advanced down the aisle. He was sitting close to it, and as she came
towards him, with irresistible impulse he bent forward to meet
her, his lips parted as though to speak, his eyes implored her for
recognition, his hands were instinctively moved to attract her notice.
But she passed him with unuplifted eyes. The hem of her dress swept
across his foot. In that intense moment, which compressed within itself
the joy of another meeting and the despair of an eternal farewell--in
that moment he may have tried to read through her face and beyond
it in her very soul the story of what she must have suffered. To
any one else, on her face rested only that beauty, transcending all
description, which is born of the sorrow of earth and the peace of God.
Mournful as was this last sight of her, and touched with remorse, he
could yet bear it away in his heart for long remembrance not untempered
by consolation. He saw her well; he saw her faithful; he saw her
bearing the sorrows of her lot with angelic sweetness. Through years to
come the beauty of this scene might abide with him, lifted above the
realm of mortal changes by the serenitude of her immovable devotion.