UNDER THE ICE.
Agnes Barker rushed into the cold night so wrathfully that even the
shadow that followed her seemed vital with hate. On they walked
together--the girl and this weird shadow--blackening the snow with
momentary darkness as they passed; the one tossing out her arms with
unconscious gesticulation, the other mocking her, grotesquely, from the
crusted snow.
She descended from the eminence upon which the house stood, into the
hollow where Lina and Ralph had paused on the first day of their
confessed love. Over the spot made holy by the feelings of this
beautiful epoch, she trod her way in mad haste, reckless of the cold,
which, but for the fiery strife within, must have pierced her to the
vitals; Zillah had aroused her from sleep but half-robed--her dress had
been loosened as she lay down, and the sharp wind lifted particles of
snow with every gust, sweeping them into her bosom and over her
uncovered head. Neither shawl nor mantle shielded her, but thus all
exposed as she had risen from her sleep, she rushed on, mad as a wild
animal which save in form, for that fatal moment, she was.
The snow upon the hills, drifted its white carpet out upon the Hudson,
and even in the day time a practised eye only could tell where the shore
ended, and the water commenced. Agnes had no motive for crossing the
river, and, for a time, she kept along the bank, going nearer and nearer
to Ben Benson's boat-house, but perfectly regardless of that or anything
else.
As she came out from among the evergreens close by Ben's retreat, a
light, gleaming through its window, made her halt and swerve toward the
river. Any vestige of humanity was hateful to her then, and she was glad
to plunge into the cold winds which swept down the channel of the
stream, that, lacking all other opponents, she might wrestle with them.
Out she went upon the sheeted river. It was white some distance from the
shore, but in the centre lay a space of blue ice, with a surface like
polished steel, and a deep, swift current rushing beneath. This frozen
channel took an unnatural darkness from the gleam of snow on either
side. Toward this black line the girl made her way, trampling down the
snow like an enraged lioness, and laughing back a defiance to the winds
as they drifted cutting particles of snow into her face and through the
loose tresses of her hair.
It was in her face, this keen wind, beating against her, and closing the
eyes which rage had already rendered blind. She left the snow and struck
out upon the ice. That instant a cloud swept over the moon. Her shadow
forsook her then--even her shadow! A step, a hoarse plunge, and a
piercing cry rushed up from that break in the ice, a cry that cut
through the air sharper than an arrow, piercing far and wide through the
cold night! Then the moon came out, and revealed a ghastly face low down
in the blackness, and two hands grasping the ragged edges of the ice,
slipping away--clutching out again, and still again, so fiercely, that
drops of blood fell after them into the dark current beneath. Still the
white face struggled upward through masses of wet hair, and the baffled
hands groped about fiercer, but more aimlessly, till both were forced
away beneath the ice, sending back a shriek so sharp and terrible that
it might have aroused the dead!--no, not the dead, for up in that
stately mansion, frowning among the snows a little way off, a human soul
had just departed--nor paused to look back, though the existence, which
was its own great sin, followed close, till both stood face to face
before the God they had offended!
But, in the stillness of the night, and in the depths of his honest
sleep, Ben Benson heard the cry. He started from his bed, hurriedly
dressed himself, and went out in great alarm, listening, as he went, for
a renewal of that fierce cry; but, though he reached the ice, and bent
over the yawning hole, nothing but the wail of the winds, and the rush
of waters underneath, met his ear. Still, as he peered down into the
darkness, a human face weltered up through the waters. Instantly, Ben
threw himself upon the ice, plunged his arms downward, and rose
staggering to his feet. In the grasp of his strong hands, he drew a
human form half-way upon the ice. He had paused for breath, but horror
gave him double strength; and, gathering the pale form in his arms, he
laid it upon the ice, parting the long, dark hair reverently with his
hands, and leaving the marble face bare in the moonlight.
"Lord a mercy on us!" he exclaimed, stooping over the cold form. "It's
the young governess, dead as a stone! How on arth did she get here? Not
a purpose, I hope to mercy; it wasn't a purpose. Poor critter, if it
hadn't a been that the ice broke just here in the eddy, her poor body
would a been miles down stream 'fore now. Instead of that, she was
sucked under, and has been a whirling and a whirling the Lord of heaven
only knows how long--how long--Ben Benson, be you crazy? Wasn't it her
scream as woke you up? Ma' be there's a spark of life yet, and you a
talking over her here. Go home, you old heathen; go home at 'onst. Poor
young critter, I didn't like you over much, but now I'd give ten years
of my old life to be sarten there was a drop of warm blood in this
little heart!"
Ben knelt over the governess as he muttered those feeling words, and
laid his great kind hand over the heart, but the touch made even his
strong nerves recoil.
"It ain't a beatin'--it doesn't stir--she seems to be a freezing now
under my hand. But, I'll try. God have mercy on the poor thing! I'll
try."
Ben took the body in his arms, and carried it to the boat-house; but
with all his earnestness and strength, he had no power to give back
life, where it had been so rudely quenched. Pure or not, the blood in
those veins was frozen to ice, and though Ben heaped up wood on his
hearth till the flames roared up the wide-throated chimney, there was
not heat enough to thaw a single drop. At last, Ben gave up his own
exertions, and laid the dead girl reverently on his own couch; kneeling
meekly by her side, and then he began repeating the Lord's Prayer over
her again and again: for, when the boatman was in great trouble he
always went back, like a little child, to the prayer learned at his
mother's knee.