FAREWELL AT ONCE, FOR ONCE, FOR ALL AND EVER.
Richard II.; ii.--2.
The outward bound steamer was almost ready to sail, and all the bustle
attendant upon departure of an ocean craft eddied about three people
who stood in a half-sheltered nook upon the wharf. They were saying
little. Both Grant Herman and Ninitta kept their eyes fixed upon Helen,
while her glance was cast to the ground, save when she raised her head
in speaking.
The Italian from time to time took Helen's hand in hers and kissed it
fondly.
"I pray the Madonna for you every night," she whispered in her native
tongue, "that she will give you a safe voyage."
The sculptor watched all that went on about them, waiting with some
inward impatience for the moment when the duty of escorting Mrs.
Greyson on board would give him an opportunity of being a moment alone
with her.
"We shall miss you much," he said, feeling that any thing would be
better than the silence which hedged them in amid the noisy bustle of
the throng. "We shall not soon fill your place, shall we, Ninitta?"
He did not listen to the eager answer; his eyes were fixed upon Helen's
face, and for her alone he had ears.
"Yes," he said again with nervous platitude, when once more they had
lapsed into the silence he found it so hard to bear; "neither my wife
nor myself has any friend to take your place."
Some faint accent in the tone in which he referred to his three hours'
bride made the widow look up suddenly. To the question in her eyes his
glance gave no answer, and for the moment a feeling of despair overcame
her. Had she given him up only to the end that his life should be
miserable; had she forced him into a marriage whose bonds would gall
and chafe him with more deadly and festering wounds as time went on?
But all these questionings Helen had answered with stern bravery during
the sad wakeful nights and lonely days just past. She had first
convinced herself that it was right that Herman should redeem his
old-time pledge to Ninitta, and after that she forced herself to the
bitterer task of realizing that when time had obliterated somewhat the
clearness of her own image in the sculptor's heart, something of his
old affection for the Italian might be rekindled in his generous, warm
nature, always tenderly chivalrous towards woman, and sure to prove
doubly so to one dependent upon him. It was hard, but Helen
unflinchingly analyzed the nature of her lover, and while she could not
believe that he would ever feel for his wife the grand passion which
she had herself inspired in his breast, she saw for him a tranquil
future in which his wife's devotion would be met with enduring, even
with increasing affection, which if not love, would be so like it that
Ninitta, at least, would never distinguish; and in which her husband
would find comfort and warmth, if not fire and aspiration.
She had a harder struggle when the thought came to her, "Have I not led
him into the one thing he most dreads and despises, an act of
insincerity? Can a loveless marriage be honest?" But she answered her
doubting heart; "No; he has told Ninitta that he does not love her as
of old, and he is not deceiving her. It is my own selfishness that puts
this thought into my mind." It may be that Helen was wrong, for the
influence of her Puritan training had left a strong impress upon her
moral sense in a regard for the sanctity of a pledge, especially to its
spirit rather than its letter, so deep as to be almost morbid; yet at
least she was self sacrificing and never more truly consistent than in
the seeming inconsistency of urging this marriage.
"Come," was Herman's word, almost a command, when the crowd upon the
steamer's deck began definitely to separate into those who were to go
and those who remained. "You must go aboard. Ninitta, stand just where
you are until I come back. I will be gone only an instant."
Helen turned and kissed Ninitta, a sharp pang stabbing her very soul,
as the thought came to her: "He will love her; she is his wife, and he
will learn to love her!" Then she put her arm upon Herman's in silence.
She had been alternately desiring and fearing this moment, until her
excitement was almost beyond control. The sculptor led her on board the
steamer, and together they descended to the saloon. Every body was on
deck except the servants, and without difficulty a nook was found where
the two were alone.
"Well," he said, breaking the silence with a voice full of emotion, "it
is done, and we are parted as far as the earth is wide."
"No," she answered, clasping his hands in hers. "With a broken faith
between us we should have been separated; now we are truly together, no
matter how many oceans part us. It is hard; it is hard; but I know it
must be right."
He bent forward to kiss her.
"No," she said, drawing back. "Your kisses belong to your wife, now. I
have no right even to your thought. But I cannot help telling you, now
we are parting, how much it is to me to love you. It is hard to leave
you, Grant, to give you up; but now I understand that it is better to
love, even if we are not together, even though we may not belong to
each other. And I cannot but find comfort in thinking that you will not
forget me."
"But if hereafter," he began eagerly, but before the words were uttered
he realized what they implied, and a hot flush of shame tinged his
cheek. "No," he said, "I cannot think of the future."
She put up her hand with a gesture of appeal. The bell of the steamer
sounded out sharply upon the air.
"No," she said. "We must say good-by with no reservations, no hopes,
even with no prayers. It is simply and absolutely good-by. And oh!" she
added, her voice breaking a little, "I do so hope for your happiness,
though I must not share it."
He wrung her hand and left her. Once he halted, as if to return, but
her gesture gave him so absolute a farewell that he went on. His wife
awaited him where he had left her. She slipped her arm through his.
"I am so glad you have come back," she said in her soft Italian,
lifting to his a face full of trust and love; "I was so lonely and
afraid without you."
He was touched with a tender pity as he looked into her eyes. When he
withdrew his glance the steamer was moving, and he saw Helen leaning
over the rail. She waved her hand, and as the ship glided away, down
the harbor, these two, so separated, yet so united, clung together by
their glances until distance shut them from each other's sight.