"HE KNEW THAT I LOVED YOU."
It was almost dark when the buggy returned. As Jake drove up to the
gate he bent forward to look at something.
"Thar's a critter hitched to the fence," he remarked. "'Taint no
critter from round yere. I never seen it afore."
Mrs. Nance came out upon the porch to meet them. She was gently
excited by an announcement she had to make.
"Louisianny," she said, "thar's a man in the settin'-room. He's
a-waitin' to see ye. I asked him ef he hed anything to sell, an' he
sed no he hedn't nothin'. He's purty _gen_-teel an' stylish, but not
to say showy, an' he's polite sort o' manners."
"Has he been waiting long?" Louisiana asked.
"He's ben thar half a hour, an' I've hed the fire made up sence he
come."
Louisiana removed her hat and cloak and gave them to Mrs. Nance. She
did it rather slowly, and having done it, crossed the hall to the
sitting-room door, opened it and went in.
There was no light in the room but the light of the wood fire, but that
was very bright. It was so bright that she had not taken two steps
into the room before she saw clearly the face of the man who waited for
her.
It was Laurence Ferrol.
She stopped short and her hands fell at her sides. Her heart beat so
fast that she could not speak.
His heart beat fast, too, and it beat faster still when he noted her
black dress and saw how pale and slight she looked in it. He advanced
towards her and taking her hand in both his, led her to a chair.
"I have startled you too much," he said. "Don't make me feel that I
was wrong to come. Don't be angry with me."
She let him seat her in the chair and then he stood before her and
waited for her to speak.
"It was rather--sudden," she said, "but I am not--angry."
There was a silence of a few seconds, because he was so moved by the
new look her face wore that he could not easily command his voice and
words.
"Have you been ill?" he asked gently, at last.
He saw that she made an effort to control herself and answer him
quietly, but before she spoke she gave up even the effort. She did not
try to conceal or wipe away the great tears that fell down her cheeks
as she looked up at him.
"No, I have not been ill," she said. "My father is dead."
And as she uttered the last words her voice sank almost into a whisper.
Just for a breath's space they looked at each other and then she turned
in her chair, laid her arm on the top of it and her face on her arm,
with a simple helpless movement.
"He has been dead three months," she whispered, weeping.
His own eyes were dim as he watched her. He had not heard of this
before. He walked to the other end of the room and back again twice.
When he neared her the last time he stopped.
"Must I go away?" he asked unsteadily. "I feel as if I had no right
here."
But she did not tell him whether he must go or stay.
"If I stay I must tell you why I came and why I could not remain away,"
he said.
She still drooped against her chair and did not speak, and he drew
still nearer to her.
"It does not seem the right time," he said, "but I must tell you even
if I go away at once afterwards. I have never been happy an hour since
we parted that wretched day. I have never ceased to think of what I
had begun to hope for. I felt that it was useless to ask for it
then--I feel as if it was useless now, but I must ask for it. Oh!"
desperately, "how miserably I am saying it all! How weak it sounds!"
In an instant he was kneeling on one knee at her side and had caught
her hand and held it between both his own.
"I'll say the simplest thing," he said. "I love you. Everything is
against me, but I love you and I am sure I shall never love another
woman."
He clasped her hand close and she did not draw it away.
"Won't you say a word to me?" he asked. "If you only tell me that this
is the wrong time and that I must go away now, it will be better than
some things you might say."
She raised her face and let him see it.
"No," she said, "it is not that it is the wrong time. It is a better
time than any other, because I am so lonely and my trouble has made my
heart softer than it was when I blamed you so. It is not that it is
the wrong time, but--
"Wait a minute," he broke in. "Don't--don't do me an injustice!"
He could not have said anything else so likely to reach her heart. She
remembered the last faltering words she had heard as she bent over the
pillow when the sun was shining on the golden tree with the wind waving
its branches.
"Don't do no one a onjestice, honey--don't ye--do no one--a onjestice."
"Oh," she cried out, "he told me that I must not--he told me, before he
died!"
"What!" said Ferrol. "He told you not to be unjust to _me_?"
"It was you he meant," she answered. "He knew I had been hard to
you--and he knew I----"
She cowered down a little and Ferrol folded her in his arms.
"Don't be hard to me again," he whispered. "I have been so unhappy--I
love you so tenderly. Did he know that you--speak to me, Louise."
She put her hand upon his shoulder.
"He knew that I loved you," she said, with a little sob.
She was a great favorite among her husband's friends in New York the
next year. One of her chief attractions for them was that she was a
"new type." They said that of her invariably when they delighted in
her and told each other how gentle she was and how simple and sweet.
The artists made "studies" of her, and adored her, and were
enthusiastic over her beauty; while among the literary ones it was
said, again and again, what a foundation she would be for a heroine of
the order of those who love and suffer for love's sake and grow more
adorable through their pain.
But these, of course, were only the delightful imaginings of art,
talked over among themselves, and Louisiana did not hear of them. She
was very happy and very busy. There was a gay joke current among them
that she was a most tremendous book-worm, and that her literary
knowledge was something for weak, ordinary mortals to quail before.
The story went, that by some magic process she committed to memory the
most appalling works half an hour after they were issued from the
press, and that, secretly, Laurence stood very much in awe of her and
was constantly afraid of exposing his ignorance in her presence. It
was certainly true that she read a great deal, and showed a wonderful
aptness and memory, and that Laurence's pride and delight in her were
the strongest and tenderest feelings of his heart.
Almost every summer they spent in North Carolina, filling their house
with those of their friends who would most enjoy the simple quiet of
the life they led. There were numberless pictures painted among them
at such times and numberless new "types" discovered.
"But you'd scarcely think," it was said sometimes, "that it is here
that Mrs. Laurence is on her native heath."
And though all the rest of the house was open, there was one room into
which no one but Laurence and Louisiana ever went--a little room, with
strange, ugly furniture in it, and bright-colored lithographs upon the
walls.
END.
[Transcriber's note: the source book for this text contained many
punctuation and spelling variants, e.g. wont/won't, dont/don't,
waal/wa'al/w'al, etc. All have been preserved as printed.]