THE TRUTH.
Another ring brought a servant to the front door, where a gentleman with
a package in his hand, stood waiting. The man reached out his hand for
the parcel, but in its place, received a card, with directions to carry
it at once to his mistress.
There was no question about Mrs. Lambert’s being at home; no seeming
doubt that she might refuse herself; all of which was strange; but the
servant did not think of that till long afterward, for obedience seemed
natural to that voice of quiet command.
“My lady will see you in her own room—walk this way,” said the man,
returning promptly, after delivering his message. He ushered the
stranger up stairs with great deference, and opened the door with a bow,
altogether forgetting the package which the man carried.
Mrs. Lambert was struggling to compose herself; but she had been greatly
excited, and every nerve in her frame quivered. She tried to speak, but
the effort only brought tears into her eyes.
Ross did not take the hand held out to him with such timid hesitation;
but laid his bundle on a chair, then turned a sternly agitated face upon
the trembling woman.
“Elizabeth, I have come to ask you a question.”
“I will answer it, Herman! There is nothing you can ask that I will not
reply to. But first,—do not misunderstand me; I ask it for—for the sake
of my step-son. Answer the one question that I asked you.—Is that girl,
I mean Eva Laurence, anything to you?”
“Anything to me—and you ask this? Yes, everything!”
“You love her, then?”
“Yes, better than my own soul.”
“But—but you cannot marry her. It would be——”
The woman’s lips turned deadly white, and what she might have said died
upon them.
“Marry her! Woman, I wonder the heart does not sicken in your bosom at
the thought.”
“It does! it does! Then you never thought of it. I had not wronged you
so deeply that you meditated that awful blow, that wicked, wicked
crime.”
“I never thought of it, Elizabeth!”
The woman clasped her hands, and a wild sob heaved her bosom.
“Still you loved her! Ah, me! it was only the impediment! If I were
dead, now!”
The woman held out her clasped hands, and her face was wet with a rain
of tears. For the first time, a look of almost yearning tenderness
filled the sad eyes bent upon her, and a touch of compassion quivered in
the man’s voice.
“Sit down, Elizabeth. I have a few questions to ask, and for once you
and I must have truth between us.”
Mrs. Lambert dropped to the sofa, near which she stood, and Ross drew
his chair in front of it. The curtains hung low, and the light fell
dimly around them, so dimly that they seemed like ghosts questioning
each other.
“Elizabeth, when we first met, and I found you Lambert’s widow, there
was too much of passion and reproach in our interview for a clear
understanding of events, which seem to me vague and unsatisfactory.
Quiet yourself, now; be calm, if that is possible, and let us thoroughly
understand each other.”
The woman made a strong effort, and hushed her sobs.
“When we married, I was a wild, passionate youth, penniless, almost
friendless; but I loved you, God only knows how dearly!”
“And, oh heavens! how I loved you!”
“Had I been older or wiser in this world’s wisdom, it would have been an
act of treachery when I won you to that private marriage; but I was an
enthusiast, possessed of some genius, and more wild hopes. Perhaps in
the arrogance of these untried feelings, I held your father’s wealth in
too much scorn. Certain it is, I never craved it, never wished for it.”
“I know that, Herman; yet it was this very wealth that drove us apart.”
“I asked you to go away, and share my fate——”
“I could not; remember how young I was. An only child, loving my father,
whose forgiveness you refused to ask—loving you better than my own life,
but afraid to follow the hopeless path you were resolved to tread. Why
did you leave me then? Was I angry—was I unreasonable in that struggle,
so hard upon a young girl, pampered, as I had been; did I say things
which were altogether beyond forgiveness?”
“If I left you in anger, bitter and keen as it was, my great love
conquered it, before I was half across the ocean,” said Ross. “But what
came after? My letters were unanswered.”
“I never received them. Some one, my father, I think, kept them back.
Oh, Herman! you will never know how I waited, how I longed for one
line!”
“Elizabeth, give me your hands. On your life, on your honor—as you hope
for salvation, did you never hear from me, never see a line of my
writing after I left you?”
“As God shall be merciful to me, I never did!”
The woman felt the two strong hands that clasped hers shake like reeds.
“And you thought me dead?”
“I did! I did!”
“Then, and not till then you married this other man?”
“Oh, Herman! It was only my hand and wealth that I gave him. When love
perished in my heart I had only ambition left.”
“Then all love for me had perished?”
“Herman! There never has been a time when the very memory of our love
has not been dearer to me than the adoration of any living man.”
The hands which Ross still clasped were tightened painfully. For half a
moment he was silent. When he did speak, it was almost in a whisper, and
his voice was hoarse.
“Elizabeth! What have you done with our child?”
Mrs. Lambert wrenched her hands from the passionate grip fastened on
them, and stood up in wild agony.
“Our child! Oh, Father of heaven! is there no mercy for me? Have I not
suffered enough?”
The woman had no strength to stand. As grass goes down beneath the
scythe, her limbs gave way, and her face fell forward on the cushions of
the sofa.
Ross bent over her.
“Elizabeth!”
“Leave me! You have torn the vulture from my heart—let it bleed to
death; for, in a little while, I, like my child, will be beyond human
reach! God knows all that I have done, and all I have suffered.”
Ross knelt down by the woman, and laid his hand on her shoulder. Her
suffering overpowered all sense of wrong in his bosom. The thing which
she had done seemed less hideous when her grief filled the room, as with
the wail of a mother bereft.
“Our child is not dead, Elizabeth! I come to tell you so!”
The woman lifted her face.
“Not dead!”
“Let that awful thought haunt you no longer. The child is alive. Not an
hour ago I held her in my arms. God spared her life, and you, wretched
woman, a great crime.”
The woman shuddered.
“God help me! God forgive me! I was sorely tempted.”