Like a sheer mechanical thing, actuated by some external force, he went
down the steps and on to the lawn. Standing near the front gate, he saw
Rowland coming down the road, and stepped aside to avoid meeting him. He
was in no mood for mere passing platitudes such as the old man often
dealt with. Charles crept around the house on the dewy grass, and found
himself in the vicinity of the barn. Suddenly, despite his own
depression, he felt a surge of pity pass over him at the thought of the
plight of the two boys. They were her brothers, and on that account he
loved them. He wondered if they were asleep already. Presently, while he
stood looking at the dark, sloping roof of the barn, he saw a figure
steal out from the kitchen door and move across the sward toward the
barn. It was Mary. She passed close to him, but made no sign of having
seen him. Again his fears of having offended her womanhood besieged him.
She had said that she understood him, but she could not know how vast
and grave his obligations were. Was there any way by which he could make
them known and still be true to his vow? He could see none, and to
suffer under her displeasure might only be another burden to bear. He
walked back to the front of the house. He saw Rowland ascending the
stairs with a candle in his hand on his way to his room. Twenty minutes
passed and then he saw Mary returning. How it was that he had the
boldness to advance toward her he could not have explained, for, despite
her open admissions in regard to himself, he still felt that he was only
what he appeared to the outer world to be--a hired man of no social
standing.
"I was hoping that I'd see you again to-night," she began, in an even
tone. "I've just been to see my poor boys. Martin has a cold and I am
giving him some medicine for it. I wanted to make a confession to you
before I went to sleep to-night. I took the liberty of telling them
something which you may not want them to know."
"About you and Frazier?" he ventured.
"No, no!" she answered, with a near approach to the sweet tone which she
had used on the veranda. "Have you held that thought all by yourself
here on the lawn? Was it that which made you stand like a post as I
passed just now? No, I did not mention his name. They don't like him.
They don't want me to--to--I sha'n't use the word. I think that is why
you are so gloomy to-night--I mean because I said I was still at his
mercy. This is what I told the boys. I could not help it. I could not
keep it back. They won't tell, anyway. They promised, and do you know
they would not displease you for anything; they admire you intensely. I
told them who it was that sent Tobe Keith that money. I was partly
guessing, but I told them that you sent it, too, by the friend who came
here to see you and caused them such a fright."
Charles could find no words with which to answer; he heard her laugh
softly as she stepped close to him and put her hand to his lapel and
held it as she might have done were she pinning a flower upon it.
"Your good deeds tie your tongue," she said, "but you can't lie. You
would lie out of this if you could. You tried to hide that act of
goodness by what really was a sly trick, but I saw through it. I saw
through it because I wanted it to be that way."
He caught her hand and held it, telling himself that it was a brief
offense surely when he had made up his mind to give her up forever. But,
oh, how it throbbed and pleaded in his clasp! Each little finger seemed
to have a soul of its own. He dared not look into her eyes. Their
drooping lashes seemed breakable bars between him and a life of eternal
bliss.
"Are you angry because I told them?" she asked.
"Not if it pleased you," he said, passionately. "That is all I live
for--to please you."
"Do you mean it? Do you mean it, Charlie?" and she pressed his
fingers--his calloused fingers--in her soft ones. She raised her face to
his. "Oh, I know you do, but I am dying to hear you say so."
He nodded. He took a deep, quivering breath and slowly exhaled it; she
felt him trembling; his face was grim and pale.
"I have no right," he said, "to talk to you this way--to allow you
to--to talk to me in a way that would be impossible if you knew my whole
history." He was speaking now as a man might just before the black cap
was placed over his face. "I ought not to have come here to your
father's house without--without telling him and you the full truth. I am
a fugitive from the law. I can say that much without breaking my word to
others. At any moment I may be caught and imprisoned. In that case your
family would be mentioned as harboring me, and I had no right to let you
unsuspectingly run that risk."
"You--you a fugitive from the law?" Mary cried. "You!"
He released her hand and mutely nodded. He kept his eyes now on the
ground.
With a motion as swift as the flight of a hummingbird she caught his
hand. She held it against her breast and forced his eyes to rise to
hers. "I won't believe it! I won't! I won't! I won't! God will not let
that be true, Charlie. You've come into my tormented life like a sweet
dream of everything that is good and noble. You can't make me believe
it. You have reasons for deceiving me. What they are I don't know, but
what you say is not true. It would kill me to believe it. When Albert
Frazier mentioned it I knew that it was too absurd to think about."
"Well, he was wrong about _that_," said Charles, seeing her drift.
"There were certain men in the circus who left about the time I did, and
there were warrants out for their arrest. I was not one of them. I left
for fear that certain questions regarding my identity might be put to me
that I could not answer, and for the additional reason that I was sick
of the life I was leading. The--the offense with which I am charged
dates further back. I did not think that I'd ever have to tell you these
things, but I find that I must. I am not a safe man for you to
know--certainly not a man worthy of--of the things you have said
to-night. This living here and helping you a little has been like heaven
to me, but it can't go on. I am a misfit in life. I am an outcast for
all time. You may be holding a sort of ideal of me--women in their deep
purity will do those things sometimes--but I must undeceive you. You
must see me as I really am. I was a drunkard, a gambler--disgraced in
the town I lived in, expelled from the clubs I belonged to, found guilty
in court; I came away to hide myself from the eyes of all who knew me.
The new life has changed me to some extent. I see things differently. I
think I have a keener moral sense. Adversity seems to have awakened it
in me, but Fate is punishing me severely, for the consequences of my
past, it will always--always stand between me and the things I now
want."
Mary still clung to his hand. Through his desperate recital she had
looked steadfastly into his eyes. "I don't care what you have been," she
said, under her breath. "It is what you are now that counts with me. The
greatest men and the best in history have made mistakes when they were
young. It is for you to judge whether--whether we can ever be anything
more to each other than we are now. I don't think it amounts to much
which it is, if only we love each other. That is the main thing. I don't
know how you feel, but I can never love any other man--never!"
He lowered his head, but she saw that his eyes were ablaze.
"I think"--he was speaking now very earnestly, very despondently--"that
I shall leave you as soon as my summer's work is over--that is, if you
are out of your trouble by then. I could not go while you are so
unhappy. I couldn't stand that."
"Oh, you mustn't go!" she sobbed, pressing the back of his hand to her
wet eyes. "Why need you go?"
"Because the longer I stay the worse it will be for both of us, and I am
afraid that my presence here will be discovered. I am using my own name.
I never threw it off. I must not be taken here. There are a thousand
reasons why I should avoid a chance of that. You are the main one."
"Yes, that would kill me," she asserted. Almost unconsciously she kissed
his hand, she fondled it as a mother might that of a dying child. "I
couldn't live after that." Suddenly, and after a pause, she fixed her
eyes on his face again. "I want you to do something for me," she
faltered.
"What is it?" he asked.
"I don't want you to tell father or my brothers what you have told me
to-night."
"Why?" he wondered.
"Because they would misunderstand it all. They don't know you as I do,
and I could not bear to have them misjudge you. You may have broken the
law, but you said you were once in the habit of drinking too much. I am
sure that if you did wrong you really were not conscious of what you
were doing. No man with your nobility of character could do wrong
knowingly. It is not in you and never was. Don't tell my father and
brothers. Will you?"
"If you don't want me to do so, I shall not," he promised. "I only
wished you to understand my situation and be on your guard. It may be
that a man's adoration of a woman may stir her sympathy and even cause
her to imagine that she reciprocates his feeling, and you must have
known how I felt about--"
"Yes," she interrupted, "I know. That night in the cabin--oh, that
night! I've kissed its memory a thousand times. That night I saw love
born in your eyes and I knew that for you no other girl existed. Is it
any wonder that I loved you when I saw how humbly and unselfishly you
were striving to save me from pain? Imagine that I reciprocate, indeed!
There is no imagination about my feeling for you, Charlie. This morning,
when I discovered who it was that had sent that money to Tobe Keith, and
knew that you were trying to keep me from discovering that you did it, I
was so happy that I could not speak. In my mind I saw you stealing out
of the house at night, meeting your friend at the hotel, and his
slipping up to that cottage door while you remained hidden from view. Is
it any wonder that I gloated in triumph over the fact that it was you
who did the act of mercy rather than Albert Frazier? Is it any wonder
that when he kissed me--It was just on the cheek, my darling, just here
and it was as cold as ice. Kiss me, Charlie, kiss me--kiss me." Her face
was raised to his, her lips were poised expectantly.
A storm of doubt swept over him, and then he clasped her in his arms and
pressed his lips to hers.