THE FIRST WIFE.
Softly and swiftly the hazy September days glided into dun October, who
shook down leafy showers of crimson and of gold upon the withered grass,
and then gave place to the dark November rains, which made the city seem
doubly desolate to Katy, who, like the ghost of her former self, moved
listlessly about her handsome home, starting quickly as a fancied baby
cry fell on her ear, and then weeping bitterly as she remembered the sad
past and thought of the still sadder present. Katy was very unhappy, and
the world, as she looked upon it, seemed utterly cheerless. For much of
this unhappiness Wilford was himself to blame. After the first few days,
during which he was all kindness and devotion, he did not try to comfort
her, but seemed irritated that she should mourn so deeply for the child
which, but for her indiscretion, might have been living still. Her
seclusion from gay society troubled him. He did not like staying at
home, and their evenings, when they were alone, passed in gloomy
silence. At last Mrs. Cameron, annoyed at what annoyed her son, brought
her influence to bear upon her daughter-in-law, trying to rouse her to
something like her olden interest in the world; but all to no effect,
and matters grew constantly worse, as Wilford thought Katy unreasonable
and selfish, while Katy tried hard not to think him harsh in his
judgment of her, and exacting in his requirements. "Perhaps she was
the one most in fault; it could not be pleasant for him to see her so
entirely changed from what she used to be," she thought, one morning
late in November, when her husband had just left her with an angry frown
upon his face and reproachful words upon his lips.
Father Cameron and his daughters were out of town, and Mrs. Cameron,
feeling lonely in their absence, had asked Wilford and Katy to dine with
her. But Katy did not wish to go, and so Wilford had left her in anger,
saying "she could suit herself, but he should go at all events."
Left alone, Katy began to feel that she had done wrong in declining the
invitation. Surely she could go there, and the echo of the bang with
which Wilford had closed the street door was still vibrating in her ear,
when her resolution began to give way, and while Wilford was riding
moodily downtown, thinking harsh things against her, she was meditating
what she thought might be an agreeable surprise. She would go around and
meet him at dinner, trying to appear as much like her old self as she
could, and so atone for anything which had hitherto been wrong in her
demeanor.
It was strange how much better Katy felt when this decision was reached,
and Esther, below stairs, raised her finger warningly for the cook to
listen as her mistress trilled a few notes of a song. It was the first
time since her return from Silverton that a sound like that had been
heard within the house, and it seemed the precursor of better days. At
lunch, too, Katy's face was very bright, and Esther was surprised when,
later in the day, she was sent for to arrange her mistress' hair, as she
had not arranged it since baby died. Greatly annoyed, Wilford had been
by the smooth bands combed so plainly back, and at the blackness of the
dress; but now there was a change, and graceful curls fell about the
face, giving it the girlish expression which Wilford liked. The
somberness of the dark dress was relieved by simple folds of white crape
at the throat and wrists, while the handsome jet ornaments, the gift of
Wilford's father, added to the style and beauty of the childish figure,
which had seldom looked lovelier than when ready and waiting for the
carriage. At the door there was a ring, and Esther brought a note to
Katy, who, recognizing her husband's handwriting, tore it quickly open
and read as follows:
"DEAR KATY: I have been suddenly called to leave the city on business,
which will probably detain me for three days or more, and as I must go on
the night train, I wish Esther to have my portmanteau ready with whatever
I may need for the journey. As I proposed this morning, I shall dine with
mother, but come home immediately after dinner. W. CAMERON."
Katy was glad now that she had decided to meet him at his mother's, as
the knowing she had pleased him would make the time of his absence more
endurable, and after seeing that everything was ready for him she
stepped with a comparatively light heart into her carriage, and was
driven to No. ---- Fifth Avenue.
Mrs. Cameron was out, the servant said, but was expected every minute
with Mr. Wilford.
"Never mind," Katy answered; "I want to surprise them, so please don't
tell them I am here when you let them in," and going into the library
she sat down before the grate, waiting rather impatiently until the door
bell rang and she heard both Wilford's and Mrs. Cameron's voice in the
hall.
Contrary to her expectations, they did not come into the library, but
went instead into the parlor, the door of which was partially ajar, so
that every word they said could be distinctly heard where Katy sat. It
would seem that they were continuing a conversation which had been
interrupted by their arriving home, for Mrs. Cameron said, with the tone
she always assumed when sympathizing with her son: "I am truly sorry for
you. Is she never more cheerful than when I have seen her?"
"Never," and Katy could feel just how Wilford's lips shut over his
teeth as he said it; "never more cheerful, but worse if anything. Why,
positively the house seems so like a funeral that I hate to leave the
office and go back to it at night, knowing how mopish and gloomy Katy
will be."
"My poor boy, it is worse than I feared," Mrs. Cameron said, with a
little sigh, while Katy, with a great gasping sob, tried to rise and go
to them, to tell them she was there--the mopish Katy, who made her home
so like a funeral to her husband.
But her limbs refused to move, and she sank back powerless in her chair,
compelled to listen to things which no true husband should ever say to a
mother of his wife, especially when that wife's error consisted
principally in mourning too much for the child "which but for her
imprudence might have been living then." These were Wilford's very
words, and though Katy had once expected him to say them, they came upon
her now with a dreadful shock, making her view herself as the murderer
of her child, and thus blunting the pain she might otherwise have felt
as he went on to speak of Silverton and its inhabitants, just as he
would not have spoken had he known she was so near. Then, encouraged by
his mother, he talked again of her, not against her, but in a way which
made her poor aching heart throb as she whispered, sadly: "He is
disappointed in me. I do not come up to all that he expected. I do very
well, considering my low origin, but I am not what his wife should be."
Wilford had not said all this, but Katy inferred it, and every nerve
quivered with anguish as the wild wish came over her that she had died
on that day when she sat in the summer grass at home watching the
shadows come and go and waiting for Wilford Cameron. Poor Katy! she
thought her cup of sorrow full, when, alas! only a drop had as yet been
poured into it. But it was filling fast, and Mrs. Cameron's words: "It
might have been better with Genevra," was the first outpouring of the
overwhelming torrent which for a moment bore her life and sense away.
She thought they meant her baby--the little Genevra sleeping under the
snow in Silverton--and her white lips answered: "Yes, it would be
better," before Wilford's voice was heard, saying, as he always said:
"No, I have never wished Genevra in Katy's place, though I have
sometimes wondered what the result would have been had I learned
in season how much I wronged her."
Was heaven and earth coming together, or what made Katy's brain so dizzy
and the room so dark, as, with head bent forward and lips apart, she
strained her ear to catch every word of the conversation which followed,
and in which she saw glimpses of that leaf offered her once to read, and
from which she had promised not to shrink should it ever be thrust upon
her? But she did shrink, oh! so shudderingly, holding up her hands and
striking them through the empty air as if she would thrust aside the
terrible scepter risen so suddenly before her. She had heard all that
she cared to hear then. Another word and she should surely die where she
was, within hearing of the voices still talking of Genevra. Stopping her
ears to shut out the dreadful sound, she tried to think what she should
do. To gain the door and reach the street was her desire, and throwing
on her wrappings she went noiselessly into the hall, and carefully
turning the lock closed the door behind her, finding herself alone in
the street in the dusk of a November night. But Katy was not afraid, and
drawing her hood closely over her face she sped on until her own house
was reached, alarming Esther with her frightened face, but explaining
that she had been taken suddenly ill and returned before dinner.
"Mr. Cameron will be here soon," she said. "I do not need anything
to-night, so you can leave me alone and go where you like--to the
theatre, if you choose. I heard you say you wished to go. Here is the
money for you and Phillips," and handing a bill to the slightly puzzled
Esther, she dismissed her from the room.
Meanwhile, at the elder Cameron's, no one had a suspicion of Katy's
recent presence, for the girl who had admitted her had gone to visit a
sick sister, with whom she was to spend the night. Thus Katy's secret
was safe, and Wilford, when at last he bade his mother good-by and
started for home, was not prepared for the livid face, the bloodshot
eyes, and the strange, unnatural look which met him at the threshold.
Katy was waiting for him, and answered his ring herself, her hands
grasping his almost fiercely and dragging him up the stairs to her own
room, where, more like a maniac than Katy Cameron, she confronted him
with the startling question:
"Who is Genevra Lambert? It is time I knew before committing greater
sin. Tell me, Wilford, who is she?"
She was standing before him, her slight figure seeming to expand into a
greater height, the features glowing with strong excitement, and her hot
breath coming hurriedly through her dilated nostrils, but never opening
the pale lips set so firmly together. There was something terrible in
her look and attitude, and it startled Wilford, who recoiled a moment
from her, scarcely able to recognize the Katy hitherto so gentle and
quiet. She had learned his secret, but the facts must have been
distorted, he knew, or she had never been so agitated. From beneath his
hair the great sweat drops came pouring, as he tried to approach her and
take the uplifted hands, motioning him aside with the words: "Not touch
me; no, not touch me till you have told me who is Genevra Lambert."
She repeated the question twice, and rallying all his strength Wilford
answered her at last: "Genevra Lambert was my wife!"
"I thought so," and the next moment Katy lay in Wilford's arms, dead, as
he feared, for there was no motion about the eyelids, no motion that he
could perceive about the pulse or heart, as he laid the rigid form upon
the bed and then bent every energy to restore her, even though he feared
that it was hopeless.
"I must do what I can," he said, thinking once to send for a physician
and laying his hand upon the bell rope for the purpose of ringing up a
servant; but a faint, gasping sound met his ear, assuring him there yet
was life and that Katy was not dead.
If possible he would prefer that no one should intrude upon them now,
and he chafed her icy hands and bathed her face until the eyes unclosed
again, but with a shudder turned away as they met his. Then as she grew
stronger and remembered the past she started up, exclaiming: "If Genevra
Lambert is your wife, what then am I? Oh, Wilford, how could you make me
not a wife, when I trusted and loved you so much?"
He knew now that she was laboring under a mistake, and he did not wonder
at the violence of her emotions if she believed he had wronged her so
cruelly, and coming nearer to her he said: "You mistake me; Genevra
Lambert was my wife once, but is not now, for she is dead. Do you hear
me, Katy? Genevra died years ago, when you were a little girl playing in
the fields at home."
By mentioning Silverton he hoped to bring back something of her olden
look, in place of the expression which troubled and frightened him. The
experiment was successful and great tears gathered in Katy's eyes,
washing out the wild, unnatural gleam, while the lips whispered: "And it
was her picture Juno saw. She told me the night I came and I tried to
question you. You remember?"
Wilford did remember it and he replied: "Yes, but I did not suppose you
knew I had a picture. You have been a good wife, Katy, never to mention
it since then;" and he tried to kiss her forehead, but she covered it
with her hands, saying, sadly: "Not yet, Wilford, I cannot bear it now.
I must know the whole about Genevra. Why didn't you tell me before? Why
have you deceived me so?"
"Katy," and Wilford grew very earnest in his attempts to defend himself,
"do you remember that day we sat under the buttonwood tree and you
promised to be mine? Try and recall the incidents of that hour and see
if I did not hint at some things past which I wished had been
otherwise--did not offer to show you the blackest page of my whole life
and you would not see it. Was that so, Katy?"
"Yes," she answered, and he continued: "You said you were satisfied
to take me as I was. You would not hear evil against me and so I
acquiesced, bidding you not shrink back if ever the time should come
when you must read that page. I was to blame, I know, but there were
many extenuating circumstances, much to excuse me for withholding what
you would not hear."
Wilford did not like to be censured, neither did he like to censure
himself, and now that Katy was out of danger and comparatively calm, he
began to build about himself a fortress of excuses for having kept from
her the secret of his life.
"Would not most any man have done just as I did?" he continued. "Can you
mention one who would not?"
"Yes, Cousin Morris," Katy answered; "he would never have deceived me
thus."
A little vexed at the mention of Dr. Grant, Wilford replied: "I do not
pretend to be a saint, and I believe your cousin does; but I doubt
whether even he, with all his goodness, would do very differently from
what I have done; but tell me how, where did you hear of Genevra?"
Amid sobs and tears Katy told him how she had repented of her decision
not to join him at his mother's, coming to the conclusion that she was
doing wrong to seclude herself so much and trying her best to look well
again in his eyes.
"I meant to surprise you," she said, "and when I heard your mother was
out I went into the library to wait, thinking you would come there, but
you did not, and I started to go to you when my feet were stopped, for
you were talking of me, Wilford, not bad, perhaps, but as you would not
have talked had you known that I was there where I heard the words which
burned like coals of fire, so that I could have screamed in my
distress."
Katy was not weeping now and her face was like that of some accusing
angel as she continued: "I thought my heart was broken when I heard you
talk so of me and Silverton, but that was nothing compared with what
came next, when your mother spoke of Genevra. I thought it was my baby
she meant at first, and the tightness around my heart was giving way,
for if you did complain of me to your mother, I could forgive that
because you were baby's father; but Genevra Lambert! oh, Wilford, I died
a thousand deaths in one when I first heard of her and understood why
you objected to the name our baby finally bore. You did not wish to be
so constantly reminded of the other wife. I could not sit there longer,
the room around me grew so black, so I struggled to my feet and reached
the door, going into the street and thinking once I would end my
wretched life in the distant river; but something turned my steps toward
home and I came, thinking it all over and suffering such agony. Oh,
Wilford, why did you keep it from me? What was there about it wrong and
where is she buried?"
"In Alnwick, at St. Mary's," Wilford answered, determining now to hold
nothing back, and by his abruptness wounding Katy afresh.
"In Alnwick, at St. Mary's" Katy cried. "Then I have seen her grave, and
that is why you were so anxious to get there, so unwilling to go away.
Oh, if I were lying there instead of Genevra, it would be so much
better, so much better."
There was sobbing now, in a moaning, plaintive way which touched Wilford
tenderly, and smoothing her tangled hair, he said: "I would not exchange
my Katy for all the Genevras in the world. She was never as dear to me
as you. I was but a boy, and did not know my mind when I met her. Shall
I tell you about her now? Can you bear to hear the story of Genevra?"
There was a nod of assent, and Katy turned her face to the wall,
clasping her hands tightly together, while Wilford drew his chair to her
side and began to read the page he should have read to her long before.