"On that fatal evening he had seen them together somewhere in the

grounds, and though he hid what he felt, the sight had goaded him

almost to frenzy. Then came the summons from Lady Helena to go to

Powyss Place. He set out, but before he had gone half-way, the

demon of jealously whispered in his ear, 'Your wife is with Juan

Catheron now--go back and surprise them.' He turned and went

back--a madman--the last glimpse of reason and self-control gone.

He saw his wife, not with Juan Catheron, but peacefully and

innocently asleep by the open window of the room where he had left

her. The dagger, used as a paper knife, lay on the table near. I

say he was utterly mad for the time. In a moment the knife was up

to the hilt in her heart, dealing death with that one strong blow!

He drew it out and--she lay dead before him.

"Then a great, an awful horror, fell upon him. Not of the consequence

of his crime; only of that which lay so still and white before him.

He turned like the madman he was and fled. By some strange chance he

met no one. In passing through the gates he flung the dagger among

the fern, leaped on his horse, and was gone.

"He rode straight to Powyss Place. Before he reached it some of

insanity's cunning returned to him. He must not let people know _he_

had done it; they would find out he was mad; they would shut him up

in a madhouse; they would shrink from him in loathing and horror.

How he managed it, he told me with his dying breath, he never

knew--he did somehow. No one suspected him, only Inez Catheron,

returning to the nursery, had seen all--had seen the deadly blow

struck, had seen his instant flight, and stood spell-bound, speechless

and motionless as a stone. He remembered no more--the dark night of

oblivion and total insanity closed about him only to open at briefest

intervals from that to the hour of his death.

"That, Edith, was the awful story I was told that night--the story

that has ruined and wrecked my whole life and yours. I listened to

it all as you sit and listen now, still as a stone, frozen with a

horror too intense for words. I can recall as clearly now as the

moment I heard them the last words he ever spoke to me:

"'I tell you this partly because I am dying, and I think you ought

to know, partly because I want to warn you. They tell me you are

about to be married. Victor, beware what you do. The dreadful taint

is in your blood as it was in mine--you love her as I loved the wife

I murdered. Again I say take care--take care! Be warned by me; my

fate may be yours, your mother's fate hers. It is my wish, I would

say command, if I dared, that you never marry; that you let the name

and the curse die out; that no more sons may be born to hear the

ghastly story I have told you.'

"I could listen to no more, I rushed from the room, from the house,

out into the darkness and the rain, as if the curse he spoke of had

already come upon me--as though I were already going mad. How long

I remained, what I did, I don't know. Soul and body seemed in a

whirl. The next thing I knew was my aunt summoning me into the

house. My most miserable father was dead.

"Then came the funeral. I would not, _could not_ think. I drove the

last warning he had spoken out of my mind. I clenched my teeth--I

swore that I would _not_ give you up. Not for the raving of a

thousand madmen, not for the warning of a thousand dying fathers.

From that hour I was a changed man--from that hour my doom was sealed.

"I returned to Powyss Place, but not as I had left. I was a haunted

man. By day and night--all night long, all day through, the awful

warning pursued me. 'My fate may be yours--your mother's fate

_hers_!' It was my destiny, there was no escape; my mother's doom

would be yours; on our wedding-day I was fated to kill you! It was

written. Nothing could avert it.

"I don't know whether the family taint was always latent within me,

or that it was continual brooding on what I had heard, but the fate

certainly befell me. My father's homicidal mania became mine. Edith,

I felt it, felt the dreadful whisper in my ear, the awful desire

stirring in my heart, to lift my hand and take your life! Often and

often have I fled from your presence when I felt the temptation

growing stronger than I could withstand.

"And yet I would not give you up; that is where I can never forgive

myself. I could not tell you; I could not draw back then. I hoped

against hope; it seemed like tearing body and soul asunder, the

thought of losing you. 'Come what may,' I cried, in my anguish,

'she shall be my wife!'

"Our wedding-day came; the day that should have been the most blessed

of my life, that was the most miserable. All the night before, all

that morning, the demon within me had been, battling for the victory.

I could not exorcise it; it stood between us at the altar. Then came

our silent, strange wedding-journey. I wonder sometimes, as I looked

at you, so still, so pale, so beautiful, what you must think. I dare

not look at you often, I dare not speak to you, dare not think of

you. I felt if I did I should lose all control of myself, and slay

you there and then.

"I wonder, as you sit and listen there, my love, my bride, whether

it is pity or loathing that fills your heart. And yet I deserved pity;

what I suffered no tongue can ever tell. I knew myself mad, knew that

sooner or later my madness would be stronger than myself, and then

it came upon me so forcibly when we reached Carnarvon, that I fled

from you again and went wandering away by myself, where, I knew not.

'Sooner or later you will kill her;' that thought alone filled me;

'it is as certain as that you live and stand here. You will kill this

girl who trusts you and who has married you, who does not dream she

has married a demon athirst for her blood.'

"I went wild then. I fell down on my knees in the wet grass, and held

up my hands to the sky. 'O God!' I cried out in despair, 'show me

what to do. Don't let me kill my darling. Strike me dead where I kneel

sooner than that!' And with the words the bitterness of death seemed

to pass, and great calm fell. In that calm a voice spoke clearly,

and said:

"Leave her! Leave your bride while there is yet time. It is the only

way. Leave her! She does not love you--she will not care. Better that

you should break your heart and die, than that you should harm a hair

of her head.'

"I heard it as plainly, Edith, as I hear my own voice speaking now.

I rose--my resolution taken--a great, unutterable peace filling my

heart. In my exalted state it seemed easy--I alone would be the

sufferer, not you--I would go.

"I went back. The first sight I saw was you, my darling, sitting by

the open window, fast asleep. Fast asleep, as my mother had been that

dreadful night. If anything had been wanting to confirm my resolution,

that would have done it. I wrote the note of farewell; I came in and

kissed your dear hands, and went away from you forever. O love! it

seemed easy then, but my heart broke in that hour. I could not live

without you; thank Heaven! the sacrifice is not asked. I have told

you all--it lay between two things--I must leave you, or in my madness

kill you. Edith, it would have happened. You have heard my story--you

know all--the dreadful secret that has held us asunder. It is for

you to say whether I can be forgiven or not."

She had all the time been sitting, her face hidden in her hands, never

stirring or speaking. Now she arose and fell once more on her knees

beside him, tears pouring from her eyes. She drew his head into her

arms, she stooped down, and, for the first time in her life, kissed

again and again the lips of the man she had married.

"Forgive you!" she said. "O my husband, my martyr! It is I who must

be forgiven! _You_ are an angel, not a man!"

CHAPTER VI.

THE LAST ENDING OF THE TRAGEDY.

An hour later, when Lady Helena softly opened the door and came in,

she found them still so, his weak head resting in her arms as she

knelt, her bowed face hidden, her falling tears hardly yet dried.

One look into his radiant eyes, into the unspeakable joy and peace

of his face, told her the story. All had been revealed, all had been

forgiven. On the anniversary of their most melancholy wedding-day

husband and wife were reunited at last.

There was no need of words. She stooped over and silently kissed both.

"It is growing late, Edith," she said gently, "and you must be tired

after your journey. You will go up to your room now. I will watch

with Victor to-night."

But Edith only drew him closer, and looked up with dark, imploring

eyes.

"No," she said, "no, no! I will never leave him again. I am not in

the least tired, Lady Helena; I will stay and share your watch."

"But, my dear--"

"O Lady Helena--aunt--don't you see--I must do something--make

reparation in some way. What a wretch--what a wretch I have been.

Oh, why did I not know all sooner? Victor, why did I not know _you_?

To remember what my thoughts of you have been, and all the time--all

the time--it was for me. If you die I shall feel as though I were

your murderess."

Her voice choked in a tearless sob. She had hated him--loathed

him--almost wished, in her wickedness, for his death, and all the

time he was yielding up his life in his love for her.

"You will let me stay with you, Victor?" she pleaded almost

passionately; "don't ask me to go. We have been parted long enough;

let me be with you until--" again her voice choked and died away.

With a great effort he lifted one of her hands to his lips--that

radiant smile of great joy on his face.

"She talks _almost_ as if she loved me," he said.

"Love you! O Victor!--husband--if I had only known, if I had only

known!"

"If you had known," he repeated, looking at her with wistful eyes.

"Edith, if you really had known--if I had dared to tell you all I

have told you to-night, would you not have shrunk from me in fear

and horror, as a monster who pretended to love you and yet longed

for your life? Sane on all other points--how would you have

comprehended my strange madness on that? It is gone now--thank

God--in my weakness and dying hour, and there is nothing but the

love left. But my own, if I had told you, if you had known, would

you not have feared and left me?"

She looked at him with brave, steadfast, shining eyes.

"If I had known," she answered, "how your father killed your mother,

how his madness was yours, I would have pitied you with all my heart,

and out of that pity I would have loved you. I would never have left

you--never. I could never have feared you, Victor; and this I

know--what you dreaded never would have come to pass. I am as sure

of it as that I kneel here. You would never have lifted your hand

against my life."

"You think so?" Still with that wistful, earnest gaze.

"I _know_ so--I feel it--I am sure of it. You could not have done

it--I should never have been afraid of it, and in time your delusion

would have worn entirely away. You are naturally superstitious and

excitable--morbid, even; the dreadful excitement of your father's

story and warning, were too much for you to bear alone. That is all.

If you could have told me--if I could have laughed at your

hypochondrical terrors, your cure would have been half effected. No,

Victor, I say it again--I would never have left you, and you would

never have harmed a hair of my head."

Her tone of resolute, conviction seemed to bring conviction even to

him. The sad, wistful light deepened in his blue eyes.

"Then it has all been in vain," he said very sadly; "the suffering

and the sacrifice--all these miserable months of separation and pain."

Again Lady Helena advanced and interposed, this time with authority.

"It won't do," she said; "Edith you _must_ go. All this talking and

excitement may end fatally. If you won't leave him he won't sleep

a wink to-night; and if he passes a sleepless night who is to answer

for the consequences? For his sake you must go. Victor tell her to

go--she will obey you."

She looked at him beseechingly, but he saw that Lady Helena was right,

and that Edith herself needed rest. It was easy to make one more

sacrifice now, and send her away.

"I am afraid Aunt Helena is right," he said faintly. "I must confess

to feeling exhausted, and I know you need a night's sleep, so that

I may have you with me all day to-morrow. For a few hours, dear love,

let me send you away."

She rose at once with a parting caress, and made him comfortable among

his pillows.

"Good-night," she whispered. "Try to sleep, and be strong to talk

to me to-morrow. Oh!" she breathed as she turned away, "if the elixir

of life were only not a fable--if the days of miracles were not past,

if he only might be restored to us, how happy we all could be!"

Lady Helena heard her, and shook her head.

"It is too late for that," she said; "when suffering is prolonged

beyond a certain point there is but one remedy--death. If your miracle

could take place and he be restored, he has undergone too much ever

to live on and be happy and forget. There can only be one ending to

such a year as he has passed, and that ending is very near."

Edith went to her room--one of the exquisite suite that had been

prepared for her a year before. She was occupying it at last, but

how differently from what she had ever thought. She remembered this

night twelve months so well, the strange vigil in which she had spent

in taking her farewell of those letters and that picture, and waiting

for her wedding-day to dawn.

To-night she slept, deeply and soundly, and awoke to find the October

sun shining brightly in. Was he still alive? It was her first thought.

Death might have come at any moment. She arose--slipped on a dressing

gown, and rang the bell.

It was Inez who answered in person.

"I heard your bell," she said as she kissed her good-morning, "and

I knew what you wanted. Yes, he is still alive, but very weak and

helpless this morning. The excitement and joy of last night were

almost too much for him. And he remembers what anniversary this is."

Edith turned away--some of the bitterness, some of the pain of loss

she knew he was enduring filling her own heart.

"If I had only known! if I had only known!" was again her cry.

"If you had--if he had told--I believe with you all would have been

well. But it is too late to think of that--_he_ believed differently.

The terrible secret of the father has wrought its terrible retribution

upon the son. If he had told you when he returned from Poplar Lodge,

you would have been happy together to-day. You are so strong--your

mind so healthful--some of your strength and courage would have been

imparted to him. But it is too late now--all is over--we have only

to make him happy while he is left with us."

"Too late! too late!" Edith's heart echoed desolately. In those hours

of his death she was nearer loving her husband than perhaps she could

ever have been had he lived.

"I will send breakfast up here," said Inez, turning to go; "when you

have breakfasted, go to him at once. He is awake and waiting for you."

Edith made her toilet. Breakfast came; and, despite remorse and grief,

when one is nineteen one can eat. Then she hurried away to the

sick-room.

He was lying much as she had left him, propped up among the

pillows--his face whiter than the linen and lace, whiter than snow.

By daylight she saw fully the ghastly change in him--saw that his

fair hair was thickly strewn with gray, that the awful, indiscribable

change that goes before was already on his face. His breathing was

labored and panting--he had suffered intensely with spasms of the

heart all night, sleeping none at all. This morning the paroxysms

of pain had passed, but he lay utterly worn and exhausted, the cold

damp of infinite misery on his brow, the chill of death already on

hands and limbs. He lay before her, the total wreck of the gallant,

hopeful, handsome gentleman, whom only one year ago she had married.

But the familiar smile she knew so well was on his lips and in his

eyes as he saw her. She could not speak for a moment as she looked

at him--in silence she took her place close by his side.

He was the first to break the silence, in a voice so faint as hardly

to be more than a whisper. "How had she slept--how did she feel? She

looked pale, he thought--surely she was not ill?"

"I?" she said bitterly. "O, no--I am never ill--nothing ever seems

to hurt hard heartless people like me. It is the good and the generous

who suffer. I have the happy knack of making all who love me miserable,

but my own health never fails. I don't dare to ask you what sort of

night you have had--I see it in your face. My coming brings, as it

always does, more ill than good."

"No," he said, almost with energy; "a hundred times no! Ah, love!

your coming has made me the happiest man on earth. I seem to have

nothing left to wish for now. As to the night--the spasms _did_

trouble me, but I feel deliciously easy and at rest this morning,

and uncommonly happy. Edith, I talked so much last evening I gave

_you_ no chance. I want you to tell me now all about the year that

has gone--all about yourself."

"There is so little to tell," she responded; "it was really humdrum

and uneventful. Nothing much happened to me; I looked for work and

got it. Oh, don't be distressed! it was easy, pleasant work enough,

and I was much better busy. I begin to believe plenty of hard work

is a real blessing to dissatisfied, restless people--you can't be

very miserable when you are very busy--you haven't time for luxuries.

I got along very well, and never was ill an hour."

"But, tell me," he persisted; "you don't know how I long to hear.

Tell, me all about your life after--after--"

"Hush!" she interposed, holding his hands tight. "You were the

sufferer, not I. O my poor boy! I never was half worthy such a heart

as yours. I am only beginning to realize how selfish, and cruel and

hard I have been. But, with Heaven's help, I will try and be different

from this day."

She told him the story of her life, from the time of her flight from

Powyss Place to the present, glossing over all that was dark, making

the most of all that was bright. But he understood her--he knew how

her pride had suffered and bled.

"I never thought of your going away," he said sadly. "I might have

known you better, but I did not--I was so sure you would have stayed,

if not with Lady Helena, then in some safe shelter; that you would

have taken what was justly yours. I was stunned when I first heard

of your flight. I searched for you everywhere--in America and all.

Did you know I went to America, Edith?"

"Inez told me," she answered faintly.

"I could not find your father--I could not find the Stuarts. I must

have been very stupid somehow--I could find no one. Then arrived that

day when I saw you in the Oxford Street shop, when I tried to follow

you home and could not. What an evening it was! Then came my last

desperate hope when I sent Inez to you and failed. It seemed almost

hardest to bear of all."

"If I had only known--if I had only known!" was still her cry.

"Yes, the trouble lay there. With your pride you could not act

otherwise than as you did. For you are very proud, my darling," with

a smile. "Do you know it?"

"Very proud--very heartless--very selfish," she answered brokenly.

"Oh, no need to tell me how base I have been!"

"Yet, I think I like you the better for your pride; and I foresee--yes,

I foresee, that one day you will be a happy woman, with as noble, and

loving, and generous a heart as ever beat. I understand you, it seems

to me now, better than you understand yourself. One day--it may be

years from now--the happiness of your life will come to you. Don't

let pride stand between you and it then, Edith. I hope that day may

come--I pray for it. Lying in my grave, love, I think I shall rest

easier if I know _you_ are happy on earth."

"Don't! don't!" she said; "I cannot bear it! Your goodness breaks

my heart."

"There is one thing I must ask, Edith," he resumed after a pause;

"a last favor. You will grant it, will you not?"

"Victor! is there anything I would _not_ grant?"

"It is this, then--that when I am gone, you will take what is your

right and your due. This you must promise me; no more false pride--the

widow of Sir Victor Catheron must take what is hers. Juan Catheron

is married to a Creole lady, and living in the island of Martinique,

a reformed man. He inherits the title and Catheron Royals, with its

income, as heir-at-law. For the rest you have your jointure as my

widow; and my grandmother's large fortune, which descended to me,

I have bequeathed to you in my will. So that when I leave you, my

dearest, I leave you safe from all pecuniary troubles. It is my last

wish--nay, my last command, that you take all without hesitation.

You promise me this, Edith?"

"I promise," she answered lowly. She could not look at him--it seemed

like the Scriptural words, "heaping coals of fire on her head."

Then for a long time there was silence. He lay back among the pillows

with closed eyes, utterly exhausted, but looking very happy. The

bitterness of death was passed--a great peace had come. With the wife

he loved beside him, her hand clasped in his, he could go forth in

peace, knowing that in her heart there was nothing but affection and

forgiveness--that one day, in the future, she would be happy. In his

death as in his life he was thoroughly unselfish. It brought no pang

to him now to feel that years after the grass grew over his grave

she would be the happy wife of a happier man. He talked little more;

he dozed at intervals during the day. Edith never left him for a

moment. His aunt and cousin shared her watch off and on all day. They

could all see that the last great change was near. Pain had left

him--he was entirely at rest.

"Read to me, Edith," he said once as the day wore on. She took up

a volume of sermons that Lady Helena was fond of. She opened it,

haphazard, and read. And presently she came to this, reading of the

crosses and trials and sorrows of life: "And God shall wipe away all

tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death; neither

sorrow nor crying; neither shall there be any more pain."

His eyes were fixed upon her with so radiant a light, so infinite

a thankfulness, that she could read no more. Her voice choked--she

laid the book down. Later, as the sunset came streaming in, he awoke

from a long slumber, and looked at the glittering bars of light lying

on the carpet.

"Open the window, Edith," he said; "I want to see the sun set once

more."

She obeyed. All flushed with rose light, and gold and amythist

splendor, the evening sky glowed like the very gates of paradise.

"It is beautiful," Edith said, but its untold beauty brought to her

somehow a sharp pang of pain.

"Beautiful!" he repeated in an ecstatic whisper. "O love! if earth

is so beautiful, what must Heaven be!"

Then she heard him softly repeat to himself the words she had read:

"And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall

be no more death; neither sorrow nor crying; neither shall there be

any more pain." He drew a long, long breath, like one who is very

weary and sees rest near.

"Darling," he said, "how pale you are--white as a spirit. Go out for

a little into the air--don't mind leaving me. I feel sleepy again."

She kissed him and went. All her after life she was glad to remember

their last parting had been with a caress on her part, a happy smile

on his. She descended the steps leading from the window with

unquestioning obedience, and passed out into the rose and gold light

of the sunset. She remained perhaps fifteen minutes--certainly not

more. The red light of the October sky was fast paling to cold

gray--the white October moon was rising. She went back. He still lay

as she had left him--his eyes were closed--she thought he was asleep.

She bent over him, close--closer--growing white almost as himself.

And then she knew what it was.

"And there shall be no more death; neither sorrow nor crying; neither

shall there be any more pain."

A cry rang through the room, the long, wailing cry of widowhood. She

fell on her knees by the bed. An hour after, the passing bell tolled

sombrely through the darkness from the steeple of Chesholm Church,

telling all whom it might concern that Sir Victor Catheron had gone

home.

CHAPTER VII.

TWO YEARS AFTER.

One brilliant, August noonday a Cunard ship steamed gallantly down

the Mersey and out into the open sea.

There were a great number of passengers on board--every cabin, every

berth, was filled. Every country under Heaven, it seemed, was

represented. After the first two or three days out, after the first

three or four times assembling around the dinner-table and congregating

on the sunny decks, people began to know all about one another, to

learn each other's names and histories.

There was one lady passenger who from the first excited a great deal

of talk and curiosity. A darkly handsome young lady in widow's weeds,

who rather held herself aloof from everybody, and who seemed all

sufficient unto herself. A young lady, pitifully young to wear that

sombre dress and widow's cap, remarkable anywhere for her beauty,

and dignity, and grace. Who was she? as with one voice all the

gentlemen on board cried out that question the moment they saw her

first.

She was a lady of rank and title, an English lady, travelling with

her two servants--otherwise quite alone--the name on the passenger

list was Lady Catheron.

For the first two days that was all that could be ascertained--just

enough to whet curiosity to burning-point. Then in the solitude and

seclusion of the ladies' cabin the maid servant became confidential

with one of the stewardesses, and narrated, after the manner of maids,

her mistress's history as far as she knew it. The stewardess retailed

it to the lady passengers, and the lady passengers gave it at third

hand to the gentlemen. This is what it was:

Lady Catheron, young as she looked and was, had nevertheless been

a widow for two years. Her husband had been Sir Victor Catheron, of

Cheshire, who had died after the first year of married felicity,

leaving an immensely rich widow. Miserable Sir Victor! thought all

the gentlemen. She--Sarah Betts, the maid--had not known her ladyship

during the year of her married life, she had been engaged in London,

some months after my lady's bereavement, to travel with her on the

continent. My lady had travelled in company with her aunt, the Lady

Helena Powyss, and her cousin, a "Mrs. Victor." They had spent the

best part of two years wandering leisurely through every country in

Europe, and now my lady was finishing her tour of the world by coming

to America--why, Betts did not know. Not many ladies of rank came

to America alone, Betts thought, but she had heard my lady was

American by birth. Everywhere my lady went she had been greatly

admired--gentlemen always raved about her, but she seemed as cold

as marble, very high and haughty, utterly indifferent to them all.

She did not go into society--she had been awfully fond of her late

husband, and quite broken-hearted at losing him so soon. That was

Miss Betts' story, and like Sam Weller's immortal valentine, was

just enough to make them wish there was more.

For the man servant and _avant courier_ of my lady, he was a genteel,

dignified, taciturn gentleman, like an elderly duke in difficulties,

with whom it was impossible to take liberties or ask questions--a

sort of human oyster: who kept himself and his knowledge hermetically

sealed up. He told nothing, and they had to be contented with Betts'

version.

So Lady Catheron became _the_ lady of interest on board. Everybody

saw her on deck, her railway rug spread in the sunshine, her low

wicker-work chair placed upon it, a large umbrella unfurled over

her head, reading or gazing over the sea toward the land they were

nearing. She made no acquaintances, she was perfectly civil to

everybody who spoke to her, friendly to a degree with the children,

and her smile was bright and sweet as the sunshine itself. Her

reticence could hardly be set down to pride. Before the voyage was

over she was many times forward among the steerage passengers, leaving

largesses behind her, and always followed by thanks and blessings

when she came away. Not pride, surely--the great dark fathomless eyes

were wondrously sweet and soft; the lips, that might once have been

haughty and hard, tender and gentle now, and yet there was a vague,

intangible something about her, that held all at arm's length, that

let no one come one inch nearer than it was her will they should come.

Lady Catheron had been their interest from the first--she was their

mystery to the end.

Yes, it was Edith--Edith going home--home! well hardly that, perhaps;

she was going to see her father, at his urgent request. He had

returned once more to Sandypoint, he had been ailing lately, and he

yearned to see his darling. His letter reached her in Paris, and Edith

crossed over at once, and came.

Was there in her heart any hope of seeing, as well, other friends?

Hardly--and yet, as America drew near and nearer, her heart beat with

a hope and a restlessness she could no more explain than I can. In

Naples, six months ago, she had met a party of Americans, and among

them Mrs. Featherbrain, of light-headed memory. Mrs. Featherbrain

had recognized an old acquaintance in Lady Catheron, and hailed her

with effusion.

For Edith, she shrank away with the old feeling of dislike and

repulsion, and yet she listened to her chatter, too.

"How sad it was," said gay Mrs. Featherbrain, "about the poor, dear

Stuarts. That delightful Charley, too! ah! it was very sad. Did Lady

Catheron correspond with them? But of course she did, being a relative

and everything."

"No," Edith answered, her pale face a shade paler than usual; "she

had entirely lost sight of them lately. She would be very glad to

hear of them, though. Did Mrs. Featherbrain know--"

"Oh, dear, no!" Mrs. Featherbrain answered; "I have lost sight of

them too--every one has. When people become poor and drop out of the

world, as it were, it is impossible to follow them up. She _had_

heard, just before their party started, that Trixy was about to be

married, and that Charley--poor Charley! was going to California to

seek his fortune. But she knew nothing positively, only that they

were certainly not to be seen in New York--that the places and people

who had known them once, knew them no more." That was all.

It could not be, then, that the hope of meeting them was in Edith's

mind, and yet, her whole soul yearned to meet them--to ask their

forgiveness, if no more. To clasp Trixy's hand once again,--honest,

loving, impulsive, warm-hearted Trixy,--to feel her arms about her

as of old, it seemed to Edith Catheron, she could have given half

her life. Of any other, she would not let herself think. He had

passed out of her life forever and ever--nothing could alter that.

"Everywhere she went, she was admired," her servants had said, "but

to all she was cold as marble." Yes, and it would always be so while

life remained. There had been but one man in all the world for her

from the first--she had given him up of her own free will; she must

abide by her decision; but there never would be any other. One

loveless marriage she had made; she never would make another. Charley

Stuart might--would, beyond doubt--forget her and marry, but she would

go to her grave, her whole heart his.

They reached New York; and there were many kindly partings and cordial

farewells. Lady Catheron and her two servants drove away to an up-town

hotel, where rooms had been engaged, and all the papers duly chronicled

the distinguished arrival. One day to rest--then down to Sandypoint,

leaving gossiping Betts and the silent elderly gentleman behind her.

And in the twilight of an August day she entered Sandypoint, and

walked slowly through the little town, home. Only three years since

she had left, a happy, hopeful girl of eighteen--returning now a

saddened; lonely woman of twenty-one. How strangely altered the old

landmarks, and yet how familiar. Here were the stores to which she

used to walk, sulky and discontented, through the rain, to do the

family marketing. Here spread the wide sea, smiling and placid,

whereon she and Charley used to sail. Yonder lay the marsh where,

that winter night, she had saved his life. Would it have been as well,

she thought with weary wonder, if they had both died that night? Here

was the nook where he had come upon her that wet, dark morning with

his mother's letter, when her life seemed to begin--here the gate

where they had stood when he gave her his warning: "Whatever that

future brings, Edith, don't blame me." No, she blamed nobody but

herself; the happiness of her life had lain within her grasp, and

she had stretched forth her hand and pushed it away. There was the

open window where he used to sit, in the days of his convalesence,

and amuse himself setting her inflammable temper alight. It was all

associated with him. Then the house door opens, a tall, elderly man

comes out, there is a great cry,--father and daughter meet, and for

an hour or so, she can forget even Charley.

She remains a week--how oddly familiar and yet strange it all seems.

The children noisier and ruder than ever, her father grown grayer

and more wrinkled, her stepmother, shrill of tongue and acid of temper

as of yore, but fawningly obsequious to her.

The people who used to know her, and who flock to see her, the young

men who used to be in love with her, and who stare at her speechlessly

and afar off now. It amuses her for a while, then she tires of it,

she tires of everything of late, her old fever of restlessness comes

back. This dull Sandypoint, with its inquisitive gapers and

questioners, is not to be endured, even for her father's sake. She

will return to New York.

In the bustling life there--the restless, ceaseless flow of humanity,

she alone finds solitude and rest now. She goes, but she leaves behind

her that which renders keeping boarders or teaching classics forever

unnecessary to Frederick Darrell.

She goes back. What her plans are for the future she does not know.

She has no plans, she cannot tell how long she may remain, or where

she will eventually take up her abode. It seems to her she will be

a sort of feminine Wandering Jew all her life. That life lacks

something that renders her restless--she does not care to think what.

She may stay all winter--she may pack up and start any day for

England.

September passes, and she has not gone. A few of the acquaintances

she made when here before with the Stuarts call upon her, but they

can tell her nothing of them. If the Stuarts were all dead and

buried they could not more completely have dropped out of the

lives of their summer-time friends. It must be true, she thinks,

what Mrs. Featherbrain told her. Trixy is married and settled

somewhere with her mother, and Charley is thousands of miles away,

"seeking his fortune."

Then, all at once, she resolves to go back to England. Her handsome

jointure house awaits her, Lady Helena and Inez long for her, love

her--she will go back to them--try to be at peace like other women,

try to live her life out and forget. She has some purchases to make

before she departs. She goes into a Broadway store one day, advances

to a counter, and says:

"I wish to see some black Lyons velvet." Then she pauses, and looks

at some black kid gloves lying before her.

"What is the number?" she asks, lifting a pair.

The young man behind the counter makes no reply.

She raises her eyes to his face for the first time, and sees--Charley

Stuart!

CHAPTER VIII.

FORGIVEN OR--FORGOTTEN?

Charley Stuart! The original of the pictured face that lies over her

heart by night and day. Charley--unchanged, calm, handsome, eminently

self-possessed as ever, looking at her with grave gray eyes.

She turns giddy, with the utter shock of the great surprise--she leans

for a second heavily against the counter, and looks at him with eyes

that cannot believe what they see.

"Charley!"

"Edith!"

Yes, it is his voice, his smile, and he stretches his hand across

the counter and takes hers. Then she sinks into a seat, and for a

moment the store, and the faces, swim about her in a hot mist. But

her heart has given one great glad leap, and she knows she has found

what all unconsciously she has been longing for, seeking for--Charley!

He is the first to recover himself--if indeed he has lost himself

for an instant--and speaks:

"This is a staggerer," he says; "and yet I don't know why it should

be either, since everybody, high and low, who visits New York drops

in here for the necessaries of life, sooner or later. I began to

think, however, that you must have gone away again."

She looks at him. He is in no way changed that she can see--the very

same Charley of three years before. "You knew I was here!" she asks.

"Certainly, Lady Catheron. I read the morning papers, and _always_

look out for distinguished arrivals. Like the scent of the roses,

my aristocratic tastes cling to me still. I thought you would hardly

endure a month of Sandypoint--delightful, no doubt, as that thriving

township is. I don't need to ask you how you have been--I can see

for myself you never looked better."

He meets her steady, reproachful gaze with perfect _sang-froid_. "You

knew I was here, and you would not come to see me," those dark

luminous eyes say. His perfectly careless, indifferent manner stings

her to the quick.

"Trixy knew I was here too, of course!" she says in a very low voice.

"No," Charley answers; "I don't think she did. _I_ didn't tell her,

and I am pretty sure if she had found it out for herself her family

circle would have heard of it. I greatly doubt even whether she would

not have taken the liberty of calling upon you."

She lifts her eyes again, with a reproach her lips will not speak.

"I have deserved it," that dark, sad glance says, "but you might

spare me."

"We were all very sorry to hear of Sir Victor Catheron's death,"

Charley resumes gravely. "Hammond told us; he writes occasionally.

Heart disease, wasn't it?--poor fellow! I hope Lady Helena Powyss

is quite well?"

"She is quite well."

Then there is a pause--her heart is full, and he stands here so

utterly unmoved, talking common-places, and looking as though even

the memory of the past were dead and buried. As no doubt indeed it

is. She handles the gloves she still holds nervously, for once in

her life at a loss.

"Your mother and Trix are well?" she says after that pause.

"Quite well."

She looks up desperately:

"Charley," she exclaims; "_mayn't_ I see them? I have wanted to see

them so much--to--" No, her voice breaks, she cannot finish the

sentence.

"Certainly you can see them," Mr. Stuart answers promptly; "they will

be delighted, I am sure. They might not feel at liberty to call upon

you, Lady Catheron, of course, but all the same they will only be

too happy if Lady Catheron will so far honor _them_."

He says this in the old lazy, pleasant voice, but it is quite evident

he does not mean to spare her--his half-sarcastic accent makes her

wince as though in actual bodily pain.

"I'll give you the address if you like," he goes on; "it's not the

most aristocratic neighborhood in the world, but it's perfectly quiet

and safe." He scribbles something in pencil. "Here it is--due east

you see. Trix won't be home until seven; she's at work in a fancy

shop in Sixth avenue, you know--no, you don't know of course, but

she is, and I generally call round for her at closing-up time. But

you're safe to find her at home any evening you may name, Lady

Catheron, after seven P.M."

She takes the slip of paper very humbly--very unlike the Edith he

used to know--her lips quivering, as he can see.

"May I go at once?" she asks in that humble little voice; "I can't

wait. I want to see your mother, and I will stay until Trixy comes."

"My mother will be there, and charmed to see you. Of course you can

go at once--why should you hesitate--it's very kind of you and all

that I would escort you there if I could, but unhappily I'm on duty.

You'll have no trouble at all finding it."

He is perfectly cordial--perfectly indifferent. He looks at her as

he might look at Mrs. Featherbrain herself. Edith, it is all over

for you!

"I thought you were in California," she says as she rises to go; "and

that Trixy was married."

"No, I have never left New York, and Trix is pining in single

blessedness still. We are going to alter all that shortly though--for

further particulars, apply to Trix. Are you going? good-by, for the

present, Lady Catheron."

She is out in the bright sunshine, feeling as though she were in a

dream.

She summons a hack, and is driven away eastward to the address he

has given her. She finds it--a tall tenement house in a close street,

smelling of breweries, and she ascends a long flight of carpetless

stairs, and knocks at a door on the upper landing. It is opened, and

the well-remembered face of Aunt Chatty looks out.

"Mrs. Stuart!"

A darkly, beautiful face is before her, two black gloved hands are

outstretched, two brown brilliant eyes shine upon her through tears.

And Mrs. Stuart recoils with a gasp.

"Oh, dear me!" she says, "it _is_ Edith!"

Yes, it is Edith, with tears large and thick in her eyes, who kisses

the familiar face, and who is sitting beside her, how, Mrs. Stuart

never knows in her amaze and bewilderment, in the humble little front

room.

How changed it all is from the splendor of that other house in Fifth

Avenue. How different this dingy black alpaca dress and rusty widow's

cap from the heavy silks and French millinery of other days. But Aunt

Chatty's good, easy, kindly face is the same.

A hundred questions are asked and answered. Edith tells her how long

she has been in New York, of how only an hour ago she chanced upon

Charley, and found out their whereabouts. And now, if Aunt Chatty

pleases, she is going to take off her bonnet and wait until Beatrix

comes home.

"Of course you will wait! take off your things right away. Dear me!

and it is really our Edith; won't Trix be surprised and glad. It isn't

much of a place this," says poor Mrs. Stuart, glancing about her

ruefully; "not what you're used to, my dear, but such as it is--"

An impetuous kiss from Edith closes her lips.

"Ah hush!" she says; "_you_ are in it--and glad to see me. I ask no

more."

"And you are a widow too, dear child," Mrs. Stuart sighs, touching

her black dress compassionately; "it is very hard--so young, and only

one short year his wife. Captain Hammond told us--he writes to Trixy,

you know. Poor Sir Victor! so nice as he was, and that good pleasant

Lady Helena. We were all so sorry. And you, my dear--how have you

been?"

"Perfectly well," Edith answers, but she will not talk of herself.

Aunt Chatty must tell her all about their trouble. Aunt Chatty tells

plaintively, only too glad to pour her sorrows into sympathizing ears.

"It was very hard at first--dreadfully hard. Poor Mr. Stuart died--it

was too much for him. Everything was sold--everything--we were left

beggars. Work was difficult to get--then I fell ill. Charley was in

despair almost--he grew thin and hollow-eyed, the very ghost of

himself. All our old friends seemed to drop off and only Providence

sent Nellie Seton along, we might all have died or gone to the

almshouse."

"Nellie Seton?" Edith inquired; "who is she? what did she do?"

"She was a school friend of Trixy's, in reduced circumstances like

ourselves, who came to our succor like an angel in human form. She

got Trix a situation in a fancy store, she nursed me, and kept me

alive on wine and jellies when I could touch nothing else. She

cheered up Charley and kept him from dying of despair. To Nellie

Seton, under Heaven, we owe it that we are alive at all."

"She is a young lady--this good Miss Seton?" Edith asks, with a sharp

contraction of the heart.

"Yes; about Trixy's age, and wonderfully clever. She writes poetry

and gets paid for it, and the prettiest stories for the magazines,

and is quite rich. She is one of the family now almost,--very likely

she will be home presently with Charley and Trix--they're always

together. And now, if you will excuse me Edith, I'll go and get tea."

She bustles away, and Edith sits in the little parlor alone. And she

feels, with a heart like a stone, that what she has lost forever,

this brave, good Nellie Seton has won. Well! she deserves it; she

will try to like her, Edith thinks; but somehow even at the thought,

her heart revolts. The old feeling for Mrs. Featherbrain, for Lady

Gwendoline, tries to come back, in spite of her, for this unseen Miss

Seton. She is an altered woman--a better woman, a more unselfish

woman, but the old leaven of iniquity is not dead yet.

The moments drag on--it is drawing near seven. How will Trixy receive

her, she wonders. Will she be generous, and forget the past, or will

she make her feel it, as her brother has done? Seven. Mrs. Stuart

has set the table. How odd, it seems to see Aunt Chatty working. The

tea is sending its fragrance through the little rooms, the buttered

toast is made, the cake is cut, the pink ham is sliced, everything

looks nice and inviting. Suddenly there is the sound of footsteps

on the stairs, of girls gay tones and sweet laughter--then the kitchen

door flies open, and Trixy's well-remembered voice is animatedly

exclaiming:

"Ma! is tea ready? I am famished and so is Nell. What! the table set

in the parlor in state. Goodness!"

Edith rises, white as the dainty Marie-Stuart widow's cap she

wears--still and beautiful she stands. She sees Trixy's tall figure,

a smaller, slighter young lady beside her, and Charley standing

behind both. Half a minute later Trix sweeps in, sees the motionless

figure, and recoils with a shriek.

"Trix!" Edith advances with the word that is almost a sob. And Trixy's

face grows radiant.

"It is! it _is_! it IS!"

She screams, and rushes forward, and catches Edith in a perfect bear's

hug, laughing, crying, and kissing, all in a breath.

CHAPTER IX.

SAYING GOOD-BY.

No coldness about the welcome here, no ungracious remembrances of

the past, no need ever to doubt Trixy's warm heart, and, generous,

forgiving, impulsive nature.

All Edith's shortcomings were long ago forgotten and forgiven--it

is in Edith's way to inspire ardent love. Trixy loves her as dearly,

as warmly as she had ever done--she hugs, she kisses, she exclaims

at sight of her, in a perfect rapture of joy:

"O darling!" she cries, "_how_ good it is to see you again! what a

surprise is this! Charley, where are you? look here! Don't you know

Edith?"

"Most undoubtedly I know Edith," Charley answers, advancing; "old

age may have impaired my faculties, but still I recognize a familiar

face when I see it. I told her I thought you would be glad to see

her, but I didn't tell her you intended to eat her alive."

"You told her! Where? when?"

"In the store--this afternoon. She came in 'promiscuous' for black

Lyon's velvet, wasn't it, Lady Catheron? You didn't get it, by the

way. Permit me to inform you, in my professional capacity, that we

have a very chaste and elegant assortment of the article always in

stock. Trix, where's your manners? Here's Nellie hovering aloof in

the background, waiting to be introduced. Allow _me_ to be master

of the ceremonies--Lady Catheron, Miss Nellie Seton."

Both young ladies bowed--both looked each other full in the

face--genuine admiration in Miss Seton's--keen, jealous scrutiny

in Lady Catheron's. She saw a girl of two or three and twenty,

under-sized and rather plump, with a face which in point of beauty

would not for one instant compare with her own or Trixy's either.

But it was such a thoroughly _good_ face. And the blue, beaming eyes,

the soft-cut smiling mouth, gentle, and strong, and sweet, were surely

made to win all hearts at sight. Not a beauty--something infinitely

better, and as a rival, something infinitely more dangerous.

"Lady Catheron's name is familiar to me as a household word," Miss

Seton said, with a frank little laugh, that subdued Edith at once.

"Trix wakes with your name on her lips, I believe, and goes to sleep

murmuring it at night. Lady Catheron doesn't know how madly jealous

I have been of her before now."

Edith turns once more to Trix--faithful, friendly, loyal Trix--and

stretches forth both hands, with a swift, graceful impulse, tears

standing, large and bright, in her eyes.

"My own dear Trix!" is what she says.

"And now I'll run away," Miss Seton exclaims brightly; "auntie will

expect me, and I know Trix has ten thousand things to tell and to

hear. No, Trixy, not a word. Charley, what are you doing with your

hat? put it down instantly--I don't want you. I would very much

rather go home alone."

"Yes, it's so likely I'll let you. There's no earthly reason why

you shouldn't stay; but if, with your usual obstinacy and

strong-mindedness, you insist upon going--"

"I do insist upon going, and without an escort. You know you are

rather a nuisance--in the way than otherwise--oh, I mean it I get

home twice as fast when I go by myself."

He looks at her--Edith turns sick--sick, as she sees the look. He

says something in too low a tone for the rest to hear. Miss Seton

laughs, but her color rises and she objects no more. Edith sees it

all. A gray-kidded hand is extended to her.

"Good-night, Lady Catheron," Miss Seton's bright, pleasant voice says,

and Lady Catheron takes it, feeling in her heart that for once she

cannot dislike a rival. This girl who will be Charley's wife--O

blissful fate!--is worthy of him. They go out together, laughing as

they go.

"Isn't she just the dearest darling!" cries Trix in her gushing way;

"and O Edith! whatever would have become of us all without her, I

shudder to think. In the dark days of our life, when friends were

few and far between, she was our friend--our savior. She nursed mamma

from the very jaws of death, she got me my place in the fancy-store,

and I believe--she won't own it--but I do believe she saved Charley's

life."

"Saved his life?" Edith falters.

"It was such an awful time," Trix says in sombre tones, "we were

starving, Edith, literally starving. All our old friends had forsaken

us; work we could not get, 'to beg we were ashamed.' If you had seen

Charley in those days, gaunt, hollow-eyed, haggard, wretched. He looks

and feels all right now," goes on Trix, brightening up a bit, "but

_then_! it used to break my heart to look at him. He tried for work,

from morning until night, and day after day he came home, footsore,

weary, despairing. He could not leave mother and me, and go

elsewhere--she was sick, father was dead--poor pa!--and I was just

crazy, or near it. And one dark, dreadful night he went out, and down

to the river, and--Nellie followed, and found him there. Ah Edith,

he wasn't so much to blame; I suppose he was mad that night. She came

up to him, and put her arms around him, as he stood in the darkness

and the rain, and--I don't know what she said or did--but she brought

him back to us. And Providence sent him work next day--the situation

in the store he has now. I don't know about his merits as a salesman,"

says Trix, laughing, with her eyes full of tears "but he is immensely

popular with the ladies. Nellie says it isn't his eloquence--where

the other clerks expatiate fluently on the merits of ribbons, and

gloves, and laces, shades and textures, Charley stands silent and

lets them talk, and smiles and looks handsome. I suppose it answers,

for they seem to like him. So now you see we get on splendidly, and

I've almost forgotten that we were ever rich, and wore purple and

fine linen, and feasted sumptuously every day."

"You are happy?" Edith asks, with wonder and envy in her eyes.

"Perfectly happy," Trix replies cheerily; "I haven't a wish

unsatisfied--oh well! now that you've come. I did want you, Dithy;

it seems such ages and ages since we met, and I was troubled about

you. I heard of _him_, you know, poor fellow."

She touches timidly Edith's widow's weeds. There is no answer--Edith's

tears are falling. She is contrasting her own cowardice with Trixy's

courage; her own hardness with Trixy's generosity.

"How do you know?" she asks at length.

"Captain Hammond. You remember Angus Hammond, I suppose?" Trix says,

blushing and hesitating; "he wrote us about it, and"--a pause.

"Go on; what else did he write?"

"That there was trouble of some sort, a separation, I think--that

you had parted on your very wedding-day. Of course we couldn't believe

that."

"It is quite true," was the low reply.

Trixy's eyes opened.

"True! O Dithy! On your wedding-day!"

"On our wedding-day," Edith answered steadily; "to meet no more until

we met at his death-bed. Some day, Trix, dear, I will tell you how

it was--not now. Two years have passed, but even yet I don't care

to think of it. Only this--_he_ was not to blame--he was the bravest,

the noblest, the best of men, ten thousand times too good for me.

I was a mercenary, ambitious wretch, and I received my just reward.

We parted at the last friends, thank God! but I can never forgive

myself--never!"

There was a pause--an uncomfortable one for Trix.

"How long since you came to New York?" she asked at length.

Edith told her--told her how she had been wandering over the world

since her husband's death--how she had come to America to see her

father--how she had tried to find them here in New York--how signally

she had failed--and how to-day, by purest accident, she had come upon

Charley in the Broadway store.

"How astonished he must have been," his sister said; "I think I see

him, lifting his eyebrows to the middle of his forehead. Did he take

you for a ghost?"

"By no means, and he was not in the least surprised. He knew I was

here, from the first."

"Edith!"

"He told me so. He saw my arrival in the paper when I first landed."

"And he never told _me_, and he never went to see you! The wretch!"

cried Trix.

"I don't know that he is to blame," Edith responded quietly. "I

deserved no better; and ah! Trixy, not many in this world are as

generous as _you_. So you are perfectly happy, darling? I wonder

if Captain Hammond, now, has anything to do with it?"

"Well, yes," Tax admits blushingly again; "I may as well tell you.

We are to be married at Christmas."

"Trix! Married!"

"Married at last. We were engaged before I left England, three years

ago. He wanted to marry me then, foolish fellow!" says Trix with

shining eyes, "but of course, we none of us would listen to so

preposterous a thing. He had only his pay and his debts, and his

expectations from a fairy godmother or grandmother, who _wouldn't_

die. But she died last mail--I mean last mail brought a black bordered

letter, saying she was gone to glory, and had left Angus everything.

He is going to sell out of the army, and will be here by Christmas,

and--and the wedding is to take place the very week he arrives. And,

oh! Edith, he's just the dearest fellow, the best fellow, and I'm

the happiest girl in all New York!"

Edith says nothing. She takes Trix, who is crying, suddenly, in her

arms, and kisses her. Angus Hammond has been faithful in the hour

when she deserted them--that is her thought. Her self-reproach never

ceases--never for one hour.

"We go to Scotland of course," said Trix, wiping her eyes; "and

ma--also, of course, stays with Charley. Nellie will be here to fill

my place--don't you think she will make a charming sister?"

She laughs as she asks the question--it is the one little revenge

she takes. Before Edith can reply she runs on:

"Nellie's rich--rich, I mean, as compared with us, and she has made

it all herself. She's awfully clever, and writes for magazines, and

papers, and things, and earns oceans of money. _Oceans_," says Trix,

opening her eyes to the size of saucers; "and I don't know really

which of us ma likes best, Nellie or me. That's my one comfort in

going. Here comes Charley now--let's have tea at once. I forgot all

about it, but nobody has the faintest idea of the pangs of hunger

I am enduring."

Charley sauntered in, looking fresh and handsome, from the night air.

It was quite dark now. Trix lit the lamp and bustled about helping

to get supper. "You told Nellie?" she asked her brother in a low tone,

but Edith caught the words.

"Yes," Charley answered gravely, "I told her."

"What did she say?"

"Everything that was like Nellie--everything that was bright, and

brave, and good. She will be here in the morning to say good-by. Now,

Mrs. Stuart, if you have any compassion on a famished only son, hurry

up, and let's have supper."

They sat down around the little table where the lamp shone

brightly--Edith feeling cold and strange and out of place. Trixy

and Aunt Chatty might, and did, forgive the past but she herself

could not, and between her and Charley lay a gulf, to be spanned

over on earth no more. And yet--how beautiful and stately she looked

in her little white widow's cap, her sombre dress, and the frill of

sheer white crape at her throat.

"Edith!" Trix said involuntarily, "how handsome you have grown! You

were always pretty, but now--I don't mean to flatter--but you are

splendid! It can't be that black becomes you, and yet--Charley, don't

you see it? hasn't Edith grown lovely?"

"Trix!" Edith cried, and over her pale cheeks there rose a flush,

and into her dark, brilliant eyes there came a light, that made her

for the moment all Trixy said.

Charley looked at her across the table--the cool, clear, gray eyes,

perfectly undazzled.

"I used to think it impossible for Edith to improve; I find out my

mistake to-day, as I find out many others. As it is not permitted

one to say what one thinks on these subjects, one had better say

nothing at all."

The flush that has risen to Edith's cheeks remains there, and deepens.

After tea, at Trixy's urgent request, she sits down at the little

hired piano, and sings some of the old songs.

"Your very voice has improved," Trix says admiringly. "Edith, sing

_Charley he's my darling_, for Charley. It used to be a favorite of

his."

She gives him a malicious sidelong glance. Charley, lying back in

his mother's comfortable, cushioned rocking-chair, takes it calmly.

"It used to be, but it has ceased to be," he answers coolly. "Trix,

go out like a good child, and get me the evening paper. Among my

other staid, middle-aged habits, Lady Catheron, is that of reading

the _Post_ every evening religiously, after tea."

Never Edith any more--always Lady Catheron--never the girl he loved

three years ago--whom he had said he would love all his life, but

the richly dowered widow of Sir Victor Catheron. He will not

generously forget, even for an instant, that he is an impecunious

dry goods clerk, she a lady of rank and riches.

She rises to go--it is growing almost more than she can bear. Trix

presses her to stay longer, but in vain; _he_ never utters a word.

"Shall Charley call a carriage, or will you prefer to walk?" Trix

asks doubtfully.

"She will walk," says Charley, suddenly looking up and interfering;

"the night is fine, and I will see her home."

For one instant, at the tone of his voice, at the look of his eyes,

her heart bounds.

Her bonnet and mantle are brought--she kisses Trix and Aunt Chatty

good-night--they have promised to dine with her to-morrow--and goes

forth into the soft October night with Charley.

He draws her hand within his arm--the night is star-lit, lovely. The

old time comes back, the old feeling of rest and content, the old

comfortable feeling that it is Charley's arm upon which she leans,

and that she asks no more of fate. To-morrow he may be Nellie

Seton's--just now, he belongs to her.

"Oh!" she exclaims, with a long-drawn breath, "how familiar it all

is! these gas-lit New York streets, the home-like look of the men

and women, and--you. It seems as though I had left Sandypoint only

yesterday, and you were showing me again the wonders of New York for

the first time."

He looks down at the dusk, warm, lovely face, so near his own.

"Sandypoint," he repeats; "Edith, do you recall what I said to you

there? Have you ever wished once, in those three years that are gone,

that I had never come to Sandypoint to take you away?"

"I have never wished it," she answers truly; "never once. I have

never blamed you, never blamed anyone but myself--how could I? The

evil of my life I wrought with my own hand, and--if it were all to

come over again--I would still go! I have suffered, but at least--I

have lived."

"I am glad to hear that," he says after a little pause; "it has

troubled me again and again. You see, Hammond wrote us all he ever

knew of you, and though it was rather incomprehensible in part, it

was clear enough your life was not entirely a bed of roses. All that,

I hope, is over and done with--there can be no reason why all the

rest of your life should not be entirely happy. This is partly why

I wished to walk home with you to-night, that I might know from your

own lips whether you held me blameless or not. And partly, also--" a

second brief pause;--"to bid you good-by."

"Good-by!" In the starlight she turns deathly white.

"Yes," he responded cheerily; "good-by; and as our lives lie so widely

apart in all probability, this time forever. I shall certainly return

here at Christmas, but you may have gone before that. To-morrow

morning I start for St. Louis, where a branch of our house is

established, and where I am permanently to remain. It is an excellent

opening for me--my salary has been largely advanced, and I am happy

to say the firm think me competent and trustworthy. I return, as I

said, at Christmas; after that it becomes my permanent home. You know,

of course," he says with a laugh, "why I return--Trix has told you?"

So completely has she forgotten Trix, so wholly have her thoughts

been of him, that she absolutely does not remember to what he alludes.

"Trix has told me nothing," she manages to answer, and she wonders

at herself to find how steady is her own voice.

"No?" Charley says, elevating his eyebrows; "and they say the age

of wonders is over! Trix in the new roll of keeping her own secrets!

Well, I very naturally return for _the_ wedding--_our_ wedding. It's

extraordinary that Trix hasn't told you, but she will. Then--my

Western home will be ready by that time, and we go back immediately.

My mother goes with me, I need hardly say."

Still so absolutely wrapped up in her thoughts of _him_, so utterly

forgetful of Trix, that she does not understand. _Our_ wedding--he

means his own and Nellie Seton's of course. His Western home, the

home where she will reign as his wife. In the days that have gone,

Edith thinks she has suffered--she feels to-night that she has never

suffered until now! She deserves it, but if he had only spared

her,--only left it for some one else to tell. It is a minute before

she can reply--then, despite every effort, her voice is husky:

"I wish you joy, Charley--with all my heart"

She cannot say one word more. Something in the words, in her manner

of saying them, makes him look at her in surprise.

"Well, yes," he answers coolly; "a wedding in a family is, I believe,

a general subject of congratulation. And I must say she has shown

herself a trump--the bravest, best girl alive. And you"--they are

drawing near a hotel--"may I venture to ask your plans, Lady Catheron?

how long do you think of remaining in New York?"

"I shall leave at once--at once," she replied in the same husky tone.

To stay and meet Nellie Seton after to-night is more than she is able

to do. They are close to the hotel now. Involuntarily--unconsciously,

she clings to his arm, as the drowning may cling to a straw. She feels

in a dull, agonized sort of way that in five minutes the waters will

have closed over her head, and the story of her life have come to

an end.

"Here we are," his frank, cheery voice says--his voice, that has yet

a deeper, more earnest tone than of old. "You don't know, Edith, how

glad I am of this meeting--how glad to hear you never in any way

blamed _me_."

"I blame you! oh, Charley!" she says with a passionate little cry.

"I rejoice to hear, that with all its drawbacks, you don't regret

the past. I rejoice in the knowledge that you are rich and happy,

and that a long, bright life lies before you. Edith," he takes both

her hands in his strong, cordial clasp, "if we never meet again, God

bless you, and good-by."

She lifts her eyes to his, full of dumb, speechless agony. In that

instant he knows the truth--knows that Edith loves him--that the

heart he would once have laid down his life almost to win, is his

wholly at last!

The revelation comes upon him like a flash--like a blow. He stands

holding her hands, looking at her, at the mute, infinite misery in

her eyes. Someone jostles them in passing, and turns and stares. It

dawns upon him that they are in the public street, and making a scene.

"Good-by," he says hastily once more, and drops the hands, and turns

and goes.

She stands like a statue where he has left her--he turns a corner,

the last sound of his footsteps dies away, and Edith feels that he

has gone out of her life--out of the whole world.

CHAPTER X.

THE SECOND BRIDAL.

Miss Nellie Seton came early next morning to see her friend, Mr.

Charley Stuart, off. He is looking rather pale as he bids them

good-by--the vision of Edith's eyes upturned to his, full of mute,

impassionate appeal, have haunted him all night long. They haunt

him now, long after the last good-by had been said, and the train

is sweeping away Westward. Edith loves him at last. At last? there

has never been a time when he doubted it, but now he knows he has

but to say the word, and she will lay her hand in his, and toil,

and parting, and separation will end between them forever. But he

will never, say that word--what Edith Darrell in her ambition once

refused, all Lady Catheron's wealth and beauty cannot win. He feels

he could as easily leap from the car window and end it all, as ask

Sir Victor Catheron's richly dowered widow to be his wife. She made

her choice three years ago--she must abide by that choice her life

long.

"And then," he thinks rather doggedly, "this fancy of mine may be

only fancy. The leopard cannot change his spots, and an ambitious,

mercenary woman cannot change her nature. And, as a rule, ladies

of wealth and title _don't_ throw themselves away on impecunious

dry goods clerks. No! I made an egregious ass of myself once, and

once is quite enough. We have turned over a new leaf, and are not

going back at this late day to the old ones. With her youth, her

fortune, and her beauty, Edith can return to England and make a

brilliant second marriage."

And then Mr. Stuart sets his lips behind his brown mustache, and

unfolds the morning paper, smelling damp and nasty of printer's ink,

and immerses himself, fathoms deep, in mercantile news and the doings

of the Stock Exchange.

He reaches St Louis in safety, and resumes the labor of his life.

He has no time to think--no time to be sentimental, if he wished

to be, which he doesn't.

"Love is of man's life a thing apart," sings a poet, who knew what

he was talking about. His heart is not in the least broken, nor likely

to be; there is no time in his busy, mercantile life, for that sort

of thing, I repeat. He goes to work with a will, and astonishes even

himself by his energy and brisk business capacity. If he thinks of

Edith at all, amid his dry-as-dust ledgers and blotters, his buying

and selling, it is that she is probably on the ocean by this

time--having bidden her native land, like _Childe Harold_, "One long,

one last, good-night." And then, in the midst of it all, Trixy's first

letter arrives.

It is all Edith, from beginning to end. Edith has not gone, she is

still in New York, but her passage is taken, and she will leave next

week. "And Charley," says Trix, "don't be angry now, but do you know,

though Edith Darrell always liked you, I fancy Lady Catheron likes

you even better. Not that she ever says anything; bless you! she

is as proud as ever; but we women can tell. And last night she told

ma and me the story of her past, of her married life--or rather her

_un_-married life--of her separation from Sir Victor on their

wedding-day--think of it, Charley! _on their wedding-day_. If ever

anyone in this world was to be pitied, it was he--poor fellow! And

she was not to blame--neither could have acted other than they did,

that I can see. Poor Edith! poor Sir Victor! I will tell you all when

we meet. She leaves next Tuesday, and it half breaks my heart to see

her go. Oh, Charley! Charley! _why_ need she go at all?"

He reads this letter as he smokes his cigar--very gravely, very

thoughtfully, wondering a great deal, but not in the least moved

from his steadfast purpose. Parted on their wedding-day! he has heard

that before, but hardly credited it. It is true then--odd that; and

neither to be blamed--odder still. She has only been Sir Victor's

wife in name, then, after all. But it makes no difference to

him--nothing does--all that is past and done--she flung him off

once--he will never go back now. Their paths lie apart--hers over

the hills of life, his in the dingy valleys--they have said good-by,

and it means forever.

He goes back to his ledgers and his counting-room, and four more

days pass. On the evening of the fourth day, as he leaves the store

for the night, a small boy from the telegraph office waylays him,

and hands him one of the well-known buff envelopes. He breaks it

open where he stands, and read this:

"NEW YORK, Oct. 28, '70.

"Charley: Edith is lying dangerously ill--dying. Come

back at once. BEATRIX."

He reads, and the truth does not come to him--he reads it again.

_Edith is dying_. And then a grayish pallor comes over his face,

from brow to chin, and he stands for a moment, staring vacantly at

the paper he holds, seeing nothing--hearing nothing but these words:

"Edith is dying." In that moment he knows that all his imaginary

hardness and indifference have been hollow and false--a wall of pride

that crumbles at a touch, and the old love, stronger than life,

stronger than death, fills his heart still. He has left her, and--Edith

is dying! He looks at his watch. There is an Eastward-bound train in

half an hour--there will be barely time to catch it. He does not

return to his boarding house--he calls a passing Mack, and is driven

to the depot just in time. He makes no pause from that hour--he

travels night and day. What is business; what the prospects of all

his future life; what is the whole world now? Edith is dying.

He reaches New York at last. It seems like a century since that

telegram came, and haggard and worn, in the twilight of the autumn

day, he stands at last in his mother's home.

Trix is there--they expect him to-night, and she has waited to receive

him. She looks in his face once, then turns away and covers her own,

and bursts into a woman's tempest of tears.

"I--I am too late," he says in a hoarse sort of whisper.

"No," Trix answers, looking up; "not too late. She is alive still--I

can say no more."

"What is it?" he asks.

"It is almost impossible to say. Typhoid fever, one doctor says, and

_cerebro spinal meningitis_ says the other. It doesn't much matter

what it is, since both agree in this--that she is dying."

Her sobs breaks forth again. He sits and gazes at her like a stone.

"There is no hope?"

"While there is life there is hope." But it is in a very dreary voice

that Trix repeats this aphorism: "and--the worst of it is, she doesn't

seem to care. Charley, I believe she wants to die, is glad to die.

She seems to have nothing to care for--nothing to live for. 'My life

has been all a mistake,' she said to me the other day. 'I have gone

wrong from first to last, led astray by my vanity, and selfishness,

and ambition. It is much better that I should die, and make an end

of it all.' She has made her will, Charley--she made it in the first

days of her illness, and--she has left almost everything to you."

He makes no reply. He sits motionless in the twilit window, looking

down at the noisy, bustling street.

"She has remembered me most generously," Trix goes softly on; "poor,

darling Edith! but she has left almost all to you. 'It would have

been an insult to offer anything in my lifetime,' she said to me;

'but the wishes of the dead are sacred,--he will not be able to refuse

it _then_. And tell him not to grieve for me, Trixy--I never made

him anything but trouble, and disappointment, and wretchedness. I

am sorry--sorry now, and my last wish and prayer will be for the

happiness of his life.' When she is delirious, and she mostly is

as night draws on, she calls for you incessantly--asking you to come

back--begging, you to forgive her. That is why I sent."

"Does she know you sent?" he asks.

"No--it was her desire you should not be told until--until all was

over," Trix answered with another burst of tears; "but I _couldn't_

do that. She says we are to bury her at Sandypoint, beside her

mother--not send her body to England. She told me, when she was dead,

to tell you the story of her separation from Sir Victor. Shall I tell

it to you now, Charley?"

He makes a motion of assent; and Trix begins, in a broken voice, and

tells him the sad, strange story of the two Sir Victors, father and

son, and of Edith's life from her wedding-day. The twilight deepens

into darkness, the room is wrapped in shadow long before she has

finished. He never stirs, he never speaks, he sits and listens to

the end. Then there is a pause, and out of the gloom he speaks at

last:

"May I see her, and when?"

"As soon as you come, the doctors say; they refuse her nothing now,

and they think your presence may do her good,--if anything can do

it. Mother is with her and Nellie; Nellie has been her best friend

and nurse; Nellie has never left her, and Charley," hesitatingly,

for something in his manner awes Trix, "I believe she thinks you

and Nellie are engaged."

"Stop!" he says imperiously, and Trixy rises with a sigh and puts

on her hat and shawl. Five minutes later they are in the street, on

their way to Lady Catheron's hotel.

One of the medical men is in the sick-room when Miss Stuart enters

it, and she tells him in a whisper that her brother has come, and

is waiting without.

His patient lies very low to-night--delirious at times, and sinking,

it seems to him, fast. She is in a restless, fevered sleep at present,

and he stands looking at her with a very sombre look on his

professional face. In spite of his skill, and he is very skilful,

this case baffles him. The patient's own utter indifference, as to

whether she lives or dies, being one of the hardest things he has

to combat. If she only longed for life, and strove to recruit--if,

like Mrs. Dombey, she would, "only make an effort." But she will not,

and the flame flickers, and flickers, and very soon will go out

altogether.

"Let him come in," the doctor says. "He can do no harm--he may

possibly do some good."

"Will she know him when she awakes?" Trix whispers.

He nods and turns away to where Miss Seton stands in the distance,

and Trix goes and fetches her brother in. He advances slowly, almost

reluctantly it would seem, and looks down at the wan, drawn, thin

face that rests there, whiter than the pillows. Great Heaven! and

this--_this_ is Edith! He sinks into a chair by the bedside, and

takes her wan, transparent hand in both his own, with a sort of

groan. The light touch awakes her, the faint eyelids quiver, the

large, dark eyes open and fix on his face. The lips flutter

breathlessly apart. "_Charley_!" they whisper in glad surprise;

and over the death-like face there flashes for a second an electric

light of great amaze and joy.

"Humph!" says the doctor, with a surprised grunt; "I thought it would

do her no harm. If we leave them alone for a few minutes, my dear

young ladies, it will do _us_ no harm either. Mind, my young

gentleman," he taps Charley on the shoulder, "my patient is not to

excite herself talking."

They softly go out. It would appear the doctor need not have warned

him; they don't seem inclined to talk. She lies and looks at him,

delight in her eyes, and draws a long, long breath of great content.

For him, he holds her wasted hand a little tighter, and lays his face

down on the pillow, and does not speak a word.

So the minutes pass.

"Charley," she says at last, in a faint, little whisper, "what a

surprise this is. They did not tell me you were coming. Who sent for

you? When did you come?"

"You're not to talk, Edith," he answers, lifting his haggard face

for a moment--poor Charley! "Trix sent for me." Then he lays it down

again.

"Foolish boy!" Edith says with shining eyes; "I do believe you are

crying. You don't hate me, then, after all, Charley?"

"Hate you!" he can but just repeat.

"You once said you did, you know; and I deserved it. But I have not

been happy, Charley--I have been punished as I merited. Now it is

all over, and it is better so--I never was of any use in the world,

and never would be. You will let me atone a little for the past in

the only way I can. Trix will tell you. And, by and by, when you are

quite happy, and she is your wife--"

The faint voice breaks, and she turns her face away. Even in death

it is bitterer than death to give him up.

He lifts his head, and looks at her.

"When she is my wife? when _who_ is my wife?" he asks.

"Nellie--you know," she whispers; "she is worthy of you,

Charley--indeed she is, and I never was. And she loves you, and

will make you hap--"

"Stop!" he says suddenly; "you are making some strange mistake, Edith.

Nellie cares for me, as Trix does, and Trix is not more a sister to

me than Nellie. For the rest--do you remember what I said to you that

night at Killarney?"

Her lips tremble--her eyes watch him, her weak fingers close tightly

over his. Remember! does she _not_?

"I said--'I will love you all my life!' I have kept my word, and mean

to keep it. If I may not call you wife, I will never call, by that

name, any other woman. No one in this world can ever be to me again,

what you were and are."

There is another pause, but the dark, uplifted eyes are radiant now.

"At last! at last!" she breathes; "when it is too late. Oh, Charley!

If the past might only come over again, how different it all would

be. I think"--she says this with a weak little laugh, that reminds

him of the Edith of old--"I think I could sleep more happily even

in my grave--if 'Edith Stuart' were carved on my tombstone!"

His eyes never leave her face--they light up in their dreary sadness

now at these words.

"Do you mean that, Edith?" he says bending over her; "living or dying,

would it make you any happier to be my wife?"

Her eyes, her face, answer him. "But it is too late," the pale lips

sigh.

"It is never too late," he says quietly; "we will be married

to-night."

"_Charley_?"

"You are not to talk," he tells her, kissing her softly and for the

first time; "I will arrange it all. I will go for a clergyman I know,

and explain everything. Oh, darling! you should have been my wife

long ago--you shall be my wife at last, in spite of death itself."

Then he leaves her, and goes out. And Edith closes her eyes, and lies

still, and knows that never in all the years that are gone has such

perfect bliss been hers before. In death, at least, if not life, she

will be Charley's wife.

He tells them very quietly, very resolutely--her father who is there

from Sandypoint, his mother, sister, Nellie, the doctor.

They listen in wordless wonder; but what can they say?

"The excitement will finish her--mark my words," is the doctor's

verdict; "I will never countenance any such melodramatic proceeding."

But his countenance does not matter it seems. The laws of the Medes

were not more fixed than this marriage. The clergyman comes, a very

old friend of the family, and Charley explains all to him. He listens

with quiet gravity--in his experience a death-bed marriage is not

at all an unprecedented occurrence. The hour fixed is ten, and Trixy

and Nellie go in to make the few possible preparations.

The sick girl lifts two wistful eyes to the gentle face of Nellie

Seton. It is very pale, but she stoops and kisses her with her own

sweet smile.

"You will live now for _his_ sake," she whispers in that kiss.

They decorate the room and the bed with flowers, they brush away the

dark soft hair, they array her in a dainty embroidered night-robe,

and prop her up with pillows. There is the fever fire on her wan

cheeks, the fever fire in her shining eyes. But she is unutterably

happy--you have but to look into her face to see that. Death is

forgotten in her new bliss.

The bridegroom comes in, pale and unsmiling--worn and haggard beyond

the power of words to tell. Trix, weeping incessantly, stands near,

her mother and Mr. Darrell are at one side of the bed. Nellie is

bridesmaid. What a strange, sad, solemn wedding it is! The clergyman

takes out his book and begins--bride and bridegroom clasp hands, her

radiant eyes never leave his face. Her faint replies flutter on her

lips--there is an indescribable sadness in his. The ring is on her

finger--at last she is what she should have been from the

first--Charley's wife.

He bends forward and takes her in his arms. With all her dying

strength she lifts herself to his embrace. It is a last expiring

effort--her weak clasp relaxes, there is one faint gasp. Her head

falls heavily upon his breast--there is a despairing cry from the

women, cold and lifeless, Charley Stuart lays his bride of a moment

back among the pillows--whether dead or in a dead swoon no one there

can tell.

CHAPTER XI.

THE NIGHT.

At first they thought her dead--but it was not death. She awoke from

that long, death-like swoon as morning broke--so near unto death that

it seemed the turning of a hair might weigh down the scale. And so

for days after it was--for weary miserable days and nights. The great

reaction after the great excitement had come, all consciousness left

her, she lay white and still, scarcely moving, scarcely breathing.

The one beloved voice fell as powerless on her dulled ears now as

all others, the dim, almost lifeless eyes, that opened at rare

intervals, were blank to the whole world. She lay in a species of

stupor, or coma, from which it was something more than doubtful if

she ever would awake. The few spoonfuls of beef-tea and brandy and

water she took they forced between her clenched teeth, and in that

darkened room of the great hotel, strangely, solemnly quiet, Life

and Death fought their sharp battle over her unconscious head.

And for those who loved her, her father, her friends, and one other,

nearer and dearer than father or friend, how went those darkest days

for _them_? They could hardly have told--all their after life they

looked back, with a sick shudder, to that week.

For Charley Stuart he never wanted to look back--never to the last

day of his life will he be able to recall, to realize the agony of

those six days--days that changed his whole nature--his whole life.

They watched with her unceasingly--death might come at any moment.

There were times when they bent above her, holding their own breath,

sure that the faint thread had already snapped--times when they held

a mirror to her lips to be sure she breathed at all. For her new-made

husband, he never left her except when nature succumbed to the

exhaustion of ceaseless vigil, and they forced him away. He forgot

to eat or sleep, he sat tearless and still as stone by the bedside,

almost as bloodless, almost as wan and hollow-eyed as the dying bride

herself. The doctors stood gloomily silent, their skill falling

powerless here.

"She needed only the excitement of this most preposterous marriage

to finish her," one of them growled; "I said so at the time--I say

so now. She had one chance for life--perfect quiet--and that

destroyed it."

On the fourth day, a letter from England, in a woman's hand, and

deeply bordered with black, arrived. Edith, in the first days of her

illness, had told Trix to open all her letters. She would have passed

the power over to her brother now, but he waved it away impatiently.

What did it matter whom it was from--what it contained--what did

anything matter now?

His haggard eyes went silently back to the marble face lying among

its pillows, so awfully still.

Trixy opened and read it. It was from Inez Catheron, and announced

the death of her aunt, the Lady Helena Powyss.

* * * * *

"Her end was perfect peace," said the letter; "and in her will, she

has left her large fortune divided equally between you and me. If

possible it would be well for you to return to England as speedily

as may be. If wealth can make you happy--and I hope at least it will

aid--my dearest Edith, you will have it. For me, I join a charitable

Sisterhood here in London, and will try to devote the remainder of

my life to the relief of my suffering and poor fellow-creatures. As

to the rest, if you care at all to know, my brother reigns at Catheron

Royals now! He is, in all respects, a changed man, and will not, I

think, be an unworthy successor of him who is gone. His wife and

children are all that can be desired.

"Farewell, my dear cousin. When you return to London come to the

enclosed address, and see me. No one will welcome you more gladly

than,

"INEZ CATHERON."

* * * * *

So another large fortune had been left Edith--she was rich now beyond

her wildest dreams. Rich! And yonder she lay, and all the gold of

earth, powerless to add a second to her life. What a satire it seemed.

Youth, beauty, and boundless wealth were hers and all were vain--vain!

The seventh night brought the crisis.

"This can hold out no longer," the physician said; "before morning

we will know the end, whether it is to be life or death."

"Then--there is hope yet?" Trix breathed, with clasped hands.

He looked at her gloomily and turned away, the meaningless formula

on his lips:

"While there is life there is hope."

"It will be little less than a miracle if she lives, though," the

other added; "and the days of miracles are over. Hope if you

like--but--"

"You had better not let _him_ sit up to-night," said the first

physician, looking compassionately at Charley; "he won't be able to

stand it. He is worn out now, poor fellow, and looks fit for a

sick-bed himself."

"He knows it is the crisis," Trixy answered; "he won't go."

"He has watched the last two nights," Miss Seton, interposed: "he

_must_ go, doctor; leave me an opiate--I will administer it. If--if

the worst comes, it will be but a moment's work to arouse him."

The doctor obeyed.

"I will return at day dawn," he said, "if she be still alive. If

not--send me word."

The twilight was falling. Solemn and shadowy it crept into the sombre,

silent room. They went back to the bedside, pale and tearless; they

had wept, it seemed, until they could weep no more. This last night

the two girls were to watch alone.

She lay before them. Dead and in her shroud she would never look more

awfully death-like than now. He sat beside her--ah, poor Charley!

in a sort of dull stupor of misery, utterly worn out. The sharp pain

seemed over--the long, dark watches, when his passionate prayers had

ascended for that dear life, wild and rebellious it may be, when he

had wrestled with an agony more bitter than death, had left their

impress on his life forever. He could not let her go--he could not!

"O God!" was the ceaseless cry of his soul, "have mercy--spare!"

Nellie Seton's cool, soft hands fell lightly on his head--Nellie's

soft, gentle voice spoke:

"Charley, you are to leave us for a little, and lie down. You must

have some rest, be it ever so short; and you have had nothing to eat,

I believe all day; you will let me prepare something, and take it,

and go to your room."

She spoke to him coaxingly, almost as she might to a child. He lifted

his eyes, full of dull, infinite misery, to hers.

"To-night?" he answered: "the last night! I will not go."

"Only for an hour then," she pleaded; "there will be no change. For

_my_ sake, Charley!"

All her goodness, all her patience, came back to him. He pressed her

hand in his own gratefully, and arose.

"For your sake, Nellie, then--for no other. But you promise to call

me if there is the slightest change?"

"I promise. Drink this and go."

She gave him a glass of mulled wine, containing the opiate. He drank

it and left the room. They listened breathlessly until they heard

his door, further down the passage, open and shut--then both drew

a deep breath.

"Thank Heaven," Trix said; "I couldn't bear to see him here to-night.

Nellie, if she dies it will kill him--just that."

The girl's lips quivered. What Charley had been to her--how wholly

her great, generous, loving heart had gone out to him, not even Trix

ever knew. The dream of her life's best bliss was at an end forever.

Whether Edith Stuart lived or died, no other woman would ever take

her place in his heart.

The hours of the night wore on. Oh! those solemn night watches by

the dying bed of those we love. The faint lamp flickers, deepest

stillness reigns, and on his bed, dressed as he was, Charley lies

deeply, dreamlessly asleep.

It was broad day when he awoke--the dawn of a cloudless November day.

He sat up in bed suddenly, for a moment, bewildered, and stared before

him. Only for a moment--then he remembered all. The night had passed,

the morning come. They had let him sleep--it seemed he _could_ sleep

while she lay dying so near. Dying! Who was to tell him that in yonder

distant room Edith was not lying dead. He rose up, reeling like a

drunken man, and made for the door. He opened it, and went out, down

the passage. It was entirely deserted, the great household was not

yet astir. Profound stillness reigned. Through the windows he could

see the bright morning sky, all flushed, red and golden with the first

radiance of the rising sun. And in that room there what lay--death

or life?

He stood suddenly still, and looked at the closed door. He stood there

motionless, his eyes fixed upon it, unable to advance another step.

It opened abruptly--quickly but noiselessly, and Nellie Seton's pale,

tired face looked out. At sight of him she came forward--he asked

no questions--his eyes looked at her full of a dumb agony of

questioning she never forgot.

"Charley!" she exclaimed, coming nearer.

The first ray of the rising sun streaming through the windows fell

full upon her pale face, and it was as the face of an angel.

"Charley!" she repeated, with a great tearless sob, holding out both

hands; "Oh, bless God! the doctor says we may--_hope_!"

He had braced himself to hear the worst--not this. He made one step

forward and fell at her feet like a stone.

CHAPTER XII.

THE MORNING.

They might hope? The night had passed, the morning had come, and she

still lived.

You would hardly have thought so to look at her as she lay, deathly

white, deathly still. But as the day broke she had awakened from a

long sleep, the most natural and refreshing she had known for weeks,

and looked up into the pale anxious face of Trix with the faint shadow

of a smile. Then the eyelids swayed and closed in sleep once more,

but she had recognized Trix for the first time in days--the crisis

was over and hope had come.

They would not let her see him. Only while she slept would they allow

him now to enter her room. But it was easily borne--Edith was not

to die, and Heaven and his own grateful happy heart only knew how

infinitely blessed he was in that knowledge. After the long bitter

night--after the darkness and the pain, light and morning had come.

Edith would live--all was said in that.

"There are some remedies that are either kill or cure in their

action," the old doctor said, giving Charley a facetious poke. "Your

marriage was one of them, young man. _I_ thought it was Kill--it

turns out it was Cure."

For many days no memory of the past returned to her, her existence

was as the existence of a new-born babe, spent alternately in taking

food and sleep. Food she took with eager avidity after her long

starvation, and then sank back again into profound, refreshing

slumber.

"Let her sleep," said the doctor, with a complacent nod; "the more

the better. It's Nature's way of repairing damages."

There came a day at last when thought and recollection began to

struggle back--when she had strength to lie awake and think. More

than once Trix caught the dark eyes fixed in silent wistfulness upon

her--a question in them her lips would not ask. But Miss Stuart

guessed it, and one day spoke:

"What is it, Dithy?" she said; "you look as if you wanted to say

something, you know."

"How--how long have I been sick?" was Edith's question.

"Nearly five weeks, and an awful life you've led us, I can tell you!

Look at me--worn to skin and bone. What do you suppose you will have

to say for yourself when Angus comes?"

Edith smiled faintly, but her eyes still kept their wistful look.

"I suppose I was delirious part of the time, Trixy?"

"Stark, staring crazy--raving like a lunatic at full moon! But you

needn't look so concerned about it--we've changed all that. You'll

do now."

"Yes," she said it with a sigh; "you have all been very kind. I

suppose it's only a fancy of the fever after all."

"What?"

"I--Trixy! don't laugh at me, but I thought Charley was here."

"Did you?" responded Trix; "the most natural thing in life. He _is_

here."

Her eyes lighted--her lips parted--a question trembled upon them,

but she hesitated.

"Go on," said Miss Stuart, enjoying it all; "there's something else

on your mind. Speak up, Edie! don't be ashamed of yourself."

"I am afraid you _will_ laugh this time, Trixy--I know it is only

a dream, but I thought Charley and I were--"

"Yes," said Trixy; "were--what?"

"Married, then!" with a faint little laugh. "Don't tell him, please,

but it seems--it seems so real, I had to tell you."

She turned her face away. And Trixy, with suspicious dimness in her

eyes, stooped down and kissed that thin, wan face.

"You poor little Dithy!" she said; "you _do_ like Charley, don't

you? no, it's not a dream--you were married nearly a fortnight ago.

The hope of my life is realized--you are my sister, and Charley's

wife!"

There was a little panting cry--then she covered her face with her

hands and lay still.

"He is outside," went on Trix; "you don't know what a good boy he

has been--so patient--and all that. He deserves some reward. I think

if you had died he would have died too--Lord Lovel and Lady Nancy,

over again. Not that I much believe in broken hearts where men are

concerned, either," pursued Trix, growing, cynical; "but this seems

an exceptional case. He's awfully fond of you, Dithy; 'pon my word

he is. I only hope Angus may go off in a dead faint the first time

I'm sick and get better, as he did the other day. We haven't let him

in much lately, for fear of agitating you, but I think," says Trixy,

with twinkling eyes, "you could stand it now--couldn't you, Mrs.

Stuart?"

She did not wait for a reply--she went out and hunted up Charley. He

was smoking downstairs, and trying to read the morning paper.

"Your wife wants you," said Miss Stuart brusquely; "go! only mind

this--don't stay too long, and don't talk too much."

He started to his feet--away went _Tribune_ and cigar, and up the

stairs sprang Charley--half a dozen at a time.

And then Miss Stuart sits down, throws her handkerchief over her face,

and for the next five minutes indulges in the exclusively feminine

luxury of a real good cry.

* * * * *

After that Mrs. Charles Stuart's recovery was perfectly magical in

its rapidity. Youth and splendid vitality, no doubt, had something

to do with it, but I think the fact that she _was_ Mrs. Charles

Stuart had more to do still.

There came a day, when propped up with pillows, she could sit erect,

and talk, and be talked to as much as she chose, when blinds were

pulled up, and sunshine poured in; and no sunshine that ever shone

was half so bright as her happy face. There came still another day,

when robed in a pretty pink morning-dress, Charley lifted her in his

arms and carried her to the arm-chair by the window, whence she could

look down on the bright, busy city street, whilst he sat at her feet

and talked. Talked! who is to tell of what? "Two souls with but a

single thought--two hearts that beat as one," generally find enough

to say for themselves, I notice, and require the aid of no outsiders.

And there came still another day--a fortnight after, when looking

pale and sweet, in a dark-gray travelling suit and hat, Mrs. Charles

Stuart, leaning on her husband's arm, said good-by to her friends,

and started on her bridal tour. They were to spend the next three

weeks South, and then return for Trixy's wedding at Christmas.

Christmas came; merry Christmas, sparkling with snow and sunshine,

as Christmas ever should sparkle, and bringing that gallant ex-officer

of Scotch Grays, Captain Angus Hammond--captain no longer--plain Mr.

Hammond, done with drilling and duty, and getting the route forever,

going in for quiet, country life in bonnie Scotland, with Miss Beatrix

Stuart for aider and abettor.

Charley and his wife came to New York for the wedding. They had told

Mr. Hammond how ill Edith had been, but the young Scotchman, as he

pulled his ginger whiskers and stared in her radiant, blooming face,

found it difficult indeed to realize. She had been a pretty girl--a

handsome woman--happiness had made her more--she was lovely now. For

Charley--outwardly all his easy insouciance had returned--he submitted

to be idolized and made much of by his wife, after the calm fashion

of lordly man. But you had only to see him look once into her

beautiful, laughing face, to know how passionately she was beloved.

Mr. and Mrs. Angus Hammond had a splendid wedding; and to say our

Trixy looked charming would be doing her no sort of justice. And

again Miss Seton was first bridesmaid, and Mrs. Stuart, in lavender

silk, sniffed behind a fifty dollar pocket handkerchief, as in duty

bound. They departed immediately after the ceremony for Scotland

and a Continental tour--that very tour which, as you know, Trixy

was cheated so cruelly out of three years before.

Mr. and Mrs. Stuart went back South to finish the winter and the

honeymoon among the glades of Florida, and "do," as Charley said,

"Love among the Roses." Mr. Darrell returned to Sandypoint. Mrs.

Stuart, senior, took up her abode with Nellie Seton, pending such

time as her children should get over the first delirium of

matrimonial bliss and settle quietly down to housekeeping. After

that it was fixed that she was to divide her time equally between

them, six months with each. Charley and his wife would make England

their home; Edith's ample fortune lay there, and both loved the fair

old land.

In May they sailed for England. They would spend the whole of the

summer in Continental travelling--the pleasant rambling life suited

them well. But they went down to Cheshire first; and one soft May

afternoon stood side by side in the old Gothic church where the

Catherons for generations had been buried. The mellow light came

softly through the painted windows--up in the organ loft, a young

girl sat playing to herself soft, sweet, solemn melodies. And both

hearts bowed down in tender sadness as they stood before _one_ tomb,

the last erected within those walls, that of Sir Victor Catheron.

Edith pulled her veil over her face--the only tears that had filled

her eyes since her second wedding-day falling quietly now.

There were many remembrances of the dead man. A beautiful memorial

window, a sombre hatchment, and a monument of snow-white marble. It

was very simple--it represented only a broken shaft, and beneath in

gold letters this inscription:

SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF

SIR VICTOR CATHERON, of Catheron Royals, Bart.

DIED OCT. 3, 1867, in the 24th year of his age.

"_His sun set while it was yet day_."

THE END.