It was Emilius's wife.
Lauretta assisted her indoors. The poor girl was in a pitiable plight.
Famished, ragged, penniless, with a baby in her arms. Both were
wringing wet. The pelting rain had soaked them through and through.
Throbbing with sympathy and compassion Lauretta quickly undressed
Patricia's baby, and put it in her own warm bed. They had by this time
reached Lauretta's bedroom, in which her own child was lying. Lauretta
wished to call the servants, but Patricia sobbed that she would fly
the house if any eyes but Lauretta's rested on her. It appeared,
according to the poor girl's story, that her father was in pursuit of
her, and had vowed to kill her and her baby.
"He will kill me--he will kill me!" moaned Patricia. "No one must know
I have been here but you--no one, no one!"
And then she rocked herself hysterically and cried, "What will become
of my poor baby-girl--what will become of her? I heard that your
husband was not here, and it gave me courage to crawl to you. Not that
it matters much. It isn't for myself I care. My father may kill me--I
have not long to live--but my baby, my baby! Oh, save my darling, save
her for the sake of my innocent Emilius!"
It was then that Lauretta noticed for the first time, signs in
Patricia's face which, interpreted by her fear and the poor girl's
words, seemed to be signs of approaching death. And still Patricia
insisted that she would not remain in the house; no force or
entreaties could make her.
"What, then, can I do for you?" asked Lauretta; she had already given
Patricia food and money.
"Take care of my child," replied Patricia. "Bring her up as your own.
Let her never know her father's disgrace, her mother's shame. It will
be an angel's deed! For pity's sake, do not deny me! You are rich, and
can afford the charity--and if, in your husband's life there has been
guilt, this act of charity will atone for it. See here--look on her
innocent face. Having the power, you have not the heart to deny me.
Ah, if your angel mother were alive, I should appeal to her, and
should not appeal in vain! She loved Emilius, and believed in his
innocence--yes, to the last she believed in it. I know it for a
certainty. You, too, loved my poor martyred husband, and he loved and
honoured you and yours with all the strength of his faithful heart. He
is innocent, innocent, I tell you! God forbid that I should accuse any
one of being guilty--I am too desperate and despairing, and my child's
life, the salvation of her soul, are at stake. When your sainted
mother died, did all goodness die out of the world? Ah, no--it is not
possible; you live again in her. In you she lives again, and all her
mercy and sweet kindness which caused us all, from the highest to the
lowest, to worship her, to look upon her as something holy. For her
sake, if not for my own, you cannot, cannot deny me this charity, you
who have it in your power to grant it!"
All this, and more. To say that Lauretta's heart was touched is
inadequate; it overflowed; it yearned to assist the suffering mother,
so near to her through her young motherhood, through the old ties with
Emilius and Eric. A choking cry from her own baby-girl caused her to
rush to the cradle. Within the hour a fatal circumstance occurred.
Lauretta's baby drew her last breath.
It has nearly all my days been my belief that everything in human life
is to be accounted for by human standards. I am shaken in this belief.
In this death of Lauretta's baby I seem to see the finger of fate.
Vain to attempt to describe the agonising grief of the young mother.
So overpowering was it that she lost consciousness. She recovered her
senses when the storm had passed and the morning's light was shining
on her. When she awoke to reality, what did she see?
Her husband had suddenly and unexpectedly returned home. She was in
bed, and he was sitting by her side.
"Gabriel, Gabriel!" she cried, and, overcome by the terror of her
great loss, she would have lost consciousness again but for an
unaccountable joyousness in his manner, which mingled strangely with
the sympathy he must have felt for her suffering condition.
"It was, doubtless, the storm," he said soothingly. "It raged so
fiercely for an hour and more, that I am told it exceeded in violence
anything of a like kind that has been experienced in these parts for
the last fifty years. No wonder it has had such an effect upon you.
Half the trees in our garden are uprooted. It hastened my steps home,
for I know how these convulsions of nature affect you. But as you see,
the danger has passed; the sun is shining brightly; but not more
brightly in the heavens than it is shining in my heart."
She listened to him in amazement, and raising herself in bed she
looked around for Patricia. She saw no sign of the hapless woman. The
cradle in which her baby-girl had died was by the side of the bed.
Carew bent over it and said in a tone of ecstasy:
"Mildred--Mildred! Our Mildred--our dear ewe lamb! How sweetly and
soundly she sleeps! Oh, my darling wife! What care I for the injustice
of the world now that this treasure is ours? My sweet--my sweet! You
recompense for all. Do you know, Lauretta, as travelling home I neared
the beloved spot which contained you and our treasure, my heart almost
stood still at the fear that I should not find you both well. And
now--how can I be sufficiently grateful? Of no account to me is all
that transpires outside the circle which contains you and my dear one
in the cradle here? I set great store upon our child, Lauretta. She is
to me a guarantee of all that is worth living for in the present and
the future. When I arrived home and found you prostrate I was at first
overwhelmed, but I soon discovered that you had fainted, and I judged
rightly, did I not, dear wife of my heart, that, not being strong, you
kept it from me while we were apart, in order not to distress me? But
now all is well--all shall be well. See, Lauretta, she opens her eyes,
our darling. The question is, can I raise her safely and place her by
your side? Yes, it is done, and I am the happiest father in the
world!"
Was she dreaming? In the clothes in which her child died rested this
child of Patricia's, smiling, blooming, laughing and crowing as
Lauretta drew her to her breast. Carew's delight, his gratitude, his
worship of the babe he believed to be his own, the superstitious store
he set upon her young life, were so unbounded, that Lauretta did not
dare to undeceive him. She feared, if she told him the truth, that it
would unsettle his reason, and produce between her and him a gulf
which could never be bridged over. She accepted the strange
combination of circumstances, and held her tongue. Her own dear babe
was dead, but this new Mildred, whom she grew to love truly as if she
were her own, remained, and grew to what she is, a flower of beauty,
goodness, and sweetness. Nothing more did Lauretta hear of Patricia;
whether she died or lived was not known to her. It is but a
detail--but necessary to complete the story--to state here that
Patricia lived but a few months after the occurrence of this strange
event. More important is it to state that, in some unexplained way,
Emilius learns that his daughter lived, and that the Carews were
bringing her up as if she were a child of their own. His term of
imprisonment over, he had come now to claim her.
It would be impossible for me to give expression to my feelings of
gratitude at this wonderful revelation. The despair into which I had
fallen at the contemplation of the wrecking of my dear son Reginald's
happiness vanished. A fair future lay still before him, and the most
cherished hopes of his heart would be realised. I was sure that
Emilius would not mar them. A nature so noble as his, so strong in
suffering, so heroic in the highest form of human endurance, could not
lend itself to the committal of a petty act of selfishness whereby the
child upon whose memory he had lived during his cruel and unjust
imprisonment would be rendered miserable and unhappy. To this martyred
man I was ready to bow my head, ready to give him my friendship, my
sympathy, my heart's best fruits of confidence and esteem. Thinking of
him, I was awed that a man could live through the anguish that had
been his portion, and still retain the inherent dignity and nobility
of a great and noble nature.