When Greta parted from Hugh Ritson three hours before, she was in an
agony of suspense. Another strange threat had terrified her. She had
been asked to make choice of one of two evils; refusing to believe in
Hugh Ritson's power, she had rejected both. But the uncertainty was
terrible. To what lengths might not passion, unrequited passion,
defeated passion, outraged passion, lead a man like Hugh Ritson? Without
pity, without remorse, with a will that was relentless and a heart that
never knew truth, he was a man to flinch at no extremity. What had he
meant?
Greta's first impulse had been to go in search of her husband, but this
was an idle and a foolish thought. Where should she look? Besides this,
she had promised to remain in the convent until her husband should come
for her, and she must keep her word. She did not go to supper when the
gong sounded, but crept up to her room. The bell rang for vespers, and
Greta did not go to the chapel. She lay down in anguish and wept
scalding tears. The vesper hymn floated up to her where she lay, and she
was still weeping. There was no light in this dark place; there was no
way out of this maze but to wait and suffer.
And slowly the certainty stole upon her that Hugh Ritson had made no
idle threat. He was a resolute man; he had given her a choice of two
courses, and had she not taken a selfish part? If Paul, her husband,
were indeed in danger, no matter from what machination of villainy--was
it much to ask that she, his wife, should rescue him by a sacrifice that
fell heaviest upon herself? Hugh Ritson had been right--her part had
been a selfish one. Oh, where was Mr. Christian? She had telegraphed for
him, and he had answered that he would come; yet hour had followed hour,
and still he had not arrived.
Three hours she tossed in agony. She heard the sisters pass up the
echoing stone staircase to their dormitories, and then the silent house
became as dumb as a vault. Not a ripple flowed into this still tarn from
the great stream of the world that rushed and surged and swelled with
the clangor of a million voices around its incrusted sides.
Her window overlooked the Abbey Gardens. All was quiet beneath. Not a
step sounded on the pavement. Before her the blank wall was black, and
the dark, leafless trees stood out from the vague green of the grass
beyond. Against the sky were the dim outlines of the two towers of the
old abbey--by day a great rock for the pigeons that wheeled above the
tumbling sea of the city, by night a skull of stone from which the voice
of the bell told of the flight of time.
Out of the calm of a moment's stupefaction Greta was awakened by a knock
at her door. The novice entered and told her that a woman waited below
to speak with her. Greta betrayed no surprise, and she was beyond the
reach of fresh agitation. Without word or question she followed the
novice to the room where Mrs. Drayton sat.
She recognized the landlady and heard her story. Greta's heart leaped up
at the thought of rejoining her husband. Here was the answer to the
prayer that had gone up she knew not how often from her troubled heart.
Soon she would be sure that Hugh Ritson's threat was vain. Soon she
would be at Paul's side and hold his hand, and no earthly power should
separate them again. Ah, thank God, the merciful Father, who healed the
wounded hearts of His children, she should very soon be happy once more,
and all the sorrows of these past few days would fade away into a dim
memory.
"Twelve o'clock at St. Pancras, and you have the luggage in a cab at the
door, you say?"
"Yes; and there's no time to lose, for, to be sure, the night is going
fast," said Mrs. Drayton.
"And he will be there to meet me?" asked Greta. Her eyes, still wet with
recent tears, danced with a new-found joy.
"Yes, at St. Pancras," said the landlady.
Greta's happiness overflowed. She took the old woman in her arms and
kissed her wizened cheeks.
"Wait a minute--only a minute," she said, and tripped off with the swift
glide of a lapwing. But when she was half-way up the stairs her ardor
was arrested, and she returned with drooping face and steps of lead.
"But why did he not come for me himself?" she asked.
"The gentleman is not well--he is ill," said Mrs. Drayton.
"Ill? You say he is ill? Then he could not come. And I blamed him for
not coming!"
"The gentleman is weak, but noways worse; belike he will go straight off
and meet you at the station."
Greta turned away once again, and went upstairs slowly. At a door on the
first landing she tapped lightly, and when a voice answered from within
she entered the room.
The superior was on her knees at a table. She lifted a calm and
spiritual face as Greta approached.
"Reverend mother," said Greta, "I am leaving you this moment."
"So soon, my daughter?"
"My husband has sent for me; he will meet me at the railway station at
twelve."
"Why did he not come himself?"
"He is ill; he has gone direct."
"The hour is late and the message is sudden. Are you satisfied?"
"I am anxious, reverend mother--"
"What is it, my daughter?"
"An old gentleman, a clergyman, Mr. Christian, is coming from
Cumberland. I have expected him hourly, but he is not yet arrived. I
cannot wait; I must rejoin my husband. Will you order that a message be
left for the clergyman?"
"What is the message, my child?"
"Simply that I have returned with my husband by the train leaving St.
Pancras at midnight."
"The lay sister in the hall shall deliver it."
"Who is the sister?"
"Sister Grace."
There was a silence.
"Reverend mother, has Sister Grace ever spoken of the past?"
The superior told a few beads.
"The past is as nothing to us here, my daughter. Within these walls the
world does not enter. In the presence of the Cross the past and the
future are one."
Greta drew a long breath. Then she stooped and kissed the hand of the
superior, and turned softly away.
Greta and the landlady passed out through the deep portico, and the same
nun who had opened the door closed it behind them. Mrs. Drayton clung to
Greta's arm as they went through, and her hand trembled perceptibly.
"Who is she?" whispered the landlady, when they were seated in a cab.
"Sister Grace," said Greta, and turned her head aside.
"I could ha' sworn as she were the mother of my Paul," murmured Mrs.
Drayton.
Greta faced about, but the landlady saw nothing of the look of inquiry;
her eyes, like her thoughts, were far away.