I had listened to the maid's steps as she returned up stairs, and I
believed I knew in what direction they had tended after she reached the
floor above. I would just see if one of the windows on the south side
was lighted, and, if so, if it was in any way accessible.
To make my way through the shrubbery without rousing the attention of
any one inside or out required a circumspection that tried me greatly.
But by dint of strong self-control I succeeded in getting to the
vantage-place I sought, without attracting attention or causing a single
window to fly up. This reassured me, and perceiving a square of light in
the dark mass of wall before me I peered about among the trees
overlooking this part of the building for one I could climb without too
much difficulty.
The one which looked most feasible was a maple with
low-growing-branches, and throwing off my coat I was soon half-way to
its top and on a level, or nearly so, with the window on which I had
fixed my eye.
There were no curtains to this window--the house being half dismantled
in anticipation of Mrs. Carew's departure--but it was still protected by
a shade, and this was drawn down, nearly to the ledge.
But not quite. A narrow space intervened which, to an eye placed where
mine was, offered a peep-hole of more or less satisfactory proportions,
and this space, I soon saw, widened perceptibly from time to time as the
wind caught at the shade and blew it in.
With utmost caution I shifted my position till I could bring my eye
fairly in line with the interior of this room, and finding that the
glimpse given revealed little but a blue wall and some snowy linen, I
waited for the breeze to blow that I might see more.
It came speedily, and in a gust which lifted the shade and thus
disclosed the whole inside of the room. It was an instantaneous glimpse,
but in that moment the picture projected upon my eye satisfied me that,
despite my doubts, despite my causes for suspicion, I had been doing
this woman the greatest injustice in supposing that her relations to
the child she had brought into her home were other than she had made
out.
She had come up as she had promised, and had seated herself on the bed
with her face turned toward the window. I could thus catch its whole
expression--an expression this time involuntary and natural as the
feelings which prompted it. The child, with his newly-obtained toy
clutched in one hand, knelt on the coverlet with his head pressed
against her breast, saying his prayers. I could hear his soft murmur,
though I could not catch the words.
But sweet as was the sight of his little white-clad form burying its
head, with its mass of dusky curls, against the breast in which he most
confided, it was not this alone which gave to the moment its almost
sacred character. It was the rapturous look with which Mrs. Carew gazed
down on this little head--the mother-look, which admits of nothing
false, and which when once seen on a woman's face, whether she be mother
in fact or mother only in heart--idealizes her in the mind for ever.
Eloquent with love and holy devotion the scene flashed upon my eyes for
a moment and was gone. But that moment made its impression, and settled
for good and all the question with which I had started upon this
adventure. She _was_ the true woman and I was the dreaming fool.
As I realized this I also realized that three days out of the seven were
gone.