"Oh, miss," said the woman, dropping her gossip, and returning to her
gratitude (which was genuine)--"oh, miss, mayn't I know your name? I
want to put it in me prayers. There was just three cents in the house,
miss, when you came; and Lyddy she couldn't eat the last meal I got for
her--a cracker and a piece of mackerel."
"You can pray for me without a name," said Eve, going out.
She felt as though there were hot coals in her throat, she could
scarcely breathe. She went towards the forest, and, entering it by a
cart-track, walked rapidly on. Rose Bonham was the daughter of the
butter-woman. Bonham had a forest farm about five miles from Port aux
Pins on the road to Betsy Lake, and his wife kept Paul's cottage
supplied with butter. Eve had seen the daughter several times; she was a
very beautiful girl. Eve and Cicely thought her bold; but the women who
eat the butter are apt to think so of those who bring it, if the
bringers have sparkling eyes, peach-like complexions, and the gait of
Hebe.
And Paul himself had suggested the spending the night there--an entirely
unnecessary thing--under the pretence of gaining thereby an earlier
start in the morning.
She came to a little pool of clear water; pausing beside it, half
unconsciously, she beheld the reflection of her face in its mirror, and
something seemed to say to her, "What is your education, your culture,
your senseless pride worth, when compared with the peach-like bloom of
that young girl?" Her own image looked up at her, pale, cold, and stern;
it did not seem to her to have a trace of beauty. She took a stone, and,
casting it in the pool, shattered the picture. "I wish I were beautiful
beyond words! I _could_ be beautiful if I had everything; if nothing but
the finest lace ever touched me, if I never raised my hand to do
anything for myself, if I had only dainty and delicate and beautiful
things about me, I should be beautiful--I know I should. Bad women have
those things, they say; why haven't they the best of it?"
She began to walk on again. She had not given much thought to the
direction her steps were taking; now it came to her that the road to
Lake Betsy, and therefore to Bonham's, was not far away, and she crossed
the wood towards it. When she reached it, she turned towards Bonham's.
Five miles. It was now after five o'clock.
When she came in sight of the low roof and scattered out-buildings a
sudden realization of what she was doing came to her, and she stopped.
Why was she there? If they should see her, any of them, what would they
think? What could she say? As though they were already upon her, she
took refuge hastily behind the high bushes with which the road was
bordered. "Oh, what have I come here for? Humiliating! Let me get back
home!--let me get back home!" She returned towards Port aux Pins by the
fields, avoiding the road; the shadows were dense now; it was almost
night.
She had gone more than a mile when she stopped. An irresistible force
impelled her, and she retraced her steps. When she reached Bonham's the
second time, lights were shining from the windows. The roughly-built
house rose directly from the road. Blinds and curtains were evidently
considered superfluous. With breathless eagerness she drew near; the
evening was cool, and the windows were closed; through the small
wrinkled panes she could distinguish a wrinkled Cicely, a wrinkled
judge, a Hollis much askew, and a Paul Tennant with a dislocated jaw;
they were playing a game. After some moments she recognized that it was
whist; she almost laughed aloud, a bitter laugh at herself; she had
walked five miles to see a game of whist.
A dog barked, she turned away and began her long journey homeward.
But the thought came to her, and would not leave her. "After the game is
over, and the others have gone to bed, he will see that girl somehow!"
She did not find the road a long one. Passion made it short, a passion
of jealous despair.
Reaching the town at last, she passed an ephemeral ice-cream saloon with
a large window; seated within, accompanied by a Port aux Pins youth of
the hobbledehoy species, was Rose Bonham, eating ice-cream.
The next evening at six the excursion party returned. At seven they were
seated at the tea-table. The little door-bell jangled loudly in the near
hall, there was a sound of voices; Paul, who was nearest the door, rose
and went to see what it was.
After a long delay he came back and looked in. They had all left the
table, and Cicely had gone to her room; Paul beckoned Eve out silently.
His face had a look that made her heart stop beating; in the narrow
hall, under the small lamp, he gave her, one by one, three telegraphic
despatches, open.
_The first:_ "_Monday._
"Break it to Cicely. Dear Ferdie died at dawn.
"SABRINA ABERCROMBIE."
_The second:_ _"Monday._
"Morrison died this morning. Telegraph your wishes.
"EDWARD KNOX, M.D."
_The third:_ "Wednesday._
"Morrison buried this afternoon. Address me, Charleston
Hotel, Charleston.
"EDWARD KNOX, M.D."
"I ought to have had them two days ago," said Paul. He stood with his
lips slightly apart looking at her, but without seeing her or seeing
anything.