IN a few days Madge received the following letter:—
‘FRANKFORT, O. M.,
HÔTEL WAIDENBUSCH.
‘MY DEAREST MADGE,—I do not know how to write to you. I have begun a
dozen letters but I cannot bring myself to speak of what lies before
me, hiding the whole world from me. Forgiveness! how is any
forgiveness possible? But Madge, my dearest Madge, remember that my
love is intenser than ever. What has happened has bound you closer
to me. I _implore_ you to let me come back. I will find a thousand
excuses for returning, and we will marry. We had vowed marriage to
each other and why should not our vows be fulfilled? Marriage,
marriage _at once_. You will not, you _cannot_, no, you _cannot_,
you must see you cannot refuse. My father wishes to make this town
his headquarters for ten days. Write by return for mercy’s
sake.—Your ever devoted
‘FRANK.’
The reply came only a day late.
‘MY DEAR FRANK,—Forgiveness! Who is to be forgiven? Not you. You
believed you loved me, but I doubted my love, and I know now that no
true love for you exists. We must part, and part forever. Whatever
wrong may have been done, marriage to avoid disgrace would be a wrong
to both of us infinitely greater. I owe you an expiation; your
release is all I can offer, and it is insufficient. I can only plead
that I was deaf and blind. By some miracle, I cannot tell how, my
ears and eyes are opened, and I hear and see. It is not the first
time in my life that the truth has been revealed to me suddenly,
supernaturally, I may say, as if in a vision, and I know the
revelation is authentic. There must be no wavering, no
half-measures, and I absolutely forbid another letter from you. If
one arrives I must, for the sake of my own peace and resolution,
refuse to read it. You have simply to announce to your father that
the engagement is at an end, and give no reasons.—Your faithful
friend
‘MADGE HOPGOOD.’
Another letter did come, but Madge was true to her word, and it was
returned unopened.
For a long time Frank was almost incapable of reflection. He dwelt on an
event which might happen, but which he dared not name; and if it should
happen! Pictures of his father, his home his father’s friends,
Fenmarket, the Hopgood household, passed before him with such wild
rapidity and intermingled complexity that it seemed as if the reins had
dropped out of his hands and he was being hurried away to madness.
He resisted with all his might this dreadful sweep of the imagination,
tried to bring himself back into sanity and to devise schemes by which,
although he was prohibited from writing to Madge, he might obtain news of
her. Her injunction might not be final. There was but one hope for him,
one possibility of extrication, one necessity—their marriage. It _must_
be. He dared not think of what might be the consequences if they did not
marry.
Hitherto Madge had given no explanation to her mother or sister of the
rupture, but one morning—nearly two months had now passed—Clara did not
appear at breakfast.
‘Clara is not here,’ said Mrs Hopgood; ‘she was very tired last night,
perhaps it is better not to disturb her.’
‘Oh, no! please let her alone. I will see if she still sleeps.’
Madge went upstairs, opened her sister’s door noiselessly, saw that she
was not awake, and returned. When breakfast was over she rose, and after
walking up and down the room once or twice, seated herself in the
armchair by her mother’s side. Her mother drew herself a little nearer,
and took Madge’s hand gently in her own.
‘Madge, my child, have you nothing to say to your mother?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Cannot you tell me why Frank and you have parted? Do you not think I
ought to know something about such an event in the life of one so close
to me?’
‘I broke off the engagement: we were not suited to one another.’
‘I thought as much; I honour you; a thousand times better that you should
separate now than find out your mistake afterwards when it is
irrevocable. Thank God, He has given you such courage! But you must
have suffered—I know you must;’ and she tenderly kissed her daughter.
‘Oh, mother! mother!’ cried Madge, ‘what is the worst—at least to—you—the
worst that can happen to a woman?’
Mrs Hopgood did not speak; something presented itself which she refused
to recognise, but she shuddered. Before she could recover herself Madge
broke out again,—
‘It has happened to me; mother, your daughter has wrecked your peace for
ever!’
‘And he has abandoned you?’
‘No, no; I told you it was I who left him.’
It was Mrs Hopgood’s custom, when any evil news was suddenly communicated
to her, to withdraw at once if possible to her own room. She detached
herself from Madge, rose, and, without a word, went upstairs and locked
her door. The struggle was terrible. So much thought, so much care,
such an education, such noble qualities, and they had not accomplished
what ordinary ignorant Fenmarket mothers and daughters were able to
achieve! This fine life, then, was a failure, and a perfect example of
literary and artistic training had gone the way of the common wenches
whose affiliation cases figured in the county newspaper. She was shaken
and bewildered. She was neither orthodox nor secular. She was too
strong to be afraid that what she disbelieved could be true, and yet a
fatal weakness had been disclosed in what had been set up as its
substitute. She could not treat her child as a sinner who was to be
tortured into something like madness by immitigable punishment, but, on
the other hand, she felt that this sorrow was unlike other sorrows and
that it could never be healed. For some time she was powerless, blown
this way and that way by contradictory storms, and unable to determine
herself to any point whatever. She was not, however, new to the tempest.
She had lived and had survived when she thought she must have gone down.
She had learned the wisdom which the passage through desperate straits
can bring. At last she prayed and in a few minutes a message was
whispered to her. She went into the breakfast-room and seated herself
again by Madge. Neither uttered a word, but Madge fell down before her,
and, with a great cry, buried her face in her mother’s lap. She remained
kneeling for some time waiting for a rebuke, but none came. Presently
she felt smoothing hands on her head and the soft impress of lips. So
was she judged.