She lay still, patting my face with her hand and saying: "I am--it
is--well, it seems also to be one of God's ways:
'We look before and after
And pine for what is not.'"
I heard her try to laugh in her old, brave way. She was looking again
into my eyes, and I sat holding her hand.
"But Colonel Goff," she went on, "gentleman that he is, thinks he must
settle the account for his blundering ride, and begs me to marry him
anyway; I, a cripple for life. He forgets that God balanced it when he
stopped me from the sin of selling my heart for--for--his bauble--
"I have sent him away satisfied, Jack. I believe he would love me
truly," and she smiled, "now that he sees that I cannot ride. Love me
for myself and not for my riding; but I shall love only you, Jack, till
I die--the old crippled woman."
She was silent for a moment. "And the compensation for my admitting
it--you know it is costing me something--you don't know how hard it is
for me to say it first, Jack; but the compensation I claim, will you
give it to your little lame girl? It is this, and now nod your head,
say '_yes_' Jack. I've seen--Elsie loves you, and you must--you must
marry the child. She is everything you want, and you half-way love her
already. It will be easy now, Jack, promise it; for your sake--for both
your sakes, I'm asking. Promise me, Jack, I want to see you happy."
She had my hand against her cheek, fondling it. Her eyes had never
seemed so beautiful.
[Illustration: "LOVE IS NOT LOVE THAT ALTERS."]
"Do you remember the kind of love I said I had for you that first night
after I came home?" She pressed my hand against her cheek again. "And
the kind you said you'd never felt, but would give your life to feel?"
Again I felt the pressure. "That kind which I told you of, and which I
have had for you all the time, is that kind that Shakespeare told of
when he said:
"'Love is not love that alters when it alteration finds.'
"That's the kind I have for you, Eloise--have always had; and do you
remember the love you said you wanted, you'd give your life for,
yourself, your soul and your body. '_I, who wish it so, to be widowed
of it all my life_'--those were your words. How they cut into my
heart--that love, Eloise, can't you see? Don't you know that it is
yours and you are widowed of it no longer?"
She put her arms around my neck and pulled my face down to hers,
smothering her mouth in my kisses.
"Oh, Jack, why did you say it--see it? Why did you not let me fool
myself--fool you? Why--and--oh, if you had only not seen it--not let me
know you saw it! Love? Don't you know now that the kind I said I'd
have is as I said it was? Worth life--worth death--worth all--worth
all--then God help me, Jack, if I sin--God forgive me, but I'd rather
hold it to my heart a helpless cripple that I am--hold it never to
satisfy it--never to know what it means, helpless, bed-ridden cripple
that I am than to be the well, strong thing I was without it. Oh, Jack,
don't you know now what I mean?"
She kissed me again and again, holding my cheek to hers.
"Good-by, you'll not see me again, Jack, so good-by, Jack, forever. And
in time, though you'll never forget me nor cease to love me, you will do
as I said; for yours is youth and love and strength, and they must be
mated. When you can think of me without tears, without sorrow or pity,
but as one who has lived and is gone--only as the memory of a sweet
dream that might have been--then, dear, dear Jack, remember the last
request I made of you, remember to make Elsie happy; and in time--in
time, Jack, oh, what a love-maker he is! be happy yourself. Hold me a
moment, just a moment to your heart--then--kiss me again and say with me
the little prayer Aunt Lucretia used to make us say, holding hands in
the long ago."
Holding her face against mine, and with clasped hands as of old, we
said:
"Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take."
Although the words of Eloise came to me again and again as I rode home
that night, I was never so happy, nor so hopeful. Yet she had said,
"Good-by, good-by, Jack, I shall never see you again."
"I shall see her to-morrow night," my heart kept saying over and over.
"I will not give her up; I will marry her, if I have to carry her in my
arms through life!"
But the next night when I rode over my grandfather met me at the door.
He greeted me with petulant indifference. Both Eloise and Aunt Lucretia
had left that morning--where, he did not know. She was a hopeless
cripple with a broken spine, and was carried away in a cot to some
institution where she might be cared for properly for the balance of her
life. I forgave the old man because he was old--the reiterated
statement that he had made allowance for her care himself, for although
she was no blood kin, and had no claim upon him, she had been with him
all her life, and was a ward of his daughter.
I could learn nothing from the servants. Aunt Lucretia, Eloise, and the
nurse had gone. They had carried Eloise in a cot to the train and
boarded it. It was Thomas, the driver, who gave me Aunt Lucretia's
letter. She wrote, "I have thought it all over, Jack, and this is the
only thing to do. All of them are agreed, that she can never walk again.
To keep her at home will only make life a tragedy to you both. It is
best that you never see her again, nor she you. Sentiment is one thing,
and life another. Sometimes they go together, and it is well. But when
they cannot, when sentiment lives and that love of nature which
reproduces life is dead, it is folly to quibble, for the loss of being
is the loss of life. Be sensible, brave, and manly as you have always
been and forget Eloise. Changed conditions change one's life. You must
change yours. I have a request to make. I shall be at home in a month,
but I do not want you ever to mention Eloise to me, for I shall not tell
you where she is. This is hard, but I am doing it for your good, as I
have always done, my dear boy. When I return if she is alive you may
write to her, since she has begged me so, and this is the only one
happiness the poor child will have in her stunted life, and I will see
that she gets the letters, though she can never reply. It is best to
forget."
The little note Eloise sent brought tears. It was a heart's-ease that
Aunt Lucretia had evidently gathered for her, and under it was written,
"_I am widowed of love but I am wedded. Forgive me, forget me, but love
me always, Jack, as I shall you--Eloise._"
*CHAPTER II*
*A DREAM AND ITS ENDING*
In my grief at the going of Eloise I remember little of what I did in
the next few days. Then I received a note from Colonel Goff asking me
to ride over to The Manor, as both he and Elsie wanted to see me.
On the way I stopped to see Tammas and Marget. In their worship of
Elsie I believe they thought only of her and her happiness. They had
certainly not understood about my relations with Eloise. Their
happiness was plain to be seen, the very laughter which at times broke
over their honest faces told me clearly their pride and happiness in the
turn affairs had taken with Elsie and me.
But despite my efforts not to show what was crushing my heart, they
perceived that something was very seriously wrong with me.
"Ay, Jackie, 'tis a hard time you have been having, my lad," said
Tammas, "and it's unreasonable to think the old General would turn you
out of home like this; but the final word in the book of every honest
man's life is the word good, and you'll not be losing out in the
end--na, na."
"I think you are going now to see our lassie," said Marget, smiling
slyly, "and sure, Jackie, if ever man had recompense in the sweetness of
love 'tis you. Never have I seen anything sae near an angel of light in
spirit and sae beautiful in body, since she came up the hill to us that
evening with her doubts all gone; ay, it is Tammas and I who are as
happy as you, Jackie!"
She sighed. "I dinna ken that it's a' gladness," she went on; "for the
Earl is preparing to leave soon for his estate in the auld country, and
he wants us to gang wi' him--of course--but--" and she looked at me
gravely as if seeking answer.
But I only shook my head sadly. "I do not know, Marget--I do not know.
My plans--you see--Aunt Lucretia and Eloise--that awful accident!"
Marget started to speak, but Tammas stopped her quickly, whispering to
her, "Wheest, wumman, dinna ye see, dinna ye understaun--she was as his
ain sister. It's that that's saddening him." And then he added louder,
"Eh, but it was a terrible thing--she that was sae young an' daring and
sae bonnie--to be an invalid a' her days--the bold beautiful thing that
loved life sae weel! An' it's a' but upset the Earl. I hae never kent
him to be sae troubled, for he was unco fond o' her, an' a grand
Countess she wad hae made him. An' to think it was his ain horse! The
puir man is nearly daft!"
I was silent. I could not speak. For once the kindly talk of these two
good folks annoyed me. Marget saw this, and with a motherly tenderness
that touched me deeply, said, "Weel--weel, Jackie, dinna take it sae to
heart. When you go to her ain land an' see what you have won in oor
lassie, ye'll be sayin' with Rabbie Burns that 'tis the only place to
live and love in. But awa' ye gang," she said, giving me a gentle push;
"it's near supper time a' ready an' fine I ken that she an' the Earl are
wanting ye at The Manor. For three days she has come ower here,
wondering whit wey ye had na come; she kens aboot the accident an' is
sorrowfu', tae, but she's sae keen to see ye, Jackie, an' she'll be a
bit o' comfort till ye if ye will."
Colonel Goff was already making preparations for his going. I found him
more quiet and serious than I had ever seen him. I understood that he
would give anything in the world to undo the accident, and that he now
found that he cared more for Eloise since she was lost to us than he had
himself known, and that, like me, he was in total ignorance as to where
Aunt Lucretia had taken her.
"Jack, Jack!" he kept repeating as he walked the floor, "I can never
forgive myself! That beastly, beastly ride! To have loved horses as I
have all my life, to have done so much for them and their sport and to
have my pride in them all thrown away and the whole of my life changed
like that! ... There is Elsie--go with her, Jack--the child wants you!"
he added as he headed towards his stable.
I pitied him, but I pitied myself more. For, looking at him, hearing
him talk, I saw that he did not know and would never know. God had not
made him to know as Eloise and I knew, not even as Elsie would know. In
spite of all that had passed before him, and all that he had seen, he
did not know that as he talked of Eloise it was I who was suffering
most. He did not even see remotely that it was I who loved her, not
he.... There are fish in the deep sea which carry their own electric
light.... There are others there which have not even eyes! ...
Elsie was openly happy all the afternoon with me. Such dreams as she
had dreamt of our future! Such dreams as had come true even in her own
castle!
I let her talk and plan for our future. I did not know what it all
meant, whither Fate was hurrying me. I could not see the end, but I
knew that the end would be well. For the real architect of our lives is
God. The very shadow of our doubt becomes pictures done in beauty.
It takes shadows to make pictures. In the foreground of every shadow
already stands the picture from His hand. And as for the sorrows sent
of Him, they are not sorrows; rather are they crowns of Great Joy for
brows chosen of Martyrdom.... So I let her dream and love and plan,
knowing that whatever was coming to me would be good, that behind the
Wish of our own little dreams lay the larger Will of the Great
Dreamer....
In the afternoon I had slipped away to a place where two great maples
threw their shadows across the lawn. I was tired, and my heart was full
of conflicts. I wanted to think of Eloise.
It was a quiet, sweet place. Then I heard Elsie coming, full of
happiness, to judge from the very tread of her feet on the grass.
I was lying half propped against a tree. Looking up I saw she was
kneeling above me, her eyes laughing as she shyly peeped from behind the
trunk. There was a sofa pillow in her hands and she was trying to place
it under my head. "You must sleep, now," she said softly. "You are so
tired and hollow-cheeked, Jack, my bonnie Jack. I am going to begin to
learn now to take care of you. I will come to waken you in an hour,
then we are going to drive into town, father and you and me!"
She lingered a moment slyly; then stooped to kiss my forehead and was
gone.
I had not come to sleep, I had come to think of Eloise, to dream of her
once more. I took her note from my pocket; I kissed it and with tears I
read it. "_I was widowed of love but I am wedded. Forgive me, forget
me, but love me always, Jack, as I shall you,--Eloise._" How strange it
is, this joy-sorrow! There can be but one explanation of it: down the
endless chain of our ancestry so much sorrow has come that the taint of
it lies sweetly in the pedigree of our own breast.