Part 10 (1/2)

”For the children's sake,” she murmured, still looking away from him; ”yes! and for the sake of our name, your father's name, and mine. I thought to bring honor to it, and you have brought flagrant dishonor to it.”

”That can never be wiped away,” he added.

”Never!” she repeated.

As if exhausted by these pa.s.sionate words, they fell again into silence.

The murmur of whispered prayers was about them, and the faint scent of incense floated under the arched roof. A gleam of morning light, growing stronger, though the sun was still far below the eastern mountains, glittered through a painted window, and threw a glow of color upon them.

Roland saw her standing in its many-tinted brightness, but her wan and sorrowful face was not turned to look at him. He had not caught a glance from her yet. How vividly he remembered the first moment his eyes had ever beheld her, standing as she did now on these very altar steps, with uplifted eyes and a sweet seriousness on her young face! It was only a poor village church, but it was the most sacred spot in the whole world to him; for there he had met Felicita and received her image into his inmost heart. His ambition as well as his love had centred in her, the penniless daughter of the late Lord Riversford, an orphan, and dependent upon her father's brother and successor. But to Roland his wife Felicita was immeasurably dearer than the girl Felicita Riversford had been. All the happy days since he had won her, all the satisfied desires, all his successes were centred in her and represented by her.

All his crime too.

”I have loved you,” he cried, ”better than the whole world.”

There was no answer by word or look to his pa.s.sionate words.

”I have loved you,” he said, more sadly, ”better than G.o.d.”

”But you have brought me to shame!” she answered; ”if I am tracked here--and who can tell that I am not?--and if you are taken and tried and convicted, I shall be the wife of the fraudulent banker and condemned felon, Roland Sefton. And Felix and Hilda will be his children.”

”It is true,” he groaned; ”I could not escape conviction.”

He buried his face in his hands, and rested them on the altar-rails. Now his bowed-down head was immediately beneath her eyes, and she looked down upon it with a mournful gaze; it could not have been more mournful if she had been contemplating his dead face lying at rest in his coffin.

How was all this shame and misery for him and her to end?

”Felicita,” he said, lifting up his head, and meeting the sorrowful farewell expression in her face, ”if I could die it would be best for the children and you.”

”Yes,” she answered, in the sweet, too dearly loved voice he had listened to in happy days.

”I dare not open that door of escape for myself,” he went on, ”and G.o.d does not send death to me. But I see a way, a possible way. I only see it this moment; but whether it be for good or evil I cannot tell.”

”Will it save us?” she asked eagerly.

”All of us,” he replied. ”This stranger, whose corpse I have just left--n.o.body knows him, and he has no friends to trouble about him--shall I give to him my name, and bury him as myself? Then I shall be dead to all the world, Felicita; dead even to you; but you will be saved. I too shall be safe in the grave, for death covers all sins. Even old Clifford will be satisfied by my death.”

”Could it be done?” she asked breathlessly.

”Yes,” he said; ”if you consent it shall be done. For my own sake I would rather go back to England and deliver myself up to the law I have broken. But you shall decide, my darling. If I return you will be known as the wife of the convict Sefton. Say: shall I be henceforth dead forever to you and my mother and the children? Shall it be a living death for me, and deliverance and safety and honor for you all? You must choose between my infamy or my death.”

”It must be,” she answered, slowly yet without hesitation, looking away from him to the cross above the altar, ”your death.”

A shudder ran through her slight frame as she spoke, and thrilled through him as he listened. It seemed to them both as if they stood beside an open grave, on either side one, and parted thus. He stretched out his hand to her, and laid it on her dress, as if appealing for mercy; but she did not turn to him, or look upon him, or open her white lips to utter another word. Then there came more stir and noise in the church, footsteps sounded upon the pavement, and an inquisitive face peeped out of the vestry near the altar where they stood. It was no longer prudent to remain as they were, subject to curiosity and scrutiny. Roland rose from his knees, and without glancing again toward her, he spoke in a low voice of unutterable grief and supplication.

”Let me see you and speak to you once more,” he said.

”Once more,” she repeated.

”This evening,” he continued, ”at your hotel.”

”Yes,” she answered. ”I am travelling under Phebe Marlowe's name. Ask for Mrs. Marlowe.”