Part 30 (2/2)
She turned at last into the square where their house was. It was brilliantly lighted up, for Felicita was having one of her rare receptions that evening, and in another hour or two the rooms would be filled with guests. It was too early yet, and Hilda was playing on her piano in the drawing-room, the merry notes ringing out into the quiet night. There was a side door to Phebe's studio, by which she could go in and out at pleasure, and she stood at it trying to fit her latch-key into the lock with her trembling hands. Looking back she saw Jean Merle some little distance away, leaning against the railings that enclosed the Square garden.
”Oh! I must run back to him! I must speak to him again!” she cried to her own heart. In another instant she was at his side, with her hands clasping his.
”Oh!” she sobbed, ”what can I do for you? This is too miserable for you; and for me as well. Tell me what I can do.”
”Nothing,” he answered. ”Why, you make me feel as if I had sinned again in telling you all this. I ought not to have troubled your happy heart with my sorrow.”
”It was not you,” she said, ”you did not even come to tell me; G.o.d brought you. I can bear it. But oh! to see you shut out, and inside, yonder, Hilda is playing, and Felix, perhaps, is there. They will be singing by-and-by, and never know who is standing outside, in the foggy night, listening to them.”
Her voice broke into sobs, but Jean Merle did not notice them.
”And Felicita?” he said.
Phebe could not answer him for weeping. Just yet she could hardly bring herself to think distinctly of Felicita; though in fact her thoughts were full of her. She ran back to her private door, and this time opened it readily. There was a low light in the studio from a shaded lamp standing on the chimney-piece, which made the hearth bright, but left all the rest of the room in shadow. Phebe threw off her bonnet and cloak with a very heavy and troubled sigh.
”What can make you sigh, Phebe?” asked a low-toned and plaintive voice.
In the chair by the fire-place, pushed out of the circle of the light, she saw Felicita leaning back, and looking up at her. The beauty of her face had never struck harshly upon Phebe until now; at this moment it was absolutely painful to her. The rich folds of her velvet dress, and the soft and costly lace of her head-dress, distinct from though resembling a widow's cap, set off both her face and figure to the utmost advantage. Phebe's eyes seemed to behold her more distinctly and vividly than they had done for some years past; for she was looking through them with a dark background for what she saw in her own brain. She was a strikingly beautiful woman; but the thought of what anguish and dread had been concealed under her reserved and stately air, so cold yet so gentle, filled Phebe's soul with a sudden terror. What an awful life of self-approved, stoical falsehood she had been living! She could see the man, from whom she had just parted, standing without, homeless and friendless, on the verge of pennilessness; a dead man in a living world, cut off from all the ties and duties of the home and the society he loved. But to Phebe he did not appear so wretched as Felicita was.
She sank down on a seat near Felicita, with such a feeling of heart-sickness and heart-faintness as she had never experienced before.
The dreariness and perplexity of the present stretched before her into the coming years. For almost the first time in her life she felt worn-out; physically weary and exhausted, as if her strength had been overtaxed. Her childhood on the fresh, breezy uplands, and her happy, tranquil temperament had hitherto kept her in perfect health. But now she felt as if the sins of those whom she had loved so tenderly and loyally touched the very springs of her life. She could have shared any other burden with them, and borne it with an unbroken spirit and an uncrushed heart. But such a sin as this, so full of woe and bewilderment to them all, entangled her soul also in its poisonous web.
”Why did you sigh so bitterly?” asked Felicita again.
”The world is so full of misery,” she answered, in a tremulous and troubled voice; ”its happiness is such a mockery!”
”Have you found that out at last, dear Phebe?” said Felicita. ”I have been telling you so for years. The Son of Man fainting under the Cross--that is the true emblem of human life. Even He had not strength enough to bear His cross to the place called Golgotha. Whenever I think of what most truly represents our life here, I see Jesus, faltering along the rough road, with Simon behind Him, whom they compelled to bear His cross.”
”He fainted under the sins of the world,” murmured Phebe. ”It is possible to bear the sorrows of others; but oh! it is hard to carry their sins.”
”We all find that out,” said Felicita, her face growing wan and white even to the lips. ”Can one man do evil without the whole world suffering for it? Does the effect of a sin ever die out? What is done cannot be undone through all eternity. There is the wretchedness of it, Phebe.”
”I never felt it as I do now,” she answered.
”Because you have kept yourself free from earthly ties,” said Felicita mournfully; ”you have neither husband nor child to increase your power of suffering a hundred-fold. I am entering upon another term of tribulation in Felix and Hilda. If I had only been like you, dear Phebe, I could have pa.s.sed through life as happily as you do; but my life has never belonged to myself; it has been forced to run in channels made by others.”
Somewhere in the house behind them a door was left open accidentally, and the sound of Hilda's piano and of voices singing broke in upon the quiet studio. Phebe listened to them, and thought of the desolate, broken-hearted man without, who was listening too. The clear young voices of their children fell upon his ears as upon Felicita's; so near they were to one another, yet so far apart. She s.h.i.+vered and drew nearer to the fire.
”I feel as cold as if I was a poor outcast in the streets,” she said.
”And I, too,” responded Felicita; ”but oh! Phebe, do not you lose heart and courage, like me. You have always seemed in the suns.h.i.+ne, and I have looked up to you and felt cheered. Don't come down into the darkness to me.”
Phebe could not answer, for the darkness was closing round her. Until now there had happened no perplexity in her life which made it difficult to decide upon the right or the wrong. But here was come a coil. The long years had reconciled her to Roland's death, and made the memory of him sacred and sorrowfully sweet, to be brooded over in solitary hours in the silent depths of her loyal heart. But he was alive again, with no right to be alive, having no explanation to give which could reinstate him in his old position. And Felicita? Oh! what a cruel, unwomanly wrong Felicita had been guilty of! She could not command her voice to speak again.
”I must go,” said Felicita, at last. ”I wish I had not invited visitors for to-night.”
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