Part 23 (1/2)

”Just as we all believed in Michael's innocence of the murder, so Andrea believed in your innocence of a crime even greater, never faltered in his belief, and went to his grave without a word of doubt. Oh! Fay, Fay, do you suppose there are many men like that?”

And Magdalen, who so seldom wept, suddenly burst into tears. Perhaps the thought forced itself through her mind, ”If only once long ago I had met with one little shred of such tender faith!”

”Andrea was better than I thought,” Fay faltered. The admission made her uneasy. She wished he had not been better, that her previous view of him had not been disturbed.

Magdalen's tears pa.s.sed quickly. She glanced again at Fay through a veil of them, looking earnestly for something she did not find.

”And Michael,” she went on gently. ”Dear, dear Michael. He gave himself for you, spent in one moment, not counting the cost, his life, his future, his good name--for your sake. And he goes on day by day, month by month, year in year out, enduring a living death without a word--for your sake. How long has Michael been in prison?”

”Two years.” Fay's voice was almost inaudible.

”Two years! Is it only two? To him it must seem like a hundred. But if his strength remains he will go on for thirteen more. Oh! Fay, was any man since the world began so loyal to any woman as your husband and your lover have been to you? You said just now that men were selfish and could not love. I have heard many women say the same. But _you_! How can _you_ say such a thing! To have met one man who was ready to love and serve them is not the lot of many women. Very few of us ever find anything more than a craving to be loved in the stubborn material of men's hearts. And we are thankful enough when we find that. But to have stood between two such men who must have crushed you between them if either of them had had one dishonouring thought of you. A momentary selfishness, a momentary jealousy in either of them, and--where would _you_ have been?”

”No one knows how good Michael is better than I do,” said Fay, ”but what you don't seem to realise is how awful these years have been for _me_.

He has suffered, but sometimes I think I have suffered more than he has.

No, I don't _think_ it, I _know_ it. He can't have suffered as much as I have.”

Magdalen put out her hand, and touched Fay's rough head with a tenderness that seemed new even to Fay, to whom she had been always tender.

”You have suffered more than Michael,” she said. ”I have endured certain things in my life, but I could never have endured as you have done the loss of my peace of mind. How have you lived through these two years?

What days and nights upon the rack it must have meant!”

Oh! the relief of those words. Fay leaned her head against her sister's knee, and poured forth the endless story of her agony. She had someone to confide in at last, and the person she loved best, at least whom she loved a little. She who had never borne a mosquito bite in silence, but had always shewn it to the first person she met, after rubbing it to a more prominent red, with a plaintive appeal for sympathy, was now able to tell her sister everything.

The recital took hours. A few minutes had been enough on the subject of the duke and Michael, but when Fay came to dilate on her own sufferings, when the autobiographical flood-gates were opened, it seemed as if the rush of confidences would never cease. Magdalen listened hour by hour.

Is it given even to the wisest of us ever to speak a true word about ourselves? Do our whispered or published autobiographies ever deceive anyone except ourselves? We alone seem unable to read between the lines of our self-revelations. We alone seem unable to perceive that sinister ghost-like figure of ourselves which we have unconsciously conjured up from our pages for all to see; the cruelly faithful reflection of one whom we have never known. Those who love us and have kept so tenderly for years the secret of our egotism or our false humility or our meanness, how can they endure to hear us unconsciously proclaim to the world what only Love may safely know concerning us?

Magdalen heard, till her heart ached to hear them, all the endless bolstered-up reasons why Fay was not responsible for Michael's fate. She heard all about the real murderer not confessing. She heard much that Fay would have died rather than admit. Gradually she realised that it was misery that had driven Fay to a partial confession, not as yet repentance, not the desire to save Michael. Misery starves us out of our prisons sometimes, tortures us into opening the doors of our cells bolted from within, but as a rule we make a long weary business of leaving our cells when only misery urges us forth. I think that Magdalen's heart must have sunk many times, but whenever Fay looked up she met the same tender, benignant look bent down upon her.

”Oh! why didn't I tell you before?” she said at last. ”I always wanted to, but I thought--at least I felt--I see I did you an injustice--I thought you might press me to--to----”

”_To confess_,” said Magdalen, her low voice piercing to Fay's very soul.

”Y-yes, at least to say something to a policeman or someone, so that Michael might be let out. I was afraid if I told you you would never give me any peace till Michael was released.”

”Have you _had_ any peace since he was put into prison?”

Fay shook her head.

”Make your mind easy, Fay, I shall never urge you to”--Magdalen hesitated--”to go against your conscience.”

”What would you have done in my place?” said Fay hastily.

”I should have had to speak.”

”You are better than me, Magdalen, more religious. You always have been.”