Part 38 (1/2)

Catherine had broken down at last; she turned her head from them and made no reply to their salutations.

Sister Eliza looked at her Chief thoughtfully for a moment; then made a sign to Susan, and they went out together.

Catherine sat alone in her chair over the dead fire. For hours after they had gone she remained there brooding, motionless, in agony; and when at last she rose with a s.h.i.+ver to retire to her bed, it seemed as if many years had pa.s.sed over her head in that time, so old and haggard appeared her features. Her eyes were red but not with weeping--for she could shed no tear--but hot and dry with a tearless anguish that could never find relief.

But she determined--even if she died of the agony of it--that she would do her duty. ”_My duty! My duty!_” she kept murmuring to herself in her fierce resolve; and she had strong need, indeed, to keep the Cause constantly before her mind, in order to enable her to do this thing she had to do--”My duty!--my duty!--but oh, it is hard--hard!”

CHAPTER XXII.

AN EVENTFUL DAY.

Mary's health improved rapidly after her interview with Catherine King, painful though it had been. A great weight was taken off her mind by the full confession she had made.

One day, about a week subsequent to that confession, as the weather was warm and seemed to be settled, Mrs. White, who was ever planning some little amus.e.m.e.nt or other to distract the girl from her gloomy thoughts, proposed that they should drive with the children the next morning to a certain pleasant wood on the banks of the Wey some five miles off, and take their lunch with them.

The children were delighted at the prospect of a picnic, and watched the preparations that were made for it during the afternoon with the keenest interest. When everything had been packed up ready for the morrow, a telegram was brought to Mrs. White.

She read it, and a smile of pleasure lit up her face. ”Mary,” she said, ”I am afraid we must postpone our picnic after all. My brother Harry is coming down here to-morrow to see us.”

Mary blushed slightly. ”The poor children will be very disappointed if they do not have their picnic,” she replied, feeling compelled to make some remark to cover the confusion which this sudden news produced in her.

The widow looked at her with rather an amused expression. ”Well, Mary,”

she said ”after all there is no great necessity for altering our plans.

Harry can come with us. I will telegraph to him that we will meet him at the station. It is a pity though that he has to return to town in the evening.”

The morrow proved to be a beautiful day. It was in the month of May, and the pulse of young life beat with pleasurable quickness through all animate Nature.

Mary felt unusually well and happy as they drove through the fresh morning air to Farnham station, where Dr. Duncan was to be met. The spirit of the spring stirred her blood and exhilarated her in an unwonted fas.h.i.+on. She could have sung for joy. Her heart felt full of love for these innocent friends around her, for the glorious suns.h.i.+ne, and for the kind warm breeze that kissed her pale cheeks and ruffled her soft hair.

She wondered how it was that the Shadow seemed to be so far away. That sick dread, that terrible presence which she always felt to be so near, so ready to fall, even in her happiest moods, seemed this day to be removed to a vague and immense distance. It had never been so far off before. A presentiment came to her that it was soon to be removed altogether, that it would fall away from her, and that she would know peace at last. It was as if the happiness of death was coming over her, so deeply calm was her delight. She mused to herself how sweet indeed it would be to die on this delicious spring day, with the fresh breeze and the sunlight around her--to fade away and be at rest, ere the sun set and the darkness and the cold came on, bringing with them the shadow.

The carriage with its merry party at last reached Farnham Station. The train by which the doctor was expected had not yet come in, so they had to wait there for some minutes.

The cessation of the motion of the carriage turned the course of Mary's thoughts. Her happy dream pa.s.sed away. A vague uneasiness stole over her; and she began to realize, in a vivid manner she had not done so far, that this was to be an eventful day in her life--she was to see her lover. What could she reply if he asked again that question so sweet and yet so bitter that he had asked her on that misty autumn afternoon in London--so long ago it now seemed to her?

Things had much changed with her since then. She was no longer the infanticide, the atheist, the wretched being separated from all human sympathies. She asked herself whether marriage with the man she wors.h.i.+pped was now altogether so impossible a happiness as it had been then! She thrilled at the thought. What should she reply were he to ask that question again?

She knew not what she ought to do, all the future seemed still so unsettled and cloudy. It was true that she had told Catherine all--that she had abandoned the Sisterhood; but was that enough? The secret was still with her. The Society would some day commence its horrible work.

So her thought was confused between a great dismay, and a dream of wonderful delight, and her perplexed mind could make nothing of the puzzle. She could not marry this man with that secret on her mind--she ought not to keep that from him--yet how could she betray Catherine King and the Sisterhood.

The bell rang, there was a bustling of porters, and then the train from London thundered into the station.

Mary forgot her trouble for the time: with eyes dim with emotion, she looked out timidly yet eagerly from under the cover of her broad straw hat, as the pa.s.sengers trooped out into the white road.

Yes! there he was at last, handsomer than ever, he seemed to her, and she was filled with pride to see how his n.o.ble head towered above all the men by his side.

He came out and joyously saluted his sister and her children, then he shook hands with Mary quietly, his clasp of the little hand that was so dear to him lingering almost imperceptibly, and he felt that she was trembling.