Part 55 (1/2)

Is he mad? Surely no sane man ever acted, or looked, or spoke like this. He lies so--prostrate, motionless--for upward of an hour, then slowly and heavily he rises. His face is calmer now; it is the face of a man who has fought some desperate fight, and gained some desperate victory--one of those victories more cruel than death.

He turns and goes hence. He crashes through the tall, dewy gra.s.s, his white face set in a look of iron resolution. He is ghastly beyond all telling; dead and in his coffin he will hardly look more death like.

He reaches the cottage, and the first sight upon which his eyes rest is his bride, peacefully asleep in the chair by the still open window.

She looks lovely in her slumber, and peaceful as a little child--no very terrible sight surely. But as his eyes fall upon her, he recoils in some great horror, as a man may who has received a blinding blow.

”Asleep!” his pale lips whisper; ”asleep--as _she_ was!”

He stands spell-bound for a moment--then he breaks away headlong. He makes his way to the dining-room. The table, all bright with damask, silver, crystal, and cut flowers, stands spread for dinner. He takes from his pocket a note-book and pencil, and, still standing, writes rapidly down one page. Without reading, he folds and seals the sheet, and slowly and with dragging steps returns to the room where Edith sleeps. On the threshold he lingers--he seems afraid--_afraid_ to approach. But he does approach at last. He places the note he has written on a table, he draws near his sleeping bride, he kneels down and kisses her hands, her dress, her hair. His haggard eyes burn on her face, their mesmeric light disturbs her. She murmurs and moves restlessly in her sleep. In an instant he is on his feet; in another, he is out of the room and the house; in another, the deepening twilight takes him, and he is gone.

A train an hour later pa.s.ses through Carnarvon on its way to London.

One pa.s.senger alone awaits it at the station--one pa.s.senger who enters an empty first-cla.s.s compartment and disappears. Then it goes shrieking on its way, bearing with it to London the bridegroom, Sir Victor Catheron.

CHAPTER XXII.

THE DAY AFTER.

The last red ray of the sunset had faded, the silver stars were out, the yellow moon shone serenely over land and sea, before Edith awoke--awoke with a smile on her lips from a dream of Charley.

”Do go away--don't tease,” she was murmuring half smilingly, half petulantly--the words she had spoken to him a hundred times. She was back in Sandypoint, he beside her, living over the old days, gone forever. She awoke to see the tawny moons.h.i.+ne streaming in, to hear the soft whispers of the night wind, the soft, sleepy lap of the sea on the sands, and to realize, with a thrill and a shock, she was Sir Victor Catheron's wife.

His wife! This was her wedding-day. Even in dreams Charley must come to her no more.

She rose up, slightly chilled from sleeping in the evening air, and s.h.i.+vering, partly with that chill, partly with a feeling she did not care to define. The dream of her life's ambition was realized in its fullest; she, Edith Darrell, was ”my lady--a baronet's bride;” the vista of her life spread before her in glittering splendor; and yet her heart lay like lead in her bosom. In this hour she was afraid of herself, afraid of him.

But where was he?

She looked round the room, half in shadow, half in brilliant moonlight.

No, he was not there. Had he returned from his stroll? She took out her watch. A quarter of seven--of course he had. He was awaiting her, no doubt, impatient for his dinner, in the dining-room. She would make some change in her dress and join him there. She went up to her dressing room and lit the candles herself. She smoothed her ruffled hair, added a ribbon and a jewel or two, and then went back to the drawing-room. All unnoticed, in the shadows, the letter for her lay on the table. She sat down and rang the bell. Jamison, the confidential servant, appeared.

”Has Sir Victor returned from his walk, Jamison? Is he in the dining-room?”

Mr. Jamison's well-bred eyes looked in astonishment at the speaker, then around the room. Mr. Jamison's wooden countenance looked stolid surprise.

”Sir Victor, my lady--I--thought Sir Victor was _here_, my lady.”

”Sir Victor has not been here since half an hour after our arrival. He went out for a walk, as you very well know. I ask you if he has returned.”

”Sir Victor returned more than an hour ago, my lady. I saw him myself.

You were asleep, my lady, by the window as he came up. He went into the dining-room and wrote a letter; I saw it in his hand. And then, my lady, he came in here.”

The man paused, and again peered around the room. Edith listened in growing surprise.

”I thought he was here still, my lady, so did Hemily, or we would have taken the liberty of hentering and closing the window. We was sure he was here. He suttingly hentered with the letter in his 'and. It's _very_ hodd.”

Again there was a pause. Again Mr. Jamison--

”If your ladys.h.i.+p will hallow, I will light the candles here, and then go and hascertain whether Sir Victor is in hany of the hother rooms.”

She made an affirmative gesture, and returned to the window. The man lit the candles; a second after an exclamation startled her.