Part 58 (1/2)
With face blanched and eyes still full of terror, her ladys.h.i.+p looked at the dark, contemptuous, resolute speaker.
”And if this be true--your horrible surmise; mind, I don't admit that it is--would _that_ be any excuse for Victor's conduct in leaving you?”
”No!” Edith answered, her eyes flas.h.i.+ng, ”none! Having married me, not ten thousand family secrets should be strong enough to make him desert me. If he had come to me, if he had told me, as he was bound to do before our wedding-day, I would have pitied him with all my soul; if anything could ever have made me care for him as a wife should care for a husband, it would have been that pity. But if he came to me now, and knelt before me, imploring me to return, I would not. I would die sooner!”
She was walking up and down now, gleams of pa.s.sionate scorn and rage in her dark eyes.
”It is all folly and balderdash, this talk of his love for me making him leave me. Don't let us have any more of it. No secret on earth should make a bridegroom quit his bride--no power on earth could ever convince me of it!”
”And yet,” the sad, patient voice of poor Lady Helena sighed, ”it is true.”
Edith stopped in her walk, and looked at her incredulously.
”Lady Helena,” she said, ”you are my kind friend--you know the world--you are a woman of sense, not likely to have your brain turned with vapors. Answer me this--Do you think that, acting as he has done, Sir Victor Catheron has done right?”
Lady Helena's sad eyes met hers full. Lady Helena's voice was full of pathos and earnestness, as she replied:
”Edith, I am your friend; I am in my sober senses, and, I believe in my soul Victor has done right.”
”Well,” Edith said after a long pause, during which she resumed her walk, ”I give it up! I don't understand, and I never shall. I am hopelessly in the dark. I can conceive no motive--none strong enough to make his conduct right. I thought him mad; you say he is sane. I thought he did me a shameful, irreparable wrong; you say he has done right. I will think no more about it, since, if I thought to my dying day, I could come no nearer the truth.”
”You will know one day,” answered Lady Helena; ”on his death-bed; and, poor fellow, the sooner that day comes the better for him.”
Edith made an impatient gesture.
”Let us talk about it no more. What is done is done. Whether Sir Victor Catheron lives or dies can in no way concern me now. I think, with your permission, I will go back to my room and try to sleep away this dismal day.”
”Wait one moment, Edith. It was on your account Victor came here last night to talk over the arrangements he was making for your future.”
A curious smile came over Edith's lips. She was once more back at the window, looking out at the rain-beaten day.
”My future!” she slowly repeated; ”in what possible way can my future concern Sir Victor Catheron?”
”My child, what a question! In every way. You are honest enough to confess that you married him--poor boy, poor boy--for his rank and rent-roll. _There_, at least, you need not be disappointed. The settlements made upon you before your marriage were, as you know, liberal in the extreme. In addition to that, every farthing that it is in his power to dispose of he intends settling upon you besides. His grandmother's fortune, which descends to him, is to be yours. You may spend money like water if it pleases you--the t.i.tle and the wealth for which you wedded are still yours. For himself, he intends to go abroad--to the East, I believe. He retains nothing but what will supply his travelling expenses. He cannot meet you--if he did, he might never be able to leave you. O Edith, you blame him, you hate him; but if you had only seen him, only heard him last night, only knew how inevitable it is, how he suffered, how bitterer than death this parting is to him, you would pity, you would forgive him.”
”You think so,” the girl said, with a wistful, weary sigh. ”Ah, well, perhaps so. I don't know. Just now I can realize nothing except that I am a lost, forsaken wretch; that I _do_ hate him; that if I were dying, or that if he were dying, I could not say 'I forgive you.'
As to his liberality, I never doubted that; I have owned that I married him for his wealth and station. I own it still; but there are some things not the wealth of a king could compensate for. To desert a bride on her wedding-day is one of them. I repeat, Lady Helena, with your permission, I will go to my room; we won't talk of my future plans and prospects just now. To-morrow you shall know my decision.”
She turned to go. The elder woman looked after her with yearning, sorrowful eyes.
”If I knew what to do--if I knew what to say,” she murmured helplessly.
”Edith, I loved him more dearly than any son. I think my heart is breaking. O child, don't judge him--be merciful to him who loves you while he leaves you--be merciful to me whose life has been so full of trouble.”
Her voice broke down in a pa.s.sion of tears. Edith turned from the door, put her arms around her neck and kissed her.