Part 30 (1/2)
”The Duke of Rotherham.”
”She had a great temptation, but no doubt she suffered in giving you up, even for a dukedom.”
”She ought to suffer. I wish her to suffer.”
”Then you no longer love her?”
”Loving is now out of the question, but I had, I thought, a great love for her.”
”Had!”
”Yes. I loved Ada until she contemplated making me a partner with her in the sin of deceiving the man who was then--almost--her husband. After that I had no hesitation in resigning her. I would not remain in London--she was very lovable--I might--I think not--but I might----”
”You acted as an honorable man must have done. Danger is an unknown quant.i.ty until you meet it face to face, and in this danger you were like a swimmer that only tips the tangles and does not know the depth of the water below them. I am glad you had the courage to leave her. Let her be dismissed even from your thoughts.”
”How should I dare to think of her after those London papers? The Decalogue and Christ's words concerning its seventh law still stand with me as a finality. I no longer love her. I am not even angry with her.
She was just the reef on which my life went down. An hour ago I buried her.”
”Your life has not gone down. It ought to be more rich and buoyant for this very experience. It will be.”
”Perhaps. Yet all life's pleasant things have suffered the same change that Autumn works on the flowery braes of Spring, and I feel,
'My days are as the gra.s.s, Swiftly my seasons pa.s.s, And like the flower of the field I fade.'”
Jessy waited a moment or two, and then replied, ”I think, Ian, you might be just and honorable to the poet. Why do you cut the verse in two? I will give you the other three lines, as you seem to have forgotten them:
'O Soul, dost thou not see The Wise have likened thee To the most living creature that is made?'”
”Living creature?”
”Yes, in the Spring does the gra.s.s tarry for any man's help? It comes up without tool, or seed, or labor. In the garden, the field, the roadside, it comes, fresh and strong and heavenly green. Its withered blades have a new life. Likewise certain portions of our lives change or pa.s.s away, but something better for our coming years is given us.”
”My dear Jessy, how good are your words. Is there any poetry you do not know?”
”Men and women who have souls meet each other in good poetry. I have met many a sweet soul there.”
”I must tell you, Jessy, that it is not the _d.u.c.h.ess of Rotherham_ but the Church of the Disciples that is now troubling me. I dread every Sabbath Day before me. I feel as if I could not--could not preach.”
”Do you think a woman's 'no' should change your life and your life's work?”
”It might do so.”
”It cannot. If there is no place open to a man but a pulpit, it is clear G.o.d means him to preach--whether he wants to or not. I think little of the men who are feared for the day they never saw. Bode good and you will get good. That's a fact, Ian.
”Jessy, I seem to have lost everything in one bad year--my love, my children, my work, my friends. All are changed or gone. I feel poor.
Once I was rich, and knew it not.”
”You are not poor, Ian. The poor are those who have never lost anything.
You are not doing badly even now, and you are learning on very easy terms the grand habit of doing without.”
”I am very miserable, Jessy, I know that.”