Part 65 (1/2)

”I want no friends, no home.” (She is still clinging to his knees, with her white earnest face uplifted to his.) ”Let me be your slave,--anything; but do not part from me. I cannot live without you now. It is only death you offer me.”

”Remember my temper,” he says, warningly. ”Only last night I struck you. Think of that. I shall probably strike you again. Be advised in time, and forsake me, like all the others.”

”You torture me,” she says, still in the same low panting whisper.

”You are my very heart,--my life. Take me with you. Only let me see your face sometimes, and hear your voice. I will not trouble you, or hinder you in any way; only let me be near you.” She presses her pale lips to his hand with desperate entreaty.

”Be it so,” he says, after a moment's hesitation. ”If ever, in the days to come, you repent your bargain, blame yourself, not me. I have offered you liberty, and you have rejected it. I shall leave this country in a week's time; so be prepared. But before going, as you are so determined to cast in your lot with mine, I shall marry you.”

She starts to her feet.

”Marry me?” she says, faintly. ”Make me your wife! Oh, no! you don't know what you are saying.”

She trembles violently, and her head falls somewhat heavily against his arm.

”It isn't worth a fainting fit,” he says, hastily enough; but his arm, as he places it round her, is strong and compa.s.sionate. ”Can anything be more absurd than a woman? Sit down here, and try to be reasonable.

You must be quick with your preparations, as we start on Tuesday. I will see about a special license, and we can get the marriage ceremony over to-morrow. I know a fellow who will manage it all for me.”

”You are quite sure you will never regret this step?” she says, earnestly, even at this supremely happy moment placing his happiness before her own.

”I don't suppose so. If it is any satisfaction to you to know it,” he says, with a shrug, ”you are the only woman I have ever loved, and probably the only one I ever shall love.”

A smile--radiant, perfect--lights her face. Surely, just then, the one moment of utter happiness, that they tell us is all that is ever allowed to poor mortals, is hers. It is broken by the clock of a neighboring church clanging out the hour.

”So late!” says Horace, hurriedly. ”I must go. Until to-morrow, Ruth, good-by.”

”Good-by!” She places her hands upon his shoulders, and, throwing back her head, gazes long and earnestly into his face, as though reading once again each line in the features she loves with such devotion.

”Before you go,” she says, solemnly, ”call me what I shall be so soon.

Say, 'Good-by, my wife!'”

”Good-by, my wife!” returns he, with more love in his accents than she has heard for months.

She presses her lips pa.s.sionately to his, and again, for the last time, breathes the word ”Farewell!”

His rapid footsteps descend the stairs. She listens to them until they have ceased and all is still. Then she goes to the window, and presses her forehead against the cold pane, that she may once more see him as he crosses the street. The lamps are all alight, and a lurid glare from one falls full upon her as she stands leaning eagerly forward to catch the last glimpse of him she loves.

Presently she sinks into a seat, always with her eyes fixed upon the spot where she last has seen him, and sits motionless, with her fingers twisted loosely in her lap; she is so quiet that only the red gleam from the world without betrays the fact of her presence.

Once her lips part, and from them slowly, ecstatically, come the words, ”His wife.” Evidently her whole mind is filled with this one thought alone. She thinks of him, and him only,--of him who has so cruelly wronged her, yet who, in his own way, has loved her, too.

The moments fly, and night comes on apace, clothed in her ”golden dress, on which so many stars like gems are strewed;” yet still she sits before the window silently. She is languid, yet happy,--weak and spent by the excitement of the past hour, yet strangely full of peace.

Now and again she presses her hand with a gesture that is almost convulsive to her side; yet whatever pain she feels there is insufficient to drown the great gladness that is overfilling her.

To-morrow,--nay, even now, it is to-day,--and it is bringing her renewed hope, fresh life, restored honor! He will be hers forever! No other woman will have the right to claim him. Whatever she may have to undergo at his hands, at least he will be her own. And he has loved her as he never loved another. Oh, what unspeakable bliss lies in this certainty! In another land, too, all will be unknown. A new life may be begun in which the old may be swallowed up and forgotten. There must be hope in the good future.

”When we slip a little Out of the way of virtue, are we lost?

Is there no medicine called sweet mercy?”