Part 48 (1/2)

”How should I have thought otherwise?” I exclaimed, my eyes eagerly searching her downcast face. ”Why, Caton told me it was so the night I was before Sheridan; he confirmed it again in conversation less than an hour ago. Colgate, my Lieutenant, who met you in a Baltimore hospital, referred to him the same way. If I have been deceived through all these months, surely everything and everybody conspired to that end,--you bore the same name; you told me plainly you were married; you wore a wedding-ring; you resided while at camp in his quarters; you called each other Frank and Edith. From first to last not one word has been spoken by any one to cause me to doubt that you were his wife.”

As I spoke these words hastily, vehemently, the flood of color receded from her face, leaving it pale as marble. Her lips parted, but failed in speech.

”Believe me, Mrs. Brennan, the mistake was a most innocent one. You are not angry?”

”Angry? Oh, no! but it all seems so strange, and it hurts me a little.

Surely I have done nothing to forward this unhappy deceit?”

For a moment she bowed her head upon her hands as though she would hide her face from me, conceal the depth of her emotion. Then she looked up once more, smiling through her tears.

”I recall starting to explain all this to you once,” she said, striving vainly to appear at ease. ”It was when we were interrupted by the sudden coming upon us of Mr. and Mrs. Bungay. Yet I supposed you knew, that you would have learned the facts from others. The last time we were together I told you I did not wholly understand you. It is no wonder, when you thought that of me. But I understand now, and know you must have despised me.”

”No! no!” I protested warmly, forgetting all I lacked and recalling only my deep love for her. ”It was never that. Not one word or act between us has ever lowered you an iota in my esteem. You have always been my lady of the North, and from the first night of our meeting--out yonder, amid the black mountains--I have respected and honored you as one worthy of all sacrifice, all love.”

Her eyes were drooping now, and hidden from me behind their long dark lashes.

”I am going to tell you my story, Captain Wayne,” she said quietly. ”It is not a pleasant task under these circ.u.mstances, yet one I owe you as well as myself. This may prove our last meeting, and we must not part under the shadow of a mistake, however innocently it may have originated. I am the only child of Edwin Adams, a manufacturer, of Stonington. Connecticut. My father was also for several terms a member of Congress from that State. As the death of my mother occurred when I was but five years old, all my father's love was lavished upon me, and I grew up surrounded by every advantage which abundant means and high social position could supply. During all those earlier years my playmate and most intimate companion was Charles Brennan, a younger brother of the Major, and the son of Judge David Brennan of the State Supreme Court.”

She had been speaking slowly, her eyes turned aside, as though recalling carefully each fact before utterance. Now her glance met mine, and a deeper color sprang into her clear cheeks.

”As we grew older his friends.h.i.+p for me ripened into love, a feeling which I found it impossible to return. I liked him greatly, valued him most highly, continued his constant companion, yet experienced no desire for closer relations.h.i.+p. My position was rendered the more difficult as it had long been the dream of the heads of both houses that our two families, with their contingent estates, should be thus united, and constant urging tried my decision severely. Nor would Charles Brennan give up hope. When he was twenty and I barely seventeen a most serious accident occurred,--a runaway,--in which Charles heroically preserved my life, but himself received injuries, from which death in a short time was inevitable. In those last lingering days of suffering, but one hope, one ambition, seemed to possess his mind,--the desire to make me his wife, and leave me the fortune which was his through the will of his mother. I cannot explain to you, Captain Wayne, the struggle I pa.s.sed through, seeking to do what was right and best; but finally, moved by my sympathy, eager to soothe his final hours of suffering, and urged by my father, I consented to gratify his wish, and we were united in marriage while he was on his deathbed. Two days later he pa.s.sed away.”

She paused, her voice faltering, her eyes moist with unshed tears.

Scarce knowing it, my hand sought hers, where it rested against the saddle pommel.