Part 37 (1/2)

She took one of his hands and held it in both of hers; and it was as if some stream of comfort flowed to him through their soft warm touch and enabled him to begin his ugly task.

He told her the whole thing from the beginning. Of his ambitions, and how they held chief place in his life, and how he had meant to marry Cecilia Cricklander as an aid to their advancement. He glossed over nothing of his own baseness, but went on to show how, from the moment he had seen her upon that Good Friday at the orchard house, his determination about Cecilia Cricklander had begun to waver, until the night under the tree when pa.s.sion overcame every barrier and he knew he must possess her--Halcyone--for his wife.

He made no excuse for himself; he continued the plain tale of how, his ambitions still holding him, he had selfishly tried to keep both joy and them, by asking her--she who was so infinitely above him--to descend to the invidious position of a secret wife.

She knew the rest until it came to the cause of his accident, and, when she heard it occurred because of his haste to get to her before she should reach the house, she gave a little moan of anguish and leaned her head against his breast.

So the story went on--of his agonized thoughts and fever and fears--of his comprehension that she had been taken from him, and of the utter hopelessness of his financial position, and the whole outlook, until he came to the night of his engagement; and here he paused.

”Do not try to tell me any of this part, John, my dear lover,” she said.

”I know the standard of honor in a man is that he must never give away the absent woman, and I understand--you need not put anything into words. I knew you were unhappy and coerced. I never for a moment have doubted your love. You were surrounded with strong and cruel forces, and all my tenderness could not reach you quite, to protect you as it should have done, because I was so full of foolish anguish myself. Dearest, now only tell me the end and the facts that I must know.”

He held her close to him in thankfulness, and then went on to speak of the shame and degradation he had suffered for his weakness; the drawn-out days of aching wonder at her silence, and finally the news of his Uncle Joseph Scroope's death and the fortune that would come to him, and how this fact had tied and bound his hands.

”But it has grown to such a pa.s.s,” he said, ”that I had come to breaking-point, and now I can never go back to her again. I have found you, my one dear love, and I will never leave you more.”

Halcyone shook her head sadly, and asked him to listen to her side. And when he knew that her leaving La Sarthe Chase had been brought about because of his letter to Cheiron having been posted from London, so that she hoped to find him there, it added to his pain to feel that, even in this small turn of events, his action had been the motive force.

But, as she went on, her pure and exquisite love and perfect faith s.h.i.+ning through it all seemed to draw his soul out of the mire in which it had lain. And at last they knew each other's stories and were face to face with the fateful moment of to-day, and he exclaimed gladly:

”My darling, now nothing else matters--we will never, never part again.”

Then, as he looked into her eyes, he saw that not gladness but a solemn depth of shadow grew there, and he clasped both her hands. A cold agony chilled his whole being. What, O G.o.d, was she going to say?

”John,” she whispered, all the tenderness of the angels in her gentle voice as she leaned and kissed the silver threads in his dark hair.

”John, do you remember, long ago when we spoke of Jason and Medea, and you asked me the question then, Must he keep his word to her even if she were a witch?--and I told you that was not the point at all: it was not because she was or was not a witch, but because it was _his word?_”--Here her voice broke, and he could hear the tears in it, and he wildly kissed her hands. Then she went on:

”Oh, my dear lover, it is the same question now. _You cannot break your word._ Nothing but misfortune could follow. It is a hard law, but I know it is true, and it is fate. We put in action the force which brings all that we receive, and we who have courage pay the price without flinching, and, above and beyond all momentary pleasure or pain, we must be true to ourselves.”

”I cannot, I cannot!” he groaned in agony. ”How can you condemn me to such a fate?--tied to this woman whose every influence is degrading to me; parted from you whom I adore--I would rather be dead. It is not fair--not just, if you only knew!”

Then he continued wildly. ”Ah, G.o.d--and it is all because I forgot the meaning of your dear and sacred, pledge with me that I must always be good and true! If I could suffer alone--my darling, my soul!--then I would go without a word back to h.e.l.l, if you sent me. But you, too--think, Halcyone! Can you bear your life? You who are so young, separated for evermore from love and me. Oh! my own, my own--”

Here he stopped his mad rush of words--her face was so white and grave--and he let her draw herself from him, and put her hands upon his shoulders, while her eyes, with tender stars of purity melting in their depths, gazed into his.

”John,” she said, ”do not try to weaken me. All Nature, who is my friend, and the night-winds and their voices, and that dear G.o.d Who never deserts me, tell me that for no present good must we lower ourselves now. Nothing can ever hurt me. Go back and do that which being a gentleman entails upon you to do--and leave the rest to G.o.d. This is the winter of our souls, but it will not last forever. The spring is at hand, if you will only trust, and believe with me that first we on our side must be ready to pay the price.”

Then she bent forward and kissed him as an angel might have done, and, without speaking more, rose and prepared to walk towards the stairway which descended to the lower court.

He followed her, and she turned before she began to descend the steps, while she pointed to the beautiful country.

”Look at the vines, all heavy with grapes,” she said, ”and the fields shorn of their corn, and the olives s.h.i.+mmering in the sunset; and then, dear lover, you will know that all things have their sequence, and our time of joy will come. Ah! sweetheart, it is not farewell for ever; it is only that we must wait for our spring.”

”Halcyone,” he said, while his proud eyes again filled with tears, ”you have the absolute wors.h.i.+p of my being. You have taught me, as ever, the truth. Go, my darling, and I will do as you wish, and will try to make myself more worthy of your n.o.ble soul. G.o.d keep you until we meet again.”

She did not speak; she only looked at him with a divine look of love and faith, and he watched her as she went down, it seemed, out of the very heart of the setting sun and into the shadows beneath, and so disappeared from his adoring eyes in a peaceful purple twilight.

Then he returned to the old stone seat and leaning forward gazed out over the exquisite scene.