it was one of bettina’s weary days. its hours had lagged and dragged until the evening had come, and she had sunk down, exhausted and depressed, in a big old-fashioned chair in front of her wood fire, which seemed the only ray of cheerfulness within or without. she had had these feelings before, and she knew that they would probably pass, but never before had it been so borne in upon her that life was sad and wretched alike for those whom she was trying to help and for her who was so in need of help herself—little as they dreamed it. were they worth helping, those poor evil-environed creatures who so continually disappointed her hopes and efforts? was she worth helping, either—weak, aimless creature that she was—who had vowed to be content in the mere consciousness that horace lived, and that he had once supremely loved her, and then again and again had fallen into this hopeless discontent [pg 204]which thirsted so for what she had pledged herself to give up—the possession of that love to satisfy the present hour’s need?
she lay back in the big deep chair, her white hands loosely grasping its arms, and her white lids lowered. now and then a tear would trickle from beneath those lids and a slight contraction of pain would move her lips. any one looking in upon her so might well have wondered where were the friends and companions of this beautiful, lonely woman, shut into this small room, in the silence of a twilight that hung damp and gray outside, and that the smouldering fire lighted but fitfully within, while the low murmur of flames fitfully broke the silence.
not a sound escaped her lips. she gazed longingly, sadly into the glowing heart of the fire, and saw visions and dreamed dreams, but not pleasing ones; they only served to make her sadness deeper.
presently the door opened, and nora came in with the lamp. glancing at her mistress, who did not move, the woman then went out and brought a small tea-service on a tray.
“don’t light the kettle yet, nora,” said a low voice from the depths of the chair. the speaker did not move; her manner was that of a person [pg 205]who deprecated the least noise or intrusion, and nora took the hint and silently put down the tray. then, in the same dull tone, her mistress said:
“i know you want to go to church. go. i can make tea for myself when i want it.”
nora, in comprehending silence, left the room.
still the relaxed figure in the chair moved not. the fire whiffed and crackled now and then, but beyond this there was no sound. the lamplight showed more plainly the fair youth and loveliness of that black-clad form, which never, in its most brilliant days, had looked so exquisite as now, when there was none to gaze upon its beauty or to share its solitude. the hands were ringless, for bettina had taken off her wedding-ring after the reading of the letter which the lawyer had brought her, and with it she had renounced the last vestige of allegiance to her late husband’s memory. there was no bitterness in her heart toward him. simply he existed not, as though he had never been.
vaguely she heard the sound of nora’s departure, as the door was closed behind her, and still she sat there wordless, motionless, almost breathless as it appeared, for her bosom scarcely seemed to move.
[pg 206]
presently there came two tears from under the closed lids; then quickly others followed them. the sense that she was freed even from the danger of nora’s observation weakened her more and more. then with the helpless, whispering tones of an unhappy child, she said:
“my god, how desolate i am! how can i bear it? how long must it endure?”
still she did not move except to raise her lids and cast upward her tear-drenched eyes, while she caught her lower lip between her teeth.
suddenly there was a step upon the piazza—a man’s step, as if in haste. she started and sat upright. who could it be? no man except the rector ever visited her, and this was not the rector’s step. she hastily brushed away the traces of her tears and sat listening.
then came a tap at the door—not loud, but firm, distinct, decided. it sounded strange to her, unlike the tap of any messenger or servant who had ever come to her house.
she got up, leaving the door of the sitting-room open that the light might enter the dark hall.
then, most unaccountably, a sense of fear, very unusual to her, seemed to possess her. she stood still a moment in the hall and waited.
[pg 207]
the knock was repeated, so near this time that it made her start. she was not naturally a timid woman, but she felt a sense of physical fear which was totally unreasoning. what harm was likely to come to her from such a source? she compelled herself to go forward and open the door.
it was very dark outside, and she vaguely distinguished the outline of a tall man standing before her. the light from the open door at her back threw out her figure in distinct relief, and it was evident that she had been recognized, for a voice said, in low but distinct tones,
“lady hurdly.”
she gave a cry and pressed both hands against her breast, sharply drawing in her breath. then she took a few steps backward, throwing out one hand to support herself against the wall.
“forgive me,” said the well-known voice—the voice out of all the world to which her blood-beats answered. “i have come on you too suddenly. i ought to have written and asked permission to call. i should have done so, only i feared you might deny me.”
somehow the door was closed behind them and they had made their way into the lighted [pg 208]room. bettina, still pale and breathless, began to murmur some excuses.
“i beg your pardon; i was frightened. nora had gone out, and i was all alone. i did not know who it might be. i never have visitors, and i was afraid to open the door.”
he was looking at her keenly.
“you should not be alone like this,” he said, both resentment and indignation in his tone. “why do you never have visitors? why did nora leave you? where are the other servants?”
“there are no others. there is only nora,” she said, recovering herself a little. “i let her go to church to-night. i am not usually afraid. why should i be? perhaps i am not very well.” as she uttered these incoherent sentences she sank into a chair and he took one near her.
the expression of his face had changed from anxiety to a stern sadness.
“and you live alone like this,” he said, “without proper service or protection? and, in spite of all that i could say and do, you will not take the miserable pittance which is your own, and which is wasted there in the bank, where it can avail for no one? do you think this is right to yourself—or kind to me?”
[pg 209]
the quiet reproach of his tone disturbed her.
“i do not mean to be unkind,” she said, her voice not quite steady, “and indeed i have all that i need. nora has more than time to attend to me, and as for company, it is because i do not want it that i do not have it.”
“and you think you can live without companionship?” he said. “you will find you are mistaken; but of that i have no right to speak. there is one subject, however, on which i do claim this right, and it is the fulfilment of this purpose which has brought me to america.”
“you came all this way to see me?” she said, lifting her brows as if in gentle deprecation. “you were always kind.” her voice broke and she said no more.
“it is not a question of kindness,” he said. “it is a matter of the simplest right and duty. will you hear me? are you able to hear me to-night, or shall i come again to-morrow?”
“speak now,” she said. “i am perfectly well, and am ready to hear whatever you may have to say.”
her voice gave proof of a recovered self-control. the necessity of making this a final interview between them was borne in upon her, and sitting very still and erect, with her hands [pg 210]clasped tightly together, she waited to hear what he might say.
“your leaving england so suddenly,” he began, “was, as i need not say, a disappointment to me. i had hoped to change your mind and purpose concerning the acceptance not only of money which is your own by legal right, but of such as is also yours by every rational law of possession. it was to me an insupportable idea that you should go away without the means of living as becomes your rank and station.”
bettina, with a rather chill smile, shook her head.
“rank and station i have none,” she said. “i have money enough to live as becomes my mother’s child; that i am, and no more. it is the only bond to the past which i acknowledge. the name and title which i bore a little while were never mine in a real and true sense. i do not care to speak of it; it is all past; but the very fact that your cousin saw fit to leave me with what you call a mere pittance shows that he felt the distance, the lack of union, between us, as i felt and feel it.”
it was a relief to her to say this much. he could gather nothing from it, and she wanted him to know that she had freed her soul from [pg 211]every vestige of its bondage to the man whom she chose to designate as his cousin rather than by any relationship to herself—even a past one. this point did not escape him.
“it is with humiliation that i receive your reminder that that man was, in flesh and blood at least, akin to me,” was the answer; “and for that reason i have felt it to be my duty to make whatever poor reparation may be in my power for the evil that he has done.”
he spoke with extreme seriousness, and there was a tone in his last words which conveyed to bettina the suspicion that they referred to something more than any act of lord hurdly’s which had heretofore been mentioned between them.
she waited, therefore, in some agitation to hear what his next words should be.
“i shall have to ask your forgiveness,” he said, “for touching upon a matter which might well seem to be an impertinence on my part. the necessity is forced upon me, however, and i shall be as brief as possible, if you will be good enough to listen.”
bettina answered merely by a bend of the head.
“as long as i can remember,” he began, “i have had a certain instinctive distrust of the [pg 212]late lord hurdly. it grew with my growth; but i never thought it proper, under the then existing circumstances, to give expression to it. as time went on, observation confirmed instinct, and it became evident to me that he was a man of powerful will, and was more or less unscrupulous in the attainment of its ends. after his death, in going into the affairs of the estate, and various other matters which came under my observation, i found that the truths laid bare before me revealed him as a far worse man even than i had imagined. it was a revolting manifestation in every sense; but even when those matters had been closed up—when i supposed that i was done with the man and aware of the worst—a revelation was made to me which, though of a piece with the rest, and no worse in its essence and kind, came home to me with a thousandfold intensity, from the fact that it nearly concerned both myself and you.”
bettina’s heart beat wildly. she dared not look at him, and with an instinct to protect herself from betrayal at every cost, she said, in a voice which was so cool and calm that the sound of it surprised her as it fell upon her ear:
“go on. explain yourself.”
she had taken up a paper from the table and [pg 213]was using it as if to screen her face from the fire, but she managed to get somewhat in the shadow of it, so that her companion had only a partial view of her features and expression. in this position, with her eyes bent upon the fire, her countenance was wholly inscrutable to him. there was a moment’s silence before he continued.
“how far the explanation is necessary,” he said, “i do not know. i am aware that you received a sealed letter, through cortlin, from a man named fitzwilliam clarke, who is now dead. what that letter contained is your own affair. i also received a letter from the same source and by the same hand. it is of the revelation contained in that letter that i am come to speak to you.”
bettina hardly knew whether she was waking or sleeping. the astounding suddenness of the consciousness which had come to her now seemed to stun both her body and her mind. she made no sign, however, as she sat absolutely still, and her companion went on.
“the letter to you was delivered, you remember, before my return to england. the interval which elapsed before the delivery of the letter to me—which occurred scarcely more than a [pg 214]week ago—was due to the fact that cortlin had been instructed to put each of these letters into the hands of none but the man and woman to whom they were addressed. in the second instance he was prevented by illness from the prompt performance of his duty. he has had a long and serious attack of fever. as soon as his condition of health permitted he sent for me and put the letter into my hands, telling me that he was ignorant as to its contents, but that a letter from the same source had been delivered to you by him immediately after the death of the scoundrel whose treachery had betrayed you into a marriage with him.”
bettina could not speak or look at him. the thoughts which were seething through her brain were too confused for speech. one thing, however, was quite clear to her. the resentment that this man so fiercely manifested was for her sake, not his own. his anger was an impersonal thing. he had a manly and chivalrous nature, and the mere fact that her mother had once committed her into his keeping would constitute a strong claim on such a nature. he was outraged that a countryman and kinsman of his own could so villanously have duped her. as for his own wrongs in the matter, he apparently [pg 215]did not consider these. for all consciousness of them in his words and tones they might never have existed.
while these thoughts were passing through her mind, he had risen, and was pacing the floor with restless strides. now he paused in front of her and said:
“i trust it may not seem to you that i did wrong to come to you and tell you of the revelation that had been made to me. i have done it in the belief that the letter which you received conveyed the same information. may i be allowed to know if this is true?”
bettina bent her head, but said no more.
“then i feel myself justified in having come,” he said, in a tone of relief. “if i could have known you ignorant of the infamous wrong that was done you, by the unscrupulous means used to beguile you into a marriage which must so have tortured and humiliated any woman, i might have kept silent. it might perhaps have been best to omit from the list of the wrongs you must have suffered this crowning infamy of all. but since it seemed certain that you knew it, and since it had doubtless been the reason of your refusing to touch the money which was so rightfully your due, and of your leaving the country [pg 216]where this great wrong had been done you, i could not rest until i had spoken. i could not still the longing to give you a certain solace which i hoped it might be in my power to give. i knew how sad and lonely you were. i had written to the rector and asked for tidings of you.”
“you had? he never told me,” she said, wonderingly.
“i particularly bound him not to do so; but i did write more than once, and got his answers. in that way it came to me that you were unhappy—courageously and unselfishly, yet profoundly so, and it was not difficult for me to comprehend the reason. you will forgive me for going into a dead and buried issue for this once; but i knew your nature, and it was obvious to me that you were torturing yourself because you felt that you had done a wrong to me.”
bettina caught her breath suddenly, and covered her face with her hands.
“is it not so?” he said.
but she could not speak. the shrinking anguish of her whole attitude was her only answer.
then he took the seat nearest her, and said:
“it is with the hope of lifting this totally unnecessary [pg 217]burden from your mind that i have come. i beg you to have patience with me while i speak to you quite simply and tell you why you would be doing wrong to blame yourself on my account. for this once i must ask you to let me speak of the past—not the recent past—let us consider that in its grave forever—but the remote past, in which for a short while i had a share. i, too, have my confession to make and pardon to beg, for i am conscious that i wronged you, though it was through ignorance, youth, inexperience, and also—forgive me for mentioning it, but it is my best justification—also because i loved you, with a love which i was then too ignorant even to comprehend. i needs must beg you to remember that, in owning my great wrong to you. this wrong,” he continued, after an instant’s pause, “consisted in my urging you to marry me when you did not love me. i feared it was so, even then; but i was selfish; i thought of myself and not of you. when the whispered misgiving would rise up in my mind i forced it down by vowing that if you did not already love me i could and would make you do so. when the blow fell, and i knew that i had lost you, i knew that my selfishness in thinking chiefly of my own happiness had been properly rewarded. [pg 218]at least this was the feeling that possessed my heart after the first. you were young, confiding, inexperienced. i knew better than you possibly could know that you did not love me. later, you knew it also.”
he waited, as if for her response. from behind her close-pressed hands the answer came.
“yes,” she said, lowly, “i have long known that it was a mistake on my part. you are right. i did not love you.”
had she been looking, she would have seen a shadow cross his face—a very faint one, as the hope that it obscured had been faint also.
“therefore,” he said, “i took advantage of you, and obtained from you a promise which i should never have asked. i want you to feel that i realize the wrong i did you in that, and ask your forgiveness for it.”
slowly she lowered her hands and looked at him.
“and you can ask forgiveness of me?” she said.
“i humbly beg it—as on my knees.”
“then what should be my attitude to you?”
“the proud and upright one of never having done me any conscious wrong.”
“but when i left you, rejected you, threw you off—”
[pg 219]
“that was not done to me, but to the man you supposed me to be—the man who had been proved to you a scoundrel, by such proof as any one would have deemed you mad to doubt.”
she looked at him somewhat timidly.
“you are generous indeed,” she said.
“i am no whit more than just. you were absolutely warranted in such a course toward me. what i long to do—what i have crossed the world in the hope of doing—is to get you to forgive yourself, to free yourself of a hallucination which is casting a needless shadow on your life.”
“oh, you are good—good!” she said. “i never knew so kind a heart. therefore must my unending misery be the greater that i have once wounded it.”
“that consciousness should have no sting for you hereafter. you did it in utter ignorance. i cannot claim that i was half so ignorant in my wrong toward you. but surely we may remember that we have once been friends, and so we may feel that there is full and free forgiveness between us before we part.”
she did not speak. that last word had pierced too deeply to her heart.
“you do forgive me—do you not?” he said, as if he misunderstood her silence.
[pg 220]
“i thank you—i bless you—i seek your forgiveness,” she said.
at these last words he smiled—a smile that had a certain bitterness in it. then suddenly his face became rigidly grave.
“if i had not given you my forgiveness, long ago,” he said, “i should like to offer it to you now, at a price. i wish to god that i could.”
“what do you mean?” she said, a sweet perplexity upon her face. “what price have i to pay for anything?”
“ah, there it is! it may seem brutal of me to put a literal construction upon what you have used as a figure of speech, but let the truth come out. you are poor, unprotected, alone, and you ask me to go and leave you so! god knows it is little enough that i have it in my power to do, but the possession of money would enable you at least to live as it becomes you to live. i do not speak of your title—it is not what you are called, but what you are, that i have in mind. if you had money, even the small income which i so desire that you shall accept, your life would be different.”
but bettina looked away from him, and shook her head in the gentle negation which he knew to be so final.
[pg 221]
“how would my life be different?” she said.
“you could make it so.”
“in what way?”
“you could travel, for one thing.”
“i do not want to travel. i desired it once, and i got my wish. but with it came a wretchedness that all the travelling in the world could not carry me away from.”
“then what is to be your life?”
“what you see it now. i do not wish to change it for any other. i have tried the world and its rewards. there is nothing in them.”
her tone of absolute, unexpectant decision maddened him.
“my god, bettina!” he exclaimed, too excited to notice that the name had escaped him. “are you in earnest? can you mean it? i wish i could believe that you did not. but there is a deadly reality about you now which makes me fear that you will keep your word. that you should spend your life in this isolation, that you—you—”
he broke off, as if words failed him.
“what better can i do?” she said. “you must not think of me as idle and useless. i am going to try not to be that. i have tried a little. ask the rector. and i am going to try more. [pg 222]there is but one thing that i deeply desire, and that is to be a better woman than i have been in the past. oh, i will try hard—i will, indeed i will—to do a little good in the future, to make up for all the harm i have done!”
she ceased, her voice failing her, and as she looked at the man standing near her she saw that he was scarcely listening. some intense preoccupation made him take in but vaguely what she was saying. she saw that he was deeply moved in some way, and the consciousness that this was so gave her a sense of alarm. she felt her own will weakening, and she knew that somehow she must get this parting over, if her strength were to suffice for it.
“good-bye,” she said, holding out her hand.
“don’t be too sorry for me. you have lightened my heart inexpressibly by what you have told me. now that i can feel that you know all—that, wrong and wicked as i was, i was not so false as it seemed—i can bear the future with courage. i am sure of it. i want to say good-bye now, because i prefer not to see you again. you would only try to shake me in a determination that is not to be shaken. don’t trouble about me—please don’t,” she added. “i have health and youth, and these will suffice me for what i have to do.”
[pg 223]
“health and youth!” he cried, ignoring her proffered hand, and throwing his own hands up in a gesture of repudiation. “and what do these signify in a situation such as yours? they only mean that you will prolong an existence which, for such a woman as you, seems worse than death. you ask me to leave you so? to say good-bye—”
“yes, i beg it, i implore it, i insist upon it,” she interrupted him, feeling that her strength was almost gone. “you have said that you were willing to do me a service—then leave me.”
she sank back in her chair exhausted.
“my god! am i a brute?” he said. “have i made you ill with my idiotic persistency? i will go. i will rid you of the distress and annoyance of my presence. but before i go, bettina,” he said, with a sudden break in his voice, “i must and will satisfy my heart by one thing: i must, for the sake of my own soul’s peace, tell you this. i have never ceased to love you, and i never shall. i gave you up when i saw the renunciation to be inevitable, but i knew then, as i know now, that i can never put any other in your place. you were the love of my youth, and you will be the love of my old age, if my lonely life goes on till then. don’t turn from me. don’t hide your [pg 224]face like that. i ask nothing but this sacred right to speak. i know you never loved me. i know it is not in me—if, indeed, it be in any mortal man—to enter into the heaven of being loved by you. but, at least, you have been the vision in my life—the sacred manifestation of what girl and sweetheart and woman and wife might be—and for that i thank you. in the shadow of that beatific vision i shall walk henceforth, and believe me when i say that i shall walk there alone.”
bettina, with her face buried in her hands, remained profoundly still. when he had waited a moment he began to fear that he had overtaxed her strength too far, and that she might have fainted.
kneeling in front of her, he took her two wrists gently in his hands and tried to draw them away from her eyes. the strong resistance that she made to this gave evidence enough that she was conscious in every sentient nerve.
“forgive me,” he said; “i am going—i have been wrong to force all this upon you—but it is the last time that we shall meet. let me, i pray you, see your face once more before i turn away from it forever.”
the tense hands relaxed within his grasp, but [pg 225]he caught no more than a second’s glimpse of the beautiful face before it was hid against his shoulder.
at the same instant a low voice whispered in his ear:
“don’t move until i speak to you.”
overwhelmed with wonder, he felt the hands which he had grasped now holding fast his own, that she might compel him to the stillness which she had commanded. then the soft voice at his ear went on:
“you were right in saying that i did not love you—that you would have urged me into a marriage to which i could not have brought the true feeling. i did not know it then, but i know it now. and i know it now because—because—” her voice trembled and her breath came quick—“because now i do love you. oh, horace, better love than this man could not have or woman give.”
she ended in a burst of tears, and her exhausted body leaned against him for support.
for a moment he felt an amazement so overwhelming that he seemed half unconscious from the whirling in his brain. then, as a lightning flash lights up the whole dark heaven in an instant’s time, the truth was revealed to him, and, [pg 226]with that consciousness, his arms were tight about her and his kisses on her lips.
if he questioned her at all, it was with his spirit, and her answer came in that ineffable sense of union which fused their souls in one. for long still moments they rested so, in that embrace, and when they moved apart and looked into each other’s eyes it was to take up forever that united life which was to bind them in true marriage.
when nora returned from church she found them sitting quietly before the fire, the lamp burning brightly under the kettle, from which the lady hurdly that was and was to be had just made tea for her lord.
