When he has read it, he drops it with a groan, and covers his face with his hands. To him, too, the evidence seems clear and convincing.
"I told you to avoid me. I warned you," she says, presently, with a wan smile. "I am born to ill-luck; I bring it even to all those who come near me--especially, it seems, to the few who are unhappy enough to love me. Go, Cyril, while there is yet time."
"There is not time," desperately: "it is already too late." He moves away from her, and in deep agitation paces up and down the secluded garden-path; while she, standing alone with drooping head and dry miserable eyes, scarcely cares to watch his movements, so dead within her have all youth and energy grown.
"Cecilia," he says, suddenly, stopping before her, and speaking in a low tone, that, though perfectly clear, still betrays inward hesitation, while his eyes carefully avoid hers, "listen to me. What is he to you, this man that they say is still alive, that you should give up your whole life for him? He deserted you, scorned you, left you for another woman. For two long years you have believed him dead. Why should you now think him living? Let him be dead still and buried in your memory; there are other lands,"--slowly, and still with averted eyes,--"other homes: why should we not make one for ourselves? Cecilia,"--coming up to her, white but earnest, and holding out his arms to her,--"come with me, and let us find our happiness in each other!"
Cecilia, after one swift glance at him, moves back hastily.
"How dare you use such words to me?" she says, in a horror-stricken voice; "how dare you tempt me? you, _you_ who said you loved me!" Then the little burst of pa.s.sion dies; her head droops still lower upon her breast; her hands coming together fall loosely before her in an att.i.tude descriptive of the deepest despondency. "I believed in you,"
she says, "I trusted you. I did not think _you_ would have been the one to inflict the bitterest pang of all." She breathes these last words in accents of the saddest reproach.
"Nor will I!" cries he, with keen contrition, kneeling down before her, and hiding his face in a fold of her gown. "Never again, my darling, my life! I forgot,--I forgot you are as high above all other women as the sun is above the earth. Cecilia, forgive me."
"Nay, there is nothing to forgive," she says. "But, Cyril,"--unsteadily,--"you will go abroad at once, for a little while, until I have time to decide where in the future I shall hide my head."
"Must I?"
"You must."
"And you,--where will you go?"
"It matters very little. You will have had time to forget me before ever I trust myself to see you again."
"Then I shall never see you again," replies he, mournfully, "if you wait for that. "My true love hath my heart, and I have hers." How can I forget you while it beats warm within my breast?"
"Be it so," she answers, with a sigh: "it is a foolish fancy, yet it gladdens me. I would not be altogether displaced from your mind."
So she lays her hand upon his head as he still kneels before her, and gently smooths and caresses it with her light loving fingers. He trembles a little, and a heavy dry sob breaks from him. This parting is as the bitterness of death. To them it _is_ death, because it is forever.
He brings the dear hand down to his lips, and kisses it softly, tenderly.
"Dearest," she murmurs, brokenly, "be comforted."
"What comfort can I find, when I am losing you?"
"You can think of me."
"That would only increase my sorrow."
"Is it so with you? For me I am thankful, very thankful, for the great joy that has been mine for months, the knowledge that you loved me. Even now, when desolation has come upon us, the one bright spot in all my misery is the thought that at least I may remember you, and call to mind your words, your face, your voice, without sin."
"If ever you need me," he says, when a few minutes have elapsed, "you have only to write, "Cyril, I want you," and though the whole world should lie between us, I shall surely come. O my best beloved! how shall I live without you?"
"Don"t,--do not speak like that," entreats she, faintly. "It is too hard already: do not make it worse." Then, recovering herself by a supreme effort, she says, "Let us part now, here, while we have courage. I think the few arrangements we can make have been made, and George Trant will write, if--if there is anything to write about."
They are standing with their hands locked together reading each other"s faces for the last time.
"To-morrow you will leave Chetwoode?" she says, regarding him fixedly.
"To-morrow! I could almost wish there was no to-morrow for either you or me," replies he.
"Cyril," she says, with sudden fear, "you will take care of yourself, you will not go into any danger? Darling,"--with a sob,--"you will always remember that some day, when this is quite forgotten, I shall want to see again the face of my dearest friend."
"I shall come back to you," he says quietly. He is so quiet that she tells herself now is a fitting time to break away from him; she forces herself to take the first step that shall part them remorselessly.
"Good-bye," she says, in faltering tones.
"Good-bye," returns he, mechanically. With the slow reluctant tears that spring from a broken heart running down her pale cheeks, she presses her lips fervently to his hands, and moves slowly away. When she has gone a few steps, frightened at the terrible silence that seems to have enwrapped him, benumbing his very senses, she turns to regard him once more.
He has never stirred; he scarcely seems to breathe, so motionless is his att.i.tude; as though some spell were on him, he stands silently gazing after her, his eyes full of dumb agony. There is something so utterly lonely in the whole scene that Cecilia bursts into tears. Her sobs rouse him.
"Cecilia!" he cries, in a voice of mingled pa.s.sion and despair that thrills through her. Once more he holds out to her his arms. She runs to him, and flings herself for the time into his embrace. He strains her pa.s.sionately to his heart. Her sobs break upon the silent air. Once again their white lips form the word "farewell." There is a last embrace, a last lingering kiss.
All is over.
CHAPTER XXIX.
"The flower that smiles to-day To-morrow dies; All that we wish to stay Tempts and then flies.
What is this world"s delight?
Lightning that mocks the night, Brief even as bright."--Sh.e.l.lEY.
At Chetwoode they are all a.s.sembled in the drawing-room,--except Archibald, who is still confined to his room,--waiting for dinner: Cyril alone is absent.
"What can be keeping him?" says his mother, at last, losing patience as she pictures him dallying with his betrothed at The Cottage while the soup is spoiling and the cook is gradually verging toward hysterics. She suffers an aggrieved expression to grow within her eyes as she speaks from the depths of the softest arm-chair the room contains, in which it is her custom to ensconce herself.
"Nothing very dreadful, I dare say," replies Florence, in tones a degree less even than usual, her appet.i.te having got the better of her self-control.
Almost as she says the words the door is thrown open, and Cyril enters.
He is in morning costume, his hair is a little rough, his face pale, his lips bloodless. Walking straight up to his mother, without looking either to the right or to the left, he says, in a low constrained voice that betrays a desperate effort to be calm:
"Be satisfied, mother: you have won the day. Your wish is fulfilled: I shall never marry Mrs. Arlington: you need not have made such a difficulty about giving your consent this morning, as now it is useless."
"Cyril, what has happened?" says Lady Chetwoode, rising to her feet alarmed, a distinct pallor overspreading her features. She puts out one jeweled hand as though to draw him nearer to her, but for the first time in all his life he shrinks from her gentle touch, and moving backward, stands in the middle of the room. Lilian, going up to him, compels him with loving violence to turn toward her.
"Why don"t you speak?" she asks, sharply. "Have you and Cecilia quarreled?"
"No: it is no lovers" quarrel," with an odd change of expression: "we have had little time for quarreling, she and I: our days for love-making were so short, so sweet!"
There is a pause: then in a clear harsh voice, in which no faintest particle of feeling can be traced, he goes on: "Her husband is alive; he is coming home. After all,"--with a short unlovely laugh, sad through its very bitterness,--"we worried ourselves unnecessarily, as she was not, what we so feared, a widow."
"Cyril!" exclaims Lilian; she is trembling visibly, and gazes at him as though fearing he may have lost his senses.
"I would not have troubled you about this matter," continues Cyril, not heeding the interruption, and addressing the room generally, without permitting himself to look at any one, "but that it is a fact that must be known sooner or later; I thought the sooner the better, as it will end your anxiety and convince you that this _mesalliance_ you so dreaded,"--with a sneer,--"can never take place."