"It cannot be that you believe that man, Eden----"
"The man I believed was you. What matters the testimony of others when I find myself deceived----"
"Eden, you have deceived yourself. Last night I told you there were things I had not wished to tell, not from lack of confidence, but because----"
"Because you knew that did I hear them I would go."
"No, not that; but because I did not wish to cause you pain."
"Yes, protest. My father said you would. But the protest comes too late. Besides, I do not care to listen."
And thereat she made a movement as though to leave the room. But this Usselex prevented. He planted himself very firmly before her. His att.i.tude was arrestive as an obelisk and uncircuitable as a labyrinth.
Attention was his to command, and he claimed it with a gesture.
"You shall not go," he said; "you shall hear me."
She stepped back to elude him, but he caught her by the wrist.
"Look at me," he continued. "It took fifty years to make my hair gray; one day has made it white."
Eden succeeded in disengaging herself from his grasp, and she succeeded the more easily in that a servant un.o.bserved by her, yet seen by Usselex, had entered the room. He loosed his hold at once and glanced at the man.
"What is it?" he asked. "No one rang."
"A letter, sir," the man answered; "it was to be delivered to you."
Usselex took the note and held it unexamined in his hand. Eden caught a glimpse of the superscription. The writing was her own. It was, she knew, the note which she had dispatched a half hour before. Meanwhile the servant had withdrawn.
"When I came home this afternoon," Usselex continued, "and found that you had gone, I could not understand----"
"You might have gone to the Ranleigh for information. Let me pa.s.s!"
"Why to the Ranleigh? surely----"
"To Mrs. Feverill, then, since you wish me to be explicit. Let me pa.s.s, I say."
"It was of her I wished to tell you----"
"Was it, indeed? You were considerate enough, however, not to do so."
"Let me tell you now?"
"Rather let me go. I prefer your reticence to your confidence."
"Eden----"
"No, I have no need to learn more of your mistress----"
Usselex stepped aside. "She is my daughter," he said, sadly. "Go, since you wish to."
--"Nor of your wife," she added, as he spoke.
"I have no other wife than you," he answered, and with the note which he held in his hand he toyed despondently. As yet he had not so much as glanced at the address.
Something, a light, an intonation, and influence undiscerned yet sentiable, stayed her steps. She halted in pa.s.sing and looked him in the face. And he, seeing that she hesitated, repeated with an accent sincere as that which is heard in the voice of the moribund, "No other wife than you."
"You say that Mrs. Feverill is your daughter?" she exclaimed. It may be that the average woman, conscious of her own mobility, is more inattentive of the past than of the present. But however that may be, the a.s.surance which Eden had just received seemed to affect her less than the preceding announcement. "You say that she is your daughter,"
she repeated. "Why, you told me--You said--"
"I have told you nothing. Will you sit a moment and let me tell you now?"
Coerced and magnetized, the girl moved back and sank down again on the lounge. Usselex still toyed absently with the note, and as he too found a seat, for the first time she recalled its contents. Then a shudder beset her.
"I ought perhaps," he began, "to have been franker in this matter. But my excuse, if it be one, is that I was dissuaded by your father. Before I ventured to ask you to marry me, I told my story to him, and he counselled silence. What I say to you now he will substantiate. Shall I ring and ask him to come here?"
His words reached her from inordinate distances, across preceding days, and out of and through the note which he held in his hand; and with them came the acutest pain. "He is telling the truth," she reflected, "and I deserve to die."
"Shall I ring?" he repeated.
She started and shook her head. "No, no," she replied. "Go on."
"I thank you," Usselex returned. "I can understand that enough has occurred to shake your confidence. In the circ.u.mstances, it is good of you to be willing to receive my unsupported word. But bear with me a moment. You will see, I think, that I have done no wrong."
As he spoke she had but one thought, to repossess herself of the note.
Could she but get it and tear it and set it aflame, out of the cinders life might re-arise.
"You may remember," he continued, "what I said of myself, "things have not always been pleasant with me." You knew as a child what it is to lose a mother, but think what it must be to have a mother and have that mother ignore your existence. Such a thing is hard, is it not? But of her I will not speak; she is dead, poor woman; I hope she never suffered as have I. The people by whom I was brought up I looked upon as my parents. They had been paid to adopt me. When I discovered that, I was old enough to make my own living. With that view I came to this country.
New York was different then. I should not care to land here now and attempt to make a fortune without a penny to start with. But it is true, I was young. I was a fair linguist, a rarity in those days, and it was not long before I found a situation. When I had a little money put by, I learned of an opening in Boston, and started in business there for myself. Shortly after I became acquainted with a girl. She was very beautiful; more so, I thought, than anyone I had ever seen. So soon as I was in a position to marry she became my wife. We lived together for three years. During that time I thought her affection as unwavering as my own. She was an excellent musician, and much sought after, not alone because of her talent, but because of her beauty as well. The entertainments which she frequented I was often unable to attend. But I was glad to have her go without me. I was proud of the admiration which she aroused. One evening she left me, and did not return. For some time her disappearance was unexplained. Ultimately I discovered that she was in New York. She had deserted me for another man. I followed her and obtained a divorce. Afterwards the man deserted her as she had deserted me. Then she went abroad. Of her life there I can only judge by hearsay.
I believe that at one time she figured in an opera troupe. Now and then she wrote, asking for money; but latterly she has ceased. It is a surprise to me that she calls herself by my name. Perhaps she has done so because she heard that I had prospered. The reflection of that prosperity may have been of advantage to her. That, however, can easily be stopped. But I am sorry, Eden, that you should have learned of it.
Even the children do not know; they think her dead. When she deserted me, I left them with their grand-parents. In so doing I sought to separate myself from everything connected with her, and I stipulated that I would provide for their maintenance on condition that they were kept in ignorance of their mother"s existence and of mine. Some years ago, however, first the grandfather, then the grandmother, died. I was obliged to appear more prominently. My daughter had married; I took her husband into my employ. It was of him I spoke the other day."
He hesitated and paused, his eyes fixed in hers. The phrases had come from him haltingly, one by one, but each he had dowered with an accent that carried conviction with it. With the note which he held in his hand, he still toyed abstractedly.
"You understand now, do you not?" he asked. "You understand and forgive?"
And Eden, as one who has weathered a storm and sees shipwreck imminent in port bowed her head. "It is truth," she told herself. "If he reads that note, he will kill me."
"You understand now, do you not?" he repeated. His voice was sonorous and caressing as an anthem, and he bent nearer that he might see her face.
"Too late!" she answered.
"No, Eden, not that. Look at me. You must not hide your eyes. In all the world there are none as fair as they. Look at me, Eden. Tell me that you forgive. I have pained you, I know; I have been stupid; but the pain has been unwitting and the stupidity born of love. Look at me, Eden. See,"
he continued, and bent at her side, "See, I ask forgiveness on my knees. Can you not give it me?"
"To you, yes, but never to myself." She spoke hoa.r.s.ely, in a voice unlike her own; her eyes were not in his, they were staring at something in his hand, and as she stared, she seemed to shrink. The muscles of her face were rigid. And Usselex, perplexed at the fixidity of her gaze, followed the direction which her eyes had taken and saw that they rested on the note which he still held, crumpled and forgotten. For a second he looked at it wonderingly, "Why, it is from you," he exclaimed.
In that second, Eden, with the prescience that is said to visit those that drown, went forward and back, into the past and into the future as well. Amid her scattered yesterdays she groped for a promise. Of the unanswering morrows she called for release, and as her husband stood up, preparing to read what she had written, she felt herself the depository of shame.
The next instant she was at his side. "Give it me," she murmured. Her voice trembled a little, but she strove to render it a.s.sured. "Give it me," she pleaded.