Norton extended his hands to her in a gesture of instinctive sympathy:
"Come, you"ll see things in a calm light to-morrow, you are young and life is all before you!"
"Yes!" she cried fiercely, "a life of shame--a life of insult, of taunts, of humiliation, of horror! The one thing I"ve always loathed was the touch of a negro----"
She stopped suddenly and lifted her hand, staring with wildly dilated eyes at the nails of her finely shaped fingers to find if the telltale marks of negro blood were there which she had seen on Cleo"s. Finding none, the horror in her eyes slowly softened into a look of despairing tenderness as she went on:
"The one pa.s.sionate yearning of my soul has been to be a mother--to feel the breath of a babe on my heart, to hear it lisp my name and know a mother"s love--the love I"ve starved for--and now, it can never be!"
She had moved beyond the table in her last desperate cry and Norton followed with a look of tenderness:
"Nonsense," he cried persuasively, "you"re but a child yourself. You can go abroad where no such problem of white and black race exists. You can marry there and be happy in your home and little ones, if G.o.d shall give them!"
She turned on him savagely:
"Well, G.o.d shall not give them! I"ll see to that! I"m young, but I"m not a fool. I know something of the laws of life. I know that Tom is not like you"--she turned and pointed to the portrait on the wall--"he is like his great-grandfather! Mine may have been----"
Her voice choked with pa.s.sion. She grasped a chair with one hand and tore at the collar of her dress with the other. She had started to say "mine may have been a black cannibal!" and the sheer horror of its possibility had strangled her. When she had sufficiently mastered her feelings to speak she said in a strange m.u.f.fled tone:
"I ask nothing of G.o.d now--if I could see Him, I"d curse Him to His face!"
"Come, come!" Norton exclaimed, "this is but a pa.s.sing ugly fancy--such things rarely happen----"
"But they do happen!" she retorted slowly. "I"ve known one such tragedy, of a white mother"s child coming into the world with the thick lips, kinky hair, flat nose and black skin of a cannibal ancestor! She killed herself when she was strong enough to leap out the window"--her voice dropped to a dreamy chant--"yes, blood will tell--there"s but one thing for me to do! I wonder, with the yellow in me, if I"ll have the courage."
Norton spoke with persuasive tenderness:
"You mustn"t think of such madness! I"ll send you abroad at once and you can begin life over again----"
Helen suddenly s.n.a.t.c.hed the chair to which she had been holding out of her way and faced Norton with flaming eyes:
"I don"t want to be an exile! I"ve been alone all my miserable orphan life!
I don"t want to go abroad and die among strangers! I"ve just begun to live since I came here! I love the South--it"s mine--I feel it--I know it! I love its blue skies and its fields--I love its people--they are mine! I think as you think, feel as you feel----"
She paused and looked at him queerly:
"I"ve learned to honor, respect and love you because I"ve grown to feel that you stand for what I hold highest, n.o.blest and best in life"--the voice died in a sob and she was silent.
The man turned away, crying in his soul:
"O G.o.d, I"m paying the price now!"
"What can I do!" she went on at last. "What is life worth since I know this leper"s shame? There are millions like me, yes. If I could bend my back and be a slave there are men and women who need my services. And there are men I might know--yes--but I can"t--I can"t! I"m not a slave. I"m not bad. I can"t stoop. There"s but one thing!"
Norton"s face was white with emotion:
"I can"t tell you, little girl, how sorry I am"--his voice broke. He turned, suddenly extended his hand and cried hoa.r.s.ely: "Tell me what I can do to help you--I"ll do anything on this earth that"s within reason!"
The girl looked up surprised at his anguish, wondering vaguely if he could mean what he had said, and then threw herself at him in a burst of sudden, fierce rebellion, her voice, low and quivering at first, rising to the tragic power of a defiant soul in combat with overwhelming odds:
"Then give me back the man I love--he"s mine! He"s mine, I tell you, body and soul! G.o.d--gave--him--to--me! He"s your son, but I love him! He"s my mate! He"s of age--he"s no longer yours! His time has come to build his own home--he"s mine--not yours! He"s my life--and you"re tearing the very heart out of my body!"
The white, trembling figure slowly crumpled at his feet.
He took both of her hands, and lifted her gently:
"Pull yourself together, child. It"s hard, I know, but you begin to realize that you must bear it. You must look things calmly in the face now."
The girl"s mouth hardened and she answered with bitterness:
"Yes, of course--I"m n.o.body! We must consider you"--she staggered to a chair and dropped limply into it, her voice a whisper--"we must consider Tom--yes--yes--we must, too--I know that----"
Norton pressed eagerly to her side and leaned over the drooping figure:
"You can begin to see now that I was right," he pleaded. "You love Tom--he"s worth saving--you"ll do as I ask and give him up?"
The sensitive young face was convulsed with an agony words could not express and the silence was pitiful. The man bending over her could hear the throb of his own heart. A quartet of serenaders celebrating the victory of the election stopped at the gate and the soft strains of the music came through the open window. Norton felt that he must scream in a moment if she did not answer. He bent low and softly repeated:
"You"ll do as I ask now, and give him up?"
The tangled ma.s.s of brown hair sank lower and her answer was a sigh of despair:
"Yes!"
The man couldn"t speak at once. His eyes filled. When he had mastered his voice he said eagerly:
"There"s but one way, you know. You must leave at once without seeing him."
She lifted her face with a pleading look:
"Just a moment--without letting him know what has pa.s.sed between us--just one last look into his dear face?"
He shook his head kindly:
"It isn"t wise----"
"Yes, I know," she sighed. "I"ll go at once."
He drew his watch and looked at it hurriedly:
"The first train leaves in thirty minutes. Get your hat, a coat and travelling bag and go just as you are. I"ll send your things----"
"Yes--yes"--she murmured.
"I"ll join you in a few days in New York and arrange your future. Leave the house immediately. Tom mustn"t see you. Avoid him as you cross the lawn.
I"ll have a carriage at the gate in a few minutes."
The little head sank again: