A Mad Marriage by May Agnes Fleming (best ebook reader android .TXT) đ
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doubt; the same, with a differenceâworn and haggard, set and sternâthe
same, yet that was the face of a frank, happy boy, this of a reckless,
desperate man. A straw hat was pulled over his eyes, a gray summer
overcoat was buttoned upâa soldier and a gentleman, that was evident at
a glance.
I turned up a side street and hastened breathlessly on. My first duty
was to my mistress. I must tell her that what she dreaded had comeâthat
the husband from whom she had fled, was here. I walked at my utmost
speed, and in half an hour was at Saltmarsh.
âShe said he would kill her!â I thought, turning hot and cold; âand who
knows that he will not? He would not be the first husband that has
killed a runaway wife.â
I ran through the rooms, all flurried and breathless, calling out her
name.
She was not in any of them. Of late, since June had come, the fine
weather at times had tempted her out. This, most unfortunately, was one
of the times. I knew pretty well where to find herâon the river bank
below there was a strip of yellow sand, where she was fond of walking up
and down in the sunshine. She was sure to be there now.
I rushed out, looking wildly around. Yes, there was the tall, soldierly
figure in the straw hat and summery overcoat, coming rapidly toward me
at a swinging pace.
I declare I almost screamed, so nervous and overwrought had I become.
If he was before meâif he came upon her suddenly, the shock alone might
kill her, for she was far from strong of late. I turned and fled
headlong down the steep hillside path, still calling her name. Yes,
there, quite alone, pacing slowly up and down the sandy riverside path,
looking at the fast-flowing water, Mrs. Gordon walked.
She paused in her slow walk, and turned to me in wonder at my break-neck
descent.
How beautiful she was! even in that supreme moment, I remember that was
my first thought.
âFor pityâs sake, fly!â I cried out; âfly at once. He is here!â
She laid both her hands suddenly over her heart. Across her face there
flashed the electric light of a great and sudden joy.
âWho?â she said, almost in a whisper.
âYour husband, the man whose picture you showed me. Fly at once if you
are afraid of him. I saw him, I tell you he is coming. Oh, Heaven!âhe
is here!â
I fell back in consternation. Yes, he had followed me; he was coming
down the path, he was here.
I turned to my mistress. Would she faint? would she fly? Neither.
Who is to understand menâs wives! Terror was there, in that wild, white
face, it is true, but over and above it all, such rapture as I never
before saw in the face of man or woman. She loved him and she saw him
againâall was said in that.
He walked down the path. She came a step forward, with that transfigured
face, and held out to him both arms with an eloquent cry:
âGordon! Gordon!â
CHAPTER III.
THE DECREE OF DIVORCE.
It had come. I could do no more. Nothing remained for me but to retreat
into the background, and wait with bated breath and beating heart for
this play of âpowerful domestic interestâ to play itself out.
He had descended the steep, hillside path and stood on the strip of
yellow sand, face to face with the wife who had deserted him. The full
light of the June afternoon fell upon his face as he stood there before
her, a face more hollow-eyed and haggard, more worn, than it had even
looked to me first. A face set and stern, with little of mercy or pity
in it.
He waved her back. Only the slightest motion of his hand, but she shrank
and shivered like a child who has got a blow.
âNo nearer,â he said in a voice as cold and steady as the chill gray
eyes that looked upon her. âUnless your sense of hearing has become
dulled since the night of Lovellâs death, when you played eavesdropper
so well, you will be able to hear all I have to say, where you stand. I
will not detain you long, and you need not wear that frightened face. I
am not going to kill youâthe time for all that is passed. But let me
tell you this: If you had not played eavesdropper that memorable night
five months ago, if you had not fled as you did, if I had found you
before me when I returned, you would never have lived to see the
morning. The greatest fool that ever walked the earth I had beenâif you
and I had met that night I would have been a murderer as well.â
All this he said in a slow, self-repressed sort of tone, but the deep
gray eyes that watched her were full of such hatred as no words of mine
can tell.
âSpare me, Gordon,â she answered, with a sobbing cry.
âSpare you?â he repeated, with cold scorn; âhave I not said so? I would
not lift a finger to harm a hair of your head, or to save your life if I
saw you drowning in the river yonder. You are as dead to me as though I
had gone home and strangled you that eventful night. The madness of love
and rage, alike, are past forever. I have cut you off utterly and
absolutely from my life. You have been in hiding here, they tell me, in
daily dread of your life no doubt. Let us end all that. You are free to
come and go where and how you will. After to-day I will never look upon
your face again of my own free will, alive or dead.â
She gave a shrill cry, like a culprit under the lash, her hands still
held out to him in dumb agony.
âI have not even come to Quebec now in search of you,â the cold,
pitiless voice went on; âdonât think it. I came to visit General
Forrester, stationed yonder at the Citadel, before leaving this accursed
Canada foreverâaccursed since in it I met you.â
Her outstretched hands went up, with a dull moaning sound, and covered
her face.
âWould you care to know how I found you out, and why I came?â he slowly
went on. âListen: Last night at mess the fellows were speaking of a
widow lady, a most mysterious widow lady, young and beautiful, so rumor
said, who had taken a desolate old house in a marsh, and there shut
herself up, hidden from mortal man and light of day. Her name was _Mrs.
Gordon_. Where she came from, who she was, why she had come, no man
could tell. Before the name was uttered I knew it was you. Knew that
when you fled from Toronto you fled here; knew that the lost woman who
had been my wife was found.â
Her hands dropped. For the first time she stood upright before him and
looked him full in the face, stung, it would seem, into turning at bay
by these last words.
âWho had been your wife!â she cried, passionately; âwho is your wife,
Gordon Caryll! Nothing,â a sort of exultation lit her face as she said
it, ânothing but death can ever alter that!â
For fully a minute he stood silently looking at her, a smile on his
lips, a pitiless triumph in his eyes.
âNothing can change that?â he repeated; ânothing but death? Well, I will
answer that before we part. Let me go on. I knew it was you, this woman
they talked of, and I said to myself: âI will find her to-morrow; I will
look upon her face once more, for the last time, and I will see what
there was, if I can, in its wax-doll beauty, its yellow-black eyes, its
straight nose and silken hair, to turn men into blind, besotted fools.â
Take down your hands, Rosamond, and let me look at you.â
She had shrank from him, from his smile, in some nameless, dreadful
fear, that made her cover her white face once more. She dropped her
hands now, at his bidding, looking up with dilated eyes.
âGordon, have mercy on me. I love you!â
Again she stretched forth her hands to him with that piteous cry. Again
he motioned her imperiously back, his lips set, his eyes pitiless, his
face like stone.
âStand still!â he ordered.
She obeyed.
For fully two minutes this strange tableau was before me, and all
unseen, in my obscure nook, I stood gazing with an interest that held me
rapt and spellbound. He, drawn up to his full height, his face like
white stone, so hard, so cold, that chill, half smile still on his lips.
She, half cowering before him, her lovely, colorless face uplifted, her
eyes full of dreadful terror, her loose, feathery hair blowing in the
wind,âyoung, fair, innocent to see, at least. So they stoodâstern
young judge, quivering little criminal, until it grew almost too much
even for my nerves to endure.
âYou are a beautiful little woman, Rosamond,â he said, at length; âone
of those exceptional women, who, like Ninon de LâEnclos, will be
beautiful at eighty. And that fair face of yours will do its devilâs
work, I donât doubt, to the end of the chapter. To possess that face for
four short months I have lost all that man holds dearâname, honor,
home, friends, fortuneâall. For the name that you have borne and
disgraced, I will bear no longer. I have sold outâdo you know it? my
father has disinherited meâI am the laughingstock of all who ever knew
me. I look back and wonder at my own infatuation. I loved youâI trusted
you. Oh, God!â he cried out, a spasm of anguish distorting his face; âI
married youâyou! You played your game well, you and Lovell. It was
your trade; and with such a fool as I, it was an easy game enough. But
you had cause to fear, and you knew itâI say again you did well to fly.
I went out from Lovellâs death-bed a madmanâif I had found you on my
return, by the light above us, I would have murdered you!â
She shrank back from him, trembling with pure physical terror now, from
head to foot.
âNo need to trembleâno need to fear now,â he went on, his voice
losing its sudden fury, and sinking to its former cold monotone; âI have
told you all that is past and done with. But before we part, I should
like to hear once from your own lips, just once (not that I doubt) that
Major Lovellâs story was true.â
Her only answer was to cower still farther away, and with a great,
heart-wrung sob, to bury her face once again in her hands.
âAh, hide it,â he said bitterly; âhide it forever from the sight of
manâthe fairest, falsest face ever made. But speakâif such lips as
yours can speak truth, and tell me that Lovellâs story was true.â
âGordon! have mercy.â
âWas it true?â
âI loved you, Gordon! As there is a heaven above us, I loved you with
all my heart.â
He half laughedâeven in that moment.
âYour heartâyours! What witty things are said by accident! Never mind
your heart or your love. I know what both are worth.
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