Was It Right to Forgive? by Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr (free novel 24 .txt) 📖

a thrill of genuine natural happiness. She thought of the fresh sea and the queer, splendid old towns beyond it, and she hoped Ida would be willing to start by the first possible steamer.

To such thoughts she stepped brightly forward, her garments fluttering in the wind, and a large bunch of daffodils in her hands. As she approached Seventeenth Street, she felt a sudden impulse to answer an unknown gaze; and she let her eyes wander among the advancing crowd. In an instant they fell upon Ida Stirling and Mr. Duval. They were walking together, and their air was that of lovers; and Rose felt that they were talking about her. For a moment she was stunned; her soul was really knocked down, and her body felt unable to lift it. The next moment she stumbled on, with flaming cheeks, and ears so painfully alert that they heard every tone of the mocking little laugh which saluted her in the passing. Ida was looking into Duval's face, and affected not to see Rose; but Duval stared insolently at her, without a token of recognition. She had herself, in the momentary pause, made a faint inquisitive smile, a slight movement that she could not restrain, but which she instantly felt to be the most shameful wrong to herself. It was answered--if at all--by that mockery of a laugh which entered her ears like the point of a sword and reached her heart through them.

Blindly, breathing in short gasps, she reached her carriage; and with a great effort gave the order "home." She was distracted. Her anger burned inward, set her blood on fire, and shook her like an earthquake. Her lover and her friend, both false! All her confidences betrayed! Her poor heart laid bare for their scorn and mirth! It was impossible to endure so abominable a wrong. She was struck dumb with it. She knew no words to express her distress. She could not rest a moment, sleep fled from her; her inner self was in a chaos of indescribable suffering.

In the morning she was physically ill; a great nausea, a burning fever, and a pain in every limb subdued her. All night her soul had seemed a substance made of fire; in the morning, it was dulled and numbed by her bodily agony; for pain is indeed perfect misery, and the very worst of mortal evils. Mrs. Filmer and a doctor were sent for; and Rose lay nearly two weeks, stunned and suffering from the soul-blow she had received. Much of the time she was hardly conscious of the present, moaning and fretful when awake, and when asleep lost in the unutterable desolation of dreams, full of portentous shapes and awful suggestions. Her life had lost its balance, and she had lost her foothold on it in consequence.

"Am I very ill, mamma?" she asked mournfully, one midnight.

"Not very, my dear Rose. You are beginning to get better. The doctor thinks you have had a severe mental shock. What was it? Antony?"

"No; not Antony. Antony is not brutal. Am I strong enough to talk, mamma?"

"It may do you good to talk--to tell me what made you ill."

"I met Ida Stirling and Mr. Duval walking together. They laughed in my face as they passed me. And I had told Ida everything--everything!"

"Do you mean about Antony?"

"Yes; and about that dreadful day when you all thought I intended to go to Cuba."

"Rose, I never have understood that affair."

"And yet, without understanding it, every one, even you, thought the very worst of me."

"Then why did you not explain?"

"I don't know. I was too angry. I felt wicked enough to let you all think whatever you chose. And then baby was dead, and Antony treated me as if I were her murderer."

"You did not intend, however, to go to Cuba?"

"No more than you intended to go."

"What took you to the steamer then?"

"Mr. Duval had some letters--foolish, imprudent letters--and I was miserable about them; because whenever I did not meet him, or send him money, he threatened to show them to Antony. He promised, as he was going to Cuba, to give them to me for $500. I had only three days to procure the money, and I did not succeed in getting it until noon of the last day. Then I went to the Astor House, where Mr. Duval was waiting for me, and because I wanted to keep him in a good temper, I took lunch with him. He said he would give me the letters after lunch. I did not take but two glasses of wine, yet they made me feel strange, and when I was told that his luggage had all gone to the steamer, and that I must go there for the letters, I could not help crying. When Adriana spoke to me, I was begging for my letters, and he was urging me to go to Cuba with him. He wanted my money, mamma, and I knew it. He was cruel to me, and I had become afraid of him. While he was talking, I was listening for the bell to warn people ashore, and I should have fled at the first sound."

"He might have prevented you, Rose. My dear, what danger you were in!"

"I thought of that. There were several passengers on deck, and the captain was not far away. I would have thrown myself into the water rather than have gone to Cuba with Mr. Duval."

"Did you get the letters?"

"No. Yanna came interfering, and then Antony. I let them think what they liked. Duval said I intended to go with him. It was a lie, and he knew it; but Yanna and Antony seemed to enjoy believing it, and so I let them think me as wicked and cruel as they desired. Not one of you took the trouble to ask me a question."

"We feared to wound your feelings, Rose, by alluding to what could not be undone. And you were fretting so about your child."

"Not one of you noticed that I had taken no clothing, none of my jewelry, not a single article necessary for comfort. Was it likely I would leave all my dresses and jewels behind me? If Mr. Duval thought I was going with him, was it likely he would have suffered me to forget them?"

"Why did you not tell me all this before, Rose?"

"I do not know 'why,' mamma. I enjoyed seeing Antony miserable. I enjoyed humbling Yanna's pride. I used to laugh at the thought of Harry and her talking over my misconduct. A spirit I could not control took possession of me. I did not want to do wrong, but I liked people to think I did wrong. I suppose you cannot understand me, mamma?"

"Yes, I understand, Rose."

"When I was quite alone, I used to cry bitterly about the sin of it; but all the same, as soon as Antony, or you, or Yanna, or any one that knew about Duval, came into my sight, I tried to shock them again."

"You will do so no more, Rose?"

"The desire has gone from me. I do not even fear Mr. Duval now. He can send all the letters he has to Antony, if he wishes. I am naturally a coward, and cowardice made me sin many a time. If I had only been brave enough to tell Antony what the villain made me suffer, I need not have endured it. Antony is generosity. Duval is cruelty."

This explanation gave Mrs. Filmer great relief, and doubtless it tended to Rose's quick recovery. She no longer bore her burden alone, and her mother's sympathy, like the pity of the Merciful One, was without reproach. But it was now that Rose began to realize for the first time that love teaches as the demon of Socrates taught--by the penalties exacted for errors. For every hour of her life she felt the loss of her husband's protecting care. Her sickness had compelled her to leave everything to servants; and the house was abandoned to their theft and riot. Waste, destruction, quarreling all day, and eating and drinking most of the night, were the household ordering. She found it difficult to get for her own wants the least attention; and the light, nourishing food she craved was prepared, if at all, in the most careless manner. Her orders were quarreled over, disputed, or neglected; and withal she had the knowledge that she must, for the time being, endure the shameful tyranny. But, oh, how every small wrong made her remember the almost omniscient love of her husband, and the involuntary and constant cry of her heart was, "If Antony were only here!"

Her loneliness, too, was great; she was unaccustomed to solitude, and she was too weak to bear the physical fatigue of much reading. So the hours and the days of her convalescence went very drearily onward. She could not look backward without weeping, and there was no hope in the future. Alas! alas! our worst wounds are those inflicted by our own hands; and Rose, musing mournfully on her sofa, knew well that no one had injured her half so cruelly as she had injured herself. With how many tears her poor eyes did penance! But they were a precious rain upon her parched soul; it was softened by them, and though she had as yet no clear conception of her relationship to God, as a wandering daughter, far from His presence--but never beyond His love--she had many moments of tender, vague mystery, in which, weeping and sorrowful, she was brought very close to Him. For it is often in the dry time, and the barren time, that God reaches out His hand, and puts into the heart the hopeful resolve, "I will arise and go to my Father!" In some sense this was the cry that broke passionately from Rose's lips on one night which had ended a day full to the brim of those small, shameful household annoyances, through which servants torture those whom they can torture.

"I will arise and go to my husband!" That was the first step on the right road, and the resolve sprang suddenly from a heart broken and wounded, and hungry and thirsty for help and sympathy.

"In Antony's heart there is love and to spare," she cried. "He would not suffer me to be tormented and neglected. He would put his strong arms round me, and the very south wind he would not let blow too rudely on my face. Oh, Antony! Antony! If you only knew how I long for you! How sorry I am for all the cruel words I said! How sorry I was even while saying them! I will go to Antony. I will tell him that I cannot forgive myself until he forgives me. I will tell him how truly I love him; how lonely and tired and sick and poor and wretched I am. He will forgive me. He will love me again. I shall begin to go now--at this very moment."

She rose up with the words, and felt the strength of her resolve. She looked at her watch. It was not quite nine o'clock. She rang the bell and ordered her carriage. The man hesitated, but finally obeyed the order. She was driven directly to her father's house. Mrs. Filmer had gone out with Harry and Adriana, but Mr. Filmer was in his study. He was amazed and terrified, when he saw Rose enter.

"My dear Rose! what are you doing here?" he cried. "You are ill, Rose."

"Ill or well,