CHAPTER XLI.
The rain ceases, and St. John endeavours to work off his disappointmentand rage in a very long walk. When he at length re-enters the house,the two old people are hobbling into luncheon, and Miss Blessingtonsweeping, slowly and alone, after them. Her face is serene, and, to hissurprise, wears no bellicose expression towards himself. To tell thetruth, during three hours of point-lace work, the Gerard diamonds havekept flashing and gleaming, restless-bright, before her mind's eye. Shehas been telling herself that she was over-hasty in the relinquishmentof them--has been resolving to make one effort, if consistent withdignity, for their recapture.
"Does Miss Craven know that luncheon is ready?" asks St. John of thebutler, when they have all been seated for some minutes.
"If you please, sir, I don't think that Miss Craven is coming to lunch."
"Why not?--is she ill?" he inquires, anxiously, perfectly indifferentas to whether his anxiety is remarked or no.
"I believe she is rather poorly, sir."
Luncheon over, the old people are convoyed back to their arm-chairs.Gerard stands with his back to the hall-fire, with the _Times_ in hishand. Constance, under some pretext of looking over the day's papers,lingers near him.
"I have been telling my aunt about our alarm last night, St. John," shesays, as sweetly as usual.
"Indeed!"
"And its tame prosaic _denouement_."
"Indeed!"
"I am afraid I was unreasonably angry with you for what was evidently amere accident; but when one is nervous and frightened, one really doesnot know what one says. I'm sure I have the vaguest recollection ofwhat I said."
"I remember distinctly what you said, Constance."
"Indeed!" (with a smooth low laugh). "You don't bear malice, I hope?Things are much as they were before, I suppose?"
He lays down his paper, and looks at her steadily with his clear greyeyes. "Things are between us as they have been all our lives up to lastOctober; as they have been since then, they will never be again."
She turns away quickly, to hide the mortification which even the coldpure mask of her face cannot wholly conceal.
"That is what I meant," she answers, quietly--with great presence ofmind endeavouring to prevent her defeat from being converted into arout; and though she deceives neither herself nor him, the effort to doboth is at least laudable.
And Esther, interrupted midway in the packing of her few and paltrygoods by the sharper recurrence of that pain in her side, lies on herbed, shut out by the strength of that bodily agony from all power ofmental suffering. The excitement of the night--the exposure to thechill morning air--the thorough wetting undergone in her wild runthrough the park, amid the driving rain, have hastened the coming ofthat great sickness with which for weeks past she has been threatened.
Darkness falls: dinner-time comes. Presently the housemaid, who hadformerly given her the laudanum, knocks at her door.
"Dinner, please, miss."
"I cannot go down," answers the poor child, rather piteously, sittingup, and pushing away the tumbled hair from her flushed cheeks, whileher eyes blink in the candle-light. "I don't want any dinner; I'm ill!"
"Dear me, 'm! you _do_ look bad!" exclaims the woman, drawing nearer tothe bed, and speaking with an accent half-shocked, half-pleased; for,in a servant's eyes, the next best thing to a death in the house is aserious illness. "Would not you like to have Mr. Brand sent for?"
"Oh, no--thanks!" replies the girl, sinking wearily back on her pillow."I daresay it will go of itself."--"If I did send for him, I have nomoney to pay for him," is her mental reflection.
The evening drags away about as heavily as usual in the saloon. Gerard,having ascertained that Miss Craven is still in the house, and hasconsequently broken her resolution of not sleeping another night underthe same roof with him, tries to content himself with the idea thatto-morrow--her temporary indisposition probably past--he will haveanother opportunity of reasoning and pleading with her. About nineo'clock Miss Blessington's maid appears at the door.
"Please 'm, might I speak to you for a moment?"
"Certainly," answers Constance, graciously, rising and walking off tothe demanded conference.
Constance is always polite to her servants; it is a bad style,middle-class to be rude to one's inferiors.
"If you please, 'm, I really think as something oughter to be done forMiss Craven; she is uncommon bad, poor young lady!"
"What is the matter with her?" inquires the other, placidly; "nothingbut influenza, I daresay; it always goes through a house."
"Indeed, 'm, I don't know; but she has a hawful pain in her side, andshe can scarce draw her breath, and she is hot--as hot as fire."
"Good heavens!" cries Constance, thoroughly roused by this gay picture;"I hope it is not anything _catching!_"
Reassured on this point, and having ordered the attendance of Mr.Brand, she returns unruffled to the fireside.
"What was that mysterious communication, Constance?" asks St. John,lazily, quite willing to be amicable now that their relative positionsare made clearly evident.
"She only came to tell me that Miss Craven was very unwell," sheanswers, carelessly. "Servants exaggerate so; I daresay it is nothing!"
"What is the matter with her?" he asks, hurriedly.
"I really don't know," she replies, drily; "you had better wait tillMr. Brand comes, and ask him."
Ten o'clock! The old couple are trundled off to their separateapartments: and Miss Blessington, having bidden St. John a cold"good-night," sails, candle in hand, up the grand staircase, to thatsleep that never fails to come at her calm bidding. Gerard foregoes hisevening pipe, because the smoking-room does not look to the front. Inpainful unrest, he unfastens the shutters of one of the saloon-windows,and, raising the stiff and seldom-opened sash, leans out, looking andlistening--looking at the maiden moon that rides, pale and proud,while black ruffian clouds chase each other to overtake her. Mr. Brandis out, apparently; for half-past ten has been struck, in differenttones--bass and treble, deep and squeaky--by half-a-dozen differentclocks, and still he has not arrived. At length, to the watcher'sstrained ear, comes the sound of wheels descending the steep pitch,from Blessington village; then a brougham's lamps gleam, issuing frombetween the rhododendron banks, and roll, like two angry eyes, to thedoor. In his feverish anxiety, and impatience at the long tarrying ofthe sleepy footman, St. John himself admits the doctor; and, followinghim at a little distance, as he is ushered upstairs, sits down in hisown bedroom, with the door wide open, ready to pounce out upon thesmall AEsculapius, as he passes along the gallery at his departure, andlearn his verdict.
The visit is rather a long one; to St. John, sitting still in his idleimpatient misery, it seems as though the sound of Esther's opening doorwould never come; but never is a long day. At length the welcome soundis heard; and the young man, precipitating himself into the passage,comes face to face with a small elderly gentleman, shiveringly takinghis way down the unwarmed ghostly old corridors.
"Is it a serious case?" he asks, abruptly, framing the simple words asthey rise from his full heart.
Mr. Brand stares, surprised, at his questioner's blanched face. He hadimagined that his patient was a little friendless orphan companion,whose life or death--save as a mere matter of compassion--were subjectsof almost equal indifference to the people under whose roof she lies,panting out her young life.
"_Serious?_ Well--oh! I assure you there is no cause for alarm, my dearsir," he says, imagining that he has got the key to the mystery; "it isnothing infectious, I assure you--nothing whatever!"
"That is not what I asked," rejoins Gerard, bluntly. "I don't carewhether it is infectious or not; is it _dangerous?_"
"Are you any relation of the young lady, may I ask?--brother, perhaps?"inquires the little doctor, peering inquisitively, though underdifficulties--for the abundant wind is playing rude tricks with theflame of his candle--into St. John's sad brown face.
"No--none."
&nb
sp; "Well, then, to be candid with you, it _does_ look rather serious,"he answers, with the careless deliberate calmness which those whosehalf-life is spent in pronouncing death-warrants seem insensibly toacquire: "a sharp attack of inflammation of the lungs, brought on byneglect and exposure. By-the-by, can you inform me whether there is anypredisposition to lung-disease in Miss--Miss Craven's family?"
"I know nothing about her family," replies the other, gloomily. Hehas no reason, beyond the probability of the thing, for supposingthat she had ever had a father or mother, much less a grandfather orgrandmother. Mr. Brand retires, completely mystified; and St. John,re-entering his room, throws himself into an arm-chair, and, coveringhis face with his hands, sends up violent voiceless prayers for theyoung life that is exchanging the first passes with that skilfulest offencers, whom the nations have christened "Death!" In all his roughgodless life he has had small faith in the efficacy of prayer: but, onthe bare chance of there being some good in it, he prays wordlessly inhis stricken heart for her.
Before they have done with him, the inmates of Blessington Hall havegrown very familiar with Dr. Brand's face; night and morning, night andmorning, coming and going, coming and going, through many days; for theadversary with whom the child is wrestling has thrown many a betterand stouter than she--and the battle is bitter. It is of little usenow that she hate the shadowing ginger curtains of the vast old woodenfour-poster; there must she lie, through all the weary twenty-fourhours, in paroxysms of acutest pain, in fits of utter breathlessness,in agonies of thirst. Grief for Jack, love for St. John, shamedconcern at Miss Blessington's damaging story and insulting words, areall swallowed up in the consuming craving for something to wet herparched lips, to cool her dry throat--something to drink! something todrink! By-and-by, with the pain, she becomes light-headed--wanders alittle--"babbles of green fields;" babbles to the uninterested ears ofthe sleepy tired nurse, of the twisted seat under the old cherry-tree,of the tea-roses up the kitchen-garden walk, of the yellow chickens inthe rickyard. Then her delirium grows wilder: the green flabby Cupidson the walls come down out of the tapestry, and make at her. One, thatis riding on a lion and blowing a horn, with fat cheeks puffed out,comes riding at her--riding up the bed-quilt, riding over her. Then theblack and gold cocks on the old japan-chest, that, with neck-feathersruffled, and heads lowered, stand ever, in act to fight, change theirattitude: come pecking, pecking at her--pecking at her eyes; and she,with terrified hands stretched out, fights at them--thrusts them away.
"And thrice the double twilights rose and fell, About a land where nothing seemed the same, At morn or eve, as in the days gone by."
And it comes to pass, that there falls a day when these sick fanciespass--when the pain and breathlessness pass--and when Esther lies inutter exhaustion, weak as a day-old babe, whiter than any Annunciationlily, between her sheets. Eyes and ears and power of touch are stillhers: but it seems as though all objects of sensation, of sight andsound and touch, reach her only through a thick blanket. She can see,as if at an immense distance off, shrouded in mist, the faces of doctorand nurse as they lean over her, and then, turning away, whispertogether. She cannot hear what they say; she has no wish to hear--shehas no wish for anything; only she lies, staring, with great eyes,straight before her at the bed-hangings, at the ceiling, at the littlecountless pigeon-holes in her toilet-table. One of the windows is open;and heaven's sweet breath circulates fresh and slow through the quietroom.
It is Sunday; the village people are clustering about the church-door;the violets, like blue eyes that have slept through winter's night,are opening under the churchyard wall. The bells are ringing; now,loud and clear--"ding-dong bell! ding-dong bell!" almost as if theywere being rung in the still chamber itself--they come; now, faint andfar; the wind has caught the sound in his rough hand, and carried itotherwhither. Whether they ring loud or faint, whether they ring orring not at all, she has no care; she has no care for anything. She isvery weary: it seems as if there were but a faint life-spark left inher; she can scarce lift her hand to her head. Now and then they raiseher up, and, without asking her consent, pour brandy and beef-tea downher reluctant throat. She is _so_ tired! Oh! why cannot they leave heralone! The slow hours roll themselves round; the people have gone intochurch, and have come out again.
Mr. Brand is here still; he is entering at the door; he is leaning overher. What can he have to say that he must needs look so solemn over?"My dear Miss Craven," he begins, with slow distinctness, as if heimagined that her illness had carried away her powers of hearing, "Mr.Winter is here; would not you like to see him?"
Mr. Winter is the meek M.A., whose voice the old squire drowns.
She fixes her great eyes,
"Yet larger through her leanness,"
upon his face--wondering as a child's just opened upon this strangegreen world. "I--why should I?" she asks, in a faint astonishedwhisper. She cannot speak above a whisper.
The good man looks embarrassed. "You are very ill," he says, indirectly.
"Am I?"
"And people in your situation generally wish for the holy offices of aminister of the Church."
"Do they?" She is too feeble to join one link to another in thesimplest chain of reasoning. She has failed to grasp his meaning. Helooks baffled, uneasy.
"My dear young lady," he says, very gravely, "it is very painful for meto have such a sad task to perform; but I cannot reconcile it with myconscience not to tell you that, in all human probability, you have notmany more days to live."
Through the thick veil of her weakness and its attendant apathy piercesthe sting of that awful news: her eyes dilate in their horror and fear,and she falls to weeping, feebly and helplessly.
"Don't say that--it is not true. How unkind you are! I don't want todie; I'm so young; I have had so little pleasure!"
"We must submit to God's will," says the doctor, a little tritely.It is so easy to submit to God's will towards one's friends andacquaintance.
She does not answer, but raises her hands with difficulty to her wastedface, while the tears trickle hot and frequent through that poor whiteshield.
"Have you any relations that you would like to have sent for?" inquiresMr. Brand, not unkindly; stooping over her, rather moved, but not verymuch so. Often before has it been his portion to say, to youth and maidand stalwart man, "Thou must die!"
"I have no relations," she answers, almost inaudibly.
"Any friends?"
"I have no friends."
"You have, then, no wish to see any one?"
"No. Stay," she says, as he turns to leave her, reaching out her handto detain him; "are you _quite_ sure that I shall die?" (Her lipsquiver, and a slight shudder passes over her form, as she utters thewords, "Is it _quite_ certain?")
"It is impossible to be _quite_ certain in any case," he answers,slowly; "while there is life, there is hope, you know; but--but--Icannot buoy you up with a false confidence."
She lies quiet a moment or two, regathering her spent strength. "Howlong do you think I shall live?"
"It is impossible to say exactly," he replies, gravely. "A few days--afew hours; one cannot be certain which."
Again she is silent, exhausted with the slight effort of framing asentence. "Ask Mr. Gerard to come and see me--_now--at once--before Idie!_"
He looks at her in astonishment, with a half-suspicion that she islight-headed; but her eyes look back at him with such perfect sanityin their clear depths, that he must needs abandon that idea. He cannotchoose but undertake her commission at her bidding.
And St. John comes. They are singing the "Nunc Dimittis," which, saithBacon, "is ever the sweetest canticle" in the Church, as he crossesthe threshold of that room, and draws near that bed on which, buta few short nights ago, he had seen her, with his covetous lover'seyes, lying in all her round dimpled beauty. There comes no greetingblush _now_ into her cheeks--the cheeks, that the sound of his far-offfootfall had been wont to redden. How can she, that is the affiancedof great Deat
h, blush for any _mortal_ lover? Her eyes lift themselveslanguidly to his face; and, even in the "valley of the shadow," dwellthere comfortably; though in that countenance--never beautiful, andnow made haggard by watching, with reddened eyelids and quiveringmuscles--a stranger would have seen small comeliness.
"So I am going to die, they tell me!" she says, whisperingly--says itsimply and mournfully.
Gerard cannot answer; only he flings himself forward upon the bed, anddevours her thin hand with miserable kisses.
"Perhaps it is not true! Oh, I hope it is not, St. John!" she says,falling to weeping; in her feebleness and great dread of that goal towhich all our highways and byways and field-paths lead:
"Death, and great darkness after death!"
Still no answer.
"Cannot they do anything for me?" she asks piteously.
He lifts his head; and in his eyes--the eyes that have not wept morethan twice since he was a little white-frocked child--stand heavyburning tears.
"Nothing, darling, I'm afraid," he answers, in a rough choked voice.
"There is _no_ hope, then?"
"Oh, poor little one! why do you torture me with such questions? I_dare_ not tell you a lie!"
"You mean that I am _sure_ to die!" she says, faintly, with a slightshudder, while a look of utter hopeless fear comes into her wan face.
He throws his arms about her in his great despair. "Why do you make metell you such news _twice?_ Is not _once_ enough?"
"It is _quite_ sure! Oh, I wish I was not so frightened!"
His features contract in the agony of that moment; an overpoweringtemptation assails him, to tell her some pleasant falsehood about herstate; but he resists it.
"As far as anything human _can_ be sure, it is so," he says, turningaway his head.
"Are you sure there is no mistake?--is it _quite_ certain?"
"Quite."
"Then"--essaying to raise herself in the bed, and reaching out herslight, weary arms to him--"then kiss me, St. John!"
Without a word he gathers her to his breast; fully understanding, inhis riven heart, that this embrace, which she herself can ask for, mustindeed be a final one; his lips cling to hers in the wild silence of asolemn last farewell.
"I'm glad you are not angry with me now," she whispers, almostinaudibly; and then her arms slacken their clasp about his bronzedneck, and her head droops heavy and inert on his shoulder.
And so they find them half an hour later: he, like one crazed, with aface as ashen-white as her own, clasping a lifeless woman to his breast.
CHAPTER XLII.
Lifeless! Yes! But there are two kinds of lifelessness: one from whichthere is no back-coming--one from which there is. Esther's is thelatter. Although a member of that fraternity whose province it is tokill and to make alive has sapiently said of her, "She will die!--shehas not week to live!" Mother Nature has made answer, "She shall _not_die; I will save her alive! She has yet many years." And Esther lives.For many days, it is hard to predicate of her whether she be deador alive; so faintly does the wave of life heave to and fro in herbreast--so lowly does life's candle burn. But though the candle burnlow, it is not blown out. By-and-bye strength gathers itself again, andcomes back to pulse and vein and limb.
At seventeen life holds us so fast in his embrace that he will hardlylet us go. To the sick child there come sweet sleeps; there comes adesire for food--a pleasure in the dusty sunbeam streaming throughthe window--in the mote playing up and down on ceiling and wall. Imarvel will the bliss of spirits at the Resurrection dawn, feelingthe clothing of pure new bodies, surpass the delight that attendsthe renewal of the old body at the uprising from a great sickness?The blanket that hung between Esther and all objects of sensation iswithdrawn: full consciousness returns, and remembrance; and in theircompany, untold shame--shame at not having died! The celandine'sgreenish buds are unclosing into little brazen wide-awake flowersin the hedge-banks: the crocuses in the garden-borders hold uptheir gold chalices to catch the gentle February rain and the mildFebruary sunbeams; in the wood-hollows the mercury--spring's earliestherald--flourishes, thick and frequent, its stout green shoots. Aboutthe meadows, small gawky lambs make a feeble "ba-a-a-ing." It isdrawing towards sundown. The window is open; and near it, on a beechbough, a thrush sits, singing a loud sweet even-song.
Esther has been fully dressed for the first time, and has been movedinto an adjoining dressing-room. In the small change of scene, thereis, to her, intense delight--delight even in the changed pattern on thewalls, in the different shape of the chairs--even in the brass handlesof the old oak chest of drawers. Every power seems new and fresh--everysensation exquisitely keen; in every exercise of sight and sound andtouch there is conscious joy. She has been amusing herself makinglittle tests of her strength. She lifts a book that lies on the tablebeside her; it is small and light, but to her it seems over-heavy; shehas to take two hands to it. She makes a pilgrimage from her arm-chairto the window--she has to catch at the wall, at the furniture,for support; but she gets there at last, and, sitting down on thewindow-seat, looks out at the quiet sky, blackened with home-comingrooks--at the pool made flame-red by the westering sun--at the peepingroof of the distant deer-barn. That little bit of roof brings a floodof recollections to her, and first and foremost amongst them stands St.John and her last interview with him. Although she is quite alone, atorrent of red invades cheeks and throat and brow, even to the roots ofher hair. "_I sent for him_," she says to herself, with a sort of gasp;"_I asked him to kiss me_, and _I did not die!_ How horrible! I mustnever see him again." Then she falls to thinking about him: whetherhe is still in the house? whether he has made up his differences withMiss Blessington? whether he is very joyful at her own recovery?whether he is not penetrated with the ridiculousness of her impressiveleave-taking, which, after all--oh bathos!--was no leave-taking at all?"He must never hear me mentioned again," she says, twisting her handsnervously together. "Perhaps he will forget it in time; perhaps he willnot tell any one about it. How soon shall I be well enough to go?--in aweek? five days? four? three?--and whither am I to go?"
Aye, whither, Miss Craven? There are but two alternatives for her--theUnion and Plas Berwyn. She must swallow her pride, and return to theBrandons: to the long prayers; to the half-past six tea and bread andscrape; to the three bits of bacon at breakfast; and to the perusalof the _Record_ and the _Rock:_ she must induce Mrs. Brandon again toadvertise for a situation in a pious family. This morning's post hasbrought her four pages of doctrine, reproof, and instruction from MissBessy, and, lurking within them, has come a short, sweet, metricalprayer, adapted to every Christian's daily use:
"My heart is like a rusty lock, Lord, oil it with Thy grace; And rub, and rub, and rub it, Lord, Till I can see Thy face."
There is no time like the present; she will write now. She has drawnpaper and pens towards her, when the door opens, and her friend thehousemaid enters. Doctor and nurse have fled,
"Like bats and owls, And such melancholy fowls, At the rising of the day."
"If you please, Miss Craven, do you feel well enough to see visitors?"
She looks up astonished. "I'm well enough for anything; but I'm sure Idon't know who is likely to visit me."
"Mr. Gerard was asking whether he might speak to you 'm?"
"Certainly not--I mean yes--No.--Yes, I suppose--if he wishes," repliesthe girl, stammering hopelessly.
Miss Craven looks rather small, and excessively childish, sunk in herhuge elbow-chair; a white wrapper envelopes her figure; her hair, whichshe has not taken the trouble to dress properly, is twisted up in theloosest, unfashionablest, sweetest great knot at the back of her neck;while a cherry-coloured ribbon coquettishly snoods her noble smallhead: the innocentest, freshest, shyest rosebud-face, and the liquidestsouthern eyes, complete the picture. St. John apparently treads hardupon the heels of the messenger, for, before permission is wellaccorded him, he is in his mistress's presence. Upon his brown faceis untold gladness--
in his eyes enormous love; and in them lurks alsoa look of half-malicious, half-tender mirth. She rises, and then sitsdown again, in unutterable confusion; and at length holds out her handwith distant diffidence to him, while as intense a blush as ever mademortal woman call upon the hills to cover her, bathes every inch of herthat is visible. Her cheeks feel like gigantic red globes, over whichher eyes have difficulty in looking. _His_ eyes, laughing, pitiless,yet impassioned, refuse to leave her.
"You did not give me so cold a greeting when I last saw you, Essie?" hesays, with an enraging smile of passionate triumph.
She turns away her head, and covers her face with both hands; but,in the interstices between her fingers, the lovely carnation blazesmanifestly vivid.
"Oh, don't--don't be so cruel!" she murmurs, in a stifled voice.
"The truth can never be cruel!" he says quietly, smiling still; and sokneels down on the floor beside her.
But she only murmurs, "Go away; _please_ go away! please let mealone!"--the words coming half-broken, half-lost, from behind thecovering of her hands.
He puts up his, and tries to draw away the screen from her shameddiscomfited face, saying, "Look at me, Essie!" But she, with all herfeeble strength, resists.
"I cannot!--I cannot!" she cries, vehemently; "don't ask me! Why didn'tI die? When they saw I was getting well, they ought to have killed me.Oh, I wish they had!"
"I'm rather glad, on the whole, they did not," he answers, gravely;and so, with one final effort, he being strong, and she being weak,he obtains possession of her two hands, and her face lies bare,unshaded--dyed with an agony of shame--clothed with great beauty--underthe hungry tenderness of his happy eyes.
"To think of making one's last dying speech and confession, and thennot dying after all," she says, in torments of confusion, yet unable torestrain an uneasy laugh. "It is _too_ disgraceful! I shall never getover it! _Never!_--NEVER!--_NEVER!!_"
"Time, which mitigates all afflictions, _may_ mitigate yours," hereplies, gaily, unable to resist the exquisite pleasure of teasing her.
She turns from him with a petulant movement of head and shoulder. "Whydon't you go?" she cries, the angry tears flashing into her eyes; "Ihate the sight of you!"
At that he grows grave. "Essie," he says, slipping his arms round heras she sits, shrinking away from him in the deep chintz chair, "in thatawful moment, when you thought--and God knows I thought so too--that wewere saying 'goodbye' to one another for _always_, the barriers thatyour wretched false pride had built up between us were knocked down;try as you may, you can never build them up again."
"I knocked down plenty of barriers, I'm aware," she answers, ruefully."You need not remind me of that!"
"Never to be built up again any more--never any more!" he says, hismirth swallowed up in great solemn joy.
She has fallen forwards into his embrace; he holds her little tremblingform against his heart--a posture to which she submits, chiefly becauseit affords her an opportunity of hiding her face upon his shoulder.
"Never any more!" she repeats, mechanically, and then there is silence,save for the thrush, that trills ever his high tender lay. PresentlyEssie stirs, and whispers, with uneasiness, "St. John!"
"Well?"
"You won't tell any one, will you?"
"Tell them what?--that you and I are going to be married? By this timeto-morrow I hope to have told every one I meet: I am not so selfish asto wish to keep such good news to myself."
"No--I don't mean that; but you won't tell any one about--about--about_that?_" This is the nearest approach she can bear to make to theabhorred theme.
"Esther!"
"And you'll promise never to joke about it?"
"_Never_, by the holy poker!"
"And you won't twit me with it when we quarrel?"
"What! you contemplate our having little differences of opinion?"
"Of course," she answers, laughing; "when two such ill-tempered peoplecome together, how can it be otherwise?"
"Quarrel or no quarrel," he cries, passionately kissing her sweet shylips, as one that can never be satiated with their tender warmth, "weare together now, for bad and good, for fair weather and foul, tilldeath us do part! Say it after me, Essie; don't let ours be a one-sidedcompact."
And Essie, obedient, murmurs after him, "Till death us do part!"
* * * * *
And so it comes to pass that in the sweet spring weather, when theground is a carpet of strewn cherry-blooms, when the cows standknee-deep in buttercups, and the brake-fern is uncrumpling its tenderfronds, the church-bells ring out, and they two are wed.
And the sun, that shines down on the bravery of the wedding pomp, asbride and groom pace by, shines also hotlier, with a more brazen sicklyglare, on a soldier's grave, over which, three days ago, his comradesfired the parting volley on Bermuda's sultry shore.
The name of the soldier to whom Heaven has granted his discharge isRobert Brandon. Esther Gerard may spare her remorse now; treachery ofhers can wound that loyal heart, on which the worm feeds sweetly, nevermore! Not unknowing of the good fortune of the woman he had so madly,miserably, nobly loved, has he passed away. In his poor schoolboyscrawl he had written her a little simple, badly-worded note, bidding,"God bless and speed her on her way!" The tears had fallen hot andthick upon the paper; but he had wiped them off, and she had neverguessed them. He has hoarded his scant pay, has denied himself many ofthe small comforts that to his brother-officers are bare necessariesof life, that he may send her a wedding-gift befitting Gerard's bride.And he had gone about his wonted ways with no moping martyr's airs,unshaken in his simple creed that, since God wills it, all must befor the best. His honest laugh, if it come seldomer than it used, yetis none the less hearty and genial when it does come. And then, thatpestilence which, at stated seasons, never forgetting its appointedperiods, visits that tropic clime, comes and lays its heavy hand onthe shoulder of many a fair-haired youth; and, among the first, uponthe stalwart shoulder of Robert Brandon. And he, with no life-hatingmadness, with no quarrel against fate, yet not all unwilling, havingstoutly fought life's hard battle:
"Surrenders his fair soul Unto his Captain--Christ!"
THE END.
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