From the blue sea, now and then, came the breath of Winter, though Autumn lingered on the shore. Many of the people at the hotel had gone back to town, feeling the imperious call of the city with the first keen wind. Eloise, with a few others, waited. She expected to stay until Barbara was strong enough to go with her.

But Barbara's strength was coming very slowly now. She grieved for her father, and the grieving kept her back. Allan came down once a fortnight to spend Sunday with Eloise and to look after Barbara, though he realised that Barbara was, in a way, beyond his reach.

[Sidenote: What We Need]

"She doesn't need medicine," he said, to Eloise. "She is perfectly well, physically, though of course her strength is limited and will be for some time to come. What she needs is happiness."

"That is what we all need," answered Eloise.

Allan flashed a quick glance at her. "Even I," he said, in a different tone, "but I must wait for mine."

"We all wait for things," she laughed, but the lovely colour had mounted to the roots of her hair that waved so softly back from her low forehead.

"When, dear?" insisted Allan, possessing himself of her hand.

"I promised once," she answered. "When the colour is all gone from the hills and the last leaves have fallen, then I'll come."

"You're not counting the oaks?" he asked, half fearfully. "Sometimes the oak leaves stay on all Winter, you know. And evergreens are ruled out, aren't they?"

"Certainly. We won't count the oaks or the Christmas trees. Long before Santa Claus comes, I'll be a sedate matron instead of a flyaway, frivolous spinster."

"For the first time since I grew up," remarked Allan, with evident sincerity, "I wish Christmas came earlier. Upon what day, fair lady, do you think the leaves will be gone?"

"In November, I suppose," she answered, with an affected indifference that did not deceive him. "The day after Thanksgiving, perhaps."

"That's Friday, and I positively refuse to be married on a Friday."

[Sidenote: The Best Day of All]

"Then the day before—that's Wednesday. You know the old rhyme says: 'Wednesday the best day of all.'"

So it was settled. Allan laughingly put down in his little red leather pocket diary, under the date of Wednesday, November twenty-fifth, "Miss Wynne's wedding." "Where is it to be?" he asked. "I wouldn't miss it for worlds."

"I've been thinking about that," said Eloise, slowly, after a pause. "I suppose we'll have to be conventional."

"Why?"

"Because everybody is."

"The very reason why we shouldn't be. This is our wedding, and we'll have it to please ourselves. It's probably our last."

"In spite of the advanced civilisation in which we live," she returned, "I hope and believe that it is the one and only wedding in which either of us will ever take a leading part."

"Haven't you ever had day-dreams, dear, about your wedding?"

"Many a time," she laughed. "I'd be the rankest kind of polygamist if I had all the kinds I've planned for."

"But the best kind?" he persisted. "Which is in the ascendant now?"

[Sidenote: An Ideal Wedding]

"If I could choose," she replied, thoughtfully, "I'd have it in some quiet little country church, on a brilliant, sunshiny day—the kind that makes your blood tingle and fills you with the joy of living. I'd like it to be Indian Summer, with gold and crimson leaves falling all through the woods. I'd like to have little brown birds chirping, and squirrels and chipmunks pattering through the leaves. I'd like to have the church almost in the heart of the woods, and have the sun stream into every nook and corner of it while we were being married. I'd like two taper lights at the altar, and the Episcopal service, but no music."

"Any crowd?"

Her sweet face grew very tender. "No," she said. "Nobody but our two selves."

"We'll have to have a minister," he reminded her, practically, "and two witnesses. Otherwise it isn't legal. Whom would you choose for witnesses?"

"I think I'd like to have Barbara and Roger. I don't know why, for I have so many other friends who mean more to me. Yet it seems, some way, as if they two belonged in the picture."

[Sidenote: Right Now]

A bright idea came to Allan. "Dearest," he said, "you couldn't have the falling leaves and the squirrels if we waited until Thanksgiving time, but it's all here, right now. Don't you remember that little church in the woods that we passed the other day—the little white church with maples all around it and the Autumn leaves dropping silently through the still, warm air? Why not here—and now?"

"Oh, I couldn't," cried Eloise.

"Why not?"

"Oh, you're so stupid! Clothes and things! I've got a million things to do before I can be married decently."

He laughed at her woman's reason as he put his arms around her. "I want a wife, and not a Parisian wardrobe. You're lovelier to me right now in your white linen gown than you've ever been before. Don't wear yourself out with dressmakers and shopping. You'll have all the rest of your life for that."

"Won't I have all the rest of my life to get married in?" she queried, demurely.

"You have if you insist upon taking it, darling, but I feel very strongly to get married to-day."

"Not to-day," she demurred.

"Why not? It's only half past one and the ceremony doesn't last over twenty minutes. I suppose it can be cut down to fifteen or eighteen if you insist upon having it condensed. You don't even need to wash your face. Get your hat and come on."

His tone was tender, even pleading, but some far survival of Primitive Woman, whose marriage was by capture, stirred faintly in Eloise. "Our friends won't like it," she said, as a last excuse.

[Sidenote: The Two Concerned]

He noted, with joy, that she said "won't," instead of "wouldn't," but she did not realise that she had betrayed herself. "We don't care, do we?" he asked. "It's our wedding and nobody's else. When we can't please everybody, we might as well please ourselves. Matrimony is the one thing in the world that concerns nobody but the two who enter into it—and it's the thing that everybody has the most to say about. While you're putting on your hat, I'll get the license and see about a carriage."

"I thought I'd wait until Barbara could go to town with me," she said.

"There's nothing to hinder your coming back for her, if you want to and she isn't willing to come with Roger. I insist upon having my honeymoon alone."

"All alone? If I were very good, wouldn't you let me come along?"

Allan coloured. "You know what I mean," he said, softly. "I've waited so long, darling, and I think I've been patient. Isn't it time I was rewarded?"

They were on the beach, behind the friendly sand-dune that had been their trysting place all Summer. Thoroughly humble in her surrender, yet wholly womanly, Eloise put her soft arms around his neck. "I will," she said. "Kiss me for the last time before——"

"Before what?" demanded Allan, as, laughing, she extricated herself from his close embrace.

"Before you exchange your sweetheart for a wife."

[Sidenote: More Secure]

"I'm not making any exchange. I'm only making my possession more secure. Look, dear."

He took from his pocket a shining golden circlet which exactly fitted the third finger of her left hand. Their initials were engraved inside. Only the date was lacking.

"I've had it for a long, long time," he said, in reply to her surprised question. "I hoped that some day I might find you in a yielding mood."

When she went up to her room, her heart was beating wildly. This sudden plunge into the unknown was blinding, even though she longed to make it. Having come to the edge of the precipice she feared the leap, in spite of the conviction that life-long happiness lay beyond.

In the fond sight of her lover, Eloise was very lovely when she went down in her white gown and hat, her eyes shining with the world-old joy that makes the old world new for those to whom it comes, be it soon or late.

[Sidenote: Beautifully Unconventional]

"It's beautifully unconventional," she said, as he assisted her into the surrey. "No bridesmaids, no wedding presents, and no dreary round of entertainments. I believe I like it."

"I know I do," he responded, fervently. "You're the loveliest thing I've ever seen, sweetheart. Is that a new gown?"

"I've worn it all Summer," she laughed "and it's been washed over a dozen times. You have lots to learn about gowns."

"I'm a willing pupil," he announced. "Shouldn't you have a veil? I believe the bride's veil is usually 'of tulle, caught with a diamond star, the gift of the groom.'"

"You've been reading the society column. Give me the star, and I'll get the veil."

"You shall have it the first minute we get to town. I'd rob the Milky Way for you, if I could. I'd give you a handful of stars to play with and let you roll the sun and moon over the golf links."

"I may take the moon," she replied. "I've always liked the looks of it, but I'm afraid the sun would burn my fingers. Somebody once got into trouble, I believe, for trying to drive the chariot of the sun for a day. Give me the moon and just one star."

"Which star do you want?"

[Sidenote: The Love-star]

"The love-star," she answered, very softly. "Will you keep it shining for me, in spite of clouds and darkness?"

"Indeed I will."

The horses stopped at Barbara's door. Allan went across the street to call for Roger and Eloise went in to invite Barbara to go for a drive.

"How lovely you look," cried Barbara, in admiration. "You look like a bride."

"Make yourself look bridal also," suggested Eloise, flushing, "by putting on your best white gown. Roger is coming, too."

Barbara missed the point entirely. It did not take her long to get ready, and she sang happily to herself while she was dressing. She put a white lace scarf of her mother's over her golden hair, which was now piled high on her shapely head, and started out, for the first time in all her twenty-two years, for a journey beyond the limits of her own domain.

Allan and Roger helped her in. She was very awkward about it, and was sufficiently impressed with her awkwardness to offer a laughing apology. "I've never been in a carriage before," she said, "nor seen a train, nor even a church. All I've had is pictures and books—and Roger," she added, as an afterthought, when he took his place beside her on the back seat.

"You're going to see lots of things to-day that you never saw before," observed Allan, starting the horses toward the hill road. "We'll begin by showing you a church, and then a wedding."

"A wedding!" cried Barbara. "Who is going to be married?"

"We," he replied, concisely. "Don't you think it's time?"

"Isn't it sudden?" asked Roger. "I thought you weren't going to be married until almost Christmas."

"I've been serving time now for two years," explained Allan, "and she's given me two months off for good behaviour. Just remember, young man, when your turn comes, that nothing is sudden when you've been waiting for it all your life."

[Sidenote: The Little White Church]

The door of the little white church was open and the sun that streamed through the door and the stained glass windows carried the glory and the radiance of Autumn into every nook and corner of it. At the altar burned two tall taper lights, and the young minister, in white vestments, was waiting.

The joking mood was still upon Allan and Eloise, but she requested in all seriousness that the word "obey" be omitted from the ceremony.

"Why?" asked the minister, gravely.

"Because I don't want to promise anything I don't intend to do."

"Put it in for me," suggested Allan, cheerfully. "I might as well promise, for I'll have to do it anyway."

Gradually, the hush and solemnity of the church banished the light mood. A new joy, deeper, and more lasting, took the place of laughter as they sat in the front pew, reading over the service. Barbara and Roger sat together, half way down to the door. Neither had spoken since they entered the church.

A shaft of golden light lay full upon Eloise's face. In that moment, before they went to the altar, Allan was afraid of her, she seemed so angelic, so unreal. But the minister was waiting, with his open book. "Come," said Allan, in a whisper, and she rose, smiling, to follow him, not only then, but always.

[Sidenote: The Ceremony]

"Dearly Beloved," began the minister, "we are gathered here together in the sight of God and in the face of this company, to join together this man and this woman in holy matrimony." He went on through the beautiful service, while the light streamed in, bearing its fairy freight of colour and gold, and the swift patter of the Little People of the Forest rustled through the drifting leaves.

It was all as Eloise had chosen, even to the two who sat far back, with their hands clasped, as wide-eyed as children before this sacred merging of two souls into one.

A little brown bird perched on the threshold, chirped a few questioning notes, then flew away to his own nest. Acorns fell from the oaks across the road, and the musical hum and whir of Autumn came faintly from the fields. The taper lights burned in the sunshine like yellow stars.

"That ye may so live together in this life," the minister was saying, "that in the world to come ye may have life everlasting. Amen."

[Sidenote: After the Ordeal]

It was over in an incredibly brief space of time. When they came down the aisle, Allan had the satisfied air of a man who has just emerged, triumphantly, through his own skill, from a very difficult and dangerous ordeal. Eloise was radiant, for her heart was singing within her a splendid strophe of joy.

When Barbara and Roger went to meet them, the strange, new shyness that had settled down upon them both effectually hindered conversation. Roger began an awkward little speech of congratulation, which immediately became inarticulate and ended in silent embarrassment.

But Allan wrung Roger's hand in a mighty grip that made him wince, and Eloise smiled, for she saw more than either of them had yet guessed. "You're kids," she said, fondly; "just dear, foolish kids." Impulsively, she kissed them both, then they all went out into the sunshine again.

The minister's eyes followed them with a certain wistfulness, for he was young, and, as yet, the great miracle had not come to him. He sighed when he put out the tapers and closed the door that divided him from the music of Autumn and one great, overwhelming joy.

[Sidenote: On the Way Home]

On the way home, neither Barbara nor Roger spoke. They had nothing to say and the others were silent because they had so much. They left the two at Barbara's gate, then Allan turned the horses back to the hill road. They were to have two glorious, golden hours alone before taking the afternoon train.

Barbara and Roger watched them as they went slowly up the tawny road that trailed like a ribbon over the pageantry of the hill. When they came to the crossroads, where one road led to the church and the other into the boundless world beyond, Eloise leaned far out to wave a fluttering bit of white in farewell.

"And on her lover's arm she leant, And round her waist she felt it fold, And far across the hills they went In that new world which is the old,"

quoted Barbara, softly.

[Sidenote: O'er the Hills]

"And o'er the hills, and far away, Beyond their utmost purple rim, Beyond the night, across the day, Through all the world she followed him,"

added Roger.

The carriage was now only a black speck on the brow of the hill. Presently it descended into the Autumn sunset and vanished altogether.

"I'm glad they asked us," said Roger.

"Wasn't it dear of them!" cried Barbara, with her face aglow. "Oh, Roger, if I ever have a wedding, I want it to be just like that!"



XXIII

Letters to Constance

[Sidenote: Faith in Results]

Roger was in the library, trying to choose, from an embarrassment of riches, the ten of his father's books which he was to be permitted to take to the city with him. With characteristic thoughtfulness, Eloise had busied herself in his behalf immediately upon her return to town. She had found a good opportunity for him, and the letter appointing the time for a personal interview was even then in his pocket.

Neither he nor his mother had the slightest doubt as to the result. Miss Mattie was certain that any lawyer with sense enough to practise law would be only too glad to have Roger in his office. She scornfully dismissed the grieving owner of Fido from her consideration, for it was obvious that anyone with even passable mental equipment would not have been disturbed by the accidental and painless removal of a bull pup.

Roger's ambition and eagerness made him very sure of the outcome of his forthcoming venture. All he asked for was the chance to work, and Eloise was giving him that. How good she had been and how much she had done for Barbara! Roger's heart fairly overflowed with gratitude and he registered a boyish vow not to disappoint those who believed in him.

It seemed strange to think of Eloise as "Mrs. Conrad." She had signed her brief note to Roger, "Very cordially, Eloise Wynne Conrad." Down in the corner she had written "Mrs. Allan Conrad." Roger smiled as he noted the space between the "Wynne" and the "Conrad" in her signature—the surest betrayal of a bride.

"If I should marry," Roger thought, "my wife's name would be 'Mrs. Roger Austin.'" He wrote it out on a scrap of paper to see how it would look. It was certainly very attractive. "And if it were Barbara, for instance, she would sign her letters 'Barbara North Austin.'" He wrote that out, too, and, in the lamplight, appreciatively studied the effect from many different angles. It was really a very beautiful name.

[Sidenote: Lost in Reverie]

He lost himself in reverie, and it was nearly an hour afterward when he returned to the difficult task of choosing his ten books. Shakespeare, of course—fortunately there was a one-volume edition that came within the letter of the law if not the spirit of it. To this he added Browning. As it happened, there was a complete one-volume edition of this, too. Emerson came next—the Essays in two volumes. That made four. He added Vanity Fair, David Copperfield, a translation of the AEneid, and his beloved Keats. He hesitated a long time over the last two, but finally took down Boswell's Life of Johnson and the Essays of Elia, neither of which he had read.

[Sidenote: A Little Old Book]

Behind these two books, which had stood side by side, there was a small, thin book that had either fallen down or been hidden there. Roger took it out and carefully wiped off the dust. It was a blank book in which his father had written on all but the last few pages. He took it over to the table, drew the lamp closer, and sat down.

The gay cover had softened with the years, the pages were yellow, and some of them were blurred by blistering spots. The ink had faded, but the writing was still legible. At the top of the first page was the date, "Evening, June the seventh."

"I have lived long," was written on the next line below, "but a thousand years of living have been centred remorselessly into to-day. I cannot go over, though in this house and in the one across the road it will seem very strange. I knew the clouds of darkness must eternally hide us each from the other, that we must see each other no more save at a great distance, but the thunder and the riving lightning have put heaven between us as well as earth.

"I cannot eat, for food is dust and ashes in my mouth. I cannot drink enough water to moisten my dry, parched throat. I cannot answer when anyone speaks to me, for I do not hear what is said. It does not seem that I shall ever sleep again. Yet God, pitiless and unforgiving, lets me live on."

The remainder of the page was blank. The next entry was dated: "June tenth. Night."

[Sidenote: No Other Way]

"I had to go. There was no other way. I had to sit and listen. I saw the blind man in the room beyond, sitting beside the dark woman with the hard face. She had the little lame baby in her arms—the baby who is a year or so younger than my own son. I smelled the tuberoses and the great clusters of white lilacs. And I saw her, dead, with her golden braids on either side of her, smiling, in her white casket. When no one was looking, I touched her hand. I called softly, 'Constance.' She did not answer, so I knew she was dead.

"I had to go to the churchyard, with the others. I was compelled to look at the grave and to see the white casket lowered in. I heard that awful fall of earth upon her and a voice saying those terrible words, 'Dust to dust, earth to earth, ashes to ashes.' The blind man sobbed aloud when the earth fell. The dark woman with the hard face did not seem to care. I could have strangled her, but I had to keep my hands still.

"They said that she had not been sleeping and that she took too much laudanum by mistake. It was not a mistake, for she was not of that sort. She did it purposely. She did it because of that one mad hour of full confession. I have killed her. After three years of self-control, it failed me, and I went mad. It was my fault, for if I had not failed, she would not have gone mad, too. I have killed her."

"June fifteenth. Midnight.

"I am calmer now. I can think more clearly. I have been alone in the woods all day and every day since—. I have been thinking, thinking, thinking, and going over everything. She left no word for me; she was so sure I would understand. I do not understand yet, but I shall.

[Sidenote: Estranged]

"There was no wrong between us, there never would have been. We were divided by the whole earth, denied by all the leagues of sundering sea. Now we are estranged by all the angels of heaven and all the hosts of hell.

"My arms ache for her—my lips hunger for hers. In that mysterious darkness, does she want me, too? Did her heart cry out for me as mine for her, until the blood of the poppies mingled with hers and brought the white sleep?

"It would have been something to know that we breathed the same air, trod the same highways, listened together to the thrush and robin, and all the winged wayfarers of forest and field. It would have been comfort to know the same sun shone on us both, that the same moon lighted the midnight silences with misty silver, that the same stars burned taper-lights in the vaulted darkness for her and for me.

[Sidenote: One Hour]

"But I have not even that. I have nothing, though I have done no wrong beyond holding her in my arms for one little hour. Out of all the time that was before our beginning, out of all the time that shall be after our ending, and in all the unpitying years of our mortal life, we have had one hour."

"June nineteenth.

"I have been to her grave. I have tried to realise that the little mound of earth upon the distant hill, over which the sun and stars sweep endlessly, still shelters her; that, in some way, she is there. But I cannot.

"The mystery agonises me, for I have never had the belief that comforts so many. Why is one belief any better than another when we come face to face with the grey, impenetrable veil that never parts save for a passage? Freed from the bonds of earth, does she still live, somewhere, in perfect peace with no thought of me? Sentient, but invisible, is she here beside me now? Or is she asleep, dreamlessly, abiding in the earth until some archangel shall sound the trumpet bidding all the myriad dead arise? Oh, God, God! Only tell me where she is, that I may go, too!"

"June twenty-first.

[Sidenote: The Hand Stayed]

"It is true that the path she took is open to me also. I have thought of it many times. I am not afraid to follow where she has led, even into the depths of hell. I have had for several days a vial of the crushed poppies, and the bitter odour, even now, fills my room. Only one thought stays my hand—my little son.

"Should I follow, he must inevitably come to believe that his father was a coward—that he was afraid of life, which is the most craven fear of all. He will see that I have given to him something that I could not bear myself, and will despise me, as people despise a man who shirks his burden and shifts it to the shoulders of one weaker than he.

"When temptation assails him, he will remember that his father yielded. When life looms dark before him and among the fearful shadows there is no hint of light, he will recall that his father was too much of a coward to go into those same shadows, carrying his own light.

"And if his heart is ever filled with an awful agony that requires all his strength to meet it, he will remember that his father failed. I could not rest in my grave if my son, living, should despise me, even though my narrow house was in the same darkness that hides Her."

"July tenth. Dawn.

[Sidenote: Punishment]

"This, then, is my punishment. Because for one hour my self-control deserted me, when my man's blood had been crying out for three years for the touch of her—because for one little hour my hungry arms held her close to my aching heart, there is no peace. Nowhere in earth nor in heaven nor in hell is there one moment's forgetfulness. Nowhere in all God's illimitable universe is there pardon and surcease of pain.

"The blind man comes to me and talks of her. He asks me piteously, 'Why?' He calls me his friend. He says that she often spoke of me; that they were glad to have me in their house. He asks me if she ever said one word that would give a reason. Was she unhappy? Was it because he was blind and the little yellow-haired baby with her mother's blue eyes was born lame? I can only say 'No,' and beg him not to talk of it—not even to think of it."

"July twentieth. Night.

"The beauty of the world at midsummer only makes my loneliness more keen. The butterflies flit through the meadows like wandering souls of last year's flowers that died and were buried by the snow. The harvest moon, red-gold and wonderful, will rise slowly up out of the sea. The path of light will lie on the still waters and widen into a vast arc at the line of the shore. Cobwebs will come among the stubble when the harvest is gathered in and on them will lie dewdrops that the moon will make into pearls.

[Sidenote: Cycle of the Seasons]

"The gorgeous colouring of Autumn will transfigure the hills with glory, and fill the far silences with misty amethyst and gold. The year-long sleep will come with the first snow, and the stars burn blue and cold in the frosty night. April bugles will wake the violets and anemones, the dead leaves of Autumn will be starred with springtime bloom, May will dance through the world with lilacs and apple blossoms, and I shall be alone.

"I can go to her grave again and see the violets all around it, their exquisite odour made of her dust. I can carry to her the first roses of June, as I used to do, but she cannot take them in her still hands. I can only lay them on that impassable mound, and let the warm rains, as soft as woman's tears, drip down and down and down until the fragrance and my love come to her in the mist.

"But will she care? Is that last sleep so deep that the quiet heart is never stirred by love? When my whole soul goes out to her in an agony of love and pain, is it possible that there is no answer? If there is a God in heaven, it cannot be!"

"October fifth. Night.

"It is said that Time heals everything. I have been waiting to see if it were so. Day by day my loss is greater; day by day my grief becomes more difficult to bear. I read all the time, or pretend to. I sit for hours with the open book before me and never see a line that is printed there. Oh, Love, if I could dream to-night, in the earth with you!"

"October seventh.

"Just four months ago to-day! I was numb, then, with the shock and horror. I could not feel as I do now. When the tide of my heart came in, with agony in every pulse-beat, it rose steadily to the full, without pause, without rest. I think it has reached its flood now, for I cannot endure more. Will there ever be recession?"

"November tenth.

[Sidenote: Death of Passion]

"I am coming, gradually, to have some sort of faith. I do not know why, for I have never had it before. I can see that all things made of earth must perish as the leaves. Passion dies because it is of the earth, but does not love live?

[Sidenote: A Gift]

"If only the finer things of the spirit could be bequeathed, like material possessions! All I have to leave my son is a very small income and a few books. I cannot give him endurance, self-control, or the power to withstand temptation. I cannot give him joy. If I could, I should leave him one priceless gift—my love for Constance, to which, for one hour, hers answered fully—I should give him that love with no barrier to divide it from its desire.

"I wonder if Constance would have left hers to her little yellow-haired girl? I wonder if sometimes the joys of the fathers are not visited upon their children as well as their sins?"

"November nineteenth. Night.

"I have come to believe that love never dies for God is love, and He is immortal. My love for Constance has not died and cannot. Why should hers have died? It does not seem that it has, since to-day, for the first time, I have found surcease.

"Constance is dead, but she has left her love to sustain and strengthen me. It streams out from the quiet hillside to-night as never before, and gives me the peace of a benediction. I understand, now, the blinding pain of the last five months. The immortal spirit of love, which can neither die nor grow old, was extricating itself from the earth that clung to it.

"December third.

"At last I have come to perfect peace. I no longer hunger so terribly for the touch of her, for my aching arms to clasp her close, for her lips to quiver beneath mine. The tide has ebbed—there is no more pain.

"I have come, strangely, into kinship with the universe. I have a feeling to-night of brotherhood. I can see that death is no division when a heart is deep enough to hold a grave. The Grey Angel cannot separate her from me, though she took the white poppies from his hands, and gave none to me.

"December eighteenth.

[Sidenote: Day by Day]

"Constance, Beloved, I feel you near to-night. The wild snows of Winter have blown across your grave, but your love is warm and sweet around my heart. The sorrow is all gone and in its place has come a peace as deep and calm as the sea. I can wait, day by day, until the Grey Angel summons me to join you; until the poppies that stilled your heartbeats, shall, in another way, quiet mine, too.

"I can have faith. I can believe that somewhere beyond the star-filled spaces, when this arc of mortal life merges into the perfect circle of eternity, there will be no barrier between you and me, because, if God is love, love must be God, and He has no limitations.

"I can take up my burden and go on until the road divides, and the Grey Angel leads me down your path. I can be kind. I can try, each day, to put joy into the world that so sorely needs it, and to take nothing away from whatever it holds of happiness now. I can be strong because I have known you, I can have courage because you were brave, I can be true because you were true, I can be tender because I love you.

"At last I understand. It is passion that cries out for continual assurance, for fresh sacrifices, for new proof. Love needs nothing but itself; it asks for nothing but to give itself; it denies nothing, neither barriers nor the grave. Love can wait until life comes to its end, and trust to eternity, because it is of God."

* * * * *

[Sidenote: A Man's Heart]

Roger put the little book down and wiped his eyes. He had come upon a man's heart laid bare and was thrilled to the depths by the revelation. He was as one who stands in a holy place, with uncovered head, in the hush that follows prayer.

In the midst of his tenderness for his dead father welled up a passionate loyalty toward the woman who slept in the room adjoining the library, whose soul had "never been welded." She had known life no more than a prattling brook in a meadow may know the sea. Bound in shallows, she knew nothing of the unutterable vastness in which deep answered unto deep; tide and tempest and blue surges were fraught with no meaning for her.

The clock struck twelve and Roger still sat there, with his head resting upon his hand. He read once more his father's wish to bequeath to him his love, "with no barrier to divide it from its desire."

Hedged in by earth and hopelessly put asunder, could it at last come to fulfilment through daughter and son? At the thought his heart swelled with a pure passion all its own—the eager pulse-beats owed nothing to the dead.

[Sidenote: Out into the Night]

He found a sheet of paper and reverently wrapped up the little brown book. An hour later, he slipped under the string a letter of his own, sealed and addressed, and quietly, though afraid that the beating of his heart sounded in the stillness, went out into the night.



XXIV

The Bells in the Tower

The sea was very blue behind the Tower of Cologne, though it was not yet dawn. The velvet darkness, in that enchanted land, seemed to have a magical quality—it veiled but did not hide. Barbara went up the glass steps, made of cologne bottles, and opened the door.

[Sidenote: The Tower Unchanged]

She had not been there for a long time, but nothing was changed. The winding stairway hung with tapestries and the round windows at the landings, through which one looked to the sea, were all the same.

King Arthur, Sir Lancelot and Guinevere were all in the Tower, as usual. The Lady of Shalott was there, with Mr. Pickwick, Dora, and Little Nell. All the dear people of the books moved through the lovely rooms, sniffing at cologne, or talking and laughing with each other, just as they pleased.

The red-haired young man and the two blue and white nurses were still there, but they seemed to be on the point of going out. Doctor Conrad and Eloise were in every room she went into. Eloise was all in white, like a bride, and the Doctor was very, very happy.

Ambrose North was there, no longer blind or dead, but well and strong and able to see. He took Barbara in his arms when she went in, kissed her, and called her "Constance."

A sharp pang went through her heart because he did not know her. "I'm Barbara, Daddy," she cried out; "don't you know me?" But he only murmured, "Constance, my Beloved," and kissed her again—not with a father's kiss, but with a yearning tenderness that seemed very strange. She finally gave up trying to make him understand that her name was Barbara—that she was not Constance at all. At last she said, "It doesn't matter by what name you call me, as long as you love me," and went on upstairs.

[Sidenote: An Unfinished Tapestry]

One of the tapestries that hung on the wall along the winding stairway was new—at least she did not remember having seen it before. It was in the soft rose and gold and brown and blue of the other tapestries, and appeared old, as though it had been hanging there for some time. She fingered it curiously. It felt and looked like the others, but it must be new, for it was not quite finished.

In the picture, a man in white vestments stood at an altar with his hands outstretched in blessing. Before him knelt a girl and a man. The girl was in white and the taper-lights at the altar shone on her two long yellow braids that hung down over her white gown, so that they looked like burnished gold. The face was turned away so that she could not see who it was, but the man who knelt beside her was looking straight at her, or would have been, if the tapestry-maker had not put down her needle at a critical point. The man's face had not been touched, though everything else was done. Barbara sighed. She hoped that the next time she came to the Tower the tapestry would be finished.

[Sidenote: In the Violet Room]

She went into the violet room, for a little while, and sat down on a green chair with a purple cushion in it. She took a great bunch of violets out of a bowl and buried her face in the sweetness. Then she went to the mantel, where the bottles were, and drenched her handkerchief with violet water. She had tried all the different kinds of cologne that were in the Tower, but she liked the violet water best, and nearly always went into the violet room for a little while on her way upstairs.

As she turned to go out, the Boy joined her. He was a young man now, taller than Barbara, but his face, as always, was hidden from her as by a mist. His voice was very kind and tender as he took both her hands in his.

"How do you do, Barbara, dear?" he asked.

"You have not been in the Tower for a long time."

"I have been ill," she answered. "See?" She tried to show him her crutches, but they were not there. "I used to have crutches," she explained.

"Did you?" he asked, in surprise. "You never had them in the Tower."

"That's so," she answered. "I had forgotten." She remembered now that when she went into the Tower she had always left her crutches leaning up against the glass steps.

"Let's go upstairs," suggested the Boy, "and ring the golden bells in the cupola."

Barbara wanted to go very much, but was afraid to try it, because she had never been able to reach the cupola.

"If you get tired," the Boy went on, as though he had read her thought, "I'll put my arm around you and help you walk. Come, let's go."

[Sidenote: Up the Winding Stairs]

They went out of the violet room and up the winding stairway. Barbara was not tired at all, but she let him put his arm around her, and leaned her cheek against his shoulder as they climbed. Some way, she felt that this time they were really going to reach the cupola.

It was very sweet to be taken care of in this way and to hear the Boy's deep, tender voice telling her about the Lady of Shalott and all the other dear people who lived in the Tower. Sometimes he would make her sit down on the stairs to rest. He sat beside her so that he might keep his arm around her, and Barbara wished, as never before, that she might see his face.

[Sidenote: The Angel with the Flaming Sword]

Finally, they came to the last landing. They had been up as high as this once before, but it was long ago. The cupola was hidden in a cloud as before, but it seemed to be the cloud of a Summer day, and not a dark mist. They went into the cloud, and an Angel with a Flaming Sword appeared before them and stopped them. The Angel was all in white and very tall and stately, with a divinely tender face—Barbara's own face, exalted and transfigured into beauty beyond all words.

"Please," said Barbara, softly, though she was not at all afraid, "may we go up into the cupola and ring the golden bells? We have tried so many times."

There was no answer, but Barbara saw the Angel looking at her with infinite longing and love. All at once, she knew that the Angel was her mother.

"Please, Mother dear," said Barbara, "let us go in and ring the bells."

The Angel smiled and stepped aside, pointing to the right with the Flaming Sword that made a rainbow in the cloud. In the light of it, they went through the mist, that seemed to be lifting now.

"We're really in the cupola," cried the Boy, in delight. "See, here are the bells." He took the two heavy golden chains in his hands and gave one to Barbara.

"Ring!" she cried out. "Oh, ring all the bells at once! Now!"

[Sidenote: Ringing the Bells]

They pulled the two chains with all their strength, and from far above them rang out the most wonderful golden chimes that anyone had ever dreamed of—strong and sweet and thrilling, yet curiously soft and low.

With the first sound, the mist lifted and the Angel with the Flaming Sword came into the cupola and stood near them, smiling. Far out was the blue sky that bent down to meet a bluer sea, the sand on the shore was as white as the blown snow, and the sea-birds that circled around the cupola in the crystalline, fragrant air were singing. The melody blended strangely with the sound of the surf on the shining shore below.

The Angel with the Flaming Sword touched Barbara gently on the arm, and smiled. Barbara looked up, first at the Angel, and then at the Boy who stood beside her. The mist that had always been around him had lifted, too, and she saw that it was Roger, whom she had known all her life.

Barbara woke with a start. The sound of the golden bells was still chiming in her ears. "Roger," she said, dreamily, "we rang them all together, didn't we?" But Roger did not answer, for she was in her own little room, now, and not in the Tower of Cologne.

She slipped out of bed and her little bare, pink feet pattered over to the window. She pushed the curtains back and looked out. It was a keen, cool, Autumn morning, and still dark, but in the east was the deep, wonderful purple that presages daybreak.

Oh, to see the sun rise over the sea! Barbara's heart ached with longing. She had wanted to go for so many years and nobody had ever thought of taking her. Now, though Roger had suggested it more than once, she had said, each time, that when she went she wanted to go alone.

[Sidenote: "I'll Try It"]

"I'll try it," she thought. "If I get tired, I can sit down and rest, and if I think it is going to be too much for me, I can come back. It can't be very far—just down this road."

She dressed hurriedly, putting on her warm, white wool gown and her little low soft shoes. She did not stop to brush out her hair and braid it again, for it was very early and no one would see. She put over her head the white lace scarf she had worn to the wedding, took her white knitted shawl, and went downstairs so quietly that Aunt Miriam did not hear her.

She unbolted the door noiselessly and went out, closing it carefully after her. On the top step was a very small package, tied with string, and a letter addressed, simply, "To Barbara." She recognised it as a book and a note from Roger—he had done such things before. She did not want to go back, so she tucked it under her arm and went on.

It seemed so strange to be going out of her gate alone and in the dark! Barbara was thrilled with a sense of adventure and romance which was quite new to her. This journeying into unknown lands in pursuit of unknown waters had all the fascination of discovery.

[Sidenote: An Autumn Dawn]

She went down the road faster than she had ever walked before. She was not at all tired and was eager for the sea. The Autumn dawn with its keen, cool air stirred her senses to new and abounding life. She went on and on and on, pausing now and then to lean against somebody's fence, or to rest on a friendly boulder when it appeared along the way.

Faint suggestions of colour appeared in the illimitable distances beyond. Barbara saw only a vast, grey expanse, but the surf murmured softly on the shadowy shore. Crossing the sand, and stumbling as she went, she stooped and dipped her hand into it, then put her rosy forefinger into her mouth to see if it were really salt, as everyone said. She sat down in the soft, cool sand, drew her white knitted shawl and lace scarf more closely about her, and settled herself to wait.

[Sidenote: Sunrise on the Sea]

The deep purple softened with rose. Tints of gold came far down on the horizon line. Barbara drew a long breath of wonder and joy. Out in the vastness dark surges sang and crooned, breaking slowly into white foam as they approached the shore. Rose and purple melted into amethyst and azure, and, out beyond the breakers, the grey sea changed to opal and pearl.

Mist rose from the far waters and the long shafts of leaping light divided it by rainbows as it lifted. Prismatic fires burned on the boundless curve where the sky met the sea. Wet-winged gulls, crying hoarsely, came from the night that still lay upon the islands near shore, and circled out across the breakers to meet the dawn.

Spires of splendid colour flamed to the zenith, the whole east burned with crimson and glowed with gold, and from that far, mystical arc of heaven and earth, a javelin of molten light leaped to the farthest hill. The pearl and opal changed to softest green, mellowed by turquoise and gold, the slow blue surges chimed softly on the singing shore, and Barbara's heart beat high with rapture, for it was daybreak in earth and heaven and morning in her soul.

She sat there for over an hour, asking for nothing but the sky and sea, and the warm, sweet sun that made the air as clear as crystal and touched the Autumn hills with living flame. She drew long breaths of the wind that swept, like shafts of sunrise, half-way across the world.

[Sidenote: The Boy in the Tower]

At last she turned to the package that lay beside her, and untied the string, idly wondering what book Roger had sent. How strange that the Boy in the Tower should be Roger, and yet, was it so strange, after all, when she had known him all her life?

Before looking at the book, she tore open the letter and read it—with wide, wondering eyes and wild-beating heart.

[Sidenote: Roger's Letter]

"Barbara, my darling," it began. "I found this book to-night and so I send it to you, for it is yours as much as mine.

"I think my father's wish has been granted and his love has been bequeathed to me. I have known for a long time how much I care for you, and I have often tried to tell you, but fear has kept me silent.

"It has been so sweet to live near you, to read to you when you were sewing or while you were ill, and sweeter than all else besides to help you walk, and to feel that you leaned on me, depending on me for strength and guidance.

"Sometimes I have thought you cared, too, and then I was not sure, so I have kept the words back, fearing to lose what I have. But to-night, after having read his letters, I feel that I must throw the dice for eternal winning or eternal loss. You can never know, if I should spend the rest of my life in telling you, just how much you have meant to me in a thousand different ways.

"Looking back, I see that you have given me my ideals, since the time we made mud pies together and built the Tower of Cologne, for which, alas, we never got the golden bells. I have loved you always and it has not changed since the beginning, save to grow deeper and sweeter with every day that passed.

"As much as I have of courage, or tenderness, or truth, or honour, I owe to you, who set my standard high for me at the beginning, and oh, my dearest, my love has kept me clean. If I have nothing else to give you, I can offer you a clean heart and clean hands, for there is nothing in my life that can make me ashamed to look straight into the eyes of the woman I love.

"Ever since we went to that wedding the other day, I have been wishing it were our own—that you and I might stand together before God's high altar in that little church with the sun streaming in, and be joined, each to the other, until death do us part.

"Sweetheart, can you trust me? Can you believe that it is for always and not just for a little while? Has your mother left her love to you as my father left me his?

"Let me have the sweetness of your leaning on me always, let me take care of you, comfort you when you are tired, laugh with you when you are glad, and love you until death and even after, as he loved her.

"Tell me you care, Barbara, even if it is only a little. Tell me you care, and I can wait, a long, long time.

"ROGER."

Barbara's heart sang with the joy of the morning. She opened the little worn book, with its yellow, tear-stained pages, and read it all, up to the very last line.

"Oh!" she cried aloud, in pity. "Oh! oh!"

Fully understanding, she put it aside, closing the faded cover reverently on its love and pain. Then she turned to Roger's letter, and read it again.

[Sidenote: First Flush of Rapture]

Dreaming over it, in the first flush of that mystical rapture which makes the world new for those to whom it comes, as light is recreated with every dawn, she took no heed of the passing hours. She did not know that it was very late, nor that Aunt Miriam, much worried, had asked Roger to go in search of her. She knew only that love and morning and the sea were all hers.

The tide was coming in. Each wave broke a little higher upon the thirsting shore. Far out on the water was a tiny dark object that moved slowly shoreward on the crests of the waves. Barbara stood up, shading her eyes with her hand, and waited, counting the rhythmic pulse-beats that brought it nearer.

She could not make out what it was, for it advanced and then receded, or paused in a circling eddy made by two retreating waves. At last a high wave brought it in and left it, stranded, at her feet.

[Sidenote: A Fragment]

Barbara laughed aloud, for, broken by the wind and wave and worn by tide, a fragment of one of her crutches had come back to her. The bit of flannel with which she had padded the sharp end, so that the sound would not distress her father, still clung to it. She wondered how it came there, never guessing that it was but the natural result of Eloise's attempt to throw it as far as Allan had thrown the other, the day he took them away from her.

A great sob of thankfulness almost choked her. Here she stood firmly on her own two feet, after twenty-two years of helplessness, reminded of it only by a fragment of a crutch that the sea had given back as it gives up its dead. She had outgrown her need of crutches as the tiny creatures of the sea outgrow their shells.

"Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul, As the swift seasons roll! Leave thy low-vaulted past! Let each new temple, nobler than the last, Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, Till thou at length art free, Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea!"

The beautiful words chanted themselves over and over in her consciousness. The past, with all its pain and grieving, fell from her like a garment. She was one with the sun and the morning; uplifted by all the world's joy.

[Sidenote: The True Lover]

Her blood sang within her and it seemed that her heart had wings. All of life lay before her—that life which is made sweet by love. She felt again the ecstasy that claimed her in the Tower of Cologne, when she and the Boy, after a lifetime of waiting, had rung all the golden bells at once.

And the Boy was Roger—always had been Roger—only she did not know. Into Barbara's heart came something new and sweet that she had never known before—the deep sense of conviction and the everlasting peace which the True Lover, and he alone, has power to bestow.

It was part of the wonder of the morning that when she turned, startled a little by a muffled footstep, she should see Roger with his hands outstretched in pleading and all his soul in his eyes.

Barbara's face took on the unearthly beauty of dawn. Her blue eyes deepened to violet, her sweet lips smiled. She was radiant, from her feet to the heavy braids that hung over her shoulders and the shimmering halo of soft hair, that blew, like golden mist, about her face.

Roger caught her mood unerringly—it was like him always to understand. He was no longer afraid, and the trembling of his boyish mouth was lost in a smile. She was more beautiful than the morning of which she seemed a veritable part—and she was his.

[Sidenote: Flower of the Dawn]

"Flower of the Dawn," he cried, his voice ringing with love and triumph, "do you care? Are you mine?"

She went to him, smiling, with the colour of the fiery dawning on her cheeks and lips. "Yes," she whispered. "Didn't you know?"

Then the sun and the morning and the world itself vanished all at once beyond his ken, for Barbara had put her soft little hand upon his shoulder, and lifted her love-lit face to his.

THE END.



* * * * *



Transcriber's Notes:

Obvious punctuation errors repaired.

Page 4, "instrusted" changed to "intrusted" (china intrusted)

Page 272, "checks" changed to "cheeks" (fair cheeks)

Page 275, "venegeance" changed to "vengeance" (not of His vengeance)

Page 321, "anenomes" changed to "anemones" (and anemones)

Page 326, "assunder" changed to "asunder" (hopelessly put asunder)