CHAPTER XVII. ~ DO YOU KNOW THAT SHE IS DYING?
IT had come at last,—the letter from Geneva, for which they all had waited with such anxious hearts and so much of dread. The postman, bringing it by the morning's delivery, and handing it through the opened door to Aimée, had wondered a little at her excited manner,—she was always excited when these letters came; and the moment she had entered the parlor, holding the hurriedly read note,—it was scarcely more than a note,—there was not one of them who did not understand all before she spoke.
Mrs. Phil burst into tears; Phil himself laid down his brush and changed color; Mollie silently clung to Tod as a refuge, and looked up with trembling lips.
Mrs. Phil was the first to speak.
“You may as well tell us the worst,” she said; “but it is easy enough to guess what it is, without being told.”
“It is almost the very worst,” answered Aimée.
“Miss MacDowlas wants me to go to them at once. She is so ill that if a change does not take place, she will not live many weeks, and she has asked for me.”
They all knew only too well that “she” meant Dolly.
“Then,” said Phil, “you must go at once.”
“I can go to-day,” she answered. “I knew it would come to this, and I am ready to leave London at any moment.”
There was no delay. Her small box was even then ready packed and corded for the journey. She had taken Miss MacDowlas's warning in time. It would not have been like this heavy-hearted wise one to disregard it. She would have been ready to go to Dolly at ten minutes' notice, if she had been in India. She was not afraid, either, of making the journey alone. It was not a very terrible journey, she said. Secretly, she had a fancy that perhaps Dolly would like to see her by herself first, to have a few quiet days alone with her, in which she could become used to the idea of the farewell the rest would come to say. And in her mind the poor little oracle had another fancy, too, and this fancy she confided to Mollie before bidding her good-by.
“Mollie,” she said, “I am going to leave a charge in your hands.”
“Is it anything about Dolly?” asked Mollie, making fruitless efforts to check her affectionate tears.
“I wish you would leave me something to do for Dolly, Aimée.”
“It is something connected with Dolly;” returned Aimée. “I want you to keep constantly on the watch for Griffith.”
“For Griffith!” Mollie exclaimed. “How can I, when I don't know whether he is in England or not?”
“He is in England,” Aimée replied. “He is in London, for Mr. Gowan has seen him.”
“In London—and Dolly in Switzerland, perhaps dying!”
“He does not know that, or he would have been with her before now,” said Aimée. “Once let him know that she is ill, and he will be with her. I know him well enough to be sure of that. And it is my impression that if he went to her at the eleventh hour, when she might seem to us to be at the very last, he would bring her back to life. It is Grif she is dying for, and only Grif can save her.”
“And what do you want me to do?” anxiously.
“To watch for him constantly, as I said. Don't you think, Mollie, that he might come back, if it were only into the street to look at the house, in a restless sort of remembrance of the time when they used to be so happy?”
“It would not be unlike him,” answered Mollie, slowly. “He was very fond of Dolly. Oh, he was very fond of her!”
“Fond of her! He loved her better than his life, and does still, wherever he may be. Something tells me he will come, and that is why I want you to watch. Watch at the window as constantly as you can, but more particularly at dusk; and if you should see him, Mollie, don't wait a second. Run out to him, and make him listen to you. Ah, poor fellow, he will listen eagerly and penitently enough, if you only say to him that Dolly is dying.”
“Very well,” said Mollie, “I will remember.” And thus the wise one took her departure.
It was twilight in Bloomsbury Place, and Mollie crouched before the parlor window, resting her chin upon her hands, and looking out, pretty much as Aimée had looked out on that winter evening months ago, when Mr. Gerald Chandos had first presented himself to her mind as an individual to be dreaded.
Three days had passed since the wise one left London,—three miserable, dragging days they had seemed to Mollie, despite their summer warmth and sunshine. Real anxiety and sorrow were new experiences in Vagabondia; little trials they had felt, and often enough small unpleasantnesses, privations, and disappointments; but death and grief were new. And they were just beginning to realize broadly the blow which had fallen upon them; hard as it was to believe at first, they were beginning slowly to comprehend the sad meaning of the lesson they were learning now for the first time. What each had felt a fear of in secret was coming to pass at last, and there was no help against it.
Phil went about his work looking as none of them had ever seen him look before. Mrs. Phil's tears fell thick and fast. Not understanding the mystery, she could blame nobody but Grif, and Grif she could not forgive. To Mollie the house seemed like a grave. She could think of nothing but Dolly,—Dolly, white and worn and altered, lying upon her couch, her eyes closed, her breath fluttering faintly. She wondered if she was afraid to die. She herself had a secret girlish terror of death and its strange solemness, and she so pitied Dolly that sometimes she could not contain her grief, and was obliged to hide herself until her tears spent themselves.
She had been crying during all this twilight hour she had knelt at the window. She was so lonely that it seemed impossible to do anything else. It would have been bad enough to bear the suspense even if Aimée had been with her, but without Aimée it was dreadful. The tears slipped down her cheeks and rolled away, and she did not even attempt to dry them, her affectionate grief had mastered her completely. But she was roused at length. Some one crossed the street from the pavement opposite the house; and when this some one entered the gate and ascended the steps, she rose slowly, half-reluctant, half-comforted, and with a faint thrill at her heart. It was Ralph Gowan, and she was not wise enough or self-controlled enough yet to see Ralph Gowan without feeling her pulses quicken.
When she opened the door he did not greet her as usual, but spoke to her at once in a low, hurried tone.
“Mollie, where is Aimée?” he asked.
Her tears began to flow again; she could not help giving way.
“You had better come in,” she said, half turning away from him and speaking brokenly. “Aimée is not here. She left London three days ago. Dolly—”
“Dolly is worse!” he said, because she could not finish.
She nodded, with a heart too full for words.
He stepped inside, and, closing the door, laid his hand upon her shoulder.
“Then, Mollie,” he said, “I must come to you.”
He did not wait a moment, but led her gently enough into the parlor, and, blinded as she was by her tears, she saw that instant that he had not come without a reason.
“Don't cry,” he said. “I want you to be brave and calm now,—for Dolly's sake. I want your help,—for Dolly's sake, remember.”
She recollected Aimée's words—"Mr. Gowan has seen him"—and a sudden light flashed upon her. The tears seemed to dry of their own accord all at once, as she looked up.
“Yes,” she answered.
He knew, without hearing another word, that he might trust her.
“Can you guess whom I have just this moment seen?” he said.
“Yes,” sprang from her lips, without a second's hesitation. “You have seen Grif.”
“I have seen Grif,” he answered. “He is at the corner of the street now. If I had attempted to speak to him he would have managed to avoid me; and because I knew that, I came here, hoping to find Aimée; but since Aimée is not here—”
“I can go,” she interrupted him, all a-tremble with eagerness. “He will listen to me; he was fond of me, too, and I was fond of him. Oh! let me go now!”
That bright little scarlet shawl of Dolly's lay upon the sofa, and she snatched it up with shaking hands and threw it over her head and shoulders.
“If I can speak to him once, he will listen,” she said; “and if he listens, Dolly will be saved. She won't die if Grif comes back. She can't die if Grif comes back. Oh, Dolly, my darling, you saved me, and I am going to try to save you.”
She was out in the street in two minutes, standing on the pavement, looking up and down, and then she ran across to the other side. She kept close to the houses, so that she might be in their shadow, and a little sob broke from her as she hurried along,—a sob of joy and fear and excitement. At the end of the row of houses somebody was standing under the street lamp,—a man. Was it Grif,—or could Grif have gone even in this short time? Fate could never have been so cruel to him, to her, to them all, as to let him come so near and then go away without hearing that Dolly was lying at death's portals, and no one could save her but himself and the tender power of the sweet, old, much-tried love. Oh, no, no! It was Grif indeed; for as she neared the place where he stood, she saw his face in the lamp-light,—a grief-worn, pallid face, changed and haggard and desperate,—a sight that made her cry out aloud.
He had not seen her or even heard her. He stood there looking toward the house she had left, and seeing, as it seemed, nothing else. Only the darkness had hidden her from him. His eyes were fixed upon the dim light that burned in Dolly's window. She had not meant to speak until she stood close to him; but when she was within a few paces of him her excitement mastered her.
“Grif,” she cried out; “Grif, is it you?”
And when he turned, with a great start, to look at her, she was upon him,—her hands outstretched, the light upon her face, the tears streaming down her cheeks,—sobbing aloud.
“Mollie,” he answered, “is it you?” And she saw that he almost staggered.
She could not speak at first. She clung to his arm so tightly that he could scarcely have broken away from her if he had tried. But he did not try; it seemed as though her touch made him weak,—weaker than he had ever been before in his life. Beauty as she was, they had always thought her in some way like Dolly, and, just now, with Dolly's gay little scarlet shawl slipping away from her face, with the great grief in her imploring eyes, with that innocent appealing trick of the clinging hands, she might almost have been Dolly's self.
Try as he might, he could not regain his self-control. He was sheerly powerless before her.
“Mollie,” he said, “what has brought you here? Why have you come?”
“I have come,” she answered, “for Dolly's sake!”
The vague fear he had felt at first caught hold upon him with all the fulness of its strength.
“For Dolly's sake!” he echoed. “Nay, Dolly has done with me, and I with her.” And though he tried to speak bitterly, he failed.
She was too fond of Dolly, and too full of grief to spare him after that. Unstrung as she was, her reproach burst forth from her without a softened touch. “Dolly has done with earth. Dolly's life is over,” she sobbed. “Do you know that she is dying? Yes, dying,—our own bright Dolly,—and you—you have killed her!”
She had not thought how cruel it would sound, and the next instant she was full of terror at the effect of her own words. He broke loose from her,—fell loose from her, one might better describe it, for it was his own weight rather than any effort which dragged him from her grasp. He staggered and caught hold of the iron railings to save himself, and there hung, staring at her with a face like a dead man.
“My God!” he said,—not another word.
“You must not give way like that,” she cried out, in a new fright. “Oh, how could I speak so! Aimée would have told you better. I did not mean to be so hard. You can save her if you will. She will not die, Grif, if you go to her. She only wants you. Grif,—Grif,—you look as if you could not understand what I am saying.” And she wrung her hands.
And, indeed, it scarcely seemed as if he did understand, though at last he spoke.
“Where is she?” he said. “Not here? You say I must 'go' to her.”
“No, she is not here. She is at Lake Geneva. Miss MacDowlas took her there because she grew so weak, and she has grown weaker ever since, and three days ago they sent for Aimée to come to her, because—because they think she is going to die.”
“And you say that I have done this?”
“I ought n't to have put it that way, it sounds so cruel, but—but she has never been like herself since the night you went away, and we have all known that it was her unhappiness that made her ill. She could not get over it, and though she tried to hide it, she was worn out. She loved you so.”
He interrupted her.
“If she is dying for me,” he said, hoarsely, “she must have loved me, and if she has loved me through all this,—God help us both!”
“How could you go away and leave her all alone after all those years?” demanded Mollie. “We cannot understand it. No one knows but Aimée, and Dolly has told her that you were not to blame. Why did you go?”
“You do not know?” he said. “You should know, Mollie, of all others. You were with her when she played that miserable coquette's trick,—that pitiful trick, so unlike herself,—you were with her that night when she let Gowan keep her away from me, when I waited for her coming hour after hour. I saw you with them when he was bidding her goodnight.”
They had hidden their secret well all these months, but it was to be hidden no longer now. It flashed upon her like an electric shock. She remembered a hundred things,—a hundred little mysteries she had met and been puzzled by, in Aimee's manner; she remembered all she had heard, and all she had wondered at, and her heart seemed turned to stone. The flush of weeping died out of her face, her hands fell and hung down at her side, her tears were gone; nothing seemed left to her but blank horror.
“Was it because she did not come that night, that you left her to die?” she asked, in a labored voice. “Was it because you saw her with Ralph Gowan—was it because you found out that she had been with him, that you went away and let her break her heart? Tell me!”
He answered her, “Yes.”
“Then,” she said, turning to face him, still cold, and almost rigid, “it is I who have killed her, and not you.”
“You!” he exclaimed.
She did not wait to choose her words, or try to soften the story of her own humiliation.
“If she dies,” she said, “she has died for me.”
And without further preface she told him all. How she had let Gerald Chandos flatter and gain power over her, until the climax of her folly had been the wild, wilful escapade of that miserable long-past day. How Ralph Gowan had discovered her romantic secret, and revealed it to Dolly. How they had followed and rescued her; even how Dolly had awakened her from her dangerous dream with that light touch, and had drawn her away from the brink of an abyss, with her loving, girlish hands; and she ended with an outburst of anguish.
“Why did n't she tell you?” she said. “For my sake she did not want the rest to know; but why did not she tell you? I cannot understand.”
“She tried to tell me,” he said, in an agony of self-reproach, as he began to see what he had done,—"she tried to tell me, and I would not hear her.”
All his bygone sufferings—and, Heaven knows, he had suffered bitterly and heavily enough—sank into insignificance before the misery of this hour. To know how true and pure of heart she had been; to know how faithful, unselfish, sweet; to remember how she had met him with a tender little cry of joy, with outstretched, innocent hands, that he had thrust aside; to remember the old golden days in which she had so clung to him, and brightened his life; to think how he had left her lying upon the sofa that night, her white face drooping piteously against the cushions; to have all come back to him and know that he only was to blame; to know it all too late. Nay, a whole life of future bliss could never quite efface the memory of such a passion of remorse and pain.
“Oh, my God!” he prayed, “have mercy upon me!” And then he turned upon Mollie. “Tell me where to go to; tell me, and let me go. I must go to her now without a moment's waiting. My poor, faithful little girl,—my pretty Dolly! Dying,—dying! No, I don't believe it,—I won't. She cannot die yet. Fate has been cruel enough to us, but it cannot be so cruel as that. Love will make her live.”
He dashed down Mollie's directions in desperate, feverish haste upon a leaf of his memorandum-book, and then he bade her good-by.
“God bless you, dear!” he said. “Perhaps you have saved us both. I am going to her now. Pray for me.”
“I ought rather to pray for myself,” she said; “but for me you would never have been separated. I have done it all.”
And a few minutes after he had gone, Ralph Gowan, who had awaited her return before the window, turned to see her enter the room like a spirit and fling herself down before him, looking white and shaken and pale.
“I have found it all out now,” she cried. “I have found it all out. I have done all this, Mr. Gowan; it is through me her heart is broken, and if she dies, I shall have caused her death, as surely as if I had killed her with my own hand. Oh, save me from thinking she will die,—help me to think she will live,—help me!”
There was no one else to help her, and the blind terror of the thought was so great that she must have help, or die. To have so injured Dolly, whom she so loved,—to have, by her own deed, brought that dread shadow of Death upon Dolly, who had saved her! Her heart seemed crushed. If Aimée had been there; but Aimée was not, so she stretched out her hands to the man she had so innocently loved. And as she so knelt before him,—so fair, in the childlike abandon of her grief, so guileless and trusting in her sudden, sweet appeal, so helpless against the world, even against herself,—his man's heart was touched and stirred as it had never been before,—as even Dolly herself had not stirred it.
“My poor child!” he said, taking her hands and drawing her nearer to himself. “My poor, pretty Mollie, come to me.”
And why not, my reader? If one rose is not for us, the sun shines on many another as sweet and quite as fair; and what is more, it is more than probable that if we had seen the last rose first, we should have loved the first rose last. It is only when, like Dolly and Grif, we have watched our rose from its first peep of the leaf, and have grown with its growth, that there can be no other rose but one.
“Le roi est mort—Vive le roi!”
CHAPTER XVIII. ~ GRIF!
THERE was a hush upon the guests at the pretty little inn. Most of them were not sojourners of a day, who came and went, as they did at the larger and busier hotels,—they were comfortable people who enjoyed themselves in their own quiet way and so had settled down for the time being. Accordingly they had leisure to become interested in each other; and there were few of them who did not feel a friendly interest in the pretty, pale English girl, who, report said, was fading silently out of life in her bright room up-stairs. When Aimée arrived, the most sympathetic shook their heads dubiously.
“The sister is here,” they said; “a thoughtful little English creature with a child's face and a woman's air. They sent for her. One can easily guess what that means.”
Any one but Aimée would have been crushed at the outset by the shock of the change which was to be seen in the poor little worn figure, now rarely moved from its invalid's couch. But Aimée bore the blow with outward quiet at least. If she shed tears Dolly did not see them, and if she mourned Dolly was not disturbed by her sorrow.
“I have come to help Miss MacDowlas to take care of you, Dolly,” she said, when she gave her her greeting kiss, and Dolly smiled and kissed her in return.
But it was a terribly hard matter to fight through at first. Of course, as the girl had become weaker she had lost power over herself. She was restless and listless by turns. Sometimes she started at every sound, and again she lay with closed eyes for hours, dozing the day away. The mere sight of her in this latter state threw poor Phemie into an agony of terror and distress.
“It is so like Death,” she would say to Aimée. “It seems as if we could never rouse her again.”
And then again she would rally a little, and at such times she would insist upon being propped up and allowed to talk, and her eyes would grow large and bright, and a spot of hectic color would burn on her cheeks. She did not even mention her trouble during the first two days of Aimée's visit, but on the third afternoon she surprised her by broaching the subject suddenly. She had been dozing, and on awakening she began to talk.
“Aimée,” she said, “where is Miss MacDowlas?”
“In her room. I persuaded her to go and lie down.”
“I am very glad,” quietly. “I want to do something particular. I want Grif's letters, Aimée.”
“Where are they?” Aimée asked.
“In a box in my trunk. I should like to have them now.”
Aimée brought them to her without comment. The box had not been large enough to hold them all, and there was an extra packet tied with that dear old stereotyped blue ribbon.
“What a many there are!” said Dolly, when she came to the couch with them. “You will have to sit down by me and hold some of them. One can write a great many letters in seven years.”
The wise one sat down, obediently holding the box upon her knee. There were so many letters in it that it was quite heavy.
“I am going to look them over and tie them in packages, according to their dates,” said Dolly. “He will like to have them when he comes back.”
It would not have been natural for her to preserve her calmness all through the performance of her task. Her first glance at the first letter brought the tears, and she cried quietly as she passed from one to the other. They were such tender, impetuous letters. The very headings—"My Darling,” “My pretty Darling,” “My own sweetest Life"—impassioned, youthful-sounding, and Grif-like, cut her to the heart. Ah! how terrible it would be for him to see them again, as he would see them! She was pitying him far more than she was pitying herself.
It was a work not soon over, but she finished it at length. The packets were assorted and tied with new ribbon, and she lay down for a few minutes to rest.
“You will give them to him, Aimée?” she said. “I think he will come some day; but if he does not, you must keep them yourself. I should not like people to read them—afterwards. Love-letters won't stand being read by strangers. I have often laughed and told him ours would n't. I am going to write a last one, however, this afternoon. You are to give it him, with the 'dead' letter—but they are all dead letters, are they not?”
“Dolly,” said Aimée, with a desperate effort, “you speak as if you were sure you were—going.”
There was a silence, and then a soft, low, tremulous laugh,—the merest echo of a laugh. Despite her long suffering Dolly was Dolly yet. She would not let them mourn over her.
“Going,” she said, “well—I think I am. Yes,” half reflectively, “I think I must be. It cannot mean anything else,—this feeling, can it? It was a long time before I quite believed it myself, Aimée, but now I should be obliged to believe it if I did not wish to.”
“And do you wish to, now?”
That little silence again, and then—
“I should like to see Grif,—I want Grif,—that is all.”
She managed to write her last love-letter after this, and to direct it and tie it with the letter which had returned to her,—the “dead” letter. But the effort seemed to tire her very much, and when all was done and her restless excitement had died out, she looked less like herself than ever. She could talk no more, and was so weak and prostrate that Aimée was alarmed into summoning Miss MacDowlas.
But Miss MacDowlas could only shake her head. “We cannot do anything to rouse her,” she said. “It is often so. If the end comes, it will come in this way. She feels no pain.”
That night Aimée wrote to those at home. They must come at once if they wanted to see Dolly. She watched all night by the bedside herself; she could not have slept if she had gone to her own room, and so she remained with Dolly, watching her doze and waken, starting from nervous sleeps and sinking into them again.
“There will not be many nights through which I can watch,” she said to herself. “Even this might be the last.” And then she turned to the window, and cried silently, thinking of Grif, and wondering what she should say to him, if they ever met again.
How could she say to him, “Dolly is dead! Dolly died because you left her!”
Another weary day and night, and then the old change came again. The feverish strength seemed to come once more. Dolly would be propped up, and talk. Before very long Aimée began to fancy that she had something she wished to say to Miss Mac-Dowlas. She followed her movements with eager, unsatisfied eyes, and did not seem at ease until she sat down near her. Then when she had secured her attention the secret revealed itself. She had something to say about Grif.
Gradually, during the long weary weeks of her illness she had learned to place much confidence in Miss MacDowlas. Her affectionate nature had clung to her. In telling anecdotes of life in Vagabondia, she had talked of Grif,—Vagabondia would not have been Vagabondia without Grif,—and there was always a thrill of faithful love in her simplest mention of him. Truly, Miss MacDowlas beheld her reprobate nephew in a new light, surrounded by a halo of innocent romance and unselfish tenderness. This poor little soul, who was breaking her heart for his sake, showed him sinned against but never sinning, unfortunate but never to blame, showed him honest, sweet of nature, true, and faultless. Where were his faults in the eyes of his first and last love? The simple, whimsical stories of their loves and lovers' quarrels, of their small economies and perfect faith in the future,—a faith so sadly wrecked, as it seemed, by cruel Fate,—brought tears into Miss MacDowlas's eyes. Eloquent, affectionate Dolly won her over before she knew what she was thinking about. He could not have been such a reprobate, after all,—this Griffith Donne, who had so often roused her indignation. Perhaps he could not help being literary and wearing a shabby coat and a questionable hat. And Dolly had in the end begun to see how her long-fixed opinion had softened and changed. So she had courage to plead for Grif this afternoon. She wanted to be sure that if he should ever come back, there would be a hand outstretched to help him.
“He only wanted help,” she said; “and no one has ever helped him, though he tried so hard and worked so. Aimée knows how hard he worked, don't you, Aimée?”
“Yes,” answered Aimée, turning her working face away.
“I should like you to promise,” said Dolly, wistfully, to Miss MacDowlas. “It would make me so much happier. You have been so kind to me,—I am sure you will be kind to him,—poor Grif,—poor fellow!”
Miss MacDowlas bent over her, touched to the heart.
“My dear,” she said, “he shall never want help again. He must have been worthy of so much love, or he would never have won it. I owe him some recompense, too. If I had not been so stupidly blind I might have saved you both all this pain. I have grown very fond of you, Dolly,” she ended; and then, being quite overcome, she kissed the pretty hair suddenly, gave the thin hand an almost motherly squeeze, and made the best of her way out of the room.
“Aimée,” said Dolly, “do you remember how often I have made fun of her, when we were all so happy together? We made a good many mistakes, even in Vagabondia, did n't we?” And then she closed her eyes and lay silent, with wet lashes resting on her cheek.
In speaking of this afternoon, long afterwards, Aimée said it seemed the longest and weariest she had ever known. It was extremely hot, and the very air seemed laden with heavy languor. The sun beat down upon the outer world whitely, and scarcely a leaf stirred. Miss MacDowlas did not return, and Dolly, though she was not asleep, lay quite still and did not open her eyes again. So Aimée sat and watched at her side, wondering how the day would end,—wondering if Phil and 'Toinette and Mollie would arrive before it was too late,—wondering what that strange last hour would be like, and how Dolly would bear it when it came, and how they themselves would bear to think of it when it was over.
She was not quite sure how long she sat watching so, but she fancied that it must have been two or three hours, or even more. She got up at last and drew down the green blinds as noiselessly as possible, and then went back to her place and rested her head upon the pillow near Dolly's, feeling drowsy and tired,—she had slept so little during the past few nights.
Dolly moved restlessly, stretching out her hand to Aimée's and opening her eyes all at once—ah! what large, hollow, shadowy eyes they were!
“I am very tired,” she murmured, “so tired and so weak, Aimée,” dreamily. “I suppose this is what you would call dying of a broken heart. It seems so queer that I should die of a broken heart.” “Oh, Dolly—Dolly!” Aimée whispered, “our own dearest dear, we never thought such pain could come to you.”
But even the next moment Dolly seemed to have lost herself, her eyes closed again and she did not speak. So Aimée lay holding her hand, until the indoor silence, the shadow of the room, and the sound of the droning bees outside lulled her into a sort of doze, and her own eyelids fell wearily.
A minute, was it, five or ten, or more than that?
She could not say. She only remembered her own last words, the warmth, the shadow, the droning of the bees, and the gradual losing consciousness, and then she was wide awake again,—awakened by a strange, wild cry, which, thrilling and echoing through the room, made her start up with a beating heart and look towards the door.
“Grif!”
That was all,—only this single rapturous cry, and Dolly, who had before seemed not to have the strength of a child, was sitting up, a white, tremulous figure, with outstretched arms and fluttering breath, and Grif was standing upon the threshold.
Even when she had blamed him most, Aimée had pitied him also; but she had never pitied him as she did when he strode to the couch and took the weak, worn, tremulous little figure in his arms. He could not speak,—neither spoke. Dolly lay upon his breast crying like a little child. But for him—his grief was terrible; and when the loving hand was laid upon his cheek and Dolly found her first words, they only seemed to make it worse.
“Don't cry,” she said. “Don't cry, dear. Kiss me!” He kissed her lips, her hands, her hair. He could not bear it. She was so like, yet so fearfully unlike, the winsome, tender creature he had loved so long.
“Oh, my God!” he cried, in his old mad way, “you are dying, and if you die it will be I who have murdered you!”
She moved a little nearer, so that her pretty face rested against his shoulder and she could lift her streaming eyes to his, her old smile shining through her tears.
“Dear old fellow,” she said, “darling old fellow, whom I love with all my soul! I shall live just to prove that you have done nothing of the kind!”
It was only Grif she wanted,—only Grif, and Grif had come.
CHAPTER XIX. ~ ROSE COLOR.
OF course she recovered. What else could she do? If a man is dying for want of bread and you give him bread enough and to spare, he will regain strength and life, will he not? And so with Dolly. Having found Grif, she had nothing to die for and so much to live for, that she lived. It seemed, too, that even if she had been inclined to die, Grif would have held her fast to earth. It was worse than useless to attempt to delude him into leaving her side, even for an hour; he hung over the invalid's couch, in such an anguish of half-despairing anxiety that the hearts of the unceremoniously deposed nurses were quite touched. He watched every change in Dolly's face, every brightening or fading tint in her cheek, every glance of her eyes; he followed her every movement. If she was tired of her posture, he could raise her or lay her down and settle her cushions as no one else could; if she was strong enough to listen, he could talk to her; if she was too weak, he could be silent.
But naturally there was much to talk about. Not that the period of his absence had been a very eventful one. It was as Ralph Gowan had fancied,—he had been living quietly enough in a secluded London street during the whole of the time; but Dolly found the history of his self-banishment both interesting and soul-moving. The story of his miseries brought the tears into her eyes, and his picture of what he had suffered on that unhappy night, when he had rushed out of the house and left her insensible upon the sofa, made her cling to his hand convulsively and sob outright.
“I can scarcely believe you are here,—quite safe,” she would say; “you might have killed yourself.”
And indeed he had been in no small danger of so doing.
Among all this, however, there was one bit of brightness,—a wonderful piece of news he told her that very day after his return. Fortune had, with her usual caprice, condescended to smile upon him at last. Incredible as it appeared, he had “got into something,” and this “something” was actually remunerative,—reasonably remunerative, if not extravagantly so. Four hundred a year would pay the rent of the figurative house in Putney or elsewhere, and buy the green sofa and appurtenances, at least. Dolly could scarcely believe it, and, indeed, he scarcely believed it himself.
“It seemed as if, when I had lost all else, this came to add to the bitterness of the loss,” he said. “I am afraid I was far from being as grateful, at first, as I ought to have been. I could only remember how happy such luck would have made us both if it had only come a year or so earlier. And the very day I got the place I passed the upholsterer's where the parlor furniture was,—green sofa and all. And I went home with the firm intention of blowing my brains out. The only thing that saved me that day was the fact that my landlady met me at the door with a miserable story about her troubles and her taxes, and by the time I had listened for half an hour, and done something she wanted done, I had cooled down a little, though I was wretched enough.”
“The 'something' was paying the taxes, was n't it?” questioned Dolly.
“Something of that kind,” admitted Griffith.
“Ah,” said Dolly, “I thought so.”
Very naturally Griffith felt some slight embarrassment on encountering Miss MacDowlas, having a rather unpleasant recollection of various incidents of the past. But Miss Berenice faced the matter in a different manner and with her usual decision of character. She had made up her mind to receive Griffith Donne as a respectable fact, and then, through Dolly's eloquence, she had learned to regard him with even a sort of affection,—a vague affection, of course, at the outset, but one which would ripen with time. Thus she rather surprised him by confronting him upon an entirely new ground. She was cordial and amiable, and on the first opportunity she explained her change of feeling with great openness.
“I have heard so much of you from Dolly,” she said, “that I am convinced I have known nothing of you before. I hope we shall be better friends. I am very fond of Dolly. I wish I had known her three or four years ago.”
And there was such a softened tenderness in her thin, unpromising face, that from thenceforward Griffith's doubts were removed and his opinion altered, as hers had done. The woman who had loved and pitied Dolly when she so sorely needed pity and love, must be worthy of gratitude and affection.
Phil and 'Toinette and Mollie arriving, in the deepest affliction, to receive Dolly's last farewell, were rather startled by the turn affairs had taken. Changed as she was, the face she turned to greet them was not the face of a dying girl. She was deplorably pale and shrunken and thin, but the light of life was in her eyes and a new ring was in her voice. She had vitality enough to recognize fresh charms in Tod, and spirit enough to make a few jokes.
“She won't die,” commented Phil to his wife when they retired to their room.
“No,” said Mrs. Phil, discreetly, “it is not likely, now Grif has come back. But it won't do to waste the journey, Phil, so we may as well stay awhile. We have not been anywhere out of London this summer.”
Accordingly, with their usual genius for utilizing all things, they prolonged their visit and made it into a kind of family festival; and since their anxiety on Dolly's behalf was at an end, they managed to enjoy it heartily. They walked here, and rode there, and explored unheard-of points and places; they kept the quiet people in the quiet hotel in a constant state of pleasant ferment with their good spirits and unceremonious friendliness. Mollie and Aimée and Mrs. Phil excited such general admiration that when they made their appearance at the table d'hôte there was a visible stir and brightening, and Dolly was so constantly inquired after, that there were serious thoughts entertained of issuing hourly bulletins. The reaction of high spirits after their fears was something exhilarating even to beholders.
And while they enjoyed themselves, and explored, and instituted a high carnival of innocent rejoicing, Dolly directed all her energies to the task of getting well and filling Grif's soul with hope and bliss. As soon as she had fully recovered they were to be married,—not a day, not an hour, longer would Grif consent to wait. His only trouble was that she would not be strong enough to superintend the purchase of the green sofa and appurtenances. Aimée had, however, proved his rock of refuge as usual They were to return to London together and make the necessary preparations, and then the wedding was to take place in Geneva, and the bride would be carried home in triumph.
“We have been so long in travelling toward the little house at Putney that it will be the nicest bridal tour we could have,” said Dolly.
Then, of course, came some pleasant excitement in connection with the trousseau, in which everybody was involved. The modest hotel had never before been in such a state of mind through secret preparations, as it was when Dolly was well enough to sit up and walk about and choose patterns. Her instinct of interest in worldly vanities sustained that young person marvellously. When Grif and Aimée had returned to London she found herself well enough to give lengthy audiences to Mrs. Phil, who, with Miss MacDowlas, had taken the business of purchasing in hand, and to discuss fabrics and fashions by the hour. She remembered Grifs enthusiasm on the subject of her toilets, and she was wholly ruled by a secret and laudable ambition to render herself as irresistible as possible. She exercised to its utmost her inventive genius, and lay awake at night to devise simple but coquettish feminine snares of attire to delight and bewilder him in the future.
She might well progress rapidly toward health and strength. By the time the house was ready for her reception she was well enough to drive out and explore with the rest, though she looked frail and unsubstantial by contrast with Mollie's bloom and handsome Mrs. Phil's grand curves. She was gaining flesh and color every day, but the slender throat and wrists and transparent hands were a bitter reproach to Grif even then, and it would be many weeks before she could again indulge in that old harmless vanity in her dimples and smooth roundness of form.
Mollie mourned over her long, in secret, and, indeed, was so heart-wrung by the sight of the change she found in her, that the very day of her arrival had not drawn to its close before she burst upon her with a remorseful appeal for forgiveness.
“But even if you forgive me I shall not forgive myself,” she said. “I shall never forget that dreadful night when I found out that it was all my fault, and that you had borne everything without telling me. If—if it had not been for—for Mr. Gowan, Dolly, I think I should have died.”
“If it had not been for whom?” asked Dolly.
“Mr. Gowan,” answered Miss Mollie, dropping her eyes, her very throat dyed with guilty blushes.
“Ah!” said Dolly. “And what did Mr. Gowan do, Mollie?”
“He was very kind—and sympathizing,” replied Mollie.
“He always is sympathizing,” looking at her with affectionate shrewdness. “He is very nice, is n't he, Mollie?”
“Yes,” said Mollie. “Very nice, indeed.”
“And I dare say you were so frightened and wretched that you cried?”
“Yes,” confessed the abashed catechised.
“I thought so.” And then, conjuring up in her mind's eye a picture of Mollie, heart-broken, appealing and in tears, beauteous, piteous, and grief-abandoned, she added, with tender impulsiveness, “I don't wonder that he sympathized with you, Mollie.”
It revealed itself shortly afterward that his sympathy had not confined itself to the night Mollie called “dreadful.” Since that night he had been a frequent visitor at Bloomsbury Place,—as frequent a visitor as he had been in the days when Dolly had been wont so to entertain him.
A week after the return of Aimée and Grif from London, there fell again upon the modest hotel a hush; but it was not the hush of sympathetic silence which had fallen upon it before,—it was merely a sort of reaction after a slight excitement. The pretty English girl had, to every one's wonder, suddenly returned to earth and had been married! The wisest were bewildered, but such was the fact, nevertheless; nobody could exactly comprehend, but who could deny it? It was a mystery, indeed, until one day, some time after, a usually phlegmatic matron was struck with an idea, and accordingly propounded to her friends a somewhat vaguely expressed problem.
“After the appearance of the lover one heard no more that she was dying?”
“Just so.”
“Perhaps the lover had something to do with the matter?”, “Ah!”
“Perhaps she was dying for him, and his coming cured her?”
“Exactly. That must have been the case.”
And thenceforth the matter was deemed settled. However, the gay, light-hearted party of English had taken their departure,—the friendly young artist who sketched and smoked and enjoyed himself; his handsome young wife, who sketched and played with her handsome child, and enjoyed herself; the beautiful younger sister, who blushed and was charmingly bashful, but enjoyed herself; the fair little saint with the grave youthful face, who took care of them all, and yet enjoyed herself,—the lover, the elder lady, the guest who came to be groomsman, the bride,—they were all gone at last, and their absence was the cause of the hush of which I speak.
There had been a wedding,—a joyous, light-hearted wedding, in which the bride had looked pretty and flower-like and ethereal,—a fragile creature enough in her white dress and under her white veil, but a delightfully happy creature, notwithstanding,—in which the bridegroom had been plainly filled with chivalric tenderness and bliss,—in which the two sisters had been charming beyond measure, and the awkward, affectionate girl friend from the seminary had blushed herself into a high fever. There could not have been a more prettily orthodox wedding, said the beholders. Somehow its glow of young romance touched people, it was so evident that the young couple were fond of each other, and happy and hopeful. There were those who, seeing it solemnized in the small church, shed a few tears, they knew not why, when Grif lifted Dolly's veil and kissed her without a word.
“It is all rose color to them,” said one of these soft-hearted ones, apologetically, to her neighbor.
Rose color! I should think it was.
But if it was all rose color then, what was it that first evening they spent at home,—in their own home, in the little house which was so bright and pretty that it seemed more like a dream than a reality? What color did life look when Grif led Dolly across the threshold, half trembling himself for very joy? What color did it look when he shut the door of the little parlor, and, turning round, went to her and folded her in his arms close to his beating heart?
Rose color! It was golden and more than golden! And yet, for the first minute, Dolly could not speak, and the next she laid her cheek in her favorite place, on the lapel of Grif's coat, and burst into a great gush of soft, warm tears,—tears without a touch of any other element, however, than love and happiness.
“Home, Grif!” she said.
He was quite pale and he had almost lost his voice, too, but he managed to answer her, unsteadily.
“Yes, Dolly,” he said; “home!” And he stroked the bright hair upon his breast, with a world of meaning in his touch.
“Do you think,” she said next, “that I am good enough and wise enough to take care of it, and to take care of you, Grif?”
“Do you think,” he said, “that I am good enough and wise enough to take care of you?”
She lifted up her face and kissed him.
“We love each other,” she whispered, “we trust each other, and so we can help each other, and God will help us both. Ah, Grif, how bright and sweet life is!”
And she scarcely knew, tender little soul, that instead of “life” she should have said “love.”
There we will leave them both, merely hinting at the festivities that followed,—merely hinting at the rejoicings at Bloomsbury Place, the gatherings at Brabazon Lodge, and the grand family reception at the house of the bride,—a reception at which Dolly shone forth with renewed splendor, presiding over a gorgeous silver tea-service, which was one of Miss MacDowlas's many gifts, dispensing tea and coffee with the deportment of a housekeeper of many years' standing, and utterly distracting Grif with her matronly airs and graces.
Vagabondia was itself again in these days, but it was turning its brighter side outward. Phil was winning success, too, his position in the world of art was becoming secured, and Bloomsbury Place was to be touched up and refurnished gradually. Aimée had promised to make her home with Dolly until such time as her sweet little saint's face won her a home of her own. Miss MacDowlas had been adopted into the family circle, and was conscious of being happier than she had ever felt since her long-past youth slipped from her grasp. Tod's teeth were “through,” as Mrs. Phil phrased it, and convulsions had not supervened, to the ecstasy of his anxious admirers. And Mollie,—well, Mollie waltzed with Ralph Gowan again on the night of Dolly's reception, and when the dance was at an end, she went and seated herself near her hostess upon the green sofa—it was a green sofa, though a far more luxurious one than Dolly and Grif had ever dared to set their hearts upon in the olden days.
“Dolly,” she said, blushing for the last time in this history of mine, and looking down at her bouquet of waxen-white camellias and green leaves,—"Dolly, I suppose Aimée has told you that I am engaged to—to—”
“To Mr. Gowan,” suggested Dolly.
“Yes,” answered Mollie, “to Mr. Gowan.”