Brune was naturally shy and silent among women. Sarah made him eloquent, because she had the tact to discover 198 the subject on which he could talk,—his regiment, and its sayings and doings. So Brune was delighted with himself; he had never before suspected how clever he was. Stimulated by Sarah’s and Aspatria’s laughter and curiosity, he found it easy to retail funny little bits of palace and mess gossip, and to describe the queer men and the vain men and the fine fellows that were his familiars.
“And pray how do you amuse yourself, Lieutenant? Do you drink wine, and gamble, and go to the races, and bet your purse empty?”
“I was never brought up in such ways,” Brune answered, “and, I can tell you, I wouldn’t make believe to like them. There are a good many dalesmen in my company, and none of us enjoy anything more than a fair throw or an in-lock.”
“A throw or an in-lock! What do you mean, Lieutenant? You must explain yourself to Miss Anneys and myself.”
“Aspatria knows well enough. Did you ever see north-country lads wrestling, 199 madam? No? Then you have as fine a thing in keeping for your eyes as human creatures can show you. I’ll warrant that! Why-a! wrestling brings all men to their level. When Colonel Jardine is ugly-tempered, and top-heavy with his authority, a few sound throws over Timothy Sutcliffe’s head does bring him to level very well. I had a little in-play with him yesterday; for in the wrestling-ring we be all equals, though out of it he is my colonel.”
“Now for the in-play. Tell me about it, for I see Miss Anneys is not at all interested.”
“Colonel Jardine is a fine wrestler; a fair match he would be even for brother Will. Yesterday he said he could throw me; and I took the challenge willingly. So we shook hands, and went squarely for the throw. I was in good luck, and soon got my head under his right arm, and his head close down to my left side. Then it was only to get my right arm up to his shoulder, and lift him as high as my head, and, when so, lean backward and throw 200 him over my head: we call it the Flying Horse.”
“Oh, I can see it very well. No wonder Rosalind fell in love with Orlando when he threw the wrestler Charles.”
“Were they north-country or Cornish men?”
She was far too kindly and polite to smile; indeed, she gave Aspatria a pretty, imperative glance, and answered, in the most natural manner, “I think they were Italians.”
“Oh!” said Brune, with some contempt. “Chaff on their ways! The Devonshire wrestlers are brutal; the Cornish are too slow; but the Cumberland men wrestle like gentlemen. They meet square and level in the ring, and the one who could carry ill-will for a fair throw would very soon find himself out of all rings and all good fellowship.”
“You said ‘even brother Will.’ Is your brother a better wrestler than you?”
“My song! he is that! Will has his match, though. We had a ploughman 201 once,—Aspatria remembers him,—Robert Steadman, an upright, muscular young fellow, civil and respectful as could be in everything about his work and place; but on wet days when we were all, masters and servants, in the barn together, it was a sight to see Robert wrestling with Will for the mastery, and Will never so ready to say, ‘Well done!’ nor the rest of us so happy, as when we saw Will’s two brawny legs going handsomely over Robert’s head.”
“If I were a man, I should try to be a fine wrestler.”
“It is a great comfort,” said Brune. “If you have a quarrel of any kind, it is a deal more satisfactory to meet your man, and throw him a few times over your head, than to go to law with him. It puts a stop to unpleasantness very quickly and very good-naturedly.”
Then Sarah rose and opened the piano, and from its keys dashed out a lilting, hurrying melody, like the galloping of horses and shaking of bridles; and in a 202 few moments she began to sing, and Brune went to her side, and, because she looked so steadily into his eyes, he could remember nothing at all of the song but its dashing refrain,—
“For he whom I wed
Must be north country bred,
And must carry me back to the North Countrie.”
Then Aspatria played some wonderful music on her harp, and Sarah and Brune sat still and listened to their own hearts, and sent out shy glances, and caught each other in the act, and Brune was made nervous, and Sarah gay, by the circumstance.
By and by they began to talk of schools, and of how much Aspatria had learned; and so Brune regretted his own ignorance, and wished he had been more attentive to his schoolmaster.
Sarah laughed at the wish. “A knowledge of Shakspeare and the musical glasses and the Della Cruscans,” she said, “is for foolish, sentimental women. You can wrestle, and you can fight, and I 203 suppose you can make money, and perhaps even make love. Is there anything else a soldier needs?”
“Colonel Jardine is very clever,” continued Brune, regretfully; “and I had a good schoolmaster—”
“Nonsense, Lieutenant!” said Sarah. “None of them are good. They all spoil your eyes, and seek to lay a curse on you; that is the confusion of languages.”
“Still, I might have learned Latin.”
“It was the speech of pagans and infidels.”
“Or logic.”
“Logic hath nothing to say in a good cause.”
“Or philosophy.”
“Philosophy is curiosity. Socrates was very properly put to death for it.”
They were all laughing together, when Sarah condemned Socrates, and the evening passed like a happy dream away.
It was succeeded by weeks of the same delight. Aspatria soon learned to love Sarah. She had never before had a 204 woman friend on whom she could rely and to whom she could open her heart. Sarah induced her to speak of Ulfar, to tell her all her suffering and her plans and hopes, and she gave her in return a true affection and a most sincere sympathy. Nothing of the past that referred to Ulfar was left untold; and as the two women sat together during the long summer days, they grew very near to each other, and there was but one mind and one desire between them.
So that when the time came for Aspatria to go back to Mrs. St. Alban’s, Sarah would not hear of their separation. “You have had enough of book-learning,” she said. “Remain with me. We will go to Paris, to Rome, to Vienna. We will study through travel and society. It is by rubbing yourself against all kinds of men and women that you acquire the finest polish of life; and then when Ulfar comes back you will be able to meet him upon all civilized grounds. And as for the South Americans, we will buy all the books 205 about them we can find. Are they red or white or black, I wonder? Are they pagans or Christians? I seem to remember that when I was at school I learned that the Peruvians worshipped the sun.”
“I think, Sarah, that they are all descendants of Spaniards; so they must be Roman Catholics. And I have read that their women are beautiful and witty.”
“My dear Aspatria, nothing goes with Spaniards but gravity and green olives.”
Aspatria was easily persuaded to accept Sarah’s offer; she was indeed very happy in the prospect before her. But Brune was miserable. He had spent a rapturous summer, and it was to end without harvest, or the promise thereof. He could not endure the prospect, and one night he made a movement so decided that Sarah was compelled to set him back a little.
“Were you ever in love, Mrs. Sandys?” poor Brune asked, with his heart filling his mouth.
She looked thoughtfully at him a moment, 206 and then slowly answered: “I once felt myself in danger, and I fled to France. I consider it the finest action of my life.”
Aspatria felt sorry for her brother, and she said warmly: “I think no one falls in love now. Love is out of date.”
Sarah enjoyed her temper. “You are right, dear,” she answered. “Culture makes love a conscious operation. When women are all feeling, they fall in love; when they have intellect and will, they attach themselves only after a critical examination of the object.”
Later, when they were alone, Aspatria took her friend to task for her cruelty: “You know Brune loves you, Sarah; and you do love him. Why make him miserable? Has he presumed too far?”
“No, indeed! He is as adoring and humble as one could wish a future lord and master to be.”
“Well, then?”
“I will give our love time to grow. When we come back, if Brune has been true to me in every way, he may fall to 207 blessing himself with both hands;” and then she began to sing,—
“Betide, betide, whatever betide,
Love shall be Lord of Sandy-Side!”
“Love is a burden two hearts carry very easily together, but, oh, Sarah! I know how hard it is to bear it alone. Therefore I say, be kind to Brune while you can.”
“My dear, your idea is a very pretty one. I read the other day a Hindu version of it that smelled charmingly of the soil,—
‘A clapping is not made with one hand alone:
Your love, my beloved, must answer my own.’”
But in spite of such reflections, Sarah’s will and intellect were predominant, and she left poor Brune with only such hope as he could glean from the lingering pressure of her hand and the tears in her eyes. Aspatria’s pleading had done no good. Perhaps it had done harm; for the very nature of love is that it should be spontaneous.
One morning in spring Aspatria stood in a balcony overlooking the principal thoroughfare of Rome,—the Rome of papal government, mythical, mystical, mediæval in its character. A procession of friars had just passed; a handsome boy was crying violets; some musical puppets were performing in the shadow of the opposite palace; a party of brigands were going to the Angelo prison; the spirit of Cæsar was still abroad in the black-browed men and women, lounging and laughing in their gaudy, picturesque costumes; and the spirit of ecclesiasticism lifted itself above every earthly object, and touched proudly the bells of a thousand churches. Aspatria was weary of all.
She had that morning an imperative nostalgia. She could see nothing but the 209 mountains of Cumberland, and the white sheep wandering about their green sides. Through the church-bells she heard the sheep-bells. Above the boy crying violets she heard the boy whistling in the fresh-ploughed furrow. As for the violets, she knew how the wild ones were blowing in Ambar wood, and how in the garden the daffodil-beds were aglow, and the sweet thyme humbling itself at their feet, because each bore a chalice. Oh for a breath from the mountains and the sea! The hot Roman streets, with their ever-changing human elements of sorrow and 210 mirth, sin and prayer, riches and poverty, made her sad and weary.
Sarah came toward her with a letter in her hand. “Ria,” she said, “this is from Lady Redware. Your husband will be in England very shortly.”
It was the first time Sarah had ever called Ulfar Aspatria’s husband. In conversation the two women had always spoken of him as “Ulfar.” The change was significant. It implied that Sarah thought the time had come for Aspatria to act decisively.
“I shall be delighted to go back to England. We have been twenty months away, Sarah. I was just feeling as if it were twenty years.”
Sarah looked critically at the woman who was going to cast her last die for love. She was so entirely different from the girl who had first won that love, how was it possible for her to recapture the same sweet, faithless emotion? She had a swift memory of the slim girl in the plain black frock whom she had seen sitting under the 211 whin-bushes. And then she glanced at Aspatria standing under the blue-and-red awning of the Roman palace. She was now twenty-six years old, and in the very glory of her womanhood, tall, superbly formed, graceful, calm, and benignant. Her face was luminous with intellect and feeling, her manner that of a woman high-bred and familiar with the world. Culture had done all for her that the lapidary does for the diamond; travel and social advantages had added to the gem a golden setting. She was so little like the sorrowful child whom Ulfar had last seen in the vicar’s meadow that Sarah felt instantaneous recognition to be almost impossible.
After some hesitation, Aspatria agreed to accept Sarah’s plan and wait in Richmond the development of events. At first she had been strongly in favour of a return to Seat-Ambar. “If Ulfar really wants to see me,” she said, “he will be most likely to seek me there.”
“But then, Ria, he may think he does not want to see you. Men never know 212 what they really do want. You have to give them ‘leadings.’ If Ulfar can look on you now and have no curiosity about your identity, I should say the man was not worth a speculation from any point. See if you have hold sufficient on his memory to pique his curiosity. If you have, lead him wherever you wish.”
“But how? And where?”
“Do I carry a divining-cup, Ria? Can I foresee the probabilities of a man so impossible as Ulfar Fenwick? I only know that Richmond is a good place to watch events from.”
And of course the Richmond house suited Brune. His love had grown to the utmost of Sarah’s expectations, and he was no longer to be put off with smiles and pleasant words. Sarah had promised him an answer when she returned, and he claimed it with a passionate persistence that had finally something imperative in it. To this mood Sarah succumbed; though she declared that Brune had chosen the morning of all others most inconvenient 213 for her. She was just leaving the house. She was going to London about her jewels. Brune had arrested the coachman by a peremptory movement, and he looked as if he were quite prepared to lift Sarah out of the carriage.
So Aspatria went alone. She was glad of the swift movement in the fresh air, she was glad that she could be quiet and let it blow passively upon her. The restlessness of watching had made her feverish. She had the “strait” of a strong mind which longs to meet her destiny. For her love for her husband had grown steadily with her efforts to be worthy of that love, and she longed to meet him face to face and try the power of her personality over him. The trial did not frighten her; she felt within her the ability to accomplish it; her feet were on a level with her task; she was the height of a woman above it.
Musing on this subject, letting her mind shoot to and fro like a shuttle between the past and the present, she reached Piccadilly, 214 and entered a large jeweller’s shop. The proprietor was talking to a gentleman who was exhibiting a number of uncut gems. Aspatria knew him instantly. It was Ulfar Fenwick,—the same Ulfar, older, and yet distinctly handsomer. For the dark hair slightly whitened, and the thin, worn cheeks, had an intensely human aspect. She saw that he had suffered; that the sum of life was on his face,—toil, difficulty, endurance, mind, and also that pathetic sadness which tells of endurance without avail.
She went to the extreme end of the counter, and began to examine the jewels which Sarah had sent to be reset. Some were finished; others were waiting for the selection of a particular style, and Aspatria looked critically at the models shown her. The occupation gave her an opportunity to calm and consider herself; she could look at the jewels a few moments without expressing an opinion.
Then she gave, in a clear, distinct voice, some order regarding a pearl necklace; 215 and Ulfar turned like a flash, and looked at the woman who had spoken. She had the pearls in one hand; the other touched a satin cushion on which lay many ornaments of diamonds, sapphires, and rubies. The moonlight iridescence of the pearls, the sparkling glory of the gems, seemed to be a part of her noble beauty. He forgot his own treasures, and stood looking at the woman whose voice had called to him out of the past, had penetrated his heart like a bell struck sharply in its innermost room. Who was it? Where had they met before? He knew the face. He knew, and yet he did not know, the whole charming personality. As she turned, his eyes met her eyes, and the pure pallor of her cheeks was flooded with crimson.
She passed him within touch; the rustle of her garments, their faint perfume, the simple sense of her nearness, thrilled his being wondrously. And, above all, that sense of familiarity! What could it mean? He gave the stones into the jeweller’s care, and hurriedly followed her steps.
“That is Sarah Sandys’s carriage, my barony for it!” he exclaimed; “and the men are in the Sandys livery. Sarah, then, is in Richmond; and the woman who rides in her carriage is very likely in her house; but who can it be?”
The face haunted him, the voice tormented him like a melody that we continually try to catch. He endeavoured to place both as he rode out to Richmond. More than once the thought of Aspatria came to him, but he could not make any memory of her fit that splendid vision of the woman with uplifted hand and the string of pearls dropping from it. Her exquisite face, between the beauty of their reflection and the flashing of the gems beneath, retained in his memory a kind of glory. “Such loveliness is the proper setting for pearls and diamonds,” he said. “Many a beauty I have seen, but none that can touch the heel of her shoe.”
For he really thought that it was her personal charms which had so moved him. It was the sense of familiarity; it was in a 217 far deeper and dimmer way a presentiment of right, of possession, a feeling of personal touch in the emotion, which perplexed and stimulated him as the mere mystery and beauty of the flesh could never have done.
As soon as he reached the top of Richmond Hill he saw Sarah. She was sauntering along that loveliest of cliffs, with Brune. An orderly was leading Brune’s horse; he himself was in the first ecstasy of Sarah’s acknowledged love. Ulfar went into the Star and Garter Inn and watched Sarah. He had no claim upon her, and yet he felt as if she had been false to him. “And for a mere soldier!” Then he looked critically at the soldier, and said, 218 with some contempt: “I am sorry for him! Sarah Sandys will have her pastime, and then say, ‘Farewell, good sir!’” As for the mere soldier being Brune Anneys, that was a thought out of Ulfar’s horizon.
In a couple of hours he went to Sarah’s. She met him with real delight.
“You are just five years lovelier, Sarah,” he said.
“Admiration from Sir Ulfar Fenwick is admiration indeed!”
“Yes; I say you are beautiful, though I have just seen the most bewitching woman that ever blessed my eyes,—in your carriage too.” And then, swift as light or thought, there flashed across his mind a conviction that the Beauty and Aspatria were identical. It was a momentary intelligence; he grasped it merely as a clew that might lead him somewhere.
“In my carriage? I dare say it was Ria. She went to Piccadilly this morning about some jewels.”
“She reminded me of Aspatria.”
“Have you brought back with you that 219 old trouble? I have no mind to hear more of it.”
“Who is the lady I saw this morning?”
“She is the sister of the man I am going to marry. In four months she will be my sister.”
“What is her name?”
“That is to tell you my secret, sir.”
“I saw you throwing your enchantments over some soldier. I knew just how the poor fellow felt.”
“Then you also have been in Arcadia. Be thankful for your past blessings. I do not expect you to rejoice with me; none of the apostolic precepts are so hard as that which bids us rejoice with those who do rejoice.”
“Neither Elizabeth nor you have ever named Aspatria in your letters.”
“Did you expect us to change guard over Ambar-Side? I dare say Aspatria has grown into a buxom, rosy-cheeked woman and quite forgotten you.”
“I must go and see her.”
“I think you ought. Also, you should 220 give her her freedom. I consider your behaviour a dog-in-the-manger atrocity.”
“Can you not pick nicer words, Sarah?”
“I would not if I could.”
“Sarah, tell me truly, have I lost my good looks?”
She regarded him attentively a moment, and answered: “Not quite. You have some good points yet. You have grown thin and gray, and lost something, and perhaps gained something; but you are not very old, and then, you know, you have your title, and your castle, and your very old, old family, and I suppose a good deal of money.” In reality, she was sure that he had never before been so attractive; for he had now the magic of a countenance informed by intellect and experience, eyes brimming with light, lips neither loose nor coarse, yet full of passion and the faculty of enjoyment.
He smiled grimly at Sarah’s list of his charms, and said, “When will you introduce me to your future sister?”
“This evening. Come about nine. I 221 have a few sober people who will be delighted to hear your South American adventures. Ria goes to Lady Chester’s ball soon after nine. Do not miss your chance.”
“Could I see her now?”
“You could not.”
“What for?”
“Do you suppose she would leave a modiste for—you?”
“I wonder where Aspatria is!”
“Go and find out.”
“Sarah, who is the young lady I saw in your carriage?”
“She is the sister of the officer you saw me with, the man I am going to marry.”
“Where did you meet him?”
“At a friend’s house.”
“Where did you meet her?”
“Her brother brought her to my house. I asked her to stay with me, and finally we went to Italy together.”
“She has a very aristocratic manner.”
“She ought to have. She was educated at Mrs. St. Alban’s, and she visits at the 222 Earl of Arundel’s, the Duke of Norfolk’s, and the very exclusive Boleyns’,—Lady Mary Boleyn is her friend, and she has also had the great advantage of my society for nearly two years.”
“Then of course she is not Aspatria, and my heart is a liar, and my memory is a traitor, and my eyes do not see correctly. I will call about nine. I am at the Star and Garter. If she should name me at all—”
“Do you imagine she noticed you? and in such a public place as Howell’s?”
“I really do imagine she noticed me. Ask her.”
“I see you are in love again. After all that experience has done for you! It is a Nemesis, Ulfar. I have often noticed that, however faithless a man may be, there comes at last one woman who avenges all the rest. Enter Nemesis at nine to-night!”
“Sarah, you are an angel.”
“Thank you, Ulfar. I thought you classed me with the other side.”
“As for Aspatria—”
“Life is too short to discuss Aspatria. I remember one day at Redware being sharply requested to keep silence on that subject. The wheel of retribution has made a perfect circle as regards Aspatria! I shall certainly tell Ria that you have made her the heroine of your disagreeable matrimonial romance.”
“No, no, Sarah! Do not say a word to her. I must wait until nine, I suppose? And I am so anxious and so fearful, Sarah.”
“You must wait until nine. And as for the rest, I know very well that in the present age a lover’s cares and fears have
Dwindled to the smallest span.
Do go to your hotel, and get clothed and in your right mind. You are most unbecomingly dressed. Good-by, old friend, good-by!” And she left him with an elaborate courtesy.
Ulfar was now in a vortex. Things went around and around in his consciousness; 224 and whenever he endeavoured to examine events with his reason, then feeling advanced some unsupported conviction, and threw him back into the same senseless whirl of emotion.
He had failed to catch the point which would have given him the clew to the whole mystery,—the identity of Brune with the splendidly accoutred officer Sarah avowed to be her intended husband. Without taking special note of him, Ulfar had seen certain signs of birth, breeding, and assured position. In his mind there was a great gulf between the haughty-looking soldier and the simple, handsome, but rather boorish-looking young Squire of Ambar-Side. The two individualities were as far apart 225 in social claims as the north and south poles are apart physically.
And if this beautiful woman were indeed Aspatria, how could he reconcile the fact with her education at St. Alban’s, her friendship with such exalted families, her relationship to an officer of evident birth and position? When he thought thus, he acknowledged the impossibility; but then no sooner had he acknowledged it than his heart passionately denied the deduction, with the simple iteration, “It is Aspatria! It is Aspatria!”
Aspatria or not, he told himself that he was at last genuinely in love. Every affair before was tame, pale, uninteresting. If it was not Aspatria, then the first Aspatria was the shadow of the second and real one; the preface to love’s glorious tale; the prelude to his song; the gray, sweet dawn to his perfect day. He could not eat, nor sit still, nor think reasonably, nor yet stop thinking. The sun stood still; the minutes were hours; at four o’clock he wished to fling the timepiece out of the window.
Aspatria had the immense strength of certainty. She knew. Also, she had Sarah to advise with. Still better, she had the conviction that Ulfar loved her. Perhaps Sarah had exaggerated Ulfar’s desperate condition; if so, she had done it consciously, for she knew that as soon as a woman is sure of her power she puts on an authority which commands it. She was now only afraid that Ulfar would not be kept in suspense long enough, that Aspatria would forgive him too easily.
“Do make yourself as puzzling as you can, for this one night, Aspatria,” she urged. “Try to outvie and outdo and even affront that dove-like simplicity he used to adore in you, and into which you are still apt to relapse. He told me once that you looked like a Quakeress when he first saw you.”
“I was just home from Miss Gilpin’s school in Kendal. It was a Quaker school. I have always kept a black gown ready, like the one he saw me first in.”
“No black gown to-night. I have a mind to stay here and see that you turn the Quakeress into a princess.”
“I will do all you wish. To-night you shall have your way; but poor Ulfar must have suffered, and—”
“Poor Ulfar, indeed! Be merry; that is the best armour against love. What ruins women? Revery and sentimentality. A woman who does not laugh ought to be watched.”
But though she lectured and advised Aspatria as to the ways of men and the ways of love, Sarah had not much faith in her own counsels. “No one can draw out a programme for a woman’s happiness,” she mused; “she will not keep to its lines. Now, I do wonder whether she will dress gorgeously or not? What did Solomon in all his glory wear? If Aspatria only knew how dress catches a man’s eye, and then touches his vanity, and then sets fire to his imagination, and finally, somehow, someway, gets to his heart! If she only knew,—
‘All thoughts, all passions, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
Are but the ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame!’”
A little before nine, Ulfar entered Sarah’s drawing-room. It was lighted with wax candles. It was sweet with fresh violets, and at the farther end Aspatria stood by her harp. She was dressed for Lady Chester’s ball, and was waiting her chaperon; but there had been a little rebellion against her leaving without giving her admirers one song. Every person was suggesting his or her favourite; and she stood smiling, uncertain, listening, watching, for one voice and face.
Her dazzling bodice was clasped with emeralds; her draperies were of damasked gauze, shot with gold and silver, and abloom with flowers. Her fair neck sparkled with diamonds; and the long white fingers which touched the strings so firmly glinted with flashing gems. The moment Ulfar entered, she saw him. His eyes, full of fiery prescience, forced her to meet their inquiry; and then it was that she sat down 230 and filled the room with tinkling notes, that made every one remember the mountains, and the merry racing of the spring winds, and the trickling of half-hidden fountains.
Sarah advanced with him. She touched Aspatria slightly, and said: “Hush! a moment. This is my friend Sir Ulfar Fenwick, Ria.”
Ria lifted her eyes sweetly to his eyes; she bowed with the grace and benignity of a queen, and adroitly avoided speech by turning the melody into song:—
“I never shall forget
The mountain maid that once I met
By the cold river’s side.
I met her on the mountain-side;
She watched her herds unnoticed there:
‘Trim-bodiced maiden, hail!’ I cried.
She answered, ‘Whither, Wanderer?
For thou hast lost thy way.’”
Every word went to Ulfar’s heart, and amid all the soft cries of delight he alone was silent. She was beaming with smiles; she was radiant as a goddess; the light seemed to vanish from the room when she 231 went away. Her adieu was a general one, excepting to Ulfar. On him she turned her bright eyes, and courtesied low with one upward glance. It set his heart on fire. He knew that glance. They might say this or that, they might lie to him neck-deep, he knew it was Aspatria! He was cross with Sarah. He accused her of downright deception. He told her frankly that he believed nothing about the soldier and his sister.
She bade him come in the morning and talk to Ria; and he asked impetuously: “How soon? Twelve, I suppose? How am I to pass the time until twelve to-morrow?”
“Why this haste?”
“Why this deception?”
“After seven years’ indifference, are you suddenly gone mad?”
“I feel as if I was being very badly used.”
“How does the real Aspatria feel? Go at once to Ambar-Side.”
“The real Aspatria is here. I know it! I feel it!”
“In a court of law, what evidence would feeling be?”
“In a court of love—”
“Try it.”
“I will, to-morrow, at ten o’clock.”
His impetuosity pleased her. She was disposed to leave him to Aspatria now. And Aspatria was disposed on the following morning to make his confession very easy to him. She dressed herself in the simple black gown she had kept ready for this event. It had the short elbow sleeves, and the ruffle round the open throat, and the daffodil against her snowy breast, that distinguished the first costume he had ever seen her in. She loosened her hair and let it fall in two long braids behind her ears. She was, as far as dress could make her so, the Aspatria who had held the light to welcome him to Ambar-Side that stormy night ten years ago.
He was standing in the middle of the 233 room, restless and expectant, when she opened the door. He called her by name, and went to meet her. She trembled and was silent.
“Aspatria, it is you! My Life! My Soul! It is you!”
He took her hands; they were as cold as ice. He drew her close to his side; he stooped to see her eyes; he whispered word upon word of affection,—sweet-meaning nouns and adjectives that caught a real physical heat from the impatient heart and tongue that forged and uttered them.
“Forgive me, my dearest! Forgive me fully! Forgive me at once and altogether! Aspatria, I love you! I love none but you! I will adore you all my life! Speak one word to me, one word, my love, one word: say only ‘Ulfar!’”
She forgot in a moment all that she had suffered. She forgot all she had promised Sarah, all her intents of coldness, all reproaches; she forgot even to forgive him. She just put her arms around his neck and 234 kissed him. She blotted out the past forever in that one whispered word, “Ulfar.”
And then he took her to his heart; he kissed her for very wonder; he kissed her for very joy; but most of all he kissed her for fervent love. Then once more life was an “Interlude in Heaven.” Every hour held some sweet surprise, some accidental joy. It was Brune, it was Sarah, it was some eulogium of Ulfar in the great London weeklies. He had fought in the good fight for freedom; he had done great deeds of mercy as well as of valour; he had crossed primeval forests, and brought back wonderful medicines, and dyes, and many new specimens for the botanist and the naturalist. The papers were never weary in praising his pluck, his bravery, his generosity, and his endurance; the Geographical Society sent him its coveted blue ribbon. In his own way Ulfar had made himself a fit mate for the new Aspatria.
And she was a constant wonder to him. Nothing in all his strange experience 235 touched his heart like the thought of his simple, patient wife, studying to please him, to be worthy of his love. Every day revealed her in some new and charming light. She was one hundred Aspatrias in a single, lovable, lovely woman. On what ever subject Ulfar spoke, she understood, supplemented, sympathized with, or assisted him. She could talk in French and Italian; she was not ignorant of botany and natural science, and she was delighted to be his pupil.
In a single month they became all the world to each other; and then they began to long for the lonely old castle fronting the wild North Sea, to plan for its restoration, and for a sweet home-life, which alone could satisfy the thirst of their hearts for each other’s presence. At the end of June they went northward.
It was the month of the rose, and the hedges were pink, and the garden was a garden of roses. There were banks of roses, mazes of roses, walks and standards 236 of roses, masses of glorious colour, and breezes scented with roses. Butterflies were chasing one another among the flowers; nightingales, languid with love, were singing softly above them. And in the midst was a gray old castle, flying its old border flags, and looking as happy as if it were at a festival.
Aspatria was enraptured, spellbound with delight. With Ulfar she wandered from one beauty to another, until they finally reached a great standard of pale-pink roses. Their loveliness was beyond compare; their scent went to the brain like some divine essence. It was a glory,—a prayer,—a song of joy! Aspatria stood beside it, and seemed to Ulfar but its mortal manifestation. She was clothed in a gown of pale-pink brocade, with a little mantle of the same, trimmed with white lace, and a bonnet of white lace and pink roses. She was a perfect rose of womanhood. She was the glory of his life, his prayer, his song of joy!
“It is the loveliest place in the world!” he said, “and you! you are the loveliest woman! My sweet Aspatria!”
She smiled divinely. “And yet,” she answered, “I remember, Ulfar, a song of yours that said something very different. Listen:—
‘There is a rose of a hundred leaves,
But the wild rose is the sweetest!’”
And as she sang the words, Ulfar had a vision of a young girl, fresh and pure as a mountain bluebell, in her scrimp black frock. He saw the wind blowing it tight over her virgin form; he saw her fair, childish, troubled face as she kissed him farewell in the vicar’s meadows; and then he saw the glorious woman, nobly planned, perfect on every side, that the child wife had grown to.
So, when she ceased, he pulled the fairest rose on the tree; he took from it every thorn, he put it in her breast, he kissed the rose, and he kissed her rose-like face. Then he took up the song where she 238 dropped it; and hand in hand, keeping time to its melody, they crossed the threshold of their blessed home.
“The robin sang beneath the eaves:
‘There is a rose of a hundred leaves,
But the wild rose is the sweetest!’
“The nightingale made answer clear:
‘O darling rose! more fair, more dear!
O rose of a hundred leaves!’”
Transcriber Notes
Archaic spelling preserved, including pottle and alterative.