Fairchild having finished his song, he and Miriam plunged into an animated conversation about music in the abstract, which I, for one—being, though an ardent lover of music, no musician—found of dubious interest.
“Wherefore, I think,” I interrupted them to say, “if you will forgive the breach of ceremony, Mr. Fairchild, I shall retire to my bedroom for a bit, and take a nap. I feel somewhat fatigued after the exertions of the forenoon; and, anyhow, I am accustomed to my forty winks at this hour of the day. I am sure I leave you in good hands when I leave you to my sister and my niece.”
“Indeed, Dr. Benary, the kindest thing you can do for me—you and your good ladies—will be to let me feel that in no wise do I interfere with your convenience or your pleasure. Otherwise, I shall be compelled to take my departure instanter; and I confess that by this time I am so deeply penetrated by the comfort of your interior that I should hate mortally to renew close quarters with the storm.”
So I withdrew to my bed-chamber, and was sound asleep in no time. Nor did I wake till the mellow booming of the Japanese gong, which serves as dinner-bell in our establishment, broke in upon my slumbers.
As I rose to my feet, something dropped from the counterpane to the floor.
Stooping to pick it up, I discovered that it was a sheet of paper, folded in the form of a cocked hat, and bearing my name written across it in Josephine's hand.
“What earthly occasion can Josephine have for writing me a note?” I wondered.
Donning my spectacles, I read as follows:
“What ever shall we do? I cannot come and say this to you in person, for I dare not leave them alone together. But he has recognised Miriam!—J.”
It took fully a minute for the significance of that sentence: “He has recognised Miriam,” to percolate my understanding, still thick with the dregs of sleep. Then I started as if I had been stung; and rushing into the passage, I called “Josephine! Josephine!” at the top of my lungs.
The passage was quite dark. From the end of it, directly behind me, came the response, “Yes, Leonard.”
“Ah, you are there?” I questioned.
“I have been waiting for you to wake. I did not wish to disturb your sleep,” she explained.
“And they—where are they now?”
“Mr. Fairchild is in the guest-chamber, where he is to sleep. Miriam is in her room. I could not come to you so long as they were together. It would not do to leave them alone. That is why I wrote the note.”
By this time we were between my own four walls, and I had closed the door behind us.
“And now, for Heaven's sake, explain to me what this means,” I said, holding up the sheet of paper.
“It means what it says. He has recognised Miriam.”
“Oh, it is impossible,” I declared.
“I only wish you were right,” sighed Josephine dolefully.
“But how—but why—but what—what makes you think so?” stammered I.
“His action when he first saw her—when she and t entered the room where he was, to greet him, this forenoon.”
“Oh, it is impossible—impossible!” I repeated, helplessly. “What was his action? What did he do?”
“He caught his breath, he started, he coloured up, and then turned white, and then red again.”
“Merciful Heavens!” I gasped, panic-stricken.
“What shall we do? What can we do?” my poor sister groaned.
“Did—did Miriam notice his embarrassment?”
“I think not. She did not appear to, anyhow.”
There befell a pause, during which I tried to collect my wits, and to reflect upon the situation.
“Well,” persisted Josephine, after the silence had continued for a minute or two, “what shall we do?”
“It is impossible, it is absolutely impossible,” I said. “Her own mother would be unable to recognise her. She is altered beyond recognition. Why, that dead woman would by this time be nearly thirty years of age; whereas Miriam doesn't look two-and-twenty. Besides, the whole character and expression of her face are changed. There remain the same bony structure and the same general complexion: that is all that remains the same. Confess that the thing is impossible.”
“When he saw her, he started and coloured up.”
“Well, even so. What of it. He started and coloured up. What does that prove? Perhaps it was because of her resemblance to the dead woman, whom we will suppose him to have known. But as for identifying them as one and the same, he'd never dream of it. A merry, innocent young girl, of one or two-and-twenty, and a sad-eyed, sorrow-stricken, sinful woman, eight years her senior! The thing is on the face of it absurd. Absurd, too, is the supposition that he ever knew Louise Massarte at all. He started and coloured up at sight of Miriam, for the very simple reason of her exceeding beauty. He is a young man, and he is an artist. What quick-blooded young man, what artist, would not colour up at the sight of so beautiful a girl? Or else, it is imaginable, he has seen Miriam herself somewhere before—in the street, in an omnibus, or where not—and has been impressed by her loveliness; and then he started for surprise and pleasure at finding himself under the same roof with her. You, my good Josephine, you have jumped to a most unwarranted conclusion. Your fear was the father of your thought.—Afterwards, for instance? Did he follow up his start with such conduct as was calculated to justify you in your suspicion?”
“No. He simply returned our salutations, and behaved toward her as he did toward me—as if she were a perfectly new acquaintance.”
“Good! And then, consider the freedom and the nonchalance with which he talked to her at luncheon. No, no; it is impossible. Well, I will keep an eye upon him during dinner. And when you and Miriam leave us to our cigars, I'll seek to find out what the true explanation of the matter may be.”
And my sister and I descended to the drawing-room.
Throughout the meal that followed, I carefully observed Fairchild's bearing toward my niece; and great was my satisfaction to see in it only and exactly what under the circumstances could rightly have been expected. Frank, gay, interested, attentive, yet undeviatingly courteous, respectful, and even deferential, it was precisely the bearing due from a young gentleman of good breeding toward the lady at whose side he found himself, and whose acquaintance he had but lately made.
“So that,” I concluded, “of all conceivable theories adequate to account for his behaviour at first setting eyes upon her, Josephine's is the farthest-fetched and the least tenable.”
For the matter of that, as I had assured my sister, I was confident that her own mother, had she been alive, must have failed to identify her, so essentially was she altered both in expression of countenance and in apparent age, to say nothing of her totally transformed personality. That Fair-child did not do so I was certain. His manner exhibited neither surprise, mystification, curiosity, nor constraint. It would have required a far cunninger hypocrite than I took him to be, so effectually to have disguised such emotions, had he really felt them; and he could not have helped feeling them if, having known the dead woman, Louise Massarte, he had recognised her in the young and unsophisticated maiden, Miriam Benary. The right theory by which to explain his conduct at first meeting her, I purposed discovering, if I could, when he and I were alone.
He and Miriam had a deal of fun together making the salad, in which enterprise they collaborated—not, however, without much laughing difference as to the best method of procedure. He pretended that, instead of rubbing the bowl with garlic, one should introduce a chapon—or crust of bread discreetly tinctured with that herb—and “fatigue” it with the lettuce: whereas our niece vigorously maintained the contrary. And finally they drew lots to determine which policy should prevail, Miriam winning.
“I am defeated but not disheartened,” Fair-child declared. “If there is anything upon which I pride myself, Miss Benary, it is my erudition in the science, and my dexterity in the art, of gastronomy. You have taken it out of my power to display my skill in salad-making; but now, if you are a generous victor, you will give me an opportunity to distinguish myself in the confection of an omelet. It is an omelet of my own invention, a sort of cross between the ordinary omelette-au-vin of the French and the Italian zabaiano, I shall require the use of that chafing dish and spirit-lamp which I see yonder on the sideboard, the sherry decanter, and half a dozen eggs. I can promise your palates a delectable experience; and you, Miss Denary, by watching me, will acquire an invaluable talent.”
So, with much merriment, he proceeded with the manufacture of his omelet, Miriam observing and assisting. When it was complete, we unanimously voted it the most delicious thing in the way of an omelet that we had ever tasted. But Miriam sighed, and said, “It is all very simple except the most important point. The way is toss it up into the air, and make it turn over, and then catch it again as it descends—I am sure I shall never be able to do that.”
“Never? That is a long word. You must practise it with beans,” said Fairchild. “A pint of beans—dry beans—the kind Bostonians use for baking. Three hours daily practice for six months, and you will do it almost as easily as I do.”
After the fruit the ladies left us; and having filled our glasses and lighted our cigars, we sipped and smoked for a few minutes without speaking. Fairchild was the first to break the silence.
“I can do nothing,” he began, “but congratulate myself upon the happy chance—if chance it was, and not a kind Providence—that brought about our encounter this morning. For once in my life I was in luck.”
“It seems to me,” I replied, “that it is I who was in luck, and who have the best occasion for self-gratulation.”
“That would depend upon the dubious question of the value of life,” said he. “Has it ever struck you that this earth of ours is, after all, only a huge grave-yard, a colossal burying-ground; and that we living persons are simply waiting about—standing in a long queue, so to speak—till our turn comes to be interred? That seems to me a very pleasing fancy, and one which, considered as an hypothesis, clarifies many obscure things. Accepting it, we cease to wonder at the phenomenon of death, and regard it as the chief end, aim, object, and purpose of all human life—the consummation devoutly to be wished, which we are all attending with greater or less impatience. Anyhow, I am sceptical whether we confer a boon or inflict a bane upon the human being whom we bring into existence, or whose exit therefrom we prevent. It is indeed probable that, except for our casual meeting this morning, you would at the present hour have been numbered among the honoured dead. But, very likely—either enjoying the excitements of the happy hunting-ground or sleeping the deep sleep of annihilation—very likely, I say, you would have been better off than you are actually, or can ever hope to be in the flesh. About my good fortune, contrariwise, debate is inadmissible. Here I am in veritable clover-smoking a capital cigar after a capital dinner, in capital company, to the accompaniment of a capital glass of wine, and the richer by the acquisition of three new friends—for as friends, I trust, I may be allowed to reckon you and your ladies. Had we not happened to run across each other in the way we did, on the other hand, I should now have been seated alone by my bachelor's hearth, with no companions more congenial to me than my plaster casts, and no voice more jovial to cheer my solitude than the howling of the gale.”
“It is very flattering of you to put the matter as you do,” said I; “but being modish in no respect, I am least of all so in my metaphysics. Therefore I cannot share your pessimistic doubt of the value of life; and I assure you I should have hated bitterly to leave mine behind me in that ungodly snowbank. It is true, I am perilously close to the Scriptural limitation of man's age; and I ought perhaps to feel that I have had my fit and proper share of this world's vanities, and to be prepared for my inevitable journey to the next. But, I must confess, I am so little of a philosopher, I should dearly like to tarry here a few years longer; and hence, I maintain, my obligation to you is indisputably established.”
“Well, then, so far as I can see, we may say measure for measure; and consider ourselves quit.”
“Hardly. The balance is still tremendously in your favour.”
After that we again smoked for a while without speaking. Then again Fairchild broke the silence.
“I wonder whether you would take it amiss, Dr. Benary, if I should mention something which has been the object of my delighted admiration almost from the moment I entered your house?”
“Ah! What is that?” I queried.
“I fear you will condemn me as overbold if I answer you candidly; but I shall do so, and accept the consequences. The circumstance that I am an artist may be pleaded in my behalf, if I seem to transcend the bounds of the conventional.”
“You pique my curiosity. What is it that you allude to? I do not think you need be apprehensive of my wrath. My extended 'Life of Sir Joshua'? That is the fruit of ten years' hard labour. Or my Japanese woman by Theodore Wores? It's a wonderful piece of flesh-painting. It looks as though it would bleed if you pricked it” *
“Yes, it is in Worcs's best vein. But that is not what I have in mind. Neither is the 'Life of Sir Joshua.' which, by-the-bye, I have not seen.”
“Not seen it? Oh, well, I must show it to you directly we go upstairs. It's my particular pet and pride. But what, then? I do not know what else I have worthy of such admiration as you profess.”
“You have—if you will tolerate my saying so—you have a niece; and I allude to her extraordinary beauty.”
My pulse quickened. Here had he, of his own accord, broached that very topic upon which I was anxious to sound him.
“Ah, yes; Miriam,” I assented, a trifle nervously, and wondering what would come next. “Miriam. Yes, Miriam is a very pretty girl.”
“Pretty!” echoed he. “Pretty? Why, sir, she's—— why, in all my life I've not seen so beautiful a woman. And it isn't simply that she is so beautiful; it's her type. Her type—I believe I am conservative when I call it the least frequent, the rarest, in the whole range of womanhood. Forgive my fervour: I speak in my professional capacity—as an artist, as one to whom the beautiful is the subject-matter of his daily studies. It is a type of which you occasionally see a perfect specimen in antique marble, but in flesh and blood not oftener than once in a lifetime. To say nothing of her colouring, which a painter would go mad over, consider the sheer planes and lines of her countenance! That magnificent sweep of profile—brow, nose, lips, chin, and throat, described by one splendid flowing line! It's unutterable. It's Juno-esque. It's worth ten years of commonplaceness to have lived to see it in a veritable breathing woman.''
“Yes,” I admitted, “it's a fine profile—a noble face.”
“Her type is so rare,” he went on, “that, as I have said, Nature succeeds in producing a perfect specimen of it scarcely oftener than once in a generation. Of faulty specimens—comparable, from a sculptor's point of view, to flawed castings—she turns out many every year. You have been in Provence? In the Noonday of France? Arles, Tours, Avignon, teem with such failures—women who approach, approach, approach, but always fall short of, the perfection that your niece embodies.”
“Yes, I know the Méridionales, and I see the resemblance that you refer to. But, as you intimate, they are coarse and crude copies of Miriam. That expression of high spirituality, which is the dominant note in her face, is usually quite absent from theirs.”
“They compare to her as the pressed terracotta effigies of the Venus of Milo, which may be bought for a song in the streets, compare to the chiselled marble in the Louvre. In all my life I have never known but one woman who could properly be mentioned in the same breath with her. And even she was a good distance behind. Of her I happened to see just enough to perceive the divine potentiality of the type. Ever since, I have been watching for a faultless specimen. And to-day, when Miss Benary came into the room where you had left me, I declare for a moment my breath was taken away. I could scarcely believe my eyes. Such beauty seemed beyond reality; it was like a dream come true. In my admiration I forgot my manners: it was some seconds before I remembered to make my bow. The point of all which is that when our friendship is older, you, Dr. Benary, must permit me to model her portrait.”
Thus was my mind set at ease.
Presently we rejoined the ladies, and while Fairchild and Miriam chatted together in the bow window, I drew Josephine aside, and communicated to her the upshot of our post-prandial conversation. She breathed a mighty sigh, and professed herself to be enormously relieved.
Fairchild became a frequent visitor at our house, and an ever-welcome one. His good looks, his good sense, his droll humour, his honesty, his high spirits, made him an extremely pleasant companion. We all liked him cordially; we were always glad to see him. I told him that if pot-luck had no terrors for him, he must feel at liberty to drop in and dine with us whenever his inclination prompted and his leisure would permit. He took me at my word, as I meant he should; and from that time forth he broke bread with us never seldomer than one evening out of the seven.
At the end of a month, or perhaps six weeks, Josephine said to me, “Do you think it well, Leonard, that two young people of opposite sexes should be thrown together as frequently and as closely as Mr. Fairchild and Miriam are?”
“Why not?” questioned I.
“The reasons are obvious. How would you be pleased if they should fall in love?”
“The Lord forbid! But I see no danger of their doing so.”
“There is always danger when a beautiful young girl and a spirited young man see too much of each other.”
“But Fairchild pays no more attention to Miriam than he does to you or to me. They are never left alone together. They are simply good friends.”
“As yet, perhaps, yes. But time can change friendship into love. He begins, you must remember, with the liveliest and most profound admiration for her; she, with the deepest sense of gratitude towards him. True, as you say, they are never left alone together—not exactly alone, that is. But are they not virtually alone when you and I are seated here in the library over our backgammon-board, and he and she are therein the drawing-room at the piano?”
“But, my dear sister, the two rooms are as one. The folding doors are never closed.”
“True again: we are all within sight and hearing of one another. But as a matter of fact, you and I give no heed to them, nor do they to us. There are certain laws of nature which should not be ignored.”
“Well, what do you want me to do?” I enquired rather testily. “Shall I forbid Fairchild the house? Forbid my house to the man who saved my life?”
“Oh, no, of course not. You know I could not wish such a thing as that. Mr. Fairchild's claims upon our gratitude must never be forgotten. And besides, I like him, and I enjoy his visits as heartily as you do. Only——”
“Only what? If I don't forbid him the house, how can I prevent him and Miriam meeting? Shall I direct her to keep her room whenever he comes?”
“I do think, brother, it would be well if she were not always present when he comes. If you wish to hear my honest opinion, I believe it is to see her that he comes so often, and not to see a couple of sober, elderly folk like you and me. I cannot think that you and I are so irresistibly attractive as to draw him to our house as frequently as once or twice a week. However, I only wished to call your attention to the matter. It is for you now to act as your best judgment dictates.”
“Well, then, my good Josephine, I shall not act at all. There is no occasion for my acting. I should be most unjust and unreasonable to prevent these two young people getting what innocent pleasure they can from each other's friendship and society, simply because in the abstract it is true that they are not incapable of falling in love. I might, as reasonably enjoin Miriam against ever going out of doors, because it is possible that in the street she might be run over; against ever drinking a glass of water, because it is possible that the water might contain a disease-germ. You have conjured up a chimera. Your fears are those of a too imaginative woman. When I perceive the first symptom of anything sentimental existing between them, it will be time enough to act.”
“Perhaps then, Leonard, it will be too late,” retorted Josephine, and with that she dropped the subject.
Well, of course, as the reader has foreseen, that very complication which my sister feared and warned me of, and which I refused to consider—of course that very complication came to pass. Fairchild fell in love with Miriam, and Miriam reciprocated his unfortunate passion. Otherwise his name would never have been introduced into this narrative; or, rather, there would have been no such narrative for me to recite.
In June, 1888, Josephine, Miriam, and I went down to the little village of Ogunquit, on the coast of Wade, there to rusticate until the autumn. Toward the end of July, Fairchild joined us there, pursuant to an arrangement made before we left town; and it was on the evening of the 15th of August that he requested a few minutes' private talk with me, and then informed me of the condition of affairs.
“I love your niece with all my heart and soul, Dr. Benary. Indeed, I have loved her from the day I first became acquainted with her—the day of that blessed Blizzard. I should like to know, who could help loving her: she is so good and so intelligent, to say nothing of her beauty. To-day I emptied my heart out to her, and she has made me the happiest man in Christendom by signifying her willingness to become my wife. So, now, it only remains for you to give us your approval and benediction. I have an income sufficient to keep the wolf from the door, over and above my earnings; and for the rest, you know me well enough to judge of my eligibility for yourself.”
What answer could I give him?
Putting aside altogether, as I was bound to do, the selfish consideration that her marriage would deprive us of the treasure and the blessing of our old age, and leave our home desolate and forsaken—could I in honour, could I in justice to the man, permit him to make Miriam Benary his wife, without first imparting to him so much as I myself knew concerning Louise Massarte?
But the latter was a thing which, I was persuaded, I had no manner of right to do. The secret of her connection with Louise Massarte, Miriam herself was ignorant of. Surely, no other human being had the shadow of a claim to learn it Miriam Benary had never even heard of Louise Massarte. Louise Massarte was dead and abolished utterly. Therefore, to saddle Miriam, in her youth and her innocence, with that dead woman's name and history, to put upon her the burden of the dead woman's sin and shame, it would be to do her not only a most grievous, but a most unwarrantable, wrong.
No, I could not, I would not, I must not, tell Fairchild the story of Louise Massarte's annihilation, and the consequent existence of Miriam Benary. Yet how could I say, “Yes, you may marry her,” and keep that story to myself? What excuse could I invent wherewith to ease my conscience, if I should practise such deceit upon him in an issue that involved his dearest and most vital interests? Suppressio veri, suggestio falsi. I should be as bad as any liar if I gave my consent to their marriage, while allowing him to remain in error respecting the truth about his bride—truth which, if made known to him, might radically modify his intentions.
But furthermore, and on the other hand, suppose I should say in reply to his demand, “No, you cannot marry her”—what right had I to say that? What reason could I allege in justification of my refusal? Not the actual reason; for that would be to tell him the very story which, I had made up my mind, I must not and should not tell. And if I alleged a fictitious reason, I should simply escape the devil to plunge into the deep sea—I should simply exchange a lie for a falsehood. These young people loved each other. Therefore, to set up impediments to their union, would be to impose upon each of them endless unmerited pain. What right had I to do that? It was a vexed and difficult quandary. There were strong arguments for and strong arguments against either course out of it.
“Well, Dr. Benary, you do not answer me,” Fairchild said.
“I can't answer you. You must give me time—time to consider, to consult my sister, to make up my mind.”
We had been strolling together, he and I, up and down the sands. Now we returned to the inn. Josephine was seated on the verandah, near the entrance.
“Ah, Leonard, at last!” she exclaimed, starting up the moment she caught sight of me. “I have been waiting for you.”
I accompanied her to her room.
“Well,” she began, as soon as the door was closed behind us, “the worst has happened, as I suppose you know. Mr. Fairchild has spoken to you, has he not?”
“Ah! Then you, too, know about it?” queried I.
“Miriam has just told me the whole story.”
“What does she say?”
“That Mr. Fairchild has asked her to be his wife; that she loves him, and has accepted him—conditionally, that is, upon your approval.”
“She says she loves him?”
“She says she loves him with all her heart. She says she is as happy as the day is long. She doesn't dream that you will have any hesitation about consenting.”
For a little while we were silent. At last, “Well, what are you going to do?” my sister asked.
“That is what I wish to advise with you about.”
“Have you given any answer to Mr. Fair-child?”
“I have said to him that I must take time for reflection, and for consultation with you.”
“Well?”
“Well, it is a most difficult dilemma.”
“But you have got to make up your mind, one way or the other; and that speedily. It is cruel to keep them in suspense.”
“I know that, my dear sister.”
“Do you mean to say yes or no?”
“That's just it. That's just the difficulty, isn't it?”
“But it is a difficulty which must be solved. You will have to say one of the two.”
“How dare I say yes?”
“They love each other.”
“What right have I to say no?”
“It is their life-happiness which is at stake.”
“Exactly, exactly; therefore, if I say no, it will be to condemn them both to great misery, and misery which they have done nothing to deserve.”
“It certainly will—it will break Miriam's heart. And what reason can you give them for saying no? It will seem all the harder to them, because it will seem so unreasonable and unnecessary, so unjustifiable and wanton. They will feel that it is an act of wilful cruelty, on the part of a selfish, tyrannical old man.”
“I know it, I know it,” I groaned. “And yet, on the other hand, if I say yes——”
“If you say yes, you will assure to them the greatest happiness their hearts can desire.”
“But how dare I say yes without sharing with Fairchild the secret of Miriam's origin? Without telling him the story of Louise Massarte?”
“Surely, you cannot purpose doing that! You cannot mean to confide to another knowledge affecting her which she herself is unaware of!”
“No, of course not. But there's just the rub. How, without doing that, how can I honourably permit him to make her his wife?”
“It is a choice of evils: to break their hearts or to suppress certain facts. You must choose the lesser evil of the two.”
“That is very easily said. But the trouble is to determine which of the two evils is the lesser. Deceit or cruelty?”
“Forgive me, my dear brother, for reminding you of it: but if you had listened to my warning in the first place, this painful alternative would never have come about.”
“What could I do? You yourself agreed with me that I couldn't forbid Fairchild the house. And so long as he had the run of the house, how could I prevent him and Miriam meeting? And meeting as frequently as they did, I suppose it was inevitable that they should come to love each other. There's no use reproaching me—no use regretting the past. What was bound to happen has happened. That's the whole truth of it.”
“I did not intend to reproach you, Leonard. I merely wished to say that, since, in a manner, you have been responsible for the state of things which has come to pass—since, in other words, you neglected to take such measures as would have prevented that state of things from coming to pass—it seems as if now you were under a sort of moral obligation not to stand between them and their happiness. The time for action was the outset. You did not act then. It seems as if you had thereby forfeited your right to act. Since you have allowed things to go so far, it seems as if you had no right to forbid their going farther.”
“That is to say, you counsel me to consent.”
“I do not see how you can do otherwise now. It is too late for you to step in and separate them.”
“And the point of honour? I am to suppress the truth? I am to stand still and suffer Fair-child to make Miriam his wife, in ignorance of certain facts which, if he were aware of them, might totally change his feeling? How can I do that? It would lie for ever on my conscience.”
“So far from totally changing his feeling I do not believe those facts, if Fairchild knew them, would weigh with him so much as one hair's weight. They would not, if his love for Miriam is love in any vital sense of the word. He would agree with us in looking upon her as an entirely different person from Louise Massarte. However, he must not know, he must not even dream those facts. Therefore, as I said before, it is a choice of evils. The negative evil of suppressing the truth does not seem to me so great as the positive evil of inflicting pain. Besides, after all, is it not Miriam's prerogative to decide this matter for herself? What right have you or I to do anything but stand aside, with hands off, and let her choose her husband without constraint or interference? She is of full age and sound mind; and our relationship with her, which would give us our pretence for interfering, is, as you know, only a fiction She could not wish for a better husband than Mr. Fairchild. No woman could.”
“What you say, my dear Josephine, and what you suggest, are Jesuitry, pure and simple.”
“There come emergencies in which Jesuitry is the only feasible policy.”
A long silence followed. In the end, “Where is Miriam now?” I asked.
“She was in her room when I left her.”
“Will you find her, and send her to me? Or rather, bring her. You must be present, too, to lend me countenance—to give me moral support in the grossly immoral action which I am going to perpetrate. I feel like a pickpocket. I need the encouragement of my accomplice.”
Josephine went off. In three minutes she returned, leading Miriam by the hand.
Miriam's cheeks and throat turned crimson as she saw me; and she dropped her eyes, and stood still, waiting.
“My dear——” I called, holding out my hands.
She came to me, and put her arms around my neck, and buried her face upon my shoulder.
“So this young rascal of a sculptor has asked you to be his wife?” I began.
“Yes,” she murmured, scarcely louder than a whisper.
“And so—the double-faced rogue!—it was not, as we had supposed, because of his great fondness for your aunt and uncle, that he became a frequenter of our camp, but because he had covetous designs upon our chief treasure!”
“Oh! but he is very fond of my aunt and uncle, too,” she protested.
“Is he, indeed! Well, what answer have you given him?”
“I said—I said I—I said I liked him.”
“Ah! I see. You said you liked him. That was rather irrelevant, wasn't it?—a little evasive? He asked you to become his wife, and you said you liked him. Did you give him no more categorical an answer than that?”
“I said he must ask you.”
“Ask me? Ask me what? It isn't I that he wants to marry. And I wouldn't have him, anyhow. Why should he ask me?”
“You know what I mean. I told him I could not marry without your consent.”
“And suppose I should withhold my consent?”
“I should be very unhappy.”
“But I don't really see what my consent matters. It's for you to decide. You're of full age. I have no right to forbid you. Now, then, what are you going to do?”
“I said I would be his wife, unless you wished otherwise.”
“Well, I suppose you must keep your word. The poor fellow is waiting on the anxious seat to learn his fate. I really think, instead of tarrying here, you ought to seek him out, and put an end to his suspense.”
She hugged me and kissed me, and said some very jubilant and some very complimentary things; and then she began to cry, and then she laughed through her tears; and at last she went off to find her lover, and to convey to him the joyful tidings.
They were married on the 15th day of December, and that same afternoon they set sail for Havre aboard the steamship La Touraine, to pass six months abroad. Anxiously did Josephine and I count the days that must elapse before the post would bring us their first letter; and little did we dream what ominous news that letter would contain.
OF course, we watched the newspapers for an announcement of the Touraine's arrival. A fast steamer, ordinarily accomplishing the passage within seven days, she ought to have reached Havre on the 22nd. She was not reported, however, until Monday, the 24th, being then two days overdue.
It was on Friday, the 4th of January, that we at last got a letter. The envelope was superscribed not in Miriam's band, but in Fairchild's; and when we tore it open we saw that the letter itself had been written by the groom, and not by the bride. This struck us as rather odd, and made us a little uneasy. We hastened to read:
“Hôtel de la Grande Bretagne,
“Havre, December 25.
“Dear Dr. Benary,
“Christmas day, and such news as I have to give you! I should put off writing until we reach Paris, in the hope that when we are there the face of things may have altered for the better; only I know, if you don't receive a letter sooner than you would in that case, you will be alarmed.
“What I have to tell you is so horrible in itself, it must shock you dreadfully whatever way I put it. I can't hope to make it any less painful for you by mincing it, or beating about the bush. Yet it seems brutal to state the hideous fact downright. Miriam has become blind, totally blind.
“Whether incurably so or not, we do not yet know. Of course we hope for the best, but we can be sure of nothing till we reach Paris, where we shall consult the best oculists to be found. Meantime, you may imagine our state of mind.
“We had a most frightful passage, and that was the cause of it. We ran into a storm directly we left Cape Thunderhead; and it followed us all the way across. Bad enough at the outset, it got steadily worse and worse until we reached port. It had only this mitigation—it was behind us, and moved in the same direction with us. Therefore we were delayed but about forty-eight hours. If it had been against us, there's no telling when we should have got ashore; and twenty-four hours more of it Miriam could never have survived.
“For six consecutive days (from the 17th to the 23rd) the hatches were battened down; no passengers were allowed on deck; and not only were the port-holes kept permanently closed, but the inner iron shutters were screwed up, lest the sea should break in and swamp us. The skylights also were, covered. Thus daylight was excluded, as well as fresh air. Then the electric-lighting machine got out of order, and we had to fall back upon candles and petroleum. The atmosphere in the cabins became something unendurable. Much of the time, owing to the violent motion, it was impossible to keep even the candles or the petroleum lamps burning; and we were condemned to total darkness. At last, however, they got the electric machine into running gear again, so that we had light. From second to second, day and night, the sea broke over us with a roar like the discharge of cannon, making every timber of the ship creak and tremble. It was enough to drive one frantic, that everlasting rhythmic thunder.
“And all the while we were tossed up, down, and around, as if that giant vessel were a cockle-shell. Standing erect or walking was not to be thought of. I had to creep from place to place on hands and knees. And then the never-ending motion, and the incessant noise: the howling of the wind, the pounding of the water, the creaking of timbers, the snapping of cordage, the clanking of chains, the crashing of loose things being knocked about, the shouts and tramping of sailors overhead, the groans of sea-sick people, the shrieks of scared women and children, the darkness, the loathsome air—I tell you it was frightful; it was like pandemonium gone mad; the memory of it is like the memory of a nightmare.
“Miriam suffered excruciatingly from seasickness. It was the most heart-rending sight I have ever witnessed, the agony she endured. I had never dreamed that sea-sickness could be so terrible; and the ship's surgeon said he had never seen so severe a case. What made it worse, of course, was the hopelessness of her obtaining any relief until the storm abated, or until we reached shore. There was nothing anyone could do. I just sat there beside her, and held her hand, while she either lay exhausted, or started up and went through the torments of the damned. I can give you no idea of what she suffered. It was hard work to sit still there, and watch her sufferings, and realise that I was utterly powerless to help her in any way. From Monday, the 17th, until last night, when we had been ashore some hours—precisely one week—she did not taste food. Once in a while she would drink a little water, with a drop of brandy in it; but even that distressed her cruelly. On the 20th she was seized with convulsions, awful beyond description. From then on, until we left the ship, she simply alternated between terrible paroxysms and utter prostration. Four days! I thought she was going to die, her convulsions were so violent, the prostration that ensued was so death-like. The ship's surgeon himself admitted that there was great danger—that death might result from exhaustion. For those four days—from the 20th to the 24th—he kept her almost constantly under the influence of opiates. On Saturday she seemed a little better—that is, her convulsions occurred seldomer, and were of shorter duration. When not in convulsions, she would lie in a stupor, as if asleep, only most of the time her eyes were half open, and she would groan. But on Sunday she was worse again; and it was on Sunday night, about ten o'clock, that, after she had lain perfectly quiet for an hour or so, all at once she started up, and asked me whether the electric lights had gone out again. The lights were at that moment burning brightly in our state-room; and I told her so. Then she cried: 'I can't see you. I can't see anything. It is all dark. What has happened? I believe I am blind.'
“Of course, I thought it must be some hallucination caused by her sickness. I could not believe that she had really become blind. But the ship's surgeon came and made an examination, and discovered that it was so. He could attribute it only to a paralysis of the optic nerve, the consequence of shock and exhaustion. What the danger of its being permanent was he could not say.
“Yesterday, thank God, that hellish voyage came to an end. The instant we reached this hotel, I got her into bed and sent off for the best medical men this town holds. They simply corroborated the judgment of the ship's doctor—that she is suffering from shock and exhaustion, and that her blindness is due to a paralysis of the optic nerve. They think it will probably not be permanent. She must keep her bed until she is thoroughly rested, which will take several days. Then we must go to Paris, and put her under the treatment of Dr. Geoffroy Désessaires, who, it seems, is the great French specialist in diseases of the eye.
“She is in bed now, in the next room, sleeping. She sleeps most of the time—or rather, dozes. Her convulsions are over now, I hope for good. But all last night they occurred from time to time—very much less violently, however, than when on ship-board. She has not yet been able to take much nourishment, but as often as she wakes, I give her a little beef-tea.
“That is about all there is to tell down to the present moment. You will understand that I am in no condition of mind to write at greater length than is necessary, having gone without sleep for the greater part of a week, to say nothing of anxiety and distress. When she wakes she talks of you and bids me say how she loves you. And of course you always means yourself and Miss Josephine.
“I pray God that in my next letter I may have more cheering news to write.
“Always yours,
“Henry Fairchild.”
The dismay which the foregoing epistle occasioned Josephine and myself the sympathetic reader will conceive without my telling. But it was as nothing to that which we experienced when we read the next, and considered its purport:—
“Hôtel de la Bourdonnaye,
“Paris, January 1, 1889.
“Dear Dr. Benary,
“Miriam improved rapidly after I posted my letter of Christmas day. Rest, quiet, and nourishment were what she needed—and those she had. The doctors gave us permission to leave Havre yesterday; and we arrived here in the afternoon. She is pale and weak, and wasted to the merest shadow of herself, having lost twenty-six pounds in weight. But she does not suffer any more bodily pain; though what her agony of mind must be it is not difficult for those who love her to imagine. However, that will soon be over.
“I telegraphed in advance to Dr. Désessaires, requesting him to call upon us here at our hotel last evening. He came at eight o'clock, and put Miriam through a thorough examination. He confirmed what all the other doctors had said—that it was a paralysis of the optic nerve. He enquired all about her health in the past, and particularly whether she had ever had any trouble of the brain or spine. Then, of course, we told him of that accident which she met with in 1884, which had deprived her of her memory, 'Ah! said he, 'that gives me the key to the whole difficulty.' He proceeded very carefully to examine her head, and when he had finished he said there was a depression of the bone at the point where she had been hurt at that time, and a consequent pressure upon the brain; and it was that pressure upon the brain which accounted for the extraordinary violence of her sea-sickness and the resultant blindness. Finally, he said that an operation to relieve that pressure would, if made at once, restore her sight; but that, unless such an operation was performed, she must remain permanently blind. He assured me that the operation was not a dangerous one; that it would consist in the removal of a minute fragment of the bone—what is called trephining. Of course, there was nothing for us to do but consent to having the operation performed; and thereupon he went away, saying he would return this morning.
“At eleven o'clock this morning he arrived, accompanied by four other physicians—Dr. Cidolt, also an oculist; Dr. Gouet, the famous alienist; Dr. Marsac, a general practitioner of very high standing; and Dr. Larquot, said to be the most skilful surgeon in France. They made a long examination, and then withdrew to consult together. At the end of nearly two hours they came to me with their report, which was simply a repetition of what Dr. Dêsessaires had already said—that trephining would be necessary, that it would be effective, and that it would be as free from danger as such an operation ever is. It must be performed as soon as possible, so that atrophy of the optic nerve may not have time to set in; but before they can safely undertake it, Miriam must be perfectly recovered in general health. They have set upon this day fortnight—the 14th—as probably a favourable time. Meanwhile she is under the care of Dr. Marsac. Dr. Larquot is to conduct the operation.
“The brave little woman! She supports her calamity so patiently! And she looks forward to that dreadful ordeal with an amount of nerve and courage that a man might be proud of. God grant that all may go well.
“There is nothing more for me to write at present.
“Always Yours,
“Henry Fairchild.”
At the close of Fairchild's letter this postscript was added, in a hand that we recognised as Miriam's, though it was cramped and irregular, as if she had written with her eyes shut:—
“Dear Ones,—I cannot see to write to you; but I love you and love you, with all my heart.
“Miriam.”
When my sister Josephine read that, she burst out crying like a child.
I waited till she had dried her tears, Then, “Well, my dear sister,” I questioned, “do you realise what that letter means?”
“What it means? Why, that her blindness is only temporary, and can be cured. That she will recover her sight.”
“Nothing else?”
“What else?”
“What else! This else—and I am surprised that you do not see it for yourself—it means that the same operation which will restore her sight will also restore her memory. Do you understand? She will become Louise Massarte again. She will begin at the precise point where Louise Massarte left off. She will forget everything that has occurred during the past four years, and will recall what occurred before. It is that same pressure of the bone upon the brain to which they rightly or wrongly attribute her blindness—it is that same pressure of the bone upon the brain which keeps Louise Massarte in quiescence, and makes Miriam Benary possible. Relieve that pressure, remove that point of bone, and instantly Louise Massarte will spring into life again, while at the same moment Miriam Benary will cease to exist. That is what Fairchild's letter means.”
“Good Heavens!” gasped Josephine, holding up her hands in helpless dismay. “But—but surely—— but what—what is to be done?”
“Which, in your opinion, would be the lesser of the two evils—to have her remain permanently blind, or to have her regain her memory? She would recollect all that she is happiest in forgetting, she would forget all that she is happiest in remembering. The four years during which she has lived here with us as our niece would be utterly obliterated and undone. She would rise from that operation in mind and spirit exactly where she was, and exactly what she was, just before you and I put her under the influence of ether on the 14th day of June, 1884. Which, I want you to tell me—which would be the lesser evil: the blindness of Miriam Benary, or the resurrection of Louise Massarte?”
“Oh, there is no room for question about that. Better a thousand times that she should never see the light of day again, than that she should cease to be herself, and return to her dead personality. Why, it is—it is Miriam's very life, her very existence, which is at stake.”
“Precisely. It is, so far as she is concerned, a choice between blindness and death. Nay, something worse than death: a hideous transformation of her identity, from that of a pure and innocent young bride, to that of a weary, heart-sick, sinful woman-convict. To cure her blindness by the means which they propose, would simply be to kill her; to abolish Miriam Benary and to substitute for her Louise Massarte. It is infinitely better that she should remain blind. Therefore, I am going to prevent that operation if I can.”
“If you can indeed! But how can you? They are three thousand miles away. How can you?”
“Well, let us see. To-day—to-day is the 12th, is it not?”
“Yes, to-day is Saturday the 12th. Well?”
“Well, the day set for the operation is the 14th—that is, the day after to-morrow, Monday.”
“Yes.”
“Well, I shall go at once and cable to Fairchild, imploring him, commanding him, no matter at what cost, to postpone the operation until I arrive in Paris. Then I shall engage passage aboard the first swift steamer that sails. The South German Clyde steamers sail on Mondays. They make the passage in seven days, and touch at Cherbourg. Do you, meanwhile, prepare my things, so that I may take ship day after tomorrow. Once arrived in Paris, I will persuade Fairchild to relinquish the idea of the operation for good and all. I will convince him that Miriam's life will be imperilled. Or, failing in that, I may find myself compelled to tell him the truth about Louise Massarte. Anything will be better than to have her regain her memory.”
“Yes, anything. God grant that he may not disobey your telegram. But you must engage passage for me as well as for yourself. I cannot stay at home here idle. You must let me go with you. I should die of anxiety alone here at home.”
I went to the nearest telegraph office, and sent the following cable despatch:—
“Fairchild, Hôtel Bourdonnaye, Paris.
“At all costs postpone operation till I arrive. Miriam's life endangered. Sail Monday, viâ Cherbourg.
“Benary.”
Then I hastened to the steamship company's office in Bowling Slip, and engaged staterooms for my sister and myself aboard the Egmont which was to sail promptly at noon on Monday the 14th.
Yet, despite these precautionary measures, a heavy load of anxiety lay upon my heart. What if Fairchild should suffer the operation to proceed, notwithstanding my protest? I could not banish that contingency from my mind, nor its ghastly corollaries from my imagination.