Chapter 8

"Never," she said, "oh, never, never! I only ask to stay here, as I am, until I die."

"Christine," he said, and she could feel his strong gaze on her, through her lowered lids, "try to be honest with your own heart. Listen to its voice and you will have to own you are not happy."

"Happy! How could I ever expect to be? It would be a shame to me even to think of it. Oh, you do not know a woman's nature, or you could not talk to me of happiness."

"I know your woman's nature, Christine--well enough to reverence it and kneel to it, and I am not afraid to tell you you are outraging and wronging it, by shutting out happiness from your heart. What is there to hinder you from being happy? And oh, Christine, I know at least, there is no happiness but love."

A silence, solemn and still as death, followed these fervent, low-toned words. He could see the fluttering of her breath, and the look of deep, affrighted pain upon her face made his heart quiver.

"Christine," he murmured in a voice grown softer and lower still, "try not to be frightened or distressed. I cannot hold back my heart any longer. I love you--dear and good and noble one. If you could only love me a little, in return, I could make you so happy. I know I could, Christine, and as for me--why my life, if you refuse me your love, is worthless and wasted and dead. Oh, Christine, you are the very treasure of my heart, whether you will or no. Be my wife. You can make my happiness, as surely as I, if you will let me, can make yours."

He would not venture to take her hand, but he held out his to her, saying in a voice that had sunk to a whisper:

"Only put your hand in mine, Christine, in token that you will try to love me a little, and I will wait for all the rest."

He had bent very close to her, and she felt his breath against her hair as his passionate whisper fell upon her ear. Her heart thrilled to it, but she got up stiffly to her feet, bending her body away from him and covering her eyes, for a moment, with her hand.

Noel, who had risen too, stepped backward instantly. He saw her lips compressed convulsively as if in pain, and, for her sake, he thrust down into his heart its great longing, and forced himself to think of her alone. It cut him like a knife to see that she drew away from him.

"Don't shrink from me, Christine," he said. "If it distresses you for me to speak I can be silent. I was obliged to tell you, but there it can stop. I have laid the offering of my love and life before you and there it is for you to take or leave. Perhaps I have startled you. If you will only think about it and try to get used to the idea--"

But Christine had found her voice.

"I cannot think of it!" she cried. "I utterly refuse to think of it. Oh, I am more miserable than ever I have been yet! If I am to make you unhappy--if I am to spoil your life--"

"You have beautified and glorified and crowned it with love, Christine. I should have gone to my grave without it, if you had not given it to me. It is a godlike thing to feel what I feel for you. Come what may I shall never be sorry for it. You have nothing to reproach yourself with."

Christine was very pale. She felt herself trembling as she sank into a chair and clasped her hands about her knee. Noel too sat down, but farther away from her than he had been before.

"I entreat you not to be distressed--" he began, but she interrupted him.

"Oh, I feel--I cannot tell you what I feel," she said. "Was ever a woman at once so honored and so shamed? How could I give to any man a ruined life like mine, and yet God knows how it is sweet to me to know you have this feeling for me--to know that I may still arouse in such a heart as yours this highest, holiest, purest, best of all the heart can give. Oh, I pray God to let you feel and know the joy it is to me--and yet I'd rather cut off my right hand than listen even to the thought of marrying you."

Noel could not understand her. The look in her face completely baffled him.

"Christine," he said, "there is but one thing to do. On one thing alone the whole matter rests. Look at me."

His voice was resolute, though it was so gentle, and in obedience to its bidding Christine raised her eyes to his.

"Answer me this, Christine. Do you love me?"

And looking straight into his eyes she answered:

"No."

Noel rose from his seat and crossed over to the fire, where he stood with his back toward her. He did not see the passionate gesture with which she strained her clasped hands to her breast a moment and then stretched them out toward him. In a second she withdrew them and let them fall in her lap. Her heart reproached her for the falseness of her tongue, and this had been a passionate impulse of atonement to him for the wrong that she had done. But stronger than her heart was the other voice that told her to make her utmost effort to keep up the deceit, for in the moment that the knowledge came to her that her heart, for the first time, was possessed by a true and mighty love an instinct stronger than that love itself compelled her to deny it--to give any answer, go any length, do anything sooner than make an admission by which she might be betrayed into doing a great and ineradicable wrong to the man she loved. Yes, the man she loved! For one second's space she let the inward flame leap up, and then she forced it back and smothered it down, with all the power that was in her.

When Noel turned, his face was calm and he spoke, too, in a controlled and quiet voice.

"We will not be the less friends for this, Christine," he said; "the best that is left to me is to be near you when I can. You will not forbid me this?"

He saw that her eyes consented. To save her life she could not deny him this--or deny herself. Which was it that she thought of first?

"I think it best that Mrs. Murray should not know of it," he said, and again she consented without speaking.

"I shall come as usual," he went on, "and, Christine, never reproach yourself. Never dream but that it is more joy than I could ever have had in any other way, only to come and see you and be near you and hear you speak sometimes. Good-night," he added, taking her cold, little hand in a gentle clasp. "It is the last time. You will see how faithful I will be. But once for all--Christine, Christine, Christine!--let me tell you that I love you with as great and true and strong a love as ever man had for woman. You seem to me a being between earth and Heaven--better than men and women here, and only a little below the angels."

She felt the hand that held hers loose its hold, the kind voice died away, a door far off shut to, and Christine, rousing herself, looked about her and found that she was alone.

XIV.

Two evenings later Noel called again, finding Mrs. Murray recovered and able to join the group around the table as usual. There was no consciousness expressed in the eyes of either Christine or himself as they met. At first she was very grave and silent, but under the influence of his easy talk her manner became perfectly natural, and at the close of the evening she found herself wondering if the exciting occurrences of their last meeting could be reality. Noel read aloud most of the evening an agreeable, unexciting book, and Christine thanked him from her heart that he did not ask, as usual, for music.

As for Mrs. Murray, as the days went on she found herself continually wondering that such a state of things could last. She was perfectly sure of Noel's feeling, and she thought its continued entire suppression very strange. She was often tempted to make some excuse to leave them alone, but a fear of the consequences held her back, for she was absolutely unable to calculate upon Christine. She had not the courage to lift a finger in the matter.

Almost imperceptibly a change was coming over Christine, and by degrees Mrs. Murray became aware of it. She grew more silent and fond of being alone. She even went out now and took long, companionless walks, coming home exhausted and preoccupied. "Poor girl!" thought her kind, old friend. "She is very unhappy, and for a little while, in her deliverance from a worse unhappiness, she had managed to forget it partly."

On one occasion Noel rather urgently pressed the matter of being allowed to bring his mother and sisters to call. He did so in the hope that time might have somewhat modified Christine's feeling in the matter, but he found it absolutely unchanged and was obliged to withdraw his request.

As the days and weeks went by Noel became every day more restless and gloomy. He was unhappy if he stayed away from Christine, and yet to be in her presence merely as a friendly visitor was often galling and depressing to an almost intolerable degree. He scarcely ever saw her alone for a moment, and he had a certain conviction that while Mrs. Murray did some gentle plotting to leave them _tête-à-tête_ Christine managed ingeniously to thwart her plans.

About this time he was compelled to go away for a week on a business expedition, and so, for more than that space of time, he had not called at Mrs. Murray's. When he rang the door-bell on the evening of his return Harriet, who answered it, left him to find his way alone to the pretty sitting-room, warm and lighted and empty, as he thought. The next instant, however, his heart gave a bound, as he saw at its opposite end Christine, tall and slight and young and beautiful, standing, with her back turned, before a table against the wall, on which a large engraving rested.

It was heavily framed and he knew he had never seen it there before. The fact was Mrs. Murray, who had a very romantic heart, had seen it in a shop-window and impulsively bought it, and it had just been sent home.

Noel, stepping with the utmost caution over the thick carpet, came near enough to look at the picture over Christine's shoulder. He knew it well. It was Frederick Leighton's "Wedded."

As the man and woman stood before it each was under the spell of that beautiful representation of abandonment to love--the deep and holy wedded love which is the God-given right of every man and woman who lives and feels.

Christine was utterly unconscious of his nearness as she bent toward it eagerly. He could see by the movement of her throat and shoulders that her breaths were coming thick and fast and her heart was beating hard. As for him the fact that he was near to her was the supreme consciousness of that moment to him, and all the meaning of this consciousness was in his voice, as he whispered her name:

"Christine!"

She started and turned. His eyes caught hers and held them. For a moment she found it impossible to release them from his compelling gaze. She was under the spell of the picture still. It had broken down the habitual barriers of restraint and self-control, and sent an exultant gleam into her heart, which her face reflected.

"Christine!" he said again in that thrilling whisper.

The sound of his voice recalled her. That strange, exalted look gave place to another, which was as if a withering blight had crossed her face, and she turned and looked at Noel. He met that look of desolation and anguish with firm, unflinching eyes.

"I love you," he whispered low, but clear.

"Then spare me," she whispered back.

"Once more, Christine," he said. They kept their places, a few feet apart, and neither moved a muscle except for the slight motion of their lips, from which the faint sounds came forth like ghostly whispers. "Once more, Christine--answer me this. Do you love me?"

And again she answered:

"No."

The tone in which she said it was strong and steady in spite of its lowness, and the eyes confirmed it.

The suspense was over. With that strange recollectedness which human beings often have in the sharpest crises of their lives Noel suppressed the great sigh that had risen from his heart, and let the breath of it go forth from his parted lips, with careful pains to make no sound.

It was a relief to both that at this moment Mrs. Murray came into the room. They turned abruptly from the picture, and in the cordial greeting which the hostess bestowed upon her guest the moment's ordeal was successfully passed. Not, however, without the watchful eyes of Mrs. Murray having seen much, and conjectured far more. Whether her impulse in buying the picture had done good or harm she was puzzled to determine.

XV.

Noel, during the sleepless hours of the night which followed, looked the whole situation in the face and made his resolutions, strong and fast, for the future of Christine and himself. His love for her, which she had not forbidden and could not forbid, must be enough for him henceforth, and because all his soul desired her love in return she should not, for that reason, be deprived of his friendship. When he thought of loving any other woman, and being loved by her in return, and contrasted it with the mere right to love Christine and be near her, forever unloved, he felt himself rich beyond telling.

That evening, determined to put into effect at once this new resolution and conveying some hint of it to Christine, he went to Mrs. Murray's. He rang the bell and entered the house with a strong sense of self-possession, which was only a very little disturbed when the maid again ushered him into the little drawing-room where he found Christine alone.

He could see that his coming was utterly unexpected. The lamp, by which she usually sat at work, was not lighted, and the gas in the hall cast only a dim light upon her here, but the fire lent its aid in lighting up the figure. She was lying on the lounge before the fire as he came in, but she rose to her feet at once, saying, in a voice whose slight ring of agitation disturbed a little farther yet his self-poised calm:

"Mrs. Murray has gone to see a neighbor whose daughter is very ill. They have just moved to the house and have no friends near, and she went to see what she could do. She will be back very soon. She did not think you would come to-night."

Noel heard the little strained sound in her voice, and fancied he saw also about her eyes a faint trace of recent tears; but the light was turned low and she stood with her back to it, as if to screen herself from his gaze. A great wave of tenderness possessed his heart. He felt sure he could trust himself to be tender and no more, as he said gently:

"Christine, have you been crying--here all alone in the darkness, with no one to comfort and help you to bear? The thought of it wrings my heart."

"Oh, it is nothing," she said, her voice, in spite of her, choking up. "I sometimes get nervous--I am not used to being alone. It is over now. I will get the lamp--"

But he stopped her. He made one step toward her and took both her hands in his.

"Wait," he said, in a controlled and quiet tone. In the silence that followed the word they could hear the little clock on the mantel ticking monotonously. Noel was trying hard, as they stood thus alone in the stillness and half-darkness, to gather up his suddenly-weakened forces, so that he might tell her, in the hope of giving her comfort, of the resolute purpose he had entered into. But in the moment which he gave himself to make this rally a sudden influence came over him from the contact of the cold hands he held in his. At first it was a subtle, faint, indefinite sensation, as of something strange and wonderful and far away, but coming nearer. The very breath of his soul seemed suspended, to listen and look as he waited. The clock ticked on, and they stood there motionless as statues. Suddenly a short, low sigh escaped Christine, and he felt her cold hands tremble. The swift consciousness that ran through Noel was like living ecstasy injected in his veins. He drew her two hands upward and crushed them against his breast.

"Christine," he said, "you love me."

She met his ardent, agitated gaze with direct, unflinching eyes.

"Yes," she said distinctly, "I love you," but with the exertion of all her power she shook herself free from his grasp, and sprang away from him to the farthest limit of the little room.

"Stop," she said, waving him back with her hand. "I have owned the truth, but I must speak to you--"

As well might Christine have tried to parley with a coming storm of wind. The chained spirit within Noel had been set free by the words, "Yes, I love you," that Christine had spoken, and his passionate love must have its way. He followed her across the room, and with a gentle force, against which she was as helpless as a child, he compelled her to come into his arms, to put down her head against his shoulder and to rest on his her bounding heart. He held her so in a close, restrictive pressure, against which she soon ceased to struggle, but lay there still and unresisting.

"Now," he said gently, speaking the low word softly and clearly in her ear, "now, speak, and I will listen."

"I love you," she said brokenly.

Their full hearts throbbed together as he answered:

"That is enough."

"It is all--the utmost," she went on. "I can never marry you. When you loose me from your arms to-night it will be forever. Hold me close a little longer while I tell you."

Her voice was faint and uncertain; her frame was trembling; he could feel the whole weight of her body upon him, as he held her against his exultant heart, while the power that had come into him gave him a strength so mighty that he supported the sweet burden as if its weight were nothing.

"Go on," he murmured gently, in a secure and quiet tone, "I am listening."

"I only want to tell you, if I can, how much I love you. I want you to know it all, that the torment of having it unsaid may leave me."

Of her own will she raised her arms and put them about his neck, laying down her face on one of them, so that her lips were close against his ear.

"At the first," she said, "I liked and admired you because I saw you were good and noble. Then I trusted you, and made your truth my anchor in the awful seas of trouble I was tossed in. Then I came to reverence and almost worship you for the highness that is in you, and then, oh, then after my baby died and my other dreadful sorrow came, against my will, in spite of hard fighting and struggling and trying, I went a step higher yet and loved you, with a love that takes in all the rest--that is admiration, and trust, and reverence, and love in one. Oh," she said with a great sigh, "but it is all in vain! I cannot tell you--I cannot! I say the utmost, and it seems pale and poor and miserably weak. You do not understand the love you have called into being in my poor, broken heart. I thought I should have the comfort of feeling I had told you. I feel only that I have failed! Oh, before we part, I want you to know how I love you--how the stress of it is bursting my heart--how the mightiness of it seems to expand my soul until it touches Heaven. Oh, if I could only ease my heart of its great weight of love by finding words to tell you."

He put his lips close to her ear.

"One kiss," he said softly, and then turned them to meet hers.

Christine gave him the kiss, and it was as he had said. The stress upon her heart was loosened. She felt that she had told him all.

"You are mine," he said, in a calm, low voice of controlled exultation, although, even as he said it, he loosed her from his arms and suffered her to move away from him and sink into a chair. He came and sat down opposite her, repeating the words he had spoken.

"No," she said, "I am my own! I am the stronger to be so, now that the whole truth is known to you. Mr. Noel, I have only to tell you good-by. To-night must be the very last of it."

"Mr. Noel!" he threw the words back to her, with a little scornful laugh. "You can never call me that again, without feeling it the hollowest pretence! I tell you you are mine!"

The assured, determined calm of his tones and looks began to frighten her. She saw the struggle before her assuming proportions that made her fear for herself--not for the strength of her resolve, but for her power to carry it out. She could only repeat, as if to fortify herself:

"I will never marry you."

"Why?" he asked.

"Because--ah, because I love you too much. Be merciful, and let that thought plead for me."

"It is for the same reason that I will never give you up. It is no use to oppose me now, Christine. You are mine and I am yours."

"But if you know that you make me suffer--"

"I know, too, that I can comfort you. I know I can make you happy, beyond your highest dreams. I know I can take you away from every association of sadness, far off to beautiful foreign countries where no one will know us for anything but what we are--what alone we shall be henceforth, a man and woman who love each other and who have been united in the holy bond of marriage, which God has blessed--just a husband and wife, Christine--get used to the dear names and thought--with whose right to love each other no one will have anything to do. If the idea of the past disturbs you we will get rid of it by going where we have no past, where no one will ever have heard of us before. As for ourselves, Christine, I can give you my honor that there is nothing in the past of either of us that disturbs me for one pulse-beat, and I'll engage to make you forget all that it pains you to remember. Why, it is a simple thing to do. We send for a clergyman, and here in this room, with Mrs. Murray and Eliza and Harriet for witnesses, we are married to-morrow morning! In the afternoon we sail for Europe, to begin our long life of happiness together. You know whether I could make you happy or not, Christine. You know whether your heart longs to go with me--just as surely as I know that my one possible chance of happiness is in getting your consent to be my wife."

"I cannot!" she said, "I cannot! We must think of others beside ourselves. If you are willing to sacrifice yourself, think of your mother and sisters!"

"Sacrifice myself! I sacrifice myself only if I give you up. You must feel the falseness of such a use of the word. As for my mother and sisters, I ask you to test that matter. Agree to marry me and I promise that they will come to our wedding, and my mother will call you daughter, and my sisters will call you sister, and they will open their hearts to you and love you."

"Because your will is all-powerful with them," she said.

"Yes, partly because they trust and believe in me, and will sanction what I do; and also because--in spite of a good deal of surface conventionality and worldliness--they are right-minded, true-hearted, good women, who will only need to know your whole history, as I know it, and to realize my love for you, as I can make them realize it, to feel that our marriage is the right and true and only issue of it all."

Christine felt herself terribly shaken. She did not dare to look at Noel lest her eyes might betray her, and she would not for anything have him to know how she was weakened in her resolve by what he had said of his mother and sisters. The conviction with which he spoke had carried its own force to her mind, and she suddenly found the strongest weapon with which she had fought her fight shattered in her hands. He saw that she was weakening, but he would not take advantage of it. She was so white and tremulous; her breath came forth so quick and short; the drawn lines about her mouth were so piteous that he felt she must be spared.

"I will not press you now, Christine," he said; "take time to think about it. Let me come again to-morrow morning. I will leave you now and you must try to rest. Talk freely to Mrs. Murray. Ask her what you must do. Remember that I consent to wait, only because I am so determined. Listen to me one moment. I swear before Heaven I will never give you up. You gave yourself to me in that kiss, and you are mine."