CHAPTER XVII.

THE SUBLIMEST THING IN THE WORLD.

"Ah, tragedy of lusty life! How oft Some high emprise a soul divinely grips, But as it crests, fate's undertow despoils!"

THEODORE H. RAND.

Mrs. Nimmo was better the next morning, and, rising betimes, gave her son an early audience in her room.

"You need not tell me anything," she said, with a searching glance at him. "It is all arranged between you and the Acadien woman. I know,--you cannot stave off these things. I will be good, Vesper, only give me time,--give me time, and let us have no explanations. You can tell her that you have not spoken to me, and she will not expect me to gush."

Her voice died away in a pitiful quaver, and Vesper quietly, but with intense affection, kissed the cold cheek she offered him.

"Go away," she said, pushing him from her, "or I shall break down, and I want my strength for the journey."

Vesper went down-stairs, his eyes running before him for the sweet presence of Rose. She was not in the dining-room, and with suppressed disappointment he looked curiously at Célina, who was red-eyed and doleful, and requested her to take his mother's breakfast up-stairs. Then, with a disagreeable premonition of trouble, he turned his attention to Agapit, whose face had turned a sickly yellow and who was toying abstractedly with his food. He appeared to be ill, and, refusing to talk, waited silently for Vesper to finish his breakfast.

"Will you come to the smoking-room?" he then said; and being answered by a silent nod, he preceded Vesper to that room and carefully closed the door.

"Now give me your hand," he said, tragically, "for I am going to make you angry, and perhaps you will never again clasp mine in friendship."

"Get out," said Vesper, peevishly. "I detest melodrama,--and say quickly what you have to say. We have only an hour before the train leaves."

"My speech can be made in a short time," said Agapit, solemnly. "Your farewell of Sleeping Water to-day must be eternal."

"Don't be a fool, Agapit, but go look for a rope for my mother's trunk; she has lost the straps."

"If I found a rope it would be to hang myself," said Agapit, desperately. "Never was I so unhappy, never, never."

"What is wrong with you?"

"I am desolated over your engagement to my cousin. We thank you for the honor, but we decline it."

"Indeed! as the engagement does not include you, I must own that I will take my dismissal only from your cousin."

"Look at me,--do I seem like one in play? God knows I do not wish to torment you. All night I walked my floor, and Rose,--unhappy Rose! I shudder when I think how she passed the black hours after my cruel revealings."

"What have you said to Rose?" asked Vesper, in a fury. "You forget that she now belongs to me."

"She belongs to no one but our Lord," said Agapit, in an agony. "You cannot have her, though the thought makes my heart bleed for you."

Vesper's face flushed. "If you will let it stop bleeding long enough to be coherent, I shall be obliged to you."

"Oh, do not be angry with me,--let me tell you now that I love you for your kindness to my people. You came among us,--you, an Englishman. You did not despise us. You offer my cousin your hand, and it breaks our hearts to refuse it, but she cannot marry you. She sends you that message,--'You must go away and forget me. Marry another woman if you so care. I must give you up.' These are her words as she stood pale and cold."

Vesper seated himself on the edge of the big table in the centre of the room. Very deliberately he took out his watch and laid it beside him. So intense was the stillness of the room, so nervously sensitive and unstrung was Agapit by his night's vigil, that he started at the rattling of the chain on the polished surface.

"I give you five minutes," said Vesper, "to explain your attitude towards your cousin, on the subject of her marriage. As I understand the matter, you were an orphan brought up by her father. Of late years you arrogate the place of a brother. Your decisions are supreme. You announce now that she is not to marry. You have some little knowledge of me. Do you fancy that I will be put off by any of your trumpery fancies?"

"No, no," said Agapit, wildly. "I know you better,--you have a will of steel. But can you not trust me? I say an impediment exists. It is like a mountain. You cannot get over it, you cannot get around it; it would pain you to know, and I cannot tell it. Go quietly away therefore."

Vesper was excessively angry. With his love for Rose had grown a certain jealousy of Agapit, whose influence over her had been unbounded. Yet he controlled himself, and said, coldly, "There are other ways of getting past a mountain."

"By flying?" said Agapit, eagerly.

"No,--tunnelling. Tell me now how long this obstacle has existed?"

"It would be more agreeable to me not to answer questions."

"I daresay, but I shall stay here until you do."

"Then, it is one year," said Agapit, reluctantly.

"It has, therefore, not arisen since I came?"

"Oh, no, a thousand times no."

"It is a question of religion?"

"No, it is not," said Agapit, indignantly; "we are not in the Middle Ages."

"It seems to me that we are; does Rose's priest know?"

"Yes, but not through her."

"Through you,--at confession?"

"Yes, but he would die rather than break the seal of confession."

"Of course. Does any one here but you know?"

"Oh, no, no; only myself, and Rose's uncle, and one other."

"It has something to do with her first marriage," said Vesper, sharply. "Did she promise her husband not to marry again?"

Agapit would not answer him.

"You are putting me off with some silly bugbear," said Vesper, contemptuously.

"A bugbear! holy mother of angels, it is a question of the honor of our race. But for that, I would tell you."

"You do not wish her to marry me because I am an American."

"I would be proud to have her marry an American," said Agapit, vehemently.

"I shall not waste more time on you," said Vesper, disdainfully. "Rose will explain."

"You must not go to her," said Agapit, blocking his way. "She is in a strange state. I fear for her reason."

"You do," muttered Vesper, "and you try to keep me from her?"

Agapit stood obstinately pressing his back against the door.

"You want her for yourself," said Vesper, suddenly striking him a smart blow across the face.

The Acadien sprang forward, his burly frame trembled, his hot breath enveloped Vesper's face as he stood angrily regarding him. Then he turned on his heel, and pressed his handkerchief to his bleeding lips.

"I will not strike you," he mumbled, "for you do not understand. I, too, have loved and been unhappy."

The glance that he threw over his shoulder was so humble, so forgiving, that Vesper's heart was touched.

"I ask your pardon, Agapit,--you have worried me out of my senses," and he warmly clasped the hand that the Acadien extended to him.

"Come," said Agapit, with an adorable smile. "Follow me. You have a generous heart. You shall see your Rose."

Agapit knocked softly at his cousin's door, then, on receiving permission, entered with a reverent step.

Vesper had never been in this little white chamber before. One comprehensive glance he bestowed on it, then his eyes came back to Rose, who had, he knew without being told, spent the whole night on her knees before the niche in the wall, where stood a pale statuette of the Virgin.

This was a Rose he did not know, and one whose frozen beauty struck a deadly chill to his heart. He had lost her,--he knew it before she opened her lips. She seemed not older, but younger. The look on her face he had seen on the faces of dead children; the blood had been frightened from her very lips. What was it that had given her this deadly shock? He was more than ever determined to know, and, subduing every emotion but that of stern curiosity, he stood expectant.

"You insisted on an adieu," she murmured, painfully.

"I am coming back in a week," said Vesper, stubbornly.

The hand that held her prayer-book trembled. "You have told him that he must not return?" and she turned to Agapit, and lifted her flaxen eyebrows, that seemed almost dark against the unearthly pallor of her skin.

"Yes," he said, with a gusty sigh. "I have told him, but he does not heed me."

"It is for the honor of our race," she said to Vesper.

"Rose," he said, keenly, "do you think I will give you up?"

Her white lips quivered. "You must go; it is wrong for me even to see you."

Vesper stared at Agapit, and seeing that he was determined not to leave the room, he turned his back squarely on him. "Rose," he said, in a low voice, "Rose."

The saint died in her, the woman awoke. Little by little the color crept back to her face. Her ears, her lips, her cheeks, and brow were suffused with the faint, delicate hue of the flower whose name she bore.

A passionate light sprang into her blue eyes. "Agapit," she murmured, "Agapit," yet her glance did not leave Vesper's face, "can we not tell him?"

"Shall we be unfaithful to our race?" said her cousin, inexorably.

"What is our race?" she asked, wildly. "There are the Acadiens, there are also the Americans,--the one Lord makes all. Agapit, permit that we tell him."

"Think of your oath, Rose."

"My oath--my oath--and did I not also swear to love him? I told him only yesterday, and now I must give him up forever, and cause him pain. Agapit, you shall tell him. He must not go away angry. Ah, my cousin, my cousin," and, evading Vesper, she stretched out the prayer-book, "by our holy religion, I beg that you have pity. Tell him, tell him,--I shall never see him again. It will kill me if he goes angry from me."

There were tears of agony in her eyes, and Agapit faltered as he surveyed her.

"We are to be alone here all the years," she said, "you and I. It will be a sin even to think of the past. Let us have no thought to start with as sad as this, that we let one so dear go out in the world blaming us."

"Well, then," said Agapit, sullenly, "I surrender. Tell you this stranger; let him have part in an unusual shame of our people."

"I tell him!" and she drew back, hurt and startled. "No, Agapit, that confession comes better from thee. Adieu, adieu," and she turned, in a paroxysm of tenderness, to Vesper, and in her anguish burst into her native language. "After this minute, I must put thee far from my thoughts,--thou, so good, so kind, that I had hoped to walk with through life. But purgatory does not last forever; the blessed saints also suffered. After we die, perhaps--" and she buried her face in her hands, and wept violently.

"But do not thou remember," she said at last, checking her tears. "Go out into the world and find another, better wife. I release thee, go, go--"

Vesper said nothing, but he gave Agapit a terrible glance, and that young man, although biting his lip and scowling fiercely, discreetly stepped into the hall.

For half a minute Rose lay unresistingly in Vesper's arms, then she gently forced him from the room, and with a low and bitter cry, "For this I must atone," she opened her prayer-book, and again dropped on her knees.

Once more the two young men found themselves in the smoking-room.

"Now, what is it?" asked Vesper, sternly.

Agapit hung his head. In accents of deepest shame he murmured, "Charlitte yet lives."

"Charlitte--what, Rose's husband?"

A miserable nod from Agapit answered his question.

"It is rumor," stammered Vesper; "it cannot be. You said that he was dead."

"He has been seen,--the miserable man lives with another woman."

Vesper had received the worst blow of his life, yet his black eyes fixed themselves steadily on Agapit's face. "What proof have you?"

Agapit stumbled through some brief sentences. "An Acadien--Michel Amireau--came home to die. He was a sailor. He had seen Charlitte in New Orleans. He had changed his name, yet Michel knew him, and went to the uncle of Rose, on the Bayou Vermilion. The uncle promised to watch him. That is why he is so kind to Rose, this good uncle, and sends her so much. But Charlitte goes no more to sea, but lives with this woman. He is happy; such a devil should die."

Vesper was stunned and bewildered, yet his mind had never worked more clearly. "Does any other person know?" he asked, sharply.

"No one; Michel would not tell, and he is dead."

Vesper leaned on a chair-back, and convulsively clasped his fingers until every drop of blood seemed to have left them. "Why did he leave Rose?"

"Who can tell?" said Agapit, drearily. "Rose is beautiful; this other woman unbeautiful and older, much older. But Charlitte was always gross like a pig,--but good-natured. Rose was too fine, too spiritual. She smiled at him, she did not drink, nor dance, nor laugh loudly. These are the women he likes."

"How old is he?"

"Not old,--fifty, perhaps. If our Lord would only let him die! But those men live forever. He is strong, very strong."

"Would Rose consent to a divorce?"

"A divorce! _Mon Dieu_, she is a good Catholic."

Vesper sank into a chair and dropped his head on his hand. Hot, rebellious thoughts leaped into his heart. Yesterday he had been so happy; to-day--

"My friend," said Agapit, softly, "do not give way."

His words stung Vesper as if they had been an insult.

"I am not giving way," he said, fiercely. "I am trying to find a way out of this diabolical scrape."

"But surely there is only one road to follow."

Vesper said nothing, but his eyes were blazing, and Agapit recoiled from him with a look of terror.

"You surely would not influence one who loves you to do anything wrong?"

"Rose is mine," said Vesper, grimly.

"But she is married to Charlitte."

"To a dastardly villain,--she must separate from him."

"But she cannot."

"She will if I ask her," and Vesper started up, as if he were about to seek her.

"Stop but an instant," and Agapit pressed both hands to his forehead with a gesture of bewilderment. "Let me say over some things first to you. Think of what you have done here,--you, so quiet, so strong,--so pretending not to be good, and yet very good. You have led Rose as a grown one leads a child. Before you came I did not revere her as I do at present. She is now so careful, she will not speak even the least of untruths; she wishes to improve herself,--to be more fitted for the company of the blessed in heaven."

Vesper made some inarticulate sound in his throat, and Agapit went on hurriedly. "Women are weak, men are imperious; she may, perhaps, do anything you say, but is it not well to think over exactly what one would tell her? She is in trouble now, but soon she will recover and look about her. She will see all the world equally so. There are good priests with sore hearts, also holy women, but they serve God. All the world cannot marry. Marriage, what is it?--a little living together,--a separation. There is also a holy union of hearts. We can live for God, you, and I, and Rose, but for a time is it not best that we do not see each other?"

Again Vesper did not reply except by a convulsive movement of his shoulders, and an impatient drumming on the table with his fingers.

"Dear young man, whom I so much admire," said Agapit, leaning across towards him, "I have confidence in you. You, who think so much of the honor of your race,--you who shielded the name of your ancestor lest dishonor should come on it, I trust you fully. You will, some day when it seems good to you, find out this child who has cast off her race; and now go,--the door is open, seek Rose if you will. You will say nothing unworthy to her. You know love, the greatest of things, but you also know duty, the sublimest."

His voice died away, and Vesper still preserved a dogged silence. At last, however, his struggle with himself was over, and in a harsh, rough voice, utterly unlike his usual one, he looked up and said, "Have we time to catch the train?"

"By driving fast," said Agapit, mildly, "we may. Possibly the train is late also."

"Make haste then," said Vesper, and he hurried to his mother, whose voice he heard in the hall.

Agapit fairly ran to the stable, and as he ran he muttered, "We are all very young,--the old ones say that trouble cuts into the hearts of youth. Let us pray our Lord for old age."