CHAPTER XXVIII.

"And as the dove, to far Palmyra flying From where her native founts of Antioch beam, Weary, exhausted, longing, panting, sighing, Lights sadly at the desert's bitter stream,

"So many a soul, o'er life's drear desert faring, Love's pure, congenial spring unfound, unquaffed, Suffers--recoils--then, thirsty and despairing Of what it would, descends, and sips the nearest draught."

"You are cruel," said Victor, in a low tone, as I followed the rest of the party into the library after dinner. "This is my last day, and you will not give me a moment."

"Who's for a ride? Mr. Rutledge wants to know," said Grace, coming in from the piazza.

"Not I, for one," exclaimed Ella, throwing herself back on the sofa. "I'm going to save myself for this evening."

"And you, too, Josephine, dear," said her mother, "had better not tire yourself any more. You will be perfectly fagged if you go to drive, and you want to keep yourself fresh for the Masons."

"Aren't you made of sterner stuff?" whispered Victor. "Aren't you equal to a drive and a party in the same twenty-four hours? It is heavy work, I know, but your constitution seems a good one."

"I think I'll venture," I said, following Grace into the hall. "There's Kitty on the stairs. Mr. Viennet, tell her to bring me my bonnet, please."

Kitty was only too glad to obey Mr. Viennet's orders at any time, and she flew to get my things.

"Get mine at the same time, young woman," drawled Grace.

Before Kitty had returned from her double errand, the horses were at the door.

"Our friends, the bays," said Victor. "But I think our host means to drive them himself. He has the reins in his hands."

"Are these all your recruits, Miss Grace?" said Mr. Rutledge.

"Yes. Josephine and Ella are afraid of their complexions, or their tempers, or something, and won't come, and I can't find Captain McGuffy or Phil."

Victor stood ready to hand me into the carriage; I immediately took possession of the back seat.

"This is a very selfish arrangement," said Victor, discontentedly, as Grace was about to follow me. "Miss Grace, you'd have a much better view of the country up there beside Mr. Rutledge."

"And Grace might drive," I added; "she's so fond of horses."

"As you please," she said, with a shrug. "I only go for ballast yet awhile, I know, and it's evident I'm not wanted here. Mr. Rutledge, do _you_ want me?"

"Miss Grace, my happiness will not be complete till you comply with Mr. Viennet's disinterested suggestion;" and Grace mounted up beside him.

I had undertaken, in that drive, more than I was quite equal to. I had brought myself into the position that I had been avoiding all day, a tête-à-tête of the most unequivocal kind with a man whose devotion it was impossible to ignore, and I had gone too far to retract entirely. It was cruel to treat him with coldness, now that we were on the eve of a long separation, and to repel with indifference the tenderness that shone in his eloquent eyes and faltered in his low tones. Our companions left us entirely to ourselves; my awkward attempts to draw them into a general conversation were all frustrated by Mr. Rutledge's cool indifference, and Grace's cool impertinence.

The only time that Mr. Rutledge addressed a single remark voluntarily to me, was on our way home. We had driven around by Norbury, and were returning by way of the post-office. Suddenly drawing the reins, Mr. Rutledge stopped for an instant on the brow of the hill.

"Do you remember this?" he said, abruptly, turning to me, and fixing his eyes on my face.

Remember it? My cheek was crimson with the recollection then; the scene would never fade but with life and memory. It was just here, that, in the glow of the autumn sunset, he and I had parted on that ever-to-be-remembered evening, when my willfulness had led me into such danger. Hemlock Hollow lay dark and dense below us. Far off at the left, the mill and bridge that had served as a landmark then, gleamed in the setting sun. The forest foliage was greener and thicker now, but the picture was the same; I could never have got it out of my memory if I had tried; and yet, when Mr. Rutledge asked me that sudden question, a wicked lie, or as wicked a prevarication, rose to my lips.

"Yes, I think I remember it. Didn't we go this way to the Emersons' the day of the fête?"

"I think we did--yes," said Mr. Rutledge, with an almost imperceptible compression of the lips, as, bending forward, he startled the eager horses with a galling lash of the whip.

Grace was quite white with alarm as we reached the village.

"Mr. Rutledge, why _do_ you drive so frightfully fast? I am terrified to death."

He drew the horses in a little, and, looking down at her, said:

"Were we going fast? I am sorry I frightened you; for my part, I thought we crept."

He paused a moment at the Parsonage gate. Mrs. Arnold was in the garden; Mr. Rutledge called out to her that he had brought Mr. Shenstone's letters and papers, but had not time to stop to see him. She approached the carriage, looking so lady-like and attractive, with her soft, white hair smoothed plain under her neat cap, and her clinging dark dress, that Victor said, involuntarily to me:

"What an attractive-looking person! I never saw a gentler face."

She was quite absorbed in attending to the message Mr. Rutledge left for Mr. Shenstone, and in her retiring modesty I do not think she ventured a look at us, till Victor, who had been watching her with interest, addressed some remark to her. She raised her eyes at the sound of his voice in a startled way, the same fluttering, frightened look transformed her quiet features, and trying in vain to command herself, she stammered some excuse, and turned away.

"Strange!" exclaimed Victor, as we drove on. "Did you notice the odd way in which that person looked at me, both now and the other day?"

"It _is_ strange," said Mr. Rutledge, thoughtfully. "Can you account for it in any way?"

"In no way, sir. I do not think I ever enjoyed the happiness of meeting her before I visited this neighborhood; and since my residence in it, I cannot remember having done anything to have rendered myself at all an object of interest to her."

"Who's that bowing so graciously to you?" interrupted Grace.

"Oh! Ellerton's medical adviser."

"By the way, Mr. Viennet," said Mr. Rutledge, turning rather abruptly to him, "the doctor tells me he is an old friend of yours."

"Hardly a friend, if I understand the term aright," returned Victor, changing color slightly. "I knew him when he was studying medicine in the city two or three years ago. I lost sight of him entirely after that, and the renewal of our acquaintance has been attended with more zest on his part than on mine."

"I believe he is rather apt to presume," said Mr. Rutledge, briefly, and there the conversation dropped.

We were rather a taciturn party for the remainder of the way. Tea was waiting for us on our return, and after it, Grace and I had to make quite a hurried toilet for the party, the others being already dressed.

"Aunt Edith, be kind enough to let me accompany you," I said, hurriedly, following her into the carriage, as we all stood, ready to start, on the stone walk below the piazza. Victor, with a look of disappointment, closed the door upon Mrs. Churchill, Grace, Ella, and myself.

"Miss Josephine," I had heard Mr. Rutledge say, "it is such a lovely night, you will surely not refuse to let me drive you. It will be infinitely pleasanter than going in the carriage, I assure you."

It was a very long and a very silent drive for the inmates of the carriage, to Windy Hill; and when we arrived there, we found the gentlemen of our party awaiting our coming with some impatience. The curtain would be raised in a moment, Phil said; the tableaux had been retarded as long as possible on our account. Where were Josephine and Mr. Rutledge?

"Echo answers where," said Grace. "Taking the longest way, you may be sure, and making the most of this lovely moonlight."

Mrs. Churchill did not seem very uneasy, and after a little consultation in the dressing-room, it was decided that we should not wait for them, but should all go down to the parlor. Accordingly we descended the stairs and entered the room _en masse_. It was quite full, and as they had only been waiting for our arrival, in a few moments the curtain rose.

The tableaux were very fine, no doubt; there were murmurs of applause and exclamations of admiration from all the company. All were enthusiastically received, and some were encored. I tried to attend, but my recollection of them is only a confused jumble of convent and harem scenes, trials of queenly personages, and signings of death warrants and marriage contracts; Effie Deans, and Rebekah at the well, the eve of St. Bartholomew, and the landing of the Pilgrims. I tried to attend, both to the tableaux and to Victor's whispered conversation, but there was "something on my mind" as Kitty would have said, too engrossing to allow me to succeed. Do what I might, I still found myself listening eagerly for the sound of carriage wheels outside. Victor noticed my abstracted and nervous manner, and turned away at last with a half sigh.

The curtain rose and fell many times, the audience admired, applauded and encored, with untiring enthusiasm, the little French clock above me on the mantelpiece, marked the departing minutes faithfully, and still they did not come. This was as unlike Josephine as it was unlike Mr. Rutledge. Something dreadful had happened, I was sure; something that would make the memory of this night forever terrible, and what a miserable mockery it was for us all to be laughing and talking so thoughtlessly. Mrs. Churchill was anxious, I could see, but she tried very faithfully to conceal it, and laughed and turned off all conjectures about them with her usual skillful nonchalance. Phil had walked the piazza as long as he could endure it, then throwing himself upon his horse, had galloped off in the direction of Rutledge.

At last the parlors were cleared of all the appurtenances of the tableaux, and the dancing began. I was standing by a window listening--oh, how eagerly!--for the sound of wheels, when Victor approached me, and asked for the next dance.

"Indeed you must excuse me, I cannot dance," I said almost impatiently, "ask somebody else."

The look with which he turned away would have cut me to the heart, if my heart had not been too selfishly miserable to mind the pain of others. He did not dance, but leaning against the window opposite gazed abstractedly out. The gay music and merry voices grated perhaps as cruelly on his mood as on mine.

I never had had less the command of myself; the persons who came up to talk to me, could make nothing of me; I could not talk, could not find a word of answer to their questions. At length a gentleman who had been standing near me for some minutes, said kindly:

"These rooms are too warm for you, will you come on the piazza for a little while?"

I gave him a grateful look, and taking his arm, followed him out into the fresh air. Several others were there before us, and accepting my cicerone's offer of a seat, I leaned against the vine-covered pillar, and looked intently down the road that led winding up from the lodge. My companion evidently understood and pitied my anxiety and did not attempt to make me talk.

At last! there came a distant sound of wheels, and as they rapidly neared the house, I involuntarily covered my face with my hands. What might they bring? What news might I hear in another moment?

"They are safe," said my companion, kindly. "Look, they are at the door."

I looked up. Josephine, with a light laugh, was springing up the steps. Mr. Rutledge, who had thrown the reins to a servant, was following her. Mrs. Churchill and a group of others hurried out to meet them.

"My dear," she exclaimed hurriedly, "what has detained you? We have been excessively worried about you."

"Why, mamma," laughed the daughter, lightly kissing her mother's cheek, "I knew you would scold, and I didn't mean to have been so naughty, but you know it was such a sweet evening, and Mr. Rutledge said that wild Hemlock Hollow looked so picturesque by moonlight, that we couldn't resist the temptation of going that way, and after we had driven--oh! I can't tell you how far--we suddenly came upon a huge old tree that had fallen across the road, and over it of course we could not get, and the woods were so dense on either side that it was impossible to get around it, so the only thing left for us to do, was to turn, and make the best of our way back."

"I assure you, Mrs. Churchill," said Mr. Rutledge, "I am very much annoyed at having caused you this anxiety. You will fancy me very careless, but it was a contretemps I had never dreamed of."

The whole party passed out of sight into the hall. A group who stood near us and had been watching the scene, also moved on toward the door, but as they turned away I caught the words from one of them:

"It looks very much like it, and it will be an excellent thing on both sides; but I never thought till lately, that he would marry."

"Will you go in," said my companion.

"Yes, if you please," and we followed the crowd.

"Ah! you look like a different person," he said, smiling as we went into the light. I saw as we passed a mirror that a bright spot was burning on each cheek, and my eyes were shining unnaturally. "I could see you were dreadfully anxious about your cousin, and indeed I could not wonder at it."

"For the last time," said Victor in a low tone at my side, "will you dance with me?"

I yielded, and in a moment we were on the floor. Not an instant after that did I stop to think. If I had, my cheek would have paled to have found at the mercy of what fierce hatred, resentment and jealousy, my unguided soul then was, and whither they were hurrying me. To others, I was only a gay young girl, revelling in her first flush of triumph, thoughtless, innocent and happy. God help all such innocence and happiness!

It was the last dance; the carriage was already at the door. Mrs. Churchill had limited us to five minutes; two or three were contending for my hand. Victor had hung around me all the evening, and I caught a gleam of his sad, expressive eyes. Josephine, on Mr. Rutledge's arm, passed us at the moment. Turning toward Victor, I said to the others with a smile, "Mr. Viennet says this will be his last dance in America. I think I must give it to him."

A flash of hope lighted up his handsome face. I trembled at what I had done as I took my place among the dancers. The words that I knew I must hear before we parted, I heard now. There was but a moment for the recital, but it sufficed. Was it that such homage soothed my wounded pride; or that, bewildered by this tempest of emotions, I had mistaken gratitude for tenderness, kind regard for love? Whatever may have been my motive or excuse, the fact remained the same. Before I parted with Victor Viennet at the carriage door, I had accepted his love, and promised myself to him irrevocably.

How hot and still the night had grown! I leaned my forehead on the carriage window to cool its burning. The horses seemed to creep over the smooth road; I clenched my hands together to quiet their impatience. My companions, leaning back on the cushions, slept or rested. This very tranquillity maddened me, and, holding my breath lest they should know how gaspingly it came, I wished and longed to be alone once more. I could not, did not dare to think till there were bolts and bars between me and the world. At last I caught sight of the welcome lights of Rutledge, and almost before the deliberate horses had stopped in front of the house, I burst open the carriage door, and flew up the steps.

"Have the others got home yet?" I asked of Kitty eagerly.

"No, Miss; but they'll be here in a minute. I see the lights of the barouche just by the park gate."

The other ladies paused in the parlor till the rest of the party should arrive; for me, I never stopped till I was within the sanctuary of my own room.

"No matter for undressing me to-night," I said to Kitty, who had followed me. "I can do all that is necessary for myself, and don't come till I ring for you in the morning; I am so tired I shall want to rest."

With a look of some disappointment she turned away, and I slid the bolt, with a trembling hand, between me and the outer world. But not between me and conscience, not between me and memory, not between me and remorse. I had thought, when once I am alone, this misery will vent itself in tears--this insufferable pain will yield to the relief of solitude and quiet. But I did not know with what I had to deal. I did not estimate what foes I had invoked--what remorse and regret were to be my comrades through the slow hours of that night.

With suicidal hand, it seemed to me, I had shut myself out forever from peace, forever from all chance of happiness. Nothing now but misery: the past, a sin and guilt to recall; the future, weariness but to imagine. The promise I had given was to me as irrevocable and sacred as the marriage vow itself; and self-reproach only riveted the fetters more hopelessly, as I remembered the manly love of which I was so unworthy. To draw back now, would but add perjury to my sins, and deal undeserved misery to the man I had deceived. No, hypocrisy became a duty now; he should never know the agony that I had wrestled with when I had first looked my engagement in the face. He should never know how the first hours of it had been blackened. But oh! plead repentance, I will bury this hateful secret in my heart; I will only live to serve him; I will make him happy; I will be a true and faithful wife.

True? questioned a voice within me; and with a miserable groan I hid my face, and owned that I must leave truth at the threshold of this new relation. I must enter it with a dead love in my heart, a false vow on my lips.