Part 9

I think a great deal of you. I think of your wasted life. I don’t mean from the money standpoint. Which is the least thing in the world. For I experienced greater happiness living in a hovel, in dirt and in squalor, than I did with a butler and the other servants. But your life, Peter, is over. You are sixty and more. Time is ready to take you back into itself and close its account with you. Soon you will be dead. And out of it all you have got nothing. I’ve followed your career with interest and amusement. I knew its futility. I knew what in your heart you wanted. You wanted me. And your cupidity and your philosophy had lost for you the greatest thing in your life—love.

Do you know, Peter, that after all these years of separation I feel that you ought to come to me? That in all this world you have no one to take care of you. I told you in one of my letters to you that no matter what comes into a woman’s life, in her heart she lives alone with the man she gave herself to first. I am no different. I am only a woman, with all the frailties of a woman.

I don’t believe that there is any quality in a woman which is stronger than the quality of pity. I pity you. You are such a sad waste—such a pitiable thing. At times, Peter, I loved you with all the fervor of a young mind. That is something. Bill was only a sporadic incident in my life. As a fact he only seared it—burnt it with horrors that it would have been better that I should not have known. Had I not had the frailties of a woman I would not have gone with Bill; nature and its demands are too strong. Nature made me go with Bill. It was not of any volition of my own. If it had been I would not have gone.

Tizzia is with me. I’ve had her for the past few years. I hunted her up after I buried Bill. She is here beside me. She is looking over my shoulder as I write to you. She and I have become more than maid and mistress. I hold to her with eager hand. It is by her that I link myself with the past, with you and with the boy. I am weak. I wobble. I am not as I used to be. My strength is gone. The fight in me is over. I have suffered, Peter—suffered terribly.

I often wonder at the weakness of the human. We start with such assurance and we end so pitiably. I had strength. I had determination. I did the thing that now I know I should not have done and out of it I have gotten that thing revenge. It is only too true the words in the Bible—“Vengeance is mine saith the Lord.” I have lost. I wonder what the proper course in life is, for what we do is always wrong. I tried and I failed.

Tizzia and I talked over this thing this morning and I write it hastily for fear I may again change and the old feeling might arouse itself in me and I would not put down here truly what I feel. There is only one thing left in me that is like my old self and that is my absolute strength for the truth. That I think is my one saving grace.

Tizzia said slowly and with what I thought was wonderful clearness. “Now, Madame, I would write this. I would give Mr. Thorbald the chance. You would have done your duty. It is better. Why carry out a bad situation when it can be bettered?”

“But,” I answered, “he will think me foolish, and weak. After all my bragging as to what I was going to do.”

“We are all weak, Madame,” she replied. “We are only human.”

“What would you say, Tizzia?” I asked.

“This,” she replied shortly.

“The door is open. I wait for you to come. I will be to you as I was before. We can forget the past. It is over. All that we did is done. I am sorry. That covers with me a multitude. We have both lost. We should try in these few years left us to regain what we have lost.”

“Is that all?” I asked.

“I think so. It is direct,” she answered me.

“I can’t do that, Tizzia—I can’t. I would feel that I had put all my entity into the balance and found it wanting.”

“That has been your failure. Madame, you’ve weighed and you have lost in the weighing too much already. You have lost your life.”

“Suppose he should refuse?” I asked.

“It can’t be helped. Then you must continue to suffer. It may be that he will. It depends on what his viewpoint may be. He may be too comfortable as he is. He may have put you out of his life. You may not occur to him at all.”

“Shall I try?” I asked doubtfully.

“Yes, Madame. And you will,” she replied.

And, Peter, I am sending you this. I will wait until you reply. The door, as Tizzia says, is open. I am not hard to find. I shall wait. And while I wait, I shall be abased; for I can not know what you will answer. But I shall hope.

I wonder, shall I fail in this as in everything else?

Good-night, Peter. Remember, I hope.

C.

* * * * *

Weeks went into months. A winter came and then spring. The birds went and then came back. Clarinda and Tizzia lived and waited. But no word came from Peter. They could not tell whether the letters Clarinda had written had reached him or not. Tizzia gave up. She thought that the separation had been too long. That Clarinda had gone out of Peter’s mind—that if he remembered her at all it was only as one remembers a dream, indistinctly, without placement. She had died and been buried. Clarinda still hoped. She could not define why this condition remained with her. Hope kept her alive. Tizzia did not tell her that in her own belief the thing was done. Peter would not answer.

In June, on the same date that Clarinda had been married so many years before, on almost the same sort of day, the sun was bright. The warmth of the weather filled all the passersby with pleasure. The boulevards were lined with people. The little iron chairs that sat close to the iron tables were crowded. Gaiety and life permeated everything. In the distance here and there bands blared forth music. Clarinda sat in her garden under the shade of a pink umbrella. There was not much change in her beauty. It was still there. Her eyes were as bright and shone with the same lustre. Behind them could be seen a queer knowledge. It shone forth in bitterness. The attitude of her body was different. Her figure was almost as slim.

Her eyes were gradually closed to the light. A soft haze came between her and the day. She was soothed by the sound of the fountain that played beyond her. A bird sang in a tree. Tizzia sat close to her upon a stool at her feet. Peace, ineffable in its entirety closed about them. Clarinda slept. Tizzia watched her, not a sound disturbed the quiet. A gate clashed on its hinges. A window opened from the porch of the house. It swung to again and made almost as much clatter as the gate, then slowly and evenly two men walked down from the porch and came on through the garden. They came as if they knew every step of the way. There was no hesitancy in their advance. Tizzia did not hear them. She did not move. Clarinda sighed in her sleep. A smile crept over her face. She made a slight movement of her body as if settling herself in some deep remembrance. The smile on her face widened, and her lips spread apart showing her teeth. A great beauty settled down upon her. Tizzia looked up at her, and shook her head slowly. A new hope came into her heart. She thought that he might come. How wonderful. A probability of joy that would come filled Tizzia with anxiety. She feared it would not happen, it had been so long.

Tizzia sat and looked at her. Then suddenly she heard the steps of the men, and she sprang from the stool and raised herself. She looked up the path. Her face became pale. She shook with emotion.

“At last!” she exclaimed. Tizzia advanced towards them.

“Yes, we are here. It has been long. But we are here,” said the older man.

“She is asleep. Shall I go to her?”

“No!” answered the older of the two men. “I will go to her.”

The younger man stopped. He looked towards Clarinda. His face was drawn. A great anxiety seemed to bear down upon him. He seemed uncertain as he stood beside Tizzia.

The older man, bent by the weight of his years, strode painfully over to Clarinda. He stood in front of her. Steadily he looked down upon her. Her lips were still parted in a smile. A faint color was spread over her cheeks. To Peter they looked still smooth. He could only see an indefinite change that all the years had planted upon her; he saw her as she was the day she left him. He still remembered the cruelty of her words. They had burnt themselves into his soul, and they came back to him with even as great poignancy as if he had just listened to them.

Clarinda moved. Her hand stretched out in front of her as if she were reaching for something. It fell to her side. The smile went from her face. Peter did not move. Slowly with effort she opened her eyes. The light dazzled her as she looked at the man standing in front of her. At first she did not comprehend, then gradually it broke in upon her. She saw Peter. Her breath came from her in gasps. She could not speak.

Peter said slowly, “I am here. I have brought the boy. I have come for you, Clarinda.”

Clarinda gasped. She could not move. She lay inert in her chair, and heard his words. But she could not comprehend them. To her they were only words. It seemed to her as if some ghost had stepped out of the garden and confronted her. Gradually as if she had been steeped in a tepid bath the drops of perspiration gathered on her face.

Peter did not move, or say anything, but seemed to be waiting. Slowly Clarinda found her voice, which was weak and uncertain. It came from her in a whisper as she stammered.

“At last it is you! How—wonderful! And the boy.” Clarinda fell back into her chair. A great pallor spread over her cheeks, and with an effort she shook the tide from her. She arose from her chair, and staggered slightly. Peter stretched out his hand as if to stay her. As his hand came toward her, she moved slightly back.

“No!—No!—Peter,” she said. “It is not for you to forgive. My greatest sin has not been against you but against the boy. It lies with him, so let him think.”

Peter turned from her, and motioned to the younger man who was talking in a low tone to Tizzia. He beckoned to him and the young man advanced. He came until he stood quite close to his father.

Peter said quietly, “This is your mother.”

“You never told me, Father, where we were coming. I am unprepared. I don’t understand, I am so shocked. How beautiful she is. This is the first time in all my life I have ever heard you speak of her.”

“Yes,” answered Clarinda, “I am your mother.” She turned to Peter. “Peter,” she said, “you are bigger than I am, and after all you are a man. I have failed again.”

“What is done, is done,” he replied. “There are only a few years in front of me. I am well over sixty. You and I and the boy will go back. We will try.”

The boy knelt at his mother’s feet, and touched the hem of her dress, then he turned his eyes up to her.

“I’ve wanted a mother so much. I’ve dreamed of a mother, and at last I’ve found you.”

Clarinda wept. The tears went down her face, and she did not try to stem the torrent.

“We shall be happy,” the boy went on. “Never again shall we be separated. I am so happy! You are so beautiful—so wonderful!”

Clarinda stretched down her hand to him. He arose from the ground, and she took him in her arms. He kissed her. It was her boy. The fruit of her body.

Peter smiled.

The End