Chapter XXXIII: “i DID Not Understand, or I Should Have Loved You More.”

“I stand on the brink of a river,
The River of Life to me,
Where the billows of memory quiver,
And rise and fall like the sea.”--A. M. E.

It is the last of November, a dreary, chilly day, and Madame Orne is sitting before a cheerful fire in a room of the house on Grace street.

She has found no difficulty in proving her identity as the wronged wife of the late Monsieur Orne.

It is a mere matter of form. She produces all necessary papers, she summons witnesses from New York, she has Earle Essex, who from the first to the last has enjoyed Orne’s confidence--she has, indeed, more than enough to prove her rights, so the discomfited Miss Kingsley gets legal notice to vacate the premises on which she is unlawfully trespassing, and goes home to her parents. Madame Orne, moving at once into the house, takes with her Vivian and little Charlie. There is no need for Mrs. Essex to keep house now, as it is well known that her husband has become an inmate of the Inebriate Asylum. Worse than widowed, more unhappy than words can ever tell, poor Vivian clings to the loved friend of her girlhood’s days with the strong confidence of old, loving her even more tenderly now, since her own sorrows have brought her impulsive nature into nearer communion with that sad heart.

They have drifted back to the dead past. Madame Orne is telling Vivian the story of her sorrows:

“I have already told you, dear, that I ran away from my husband. Frightened by his cruelty, and never strong, I developed incipient heart disease. It was then that in my terror of sudden death from the daily excitement I underwent that I fled from him. I had never cared for him much, and soon my only feelings for him were fear and disgust.

“I was but nineteen, you fifteen, when I first became your governess, Viva, but I was competent, for I had been graduated at Vassar. It was tacitly understood that I was a widow, and I did not discourage the idea; I was so thankful for such a good home and such kind friends.”

“And I was so heedless, so thoughtless,” murmured Viva regretfully. “I did not understand, or I should have loved you more.”

“You remember the night I fainted in the school-room, Vivian?”

“Yes.”

“It was then that I received the first news from my husband after I had left him. Mr. Essex told me he was in Richmond seeking me.”

She paused in pity for the wife’s blush of shame for her husband.

“Go on, dear Marie,” whispered Vivian affectionately.

“Then I fainted, and was ill for several days, you remember. The evening of the ball Eve told me--in one of her spasmodic fits of kindness and curiosity--that Mr. Essex some time previous had mailed a letter addressed to a Monsieur Orne in Richmond. I knew immediately that he had betrayed me to my husband. But, dear Viva, I cannot bear to wound you by telling you this thing of Mr. Essex. Forgive me.”

“Whatever you should tell me I could not scorn Earle Essex more than I do already,” Vivian answered with flashing eyes.

“After you went to the ball a wild fear and unrest drove me out of the house and down to the river-side to listen in agony for the whistle of the train on which I feared he would come. There I crouched, ill, trembling, almost stupefied with fear, and some time after the arrival of the train I heard footsteps coming along the river-bank. Tottering to my feet I stood face to face with my husband, and a strong, rough-looking man, most probably his paid tool in his base mission.

“Oh, Heaven, Viva, I cannot tell you how mad I grew at that sight. Terror possessed me, indeed, for turning at that sight I leaped into the river, forgetting all my fear of death in the strong new horror of life that possessed me.”

“And then?” asks Vivian breathlessly, and Madame Orne answered:

“Then I remember nothing more save that some one sprang after me and seized my arms just as I was sinking below the surface. I was saved, but became unconscious immediately. Hours afterward, it seemed to me, I revived in a close traveling carriage, still in my wet garments, shaking with ague and burning with fever. Yet my brutal husband continued railing at me during the whole tiresome journey, that ended at last in a dreary old farmhouse in a lonely glen. There I struggled through a long illness, the result of my wetting in the river.

“When I recovered I found myself an absolute prisoner, debarred of every liberty, and guarded by a surly old man and woman, who never accorded me one gracious word. My husband in his rage and malice, desiring to visit me with the severest punishment, had prohibited me everything that could sweeten the terrors of solitude--books, music, employment. From the night I parted with you, Viva, until your husband came and took me away, I led an absolutely idle and miserable existence, my only books the open face of Nature that smiled upon me through my grated windows.”

She paused, and folded her small hands listlessly in her lap. Those white hands, so slender, so beautifully molded, so waxen fair, lay wearily, as though tired, though they had lifted no burden, and known no toil for five long years. After all, it is harder to wait and be still than to labor. Those beautiful violet blue eyes had a tired, far-off look sometimes that made Vivian tremble. It seemed as if they were looking into heaven, and wondering how long it must be before she should attain that heavenly rest.

Suddenly Charlton Leigh was announced, and the shadows of gloom seemed to flee away before his insouciant presence.