Chapter XXIX

Struck blind, I scarcely could have felt more stunn’d.
Was this the truth? An actress would she be?
Why had that sister of his not told me this?—

“Not told you this?” cried Elbert; “What? not told?
Ay, ay, I see.—She hoped that love, perchance—
It is a woman’s balm for every ill—
Might woo this Edith from her present life.
She knows her not.—And you—have you told her?—
Does Edith know your plans?”
“She must have known”—
I answer’d back; and then I check’d myself.
Did not she blush to hear that Elbert came?—
For fear was it, lest he should tell the truth?—
To me, her friend? to me, deceived, her dupe?
To me, whose love she might have known, yet knew
That all that she had seem’d was not her all?—
If she had meant deception, could my love
Survive the test?
Those watching death-beds, mark
That souls, when dying, ere above they spring,
Breathe deep, then pass away. And so with minds,
When come the deadliest woes. Down deep in thought,
I scarce had deem’d that aught from hell could roil
Such dregs of bitterness long undisturb’d.