Chapter VII: The Fulfilling of the Law

Three years had passed since Boston society was shaken to its depths by hearing of the elopement of one of its adored and admired favorites. Most people were left frankly baffled by the shock, and could offer neither excuse nor explanation. Mrs. Philip Morley was universally loved, and her husband was universally liked and respected, yet this inexplicable thing had happened,--and society slowly got on its feet again, dazed by the blow it had received, rubbed its bewildered eyes, and continued to love the wife and like the husband. Of course there were the inevitable few who “always suspected something queer about the girl.” Miss Milton expressed surprise only that Mrs. Morley had not disgraced herself and her poor husband sooner. “I have often noticed,” she proclaimed solemnly, “that girls who have not been brought up in Boston are very apt to do something queer sooner or later. That young woman had too good manners. She was unlike Boston people. I always knew she’d drag the Morley name in the mud.” The only people who did not discuss and wonder and exclaim were the two most interested,--Philip Morley and Mary Elton. After the long interview in which he was told the truth, Edith’s name was never mentioned between them. Philip had understood his wife, and did not need Mary’s assurances that Edith had not an evil trait in her nature. “Don’t I know that?” he had said, his tense face drawn with suffering. “The poor child was not like a human being, for all her lovable human qualities. She was like some wonderful and mysterious force of nature,--electricity, or the rushing torrent,--waiting for the hand of man to control and make the best use of it. Perhaps it was my fault that I did not know how to handle such a strange and subtle element.”

“It was her parents’ fault that they made her what she was!” Mary cried, with an angry sob accentuating her scorn. “I am sure that she started life a human child like the rest of us, only with more goodness and sweetness and beauty than is the lot of most,--and what did that Southern father and Catholic mother do to her, but divest her of her individuality, tear out her soul and make her over again, a mechanical doll to obey the strongest will! She is not responsible for her acts. I can only thank Fortune, that having been deprived of the possibility of doing and thinking for herself, the power of suffering keenly and feeling deeply was taken from her also.”

“Oh, what will be her end!” Philip had groaned, covering his eyes from the mental picture they had conjured out of his imagination.

“I suppose--for her sake--you will divorce her,” Mary said, with evident disgust. “That hound will think he is showing Southern chivalry by marrying her. From my point of view it doesn’t matter one iota whether she is divorced or not,--whether she is his wife or his mistress. It is all the same. She doesn’t want to be either.”

Philip pushed back his chair abruptly. “If you ever hear anything from Edith, or about her, please let me know, Mary. My life is broken in two, but that is not so bad as the feeling that I unconsciously broke hers. I did not understand--I loved her so tremendously at first,--and then, slowly, it came to me that there was nothing to love--nothing to hate.” His voice dropped. “It--it was terrible! Poor, radiant, beautiful Edith! My poor ill-omened opal! What a life,--Heavens, what a life!--and perhaps my fault.”

Mary stood beside him, calm and white. “No, Philip, mine. I brought you together. I encouraged your marriage; and, worse than all, I refused to give help and sympathy when it would have saved her life. I have been wicked and stupid, and I deserve to suffer as I _shall_ suffer. Oh, I shall, never fear.” Her mouth quavered, but she bit her lips into subjection again. “I had more power over Edith than any other living creature; and I was selfish and blind and did not use it for her good. I shall be remorseful all my life; but some day she will come back,--it will be to me that she will come,--and then you’ll see whether I’ll help her!” There was courage in her voice, but hopelessness in her eyes.

Philip had gone his way, and taken up his ruined life and tried to piece it together again. He faced the world, in silence but in strength, and the dignity of his life and the strenuousness of his work silenced alike whispers of gossip and whines of pity. He saw few people outside of his business, his politics, his family, and his one perfectly understanding friend. From her he received the old incentive to being and doing which he had thought was lost to him forever, and their friendship was too true and close to be heedful of the censures of Mrs. Grundy,--whose home is in Boston, though she sometimes goes away to pay visits.

Mary, meanwhile, was taking a sardonic satisfaction in what she called “fulfilling her destiny.” She became absorbed in charities and immersed in good works; clubs, classes, and committees took most of her time; and in becoming the chief manager of a vacation house for over-worked shop-girls, Mary declared she had attained her apotheosis.

She had heard once of Edith from a Boston friend who proved her right to be popularly considered a Bohemian by living in Charles Street, whence all but she had fled. This dauntless soul had gone to Italy soon after Edith’s disappearance, and had one day found herself in a small shop in Florence trying to make the man understand that she wished to buy a pair of smoked glasses, when who should come in but Edith Morley. “For a moment,” she wrote, “I stopped thinking, and in that moment I rushed up to the dear creature and kissed her, just from pure nervousness! She didn’t seem a bit surprised, nor a bit disconcerted. She was the perfect lady she always was,--and, if anything, prettier than ever. She asked with absolute naturalness about every one in Boston,--you particularly,--and might have been traveling with Cook for a chaperone, if it hadn’t been for one thing. She didn’t ask me to call on her, and when she walked out of the shop with her goddess step, that worm of a Lorimer crawled out of a crack in the pavement and joined her.”

A condensed version of this meeting was sent by Mary to Philip; but, true to the vows in their first interview, Edith’s name was not spoken between them.

So the first three years of Edith’s absence passed. One afternoon in January, Mary was sitting alone by the library fire. When her face was in repose it showed lines of grief and hopelessness sad to see in a woman of thirty. The mask of cheerfulness and courage with which she faced and deceived the unthinking portion of her world, was laid aside when she looked boldly into the past and future, as she was doing now. A blazing fire images sad pictures, even though its snaps and crackles are cheerful, and its warmth and light comforting. Mary’s meditations were interrupted by the entrance of Philip Morley, cold and brisk from a quick walk.

“You’re just the excuse I wanted for a cup of tea,” she said, as she rang the bell. “I am feeling frightfully guilty over my failure to be at a committee meeting this afternoon, and I really hadn’t the face to reward myself with refreshments; but the case is different now. You look half frozen, and politeness demands that I share your tea.” He settled himself the other side of the fire, and waited silently till the tea was made and the servant had gone. Then he said abruptly,--

“Why do you go in for so many charities, Mary? Do they really interest you, or do you drug yourself with activities merely to kill thought? You used to laugh so at the strenuousness of charity workers, yet here you are one yourself.”

“Well, I laugh at myself,” Mary exclaimed bitterly. “Between ourselves, most of my good works bore me to death; but unfortunately I have a pretty good head for organizing,--so having failed in everything else, I naturally wish to do something I can succeed in.”

“In what have you failed, Mary?”

“In the greatest vocation there is in life,--in friendship.” Her face--with its disguise still thrown aside--retained its look of hopeless tragedy, and her straight brows almost met.

“You must not say that!” Philip cried. “It is morbid and untrue. If it had not been for you I should have sunk to earth under my burdens, but I scorned to be a coward where a woman could show me such an example of courage.”

“Don’t, Philip,--don’t, don’t!” Mary cried weakly. “I don’t deserve it. You make me feel dreadfully.”

But Philip had risen, and stood in front of her, decided and relentless.

“Mary, five years ago you made me listen to you without interruption. Now you must do the same for me. The time has come when I have got to speak.”

She looked up at him, dreading and beseeching, but his expression of determination conquered hers of appeal.

“Mary, five years ago you told me something that has affected my whole life and my whole character more than you can know, more than I myself realized at first. I would to Heaven you could tell me the same thing now, since I was blind fool enough then not to be able to say to you what I cannot help saying now.”

She put out her hands in dumb protest, but he paid no heed.

“Mary, I love you with all my heart and all my strength, and you must and shall learn to say over again to me now what you were brave enough to tell me once before. I have loved you, consciously and completely, for nearly three years, but I could not speak before. I know now that I have loved you always, but without realizing it. You are my second self,--no, my first self, my better self. Whatever I have done, whatever I may become, is _yours_, _yours_ utterly. I have no thoughts that are not due to you, no wishes, no ambitions that are not yours. When I was almost crushed to earth, and seemed to have lost the power not only to do, but to feel, it was your strength, the power of your principle that gave me a new start. Oh, Mary! The joy of finding a rudder when I was adrift! The satisfaction of being steered by conviction, instead of blown by every wind! It is to you I owe everything.”

Mary looked up at him with trembling lips, the light of happiness transfiguring her face into the semblance of real beauty.

“Are you speaking the truth?” she whispered. “You are not saying this because of--of what I told you five years ago?”

The childlike appeal in her face made him kneel by her side and put a protecting arm around the self-reliant back that had never yet bent under its burdens.

“Mary, my dearest,” he whispered gently, “my whole life shall prove that we were made for one another from the beginning. Perhaps we shall realize it all the more for the suffering we have shared in the past. We shall begin our lives over again side by side, happy and rich in accomplishment, if you can give me back a little of the love I give to you.”

Mary closed her eyes for a second, as if to nerve herself for her reply. Then she rose, and clasped her hands behind her. “Philip, I should like to make you realize, if it won’t make you unhappy in the future, how my love for you has simply saved my life. It has been my absorbing passion, my dream, yet my one reality. I haven’t dared to think you cared for me--in the same way I have cared for you. It is incredible. I’m so ugly, you know,” and she laughed as she had done five years before. Then she looked at him with the motherly protection he loved. “You _dear_ boy,” she went on, “you dear blessed old Philip! You’ve given me enough happiness now to last me the rest of my life. It’s like an inexhaustible deposit in a bank,--the sense of your love. I shall keep drawing cheques on it,--and then perhaps some morning I’ll hear that I’ve overdrawn my account, and that I’m bankrupt.”

“There’ll always be plenty more, dear,” Philip said tenderly. “My heart is wholly yours, and I never realized before what a large heart I had!”

“Oh, but _I_ knew!” Mary exclaimed, laughing happily. Then she grew suddenly serious. “Philip, I’ve got to hurt you--I’ve got to seem Quixotic and unreasonable, but after a while you’ll understand and forgive, and perhaps even thank me.” She looked at him squarely but gently. “I have loved you since I knew what it meant to love any one, and I shall keep on loving you till my teeth drop out and my hair turns gray. I do believe, now for the first time--that you care for me, and the thought makes me inexpressibly happy, but I can _never_, _never_ marry you.”

Long experience had taught Philip not to exclaim at Mary’s vehement statements, so he said quietly, “I thought you were above conventional scruples. Besides, a legal divorce makes re-marriage with the--the one who has not broken any vows, entirely lawful and proper.”

“Oh, I am not afraid of doing anything unlawful!” Mary cried, “and certainly I should be doing quite the conventional and usual thing in marrying a divorcé who is above reproach morally. I am not posing as a model for others. I am not laying down laws for society. I merely say that you are asking me to do something from which my whole moral nature shrinks as an act of selfishness and disloyalty, although the impulsive natural _me_ longs to jump into your arms and remain there always, without fear or reproach.”

“Then follow your impulse, Mary,” he begged passionately. “Your heart is leading you right this time, your conscience has become morbid and diseased. There is not a living soul who could blame you for taking and giving the happiness we have both so nearly missed. Prove yourself a woman, dearest, not a thinking machine. Love is a matter of feeling, not of cold analysis. Forget that you are a Bostonian, and for once follow your inclinations, which are true and right.” He held out his arms, but Mary only shook her head dumbly, and her dry lips formed the words “I can’t.”

“Ah, you don’t really know what love is!” Philip cried cruelly, striding over to the fireplace and turning his back on Mary’s quivering look of appeal.

“Oh, yes I do. Love is the fulfilling of the law, Philip,” she almost whispered. “St. Paul was not a Bostonian, he was a man of the world and he knew what he was talking about. Oh, don’t you suppose I realize that any definition of love sounds sententious and unfeeling!” she interrupted herself stormily. “But by _law_ I don’t mean anything legal. I merely mean that the only love worth giving is the fulfilling of one’s own law of life, and if I married you I should be false to myself and treacherous to Edith. Try to understand me, Philip. Don’t make things harder than they _must_ be.”

She sank wearily into a chair, and obedient to her mood, he took his old place on the other side of the fire.

“If things were different, Philip, I would rather be your wife than anything else in the world,” she continued. “So far as we two are concerned, I should be glad to live with you on any terms, legal or illegal,--but you see the pity of it is there never _are_ only two persons concerned. If I married you, I should be doing just what I blame others for doing,--regarding my case as exceptional and making excuses for what should not be excused. If I married you, I should not blame any of the working girls I try to help and influence, for doing what would be the equivalent of such an act in their own class. My deed would give the lie to my words. It seems to me that mistakes should be as punishable as sins, and we ought to be just as unable to escape from their consequences. You committed the great error of marrying Edith Dudley. I made the greater one of encouraging you, and we must both pay the price of that error.”

“We have paid it,” he broke in vehemently. “We have paid it with bitterness and sorrow. It is unjust for the consequences of a mistake to be everlasting.”

“Philip, the consequences of a mistake _would_ be everlasting if I married you. I could not look at Edith’s picture, I could not even in imagination meet her loving smile and think, ‘She will come home some day and turn to me for help, and I shall be in her home, married to her husband, and shall have to close her own door in her face.’ When friends should turn to me with raised eyebrows and with the unspoken comment, ‘I thought you did not believe in divorced people marrying again,’ I _could_ not be untruthful enough to say, ‘but my case is different. This is a moral marriage.’ Dear Philip, it is harder than you know to say all this--caring for you as I do. I feel like a drunkard delivering a temperance lecture. I long so to be completely yours, yet I know so well we should neither of us be happy in so selfish a union.”

“Mary, you are wrong,--your ideas are twisted; trust your heart, and your judgment will follow.”

“No. You are wrong, dear,” and she shook her head sadly. “You cannot escape from your marriage with Edith. It is part of your life, and by ignoring it you cannot forget it. I am bound by every tie of loyalty and remorse to remain true to her. I must be ready when she comes back.”

“But who knows that she will ever come back?” Philip burst out. “Her husband is with her. You are sacrificing your life to a fanatical delusion. And even if you can stand this dreadful dead life you are leading, what will become of me?”

Mary smiled and stretched out her hand to him. “You used to admire my clear-sightedness and to think I could see into the future as well as interpret the present. Let me be Cassandra for a minute.” She tightened her grasp on his, and met his gaze with a courageous smile.

“I see you at first rebellious, then submissive, and finally triumphing with me in the sense that we care enough for each other to sacrifice our selfish selves to the highest truth in each other. You will care enough for me to be strong and vigorous in action. The conviction that you are doing what is right will be a living help and support, and you will make me prouder than ever of loving you,--proudest of all in being loved by you.” Her voice lowered. “I see our poor Edith drifting,--drifting,--tired of life,--her husband tiring of her, till some day she becomes conscious of my thoughts and wishes pulling and tugging her towards me; and then she will come back to me, and I shall try to make up to her for her ruined life, and I shall then at last feel worthy to be loved by you. As for me myself”--Mary suddenly dropped her head in her hands and burst into the uncontrolled sobs of a child. “Here I am talking like a dried-up old prig, when my heart is just bursting, and I can’t silence the voice inside that cries out for the right to love and be loved! Oh, my dearest,--it has been so many, many years!”

Philip’s arms were around her, and she clung to him with the desperation of one who feels the waves closing over her. “This is the last time,--the _only_ time,” she whispered. “To-morrow we shall play our parts as usual. We shall face the footlights, and we shall forget that we have been behind the scenes. And perhaps, after we are dead, we may be able to wash off the paint and powder,” she added, trying to smile underneath her tears.

“Is this really your final answer?” Philip asked, his eyes and saddened lips giving eloquence to his few words.

“It must be, dear. You will come to see that it is the only end. It could have been different, but it is too late. ‘It once might have been, once only.’”

Philip’s arms dropped to his side with a gesture of finality, as he said quietly, “I believe in you so absolutely that I may come to believe that you are right in this as in all else. If that time ever arrives, I will come back and take what strength and comfort I can from your friendship, and you may trust me never again to open the chapter you are now closing. If I do not return, it will be because I am too weak to trust myself,” and he turned away.

“You must learn to have the courage of my convictions,” Mary said, with a trembling smile, “for I am a coward, though confident,--and you are brave, though unconvinced.” She held out her hand. “Au revoir. You will return, my friend. I hope it too much not to believe it.” He left the room, not trusting himself to speak again. She kept her control till she heard the front door close. Then she clenched her teeth with angry grief. “If I am doomed to act a part all my life, it shall be a melodramatic part for once!”

She took from her desk a photograph of Edith, and gazed passionately at the passionless face. The girl’s thoughtful eyes were shaded by a large white hat; a soft feather boa fell back from her bare neck, on which lay Philip’s opal necklace. Suddenly Mary tore the picture across and flung it into the blaze. “You have ruined my life!” she ranted wildly, and flung herself on the sofa prepared to weep her heart out. But the doorbell rang, inopportunely enough, and by the time the maid came upstairs her mistress was idly poking at a piece of charred paper in the fireplace.

“It’s a lady from the Associated Charities wants to know if she can speak to you a minute about Mrs. O’Connell,” the maid said tentatively.

Mary gave her hair a quick smoothing with her hand and shook herself into shape like a dog. Then she faced the footlights once more. “Show her up,” she said, rather wearily.

The Riverside Press _Electrotyped and printed by H. O. Houghton & Co._ _Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A._

_The following pages are devoted to notices of some recent successful fiction published by Houghton, Mifflin & Company._

The
AFFAIR AT THE INN

By KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN
MARY FINDLATER
JANE FINDLATER
ALLAN McAULEY

“An international comedy unfolded with a charm that is undeniable and irresistible. Each author’s account sparkles with conversations and forms a unique narrative.

“Mrs. Wiggin’s portrayal of the alternate words of the fun-loving but sympathetic American girl is a strong bit of character writing which is deeply human.

“It is a story unique in its construction, amusing in its situations, of easy and natural progression and sustaining one’s interest from page to page.”

_Boston Herald._

Illustrated in tint by MARTIN JUSTICE

12mo, $1.25

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REBECCA
of SUNNYBROOK FARM

By KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN

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_Life, N. Y._

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_Philadelphia Item._

“A character that is irresistible in her quaint, humorous originality.”

_Cleveland Leader._

“Rebecca is as refreshing as a draught of spring water.”

_Los Angeles Times._

“Rebecca has come to stay with one for all time, and delight one perpetually, like Marjorie Fleming.”

_Literary World, Boston._

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THE REAPER

By EDITH RICKERT

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_Boston Transcript._

“A powerful story, fresh, vivid, and of unusual character and tone.”

_Chicago Record-Herald._

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BIDDY’S EPISODES

By Mrs. A. D. T. WHITNEY

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_Boston Transcript._

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_Chicago Record-Herald._

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The
PRIVATE TUTOR

By GAMALIEL BRADFORD, Jr.

The love story of an Italian countess and a wealthy young American “cub.” An amusing comedy.

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_Chicago Eve. Post._

“It narrates directly, and with just enough philosophical reflection to show the author’s personal touch and feeling, the experiences of a party of Americans visiting and living in Rome.”

_Boston Transcript._

“A book which has the distinction of intellectuality.”

_St. Louis Globe-Democrat._

Crown 8vo, $1.50

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DAPHNE
An Autumn Pastoral

By MARGARET SHERWOOD

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_Review of Reviews._

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JOHN PERCYFIELD

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_New York Times._

“Its merits will rank it among the few sterling books of the day.”

_Boston Transcript._

“A book of rare charm and unusual character ... fresh and sweet in tone and admirably written throughout.”

_The Outlook, New York._

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A
COUNTRY INTERLUDE

By HILDEGARDE HAWTHORNE

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_The Outlook, New York._

“_A Country Interlude_ is equal to any of the many stories put forth by her famous grandfather’s prentice hand.”

_Boston Transcript._

“A charming little volume filled to the brim with happiness.”

_Chicago Evening Post._

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HEROES of the STORM

By WILLIAM D. O’CONNOR

Wonderfully graphic accounts of the most famous rescues from shipwreck by the crews of the U. S. Life-Saving Service. O’Connor was a master in writing of the sea and its perils.

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Transcriber’s Notes

In the .txt version, surrounding characters have been used to indicate
_Italics_, and small caps have been rendered as ALL CAPS.
Contractions written as two words have been joined into one.
Inconsistent hyphenation has been retained.