When I first saw YOU, you seemed something so apart and different from all other men that, although I scarcely knew you, I wanted to tell you, even then, all that I have told you now. I wanted you to be my friend; something told me that you could,--that you could separate me from my past; that you could tell me what to do; that you could make me think as you thought, see life as YOU saw it, and trust always to some goodness in people as YOU did. And in this faith I thought that you would understand me now, and even forgive me all."
She made a slight movement as if to disengage his arm, and, possibly, to look into his eyes, which she knew instinctively were bent upon her downcast head. But he only held her the more tightly until her cheek was close against his breast. "What could I do?" she murmured. "A man in sorrow and trouble may go to a woman for sympathy and support and the world will not gainsay or misunderstand him. But a woman--weaker, more helpless, credulous, ignorant, and craving for light--must not in her agony go to a man for succor and sympathy."
"Why should she not?" burst out Barker passionately, releasing her in his attempt to gaze into her face. "What man dare refuse her?"
"Not THAT," she said slowly, but with still averted eyes, "but because the world would say she LOVED him."
"And what should she care for the opinion of a world that stands aside and lets her suffer? Why should she heed its wretched babble?" he went on in flashing indignation.
"Because," she said faintly, lifting her moist eyes and moist and parted lips towards him,--"because it would be TRUE!"
There was a silence so profound that even the spring seemed to withhold its song as their eyes and lips met. When the spring recommenced its murmur, and they could hear the droning of a bee above them and the rustling of the reed, she was murmuring, too, with her face against his breast: "You did not think it strange that I should follow you--that I should risk everything to tell you what I have told you before I told you anything else? You will never hate me for it, George?"
There was another silence still more prolonged, and when he looked again into the flushed face and glistening eyes he was saying, "I have ALWAYS loved you. I know now I loved you from the first, from the day when I leaned over you to take little Sta from your lap and saw your tenderness for him in your eyes. I could have kissed you THEN, dearest, as I do now."
"And," she said, when she had gained her smiling breath again, "you will always remember, George, that you told me this BEFORE I told you anything of her."
"HER? Of whom, dearest?" he asked, leaning over her tenderly.
"Of Kitty--of your wife," she said impatiently, as she drew back shyly with her former intense gaze.
He did not seem to grasp her meaning, but said gravely, "Let us not talk of her NOW. Later we shall have MUCH to say of her. For," he added quietly, "you know I must tell her all."
The color faded from her cheek. "Tell her all!" she repeated vacantly; then suddenly she turned upon him eagerly, and said, "But what if she is gone?"
"Gone?" he repeated.
"Yes; gone. What if she has run away with Van Loo? What if she has disgraced you and her child?"
"What do you mean?" he said, seizing both her hands and gazing at her fixedly.
"I mean," she said, with a half-frightened eagerness, "that she has already gone with Van Loo. George! George!" she burst out suddenly and passionately, falling upon her knees before him, "do you think that I would have followed you here and told you what I did if I thought that she had now the slightest claim upon your love or honor? Don't you understand me? I came to tell you of her flight to Boomville with that man; how I accidentally intercepted them there; how I tried to save her from him, and even lied to you to try to save her from your indignation; but how she deceived me as she has you, and even escaped and joined her lover while you were with me. I came to tell you that and nothing more, George, I swear it. But when you were kind to me and pitied me, I was mad-- wild! I wanted to win you first out of your own love. I wanted you to respond to MINE before you knew your wife was faithless.
Yet I would have saved her if I could. Listen, George! A moment more before you speak!"
Then she hurriedly told him all; the whole story of his wife's dishonor, from her entrance into the sitting-room with Van Loo, her later appeal for concealment from her husband's unexpected presence, to the use she made of that concealment to fly with her lover. She spared no detail, and even repeated the insult Mrs.
Barker had cast upon her with the triumphant reproach that her husband would not believe her. "Perhaps," she added bitterly, "you may not believe me now. I could even stand that from you, George, if it could make you happier; but you would still have to believe it from others. The people at the Boomville Hotel saw them leave it together."
"I do believe you," be said slowly, but with downcast eyes, "and if I did not love you before you told me this I could love you now for the part you have taken; but"-- He stopped.
"You love her still," she burst out, "and I might have known it.
Perhaps," she went on distractedly, "you love her the more that you have lost her. It is the way of men--and women."
"If I had loved her truly," said Barker, lifting his frank eyes to hers, "I could not have touched YOUR lips. I could not even have wished to--as I did three years ago--as I did last night. Then I feared it was my weakness, now I know it was my love. I have thought of it ever since, even while waiting my wife's return here, knowing that I did not and never could have loved her. But for that very reason I must try to save her for her own sake, if I cannot save her for mine; and if I fail, dearest, it shall not be said that we climbed to happiness over her back bent with the burden of her shame. If I loved you and told you so, thinking her still guiltless and innocent, how could I profit now by her fault?"