Part 59

"Of course," Madame returned sweetly.

"Of course," Alden echoed. His voice sounded distant and his eyes were dull.

As dinner bade fair to be a silent function, Madame turned to Edith with the first question that came into her mind.

"What have you been doing all the afternoon?"

"Packing," replied Edith, with dry lips.

"Or rather, getting ready to pack." She did not look at Alden, but at Madame, with a wan little smile that made the old lady's heart suddenly very tender toward her.

"My dear! We'll miss you so."

"I know," Edith murmured, "and I shall miss you--more than words may say, but I have to go." She drained the glass of water at her plate, then added: "My husband wants me to come back. He has written to say so."

"Then," said Madame, "I suppose you will have to go."

"I suppose so," repeated Edith, parrot-like.

Alden's eyes never swerved from Edith's white face. In their depths was the world-old longing, the world-old appeal, but never for the fraction of an instant did Edith trust herself to look at him.

When they rose from the table, Edith went back to her room immediately, murmuring an excuse. Alden watched her despairingly until the hem of her white gown was lost at the turn of the stairs. Then he sat down with the paper, but he could not read, for the words zig-zagged crazily along the page.

Madame understood and sincerely pitied them both, but there seemed to be nothing to say. She leaned back in her chair, with her eyes closed, pretending to be asleep, but, in reality, watching Alden as he stared vacantly at the paper he held in his shaking hands.

At last he rose and went out upon the veranda. Madame started from her chair, then forced herself to lean back again, calmly. She heard the scraping of his chair as he moved it along the veranda, out of the way of the light that came through the open window. For a long time there was silence.

Longing to comfort him and unable to endure it longer, Madame went out, softly. He did not hear her step, for his head was bowed upon his hands. From a room above Edith's light streamed out afar into the sweet darkness, drawing toward it all the winged wayfarers of the night.

Madame slipped her arm around his shoulders, and bent down to him. "Dear," she said brokenly, "she's married."

Alden drew a quick, shuddering breath, and freed himself roughly from the tender clasp. "I know it, Mother," he cried, in a voice vibrant with pain. "For God's sake, don't remind me of that!"

XVIII

Starbreak

Through the long night Edith lay awake, thinking. Her senses were blindly merged into one comprehensive hurt. She was as one who fares forth in darkness, knowing well the way upon which he must go, yet longing vainly for light.

Her path lay before her, mercilessly clear and distinct. A trick of memory took her back to what Madame had said, the day after she came: "The old way would have been to have waited, done the best one could, and trusted God to make it right in His good time." She remembered, too, her bitter answer: "I've waited and I've done the best I could, and I've trusted, but I've failed."

Keenly she perceived the subtlety of her punishment. Attempting to bind the Everlasting with her own personal limitations, her own desires, she had failed to see that at least half of a rightful prayer must deal with herself. She had asked only that her husband might love her; not that she might continue to love him.

Now, with her heart and soul wholly in the keeping of another man, the boon had been granted her, in bitterness and ashes and desolation. He had said, in his letter, that her coming away had made him think. Through her absence he had seen the true state of affairs between them, as she could never have made him see it if she had remained at home. This, then, was God's way of revelation to him, but--to her?

The truth broke upon her with the vividness of a lightning flash. It was the way of revelation to her also, but how? She sat up in bed, propping herself back against the pillows, her mind groping eagerly for the clue.

During the past six years she had endeavoured constantly for a certain adjustment. Now it had come, but she herself was out of harmony. Were her feet to be forever set upon the ways of pain? Was there nothing at all in the world for her?

Alden, too, was awake and thinking. She felt it, through the darkness, as definitely as though he had been in the same room, with his face full in the light. He also was conscious of the utter hopelessness of it and was striving to see his way clearly.

Until then, she had not known how far his argument had swayed her, nor how much she had depended upon the thought that her husband would gladly accept the release she offered him. Her principles had not changed, but his possible point of view had not been considered before.

"'Until death do us part,'" said Edith, to herself. "Not 'until death or divorce do us part'; nor yet 'until I see someone else I like better'; not even 'until you see someone else you like better,' And, again, 'forsaking all others keep thee only unto me so long as we both shall live.'"