Jupiter Lights Part 49

A quiver had pa.s.sed over Eve at the name. "You loved him, and he was your husband. But Paul can never take _me_ for his wife; you forgive, but he couldn't."

"You love Paul, then; is that it?" said Cicely, turning round again.

"Now I remember--that day when I saw you in the woods. Why, Eve, he _did_ forgive you, he had you in his arms."

"He did not know. He does not know now."

"You haven't told him?"

"I couldn't."

Cicely paused, consideringly. "No, you could not," she said, with conviction. "And he can never marry you." She sat down on the side of the bed and folded her hands.

"Not when he knows," Eve answered.

"And were you going to deceive him, not let him know?"

"That is what I tried to do," said Eve, sombrely. "You were the only person who knew (you knew because I had told you), and you were out of your mind; his love came to me,--I took it."

"Especially as you loved him!"

"Yes, I loved him."

"I'm glad you do," said Cicely; "now you won't be so lofty. _Now_ you understand, perhaps, how I felt about Ferdie, and why I didn't mind, no matter what he did?"

"Yes, now I understand."

"Go on; what made you change your mind? Was it because I had got back my senses, and you were afraid I should tell?" She spoke with a jeer in her voice.

"No; it changed of itself when I saw baby out in that boat alone--my brother's poor little child. I said then,'O, let me save him, and I'll give up everything!'"

"And supposing that nothing had happened to Jack, and that I had not got back my senses, how could you even then have married Paul, Eve Bruce?--let let him take as his wife a woman who did what you did?"

"What I did was not wrong," said Eve, rising, a spot of red in each cheek. She looked down upon little Cicely. "It was not wrong," she repeated, firmly.

"'Blood for blood'?" quoted Cicely, with another jeer.

"Yes, that is what Paul said," Eve answered. And she sank down again, her face in her hands.

"You say you have given him up;--are you going to tell him the reason why you do it?" pursued Cicely, with curiosity.

"How can I?"

"Well, it would keep him from pursuing you,--if he does pursue."

"I don't want him to stop!"

"Oh! you're not in earnest, then; you are going to marry him, after all?

See here, Eve, I'll be good; I'll never tell him, I'll promise."

"No," said Eve, letting her hands fall; "I gave him up when I said, 'If I can only save baby!'" Her face had grown white again, her voice dull.

"What are you afraid of? h.e.l.l? At least you would have had Paul here.

_I_ should care more for that than for anything else."

"We're alike!" said Eve.

"If we are, do it, then; I should. It's a muddle, but that is the best way out of it."

"You don't understand," Eve replied. "What I'm afraid of is Paul himself."

"When he finds out?"

"Yes."

"I told you I wouldn't tell."

"Oh, any time; after death--in the next world."

"You believe in the next world, then?"

"Yes."

"Well, I should take all the happiness I could get in this," remarked Cicely.

"I care for it more than you do--more than you do?" said Eve, pa.s.sionately.

Cicely gave a laugh of pure incredulity.

"But I _cannot_ face it--his finding out," Eve concluded.

Cicely gazed at her. "How handsome you are to-day! What are men, after all? Poor things compared to _us_. What wouldn't we do for them when we love them?--what _don't_ we do? And what do they ever do for us in comparison? Paul--he ought to be at your feet for such a love as you have given him; instead of that, we both know that he _would_ mind; that he couldn't rise above it, couldn't forget. See here"--she ran to Eve, and put her arms round her, excitedly--"supposing that he is better than we think,--supposing that I should go to him and tell him the whole, and that he should come here and say: 'What difference does that make, Eve?

We will be married to-morrow.'" And she looked up at Eve, her dark little face flushed for the moment with unselfish hopefulness.

"No," answered Eve, slowly, "he couldn't, he loved Ferdie so!" She raised her right hand and looked at it. "He would see me holding it--taking aim--"

Cicely drew away, she struck Eve's hand down with all her force. Then she ran sobbing to the bed, where Jack, half dressed, had fallen asleep again, and threw herself down beside him. "Oh, Ferdie! Ferdie!" she sobbed, in a pa.s.sion of grief.

Eve did not move.

After a while Cicely dried her eyes and rose; she woke Jack, and finished dressing him in silence; kneeling down, she began to put on his shoes.

The child rolled his little wooden horse over her shoulder. Then he called: "Old Eve! old Eve! Pum here, an' det down; I want to roll de hortie on _you_, too."

Eve obeyed; she took up the other little shoe.

"Oh, well," said Cicely, her voice still choked with sobs, "we can't help it, Eve--as long as we've got him between us; he's a tie. We shall have to make the best of each other, I suppose."

"May I go with you to Romney?" Eve asked, in a low tone.