The Unknown Sea Part 35

'It was. It was. He ate and drank.'

Of their last meeting and parting she told, without reserve, unashamed, even to her kissing the Cross on his breast.

Was ever maiden heart so candid of its pa.s.sion for a man, and he alive?

Too single-hearted was Rhoda to know how much of the truth exhaled from her words. Without real perception Lois drew it in; she grew very still; even her hands were still. Verily it had got to this: that to hear her dearest were dead, merely dead, could be the only better tale to come.

'Then,' said Rhoda, 'the morrow came and closed, and I would not believe he could have kept his promise to be dead; and a day and a day followed; and I dared tell you nothing, seeing I might not tell you all. Then I thought that in such extremity for your sake I did right to discover all I could of his secret; at least I would know if she, Diadyomene, were one vowed as I guessed in the House Monitory.

'Now I know, though I would not own it then, that deep in my heart was a terrible dread that if my guess were good, no death, but a guilty transaction had taken our Christian from us. Ah! how could I? after, for his asking, I had prayed for her.

'Now, though the truth lies still remote, beyond any guess of mine; though I heard of a thing--G.o.d only knows how she came by her life or her death--lacking evidence, ay, or against evidence, we yet owe him trust in the dark, never to doubt of his living worthily--if--he be not--dead worthily. Ah, ah! which I cannot tell you.

'I went to the House Monitory and knocked. So stupid and weak I was, for longer and harder than I looked for had the way been, and my dread had grown so very great, that when the wicket opened I had no word to say, and just stared at the face that showed, looking to read an answer there without ever a question. I got no more sense than to say: "Of your charity pray for one Diadyomene."

'I saw startled recognition of the name. Like a coward, a fool, in sudden terror of further knowledge, I loosed the sill and turned to run in escape from it. I fell into blackness. Afterwards I was told I had fainted.

'They had me in before I came to myself. Ah! kind souls they were. A monitress knelt at either side, and one held my head. When memory came back, I looked from one to the other, and dared not ask for what must come. There was whispering apart that scared me. Then one came to me. "My child," she said, "we will pray without question if you will; yet if you may, tell us who is this Diadyomene?" I thought my senses had not come back to me. They would have let me be, but I would not have it then. "Who is she?" I said; "I do not know, I came to you to ask." "We do not know."

Bewildered, I turned to the one who had opened to me. "But you know; I saw it in your face when I named her." "The name I knew, nothing more; and that I had heard but once, and my memory had let it escape." "Where had you heard it? Who knows?" I said. "On Christmas Eve a man came, a young man, fair-haired." "Christian," I said, "that was Christian." At that three faces started into an eager cl.u.s.ter. "Christian!" they said, "was his name Christian?" Then they told me that after night-fall he had come and named Diadyomene, and that before daybreak a woman, naked and very beautiful, had come wailing an only word, "Christian." But because of the hour of his coming I said no, it could not be he, for I had seen him too shortly before. And indeed it seemed to me past belief that any man could have come that way by night so speedily. So they gave detail: his hair was fair; his eyes grey; he was of great stature; he was unclothed, bleeding freshly, and, yes, they thought, gashed along the shoulder. "But here is a sure token," and with that they showed me that cross he had worn. "This," they said, "he unloosed from his neck."'

Never a word more Lois heard of that tale, though for near a minute Rhoda carried it forward. Then looking up, she saw a face like a mask, with features strained and eyes fixed, and sprang up in terror, vainly to strive at winning from the stricken senses token of the life they locked.

Was she guilty of this?

Never did she know. For the few days that sad life held on till it reached its term never a word came: not one fiducial word through the naming of Christian to exonerate Rhoda.

So Lois, too, had the comfort of death, and Rhoda only was left, through long life to go unenlightened, and still to go dauntless of the dark.

EPILOGUE

Tell us how an altered estimate grew after the pa.s.sing of Christian, to end his reproach.

But his name came to be a byword of disgrace, his story a dark, grotesque legend among records of infamy.

Tell us how Rhoda lived to be happy.

But the pain and shame of his stigma her heart could never lay aside, though long years gave to patience and fort.i.tude a likeness to serenity and strength. Where Christian had lived would she still abide all her days; and the poor reward of her constancy was in a tribute of silence concerning him that came to respect her presence.

Tell us how Philip ripened to iniquity and was cut off.

But a tiny germ of compunction, lurking somewhere in that barren conscience, quickened and grew under Rhoda's shadow, till, spite of the evidence of his own senses, spite of reason, spite of public judgment, he entertained a strange doubt, and to his world and its ridicule acknowledged it. Long years wore out Rhoda's suspicion of his sincerity; long years raised him in her esteem in exact proportion as he sank in his own.

Tell us how Rhoda never stooped to mate with one less worthy than her first love.

But a day came when the House Monitory gave her way to a grave with a little son against her breast; and she stood there to look out over the sea that hid the bones of Christian, and thanked her G.o.d for appointing her in His world a place as helpmeet for a weak soul, who by paths of humility sought after right wors.h.i.+p. Then she wept.

Tell us in some figure of words how the soul of Christian entered for reward into the light of G.o.d's countenance.

At rest his body lay, and over it flowed the tides.

Tell us in some figure of words how the soul of Diadyomene, wan and s.h.i.+vering, found an unaltered love, with full comprehension and great compa.s.sion, her shelter in the light of G.o.d's countenance.

At rest her body lay, and over it sang the winds.

Tell us in some figure of words how Lois beheld these two hand in hand, and recognised the wonderful ways of G.o.d and His mercy in the light of His countenance.

At rest her body lay, and over it gra.s.ses grew.

We need no words to tell us that G.o.d did wipe away all tears from their eyes.

Surely, surely; for quietly in the grave the elements resumed their atoms.