"'It should not be,' I replied, and explained how I came to stay, adding, 'Don't talk any more. You are not strong enough.'

"With a quiet smile that astonished me, she said, 'It won't make any difference, Miss Alden; I shall never be any better, or, rather, I shall soon be well. My mind seems growing clearer, and I'd like to talk a little. It is strange to see a young girl here. Are you strong and well?'

"'Yes, very strong, and very glad to help your mother take care of you. I was once almost as ill as you are, yet I got well. Cheer up, and let us nurse you back to health.'

"She shook her head. 'No, that's now impossible. You come and cheer poor mother and father, Miss Alden. I am more than cheerful, I am happy.'

"I made her call me Madge, and said: 'Tell me then in a few words how you can be happy. My heart has just been aching for you ever since I came.'

"Perhaps she saw tears in my eyes, for she said, 'Sit down by me.'

Then she took my hand, leaned her cheek upon it, and looked at me with such a lovely sympathy in her beautiful dark eyes!

"'Yes,' she said, 'I see you are young and strong, and you probably have wealth and many friends; still I think I am better off than you are. I am almost home, and you may have long, weary journeying before you yet. You ask me why I am happy. I'll just give you the negative reasons: think how much they mean to me--"And there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain." All these may be taken from my life any hour. Think of what will be added to it. You believe all this, Madge?'

"'Yes.'

"'Then you must know why I am happy, and why I may be better off than you are. It will be very hard for father and mother--there will be more pain for them here in consequence--but soon it will all end forever; in a little while we shall be together again. So you know nearly all about poor little me,' she said, with another of her smiles, which were the sweetest, yet most unearthly things I ever saw.

'And now tell me about yourself. I'm not able to talk much more for the present. I'd like to know something about the friend who helped me through the last few steps of my journey. I can think about you in heaven, you know,' she said, with the sweetest little laugh. 'Don't look so sad, Madge. They'll tell you I'm gone soon. "Gone where?" ask yourself, and never grieve a moment.'

"Oh, Graydon, she made it all seem so real, talking there alone in the night! And it is just as she says or it isn't anything. When you said, 'Such a G.o.d,' you had in mind a theological phantom, and I don't wonder you felt as you did; but this girl believes in a G.o.d who 'so loved the world'--who so loved her--and I do also. Her pain, her thwarted young life, I don't understand any more than I do other phases of evil, but I can give my allegiance to One who came to take away the evil of the world. That's about all the religion I have, and you mustn't ever say a word against it.

"Well, there is but little more to tell. Tilly spoke in quiet, broken sentences as her cough permitted, and I told her a little about myself and sang to her some hymns that mother sang to me when I was a child.

With the dawn her mother came in, and was frightened at having slept so long, but Tilly laughed and said it was just splendid.

"She was evidently a very intelligent girl, and must have been a pretty one, too. She certainly has read a great deal, and has taught in public schools. There didn't seem to be a trace of morbidness in her mind or feeling. She was simply trying to make the best of everything, and her best certainly is _the_ best. She has helped and comforted me more than I could her."

"Comforted you, Madge?"

"Oh, well," was the somewhat confused reply. "I've had trouble, and shall have again. Who is without it long in this world?"

"It's almost hard to see how serious trouble can reach you hereafter, you are so strong, so fortified. No, Madge; I'll never say a word against your faith or that of your new friend. Would to Heaven I had it myself! I wouldn't have missed this talk with you for the world, and you can't know how I appreciate the friendship which has led you to speak to me frankly of what is so sacred. All the whirl and pressure of coming life and business shall never blot from my memory the words you have spoken this morning or the scenes you have made so real."

If this were true, how infinitely deeper would have been his impression if he could have seen the beautiful girl, now smiling into his eyes, bowed in agony at that sick-bed, while she acknowledged with stifled sobs that the dying girl _was_ better off--far happier than she who had to face almost the certainty of lifelong disappointment.

Poor Madge had not told Graydon all her story. She would have died rather than have her secret known on earth, but she had not feared to breathe it to one on the threshold of heaven.

CHAPTER XXVIII

DISPa.s.sIONATE LOVERS

During the last moments of their drive Madge and Graydon were comparatively silent. They were pa.s.sing dwellings, meeting strangers, and they could not, with the readiness of natures less finely organized, descend to commonplaces. Each had abundant food for thought, while even Graydon now believed that he so truly understood Madge, and had so much in common with her, that words were no longer needed for companionship.

As they approached the piazza, they saw that Arnault was still Miss Wildmere's devoted attendant. His presence meant hope for Madge, and Graydon was slightly surprised at his own indifference. He felt that the girl to whom he regarded himself as bound belonged to a different world, a lower plane of life than that of which he had been given a glimpse. The best elements of his nature had been profoundly moved, and brought to the surface, and he found them alien to the pair on the piazza. He was even self-reproachful that he saw with so little resentment Stella's present companionship.

"While I don't like her course at all," he thought, "I must believe that she is acting from the most self-sacrificing motives. What troubles me most now is that I have a growing sense of the narrowness of her nature."

He had never come from her presence with his manhood aroused to its depths. It was her beauty that he dwelt upon; her piquant, alluring tones and gestures. Madge was not an ill-natured critic of the girl who threatened to destroy her future, but, by being simply what she was, she made the other shrink and grow common by contrast.

To Graydon such comparisons were odious indeed, and he would not willingly permit them; but, in conformity to mental laws and the force of circ.u.mstances, they would present themselves. Each day had found him in the society of the two girls, and even an hour like one of those just pa.s.sed compelled him to feel the superiority of Madge. His best hope already for Stella was that she would change when surrounded by better influences--that her faultless taste in externals would eventually create repugnance to modes of thought and action unsuitable in a higher plane of life. He did not question his love for her, but he felt this morning that it was a love which was becoming disenchanted early, and into which the elements of patience and tolerance might have to enter largely. Should he marry her to-day he could not, as Madge had said, and with the first glow of affection, believe her perfect. He even sighed as he thought of the future.

His heart was very tender toward Madge, but it was with an affection that seemed to him partly fraternal, and partly a regard for one different, better, purer than himself. He proved the essential fineness, the capabilities of his nature, by his appreciation of some of her higher traits. Her ministry to the dying girl had given her a sacredness in his eyes. For the time she was becoming a sort of religion to him. He revealed this att.i.tude of mind to her by a gentle manner, and a tone of respect and consideration in the least thing he said.

"Oh," thought the poor girl, "he could be so much to me and I to him!

His touch, even in thought, would never be coa.r.s.e and unfeeling; and I have seen again and again that I can inspire him, move him, and make him happy. Why must a wretched blunder thwart and blight two lives?"

Before they had finished their breakfast the beautiful languor of sleep was again in his companion's eyes, and he said: "Dear Madge, promise me you will take a long rest. Before we part I want to tell you what an illumined page you have put in my memory this morning.

Some of the shadows in the picture are very dark, but there is also a light in it that 'never was on sea or land.' When you wake I shall be on my way to the trout-stream to which Dr. Sommers will guide me; and, do you know? I feel as if my memories will be in accord with the scene of my camping-ground. As I sit in my tent-door to-night I shall think over all you have said and described."

Her only answer was a smile, that for some reason quickened his pulse.

Much occurred before they met again.

He went to his room, wrote some letters, and made other preparations.

Then, feeling that he should give the remaining time before his departure to Miss Wildmere, he sought her. She appeared to be waiting for him on the piazza, and there was reproach in her tone, as she said, "I half feared you were going without bidding me good-by."

"Such fears were scarcely just to me."

"I did not know but that you had so greatly enjoyed your morning drive as to go away in a fit of absent-mindedness. I have been sitting here alone an hour."

"I could not know that. When I drove up I saw that I should be _de trop_," he replied, as they sauntered to an adjacent grove.

"Now, Graydon, you know that is never true, so far as I am concerned."

"The trouble is, Miss Wildmere, others are concerned in such a way that the only resource left me is to keep my distance."

"Mr. Arnault has returned to the city," she said, with what appeared a great sigh of relief. "I am perfectly free now."

"Till Mr. Arnault returns."

"I cannot help his return."

"Oh, no. I do not question his right to come back, or even to buy this hotel and turn us all out."

"Please don't talk about him any more. I'm doing the best I can."

"I believe you think so, but I cannot think it will prove the best for any one. It is not what I expected or even imagined. You are acting from a mistaken sense of duty, and I am more sorry every day that you can commit such an error. Look at it in its true light, Stella. I cannot believe you are deceiving me: you must be leading Mr. Arnault to entertain a false hope."

"Graydon, I have refused Mr. Arnault, and he will take no refusal."

"You can refuse him in such a way that he must take it at once and forever."

"You don't know--" she began, tears coming into her eyes.

"No; you have only led me to surmise a great deal by implication."

"What would become of mamma and my little sister if papa should fail utterly?" and tears came faster. No one could be more pathetic than Miss Wildmere when she chose.