Maria Louise Pool

“ He was looking at a white glove that lay near him on the ground.
He dropped his head and slowly reached forth his hand till he grasped the glove.
"It's hers," was the answer.
"Hers? Caro's?" he asked, eagerly.
But as he spoke the faint odor of iris came to him from the bit of leather in his grasp. He knew that odor of iris; it had always been inseparable from anything belonging to Prudence Ffolliott.
"No," replied Leander; "it's Prue's."
Lawrence lay silent. His face was dull and clouded.
"Oh, I do wish I could do something!" exclaimed Leander. "She's gone on for help." ”

“ As for Prudence, she would have said that her heart was like lead. She dared not soften her voice when she addressed her husband, lest he might turn savagely upon her, though his manner now was as gentle and cold as a flake of snow. She glanced at him shyly, and was inwardly irritated that she should feel timid. She did not wish to be afraid of anything. One is not comfortable when one is afraid. And she was admiring him also; and she wished to tell him of that admiration, and hang upon him, and smile, and caress him. ”

“ The crow chuckled again. A dark flush rose to the young man's forehead.
"I will throw him into the sea!" he cried, in a smothered voice.
But Prudence stroked the bird's head with her finger.
"No," she said; "we will send him back to Savin Hill when it is daylight. He will go. And shall I tie a note for Aunt Tishy to his leg?"
"No," was the answer. "I don't know yet that I want to send any word. Dear, let us cast the past behind us. Don't let us refer to it. We begin to-night a new life. Oh, surely love will atone, my darling,—my darling!" ”

“ He wished he could banish the memory of Carolyn's lovely, truthful face. He was sorry he had seen her. Did human beings always want the thing they could not have?
For what seemed a long time, he heard his wife's pen on the paper; then the noise grew indistinct, and Lawrence knew that he was going to sleep, and was thankful for the knowledge.
But he did not sleep long. Nothing special awakened him, however. He opened his eyes; they rested on Prudence, who had stopped writing. She was sitting with her hands folded on her lap, gazing at him. How old and hard her face appeared! ”

“ He is going to marry Carolyn Ffolliott, and be adored all the rest of his life. At forty he'll be a fat, self-satisfied wretch.
"I hope there isn't anybody near enough to hear me."
She looked about the big chamber, which now had very little hay in it. She inhaled the air, which was odorous with the ocean smell and the fragrance of a thicket of wild roses which grew among the rocks in front of the barn and slightly to the left. Nowhere do wild roses grow more rankly, more beautifully, than on the New England coast; the keen salt wind seems to stimulate them to a greater loveliness. ”

“ She responded to the eager pressure of his hand, the eager brilliance of his eyes. Then she said, with tender gaiety, "It isn't so stupid on the water-battery, after all, is it?"
"How can it be stupid where you are?"
"Oh, thank you! That's just what I intended you should say, Lawrence. It's so nice not to have you disappoint me."
Here the two smiled into each other's eyes; and then Prudence added, "You are never dull, you dear old fellow, only when you choose to be. That's why it's so very, very trying, you know." ”

“ Carolyn looked for one instant at the eyes fixed upon her. Then Prudence suddenly threw her arms about her cousin, and exclaimed, with an outburst of tears:
"Oh, do forgive me! I'm half crazed! I don't know what I'm saying! I have to suffer so, and nobody seems to think a woman like me can suffer!"
Carolyn remained rigidly quiet; she would not pretend to respond to this embrace; inwardly she turned sick at it. Yes, of course Prudence could suffer; and she ought to suffer.
Carolyn was astonished at the vigor of her own resentment. And why had Rodney Lawrence's wife come here? ”

“ Prudence went to her own chair and sat down in it. The crow hopped round to her knee; he sat there looking at her, first with one eye and then with the other. She thought it was curious that she should recall, just at this moment, that night she had spent in the Boston hotel after the Vireo had been run down, the night before she had been married. She and the crow had been together then, and she had thought of killing him. It seemed to her that the bird had called her a liar—a liar. She tried to throw off this remembrance.
She looked at the man sitting so wearily opposite her. ”

“ She whistled two or three bars of a tune she had often whistled while she had sat beside her mother when the latter lady had been up to her neck in ground peat and sprudel water.
Sometimes the girl flung back her head and sniffed the air, much as a young colt sniffs when it has just been let out into a field after a long confinement.
But she did not relax her speed. It was not long before she turned into a better kept road, and here she saw ahead of her, and walking towards her, the figure of her cousin Carolyn, who began to hasten directly. ”

“ My husband has just had an interview with an old flame, and now he comes and tells me he thinks he never loved me. You must believe that I shall be interested in this subject. Pray, Rodney, if I may ask, what did you feel that made it possible for you to take me to Boston that night?"
Lawrence sat gazing at Prudence as she spoke. He had a fanciful notion that his heart was like ashes as well as like lead. How could he have been so blind? He could not now imagine that he had felt what he had felt for Prudence. Some one has said that there is nothing so dead as a dead passion. ”

“ Prudence contemplated her companion for a moment in silence. Then she said that she had a bit of advice to offer; advice was easily given, and it never hurt any one, because no one ever followed it.
"What is it?"
"Don't be quite so self-controlled, or Rodney will begin to think you seem indifferent because you feel so. You know men are creatures who have no intuition, and who can't see the fraction of an inch below the surface. And though they say they don't like scenes, they do, when it's love for them that makes the scene. ”

“ To this Meramble made no reply in words. The launch came to a stand, and he scrambled aboard. It is dreadful when a human being has within him quite so much of a wild-beast rage. Meramble knew that he had been made ridiculous before this woman. He knew that he was dripping and ridiculous now. He had not been in any real danger; real danger would have eliminated the ridiculous.
Lawrence rose, bowed, and relinquished the charge of the launch to its owner. ”

“ He burst into a laugh; but he stopped laughing directly. He took her hand again. "Is that all?" he asked.
"Yes; I think that's all. And that's quite enough. You see, I was here when you were in love with her; I know something about how you loved her. You did love her. And you can't have forgotten it in less than two years. Why, I couldn't forget such an experience in a lifetime. It must have been like—like fire sweeping over your heart."
"But a man comes to his senses; a man gets over everything, you know. And I've had my lesson."
Lawrence was speaking eagerly now. ”

“ Leander repeated. This grievance seemed to grow upon him. "But he'll find he isn't alone, for all that," he chuckled.
Carolyn was thinking one thought over and over:
"To-morrow we shall have left Prudence,—to-morrow we shall have left Prudence."
Then she suddenly stopped that iteration by telling herself that it was true that Rodney no longer cared for Prudence. Had he not shown plainly enough that he had recovered from that infatuation? Was it an infatuation? How often we like to call the love which is not offered us, or which we do not quite understand, by that term! ”

“ Lawrence allowed himself an uneasy movement in his chair, and he did not answer.
Prudence sat stroking the head and neck of the crow, which still remained on her knee.
"Since we are having such a very interesting conversation," she said, "pray let's continue it. There's nothing so spicy and agreeable as a tête-à-tête between husband and wife who are thoroughly disillusioned; don't you think so?" ”

“ I tell you I'm hard hit,—devilishly hard hit,—beg pardon."
"Men seem to be fools about Prudence Ffolliott," remarked Carolyn; "she seems to be that kind of a woman."
Though she spoke in a very quiet voice, hearing her own tones made her shrink from herself in a contemptuous surprise. Had she fallen so low as to allow herself to speak thus? She would have given much to recall her sentence. She drew herself up with some haughtiness as she added, "Please forget that I used such words. Naturally I don't like to think of my cousin. ”

“ Now, I suppose I'm the heroine at Savin Hill; if I'm not, I mean to be, somehow. It's always best to be the heroine if it's possible. A second fiddle has its uses, but it's pleasanter to be first fiddle. I should just like to ask what you expect of a girl who has been a Carlsbad nurse for months,—expect of her when she gets out, I mean. You expect some kind of a fling, don't you? Very well; all right; I don't think you'll be disappointed. Just wait until the folks begin to come here, and until I begin to wear my new frocks. Of course Rodney Lawrence can't be counted now. ”

“ Devil turned his head this way and that. He hopped a few inches nearer.
"Do you care for Rodney Lawrence, Devil? Oh, 100 you don't? Because he saved your life when you were just out of the shell; and he tamed you; and all you are you owe to him. You don't care if you do? All right. That's like a human being; that's ingratitude. And you stole his ring from him, did you? and hid it in the wall, and it wasn't found until he didn't care for it any more. No, he doesn't care now."
Prudence rose, and walked about over the hay-strewn floor. Her cheeks had grown red. ”

“ So the girl resolved not to yield to any such imaginings. She hastened down to the room where her mother and aunt still sat over the smouldering fire on the hearth. She walked calmly up to her mother's side and resumed her place on the footstool by her.
"Have they come home yet?" asked Prudence's mother.
"No; it's hardly time."
"There's one consolation," said the elder lady, "nothing ever happens to Prue; she'll do the strangest things, and nothing ever happens to her. We needn't worry in the least."
"No, not in the least," responded Carolyn. ”

“ He glanced up at the sail, which almost flapped, so light was the wind. He had stopped thinking of Prudence, and was now thinking of the woman he had married. His thoughts did not often linger upon that subject. He didn't know of any earthly reason why they should. But just now he remembered with exceeding distinctness that Miss Arabella Arkwright had a thick waist and thick fingers; that she had at first shown a very annoying inclination to call him "my lord," but, thank fortune, he had made her drop that; and he was quite sure that she no longer referred to him as "his lordship;" ”

“ Carolyn remained a few moments where he had left her. She was thinking that if Lady Maxwell died, then surely this time Prudence would herself become Lady Maxwell. But how could her cousin consent to pass her life with a man like that. Good-natured? Yes, perhaps, but a mere animal? Then the girl caught herself comparing the Englishman with Rodney Lawrence. She always compared every man with Lawrence, much to the advantage of the latter.
After a few moments Carolyn returned to the house. She walked restlessly up the stairs, and then into the tower which overlooked the ocean. ”

“ Don't let's talk of this any longer. When you are stronger, your mind will be stronger, and you won't have these fancies."
Carolyn did not reply to these words. She lay silently in her chair, gazing off to the line where the horizon met the ocean.
She was thinking, suddenly, that it was here on the piazza that she had been sitting when Leander had found the ring that Prudence had given to Rodney; and then Rodney had come and had asked her, Carolyn Ffolliott, to be his wife.
Well, it was all over. But she would not put on black because her lover was faithless. ”

“ It is too much to beg of any woman to forgive. Now I ought to ask you to forgive me for asking you to forgive. Can you do that?"
He did not wait for an answer to this last question. Still with his hat in his trembling hand, he turned away and began to descend the rock. But a sudden and imperative physical weakness made him stumble. He could have cursed that weakness.
Carolyn sprang forward; she caught hold of his arm.
"You are ill!" she said, in a half whisper. "Will you sit down here for a moment?"
From very helplessness Lawrence was obliged to comply. He sat down; he did not try to speak. ”

“ The human heart, besides being "desperately wicked," is a very mysterious organ.
Carolyn advanced a few steps, and the two looked into each other's eyes for the first time since Prudence had been Rodney's wife. In the eyes of Prudence were pleading, and deprecation, and just enough unhappiness to win upon her cousin; and all these feelings were also truly in her heart. She was one of those subtly wise women who know how to make use of genuine emotion. ”