Mary Imlay Taylor

“ Gerry condemned him still more for grasping these honors—which would never have come his way if he had returned with the bare story of his flight; but he was not strong enough to decline them. He knew that he would have been ruined forever had the truth been known, but he had succeeded in saving himself. He had chosen to let the snow and ice cover his desertion, and out of the wreck of his peace of mind he had snatched at the mundane honors that came to him. They were all he had, for his conscience was in agony, and the face of Overton haunted him. ”

“ To-day when she had been with Overton, when she had heard his impassioned plea, when she had almost signed the paper that was to separate her from her husband, she had suddenly awakened from her dream. The tie that bound her to Arthur Faunce was the primitive bond of all the ages. She had chosen him, he was her husband. What could her father do? What could Overton, or any other man do? “Those whom God hath joined together,” the words came to her with a new meaning, a meaning which shook her to her soul. For surely no man could put them asunder! ”

“ She felt at peace—at peace with herself and with the world. She was willing now to accept her share of the public disgrace, even her share of the unpleasant notoriety that was sure to come to Faunce. It was the price of his redemption, it was the earnest of his return to the semblance that she had loved, and she was willing to pay it. She was willing to face any sacrifice that meant that her husband, the man she loved, had completed his atonement, that he had had the supreme courage to tell the truth and bear his punishment. ”

“ Diane’s abhorrence, her scorn, had shattered his last frail hold on hope. He could never retrieve himself, never come back absolved—not even by courage, by sacrifice, by self-denial. He doubted if death could wipe it out in her eyes, yet he loved her. The fact of his love for her had made him write to her, made him demand her own decision, not her father’s; but he was well aware what that decision would be. He had lost her!
There was a futility in his agony, a helplessness. There was nothing that he could do. Dr. Gerry was right—he should never have married Diane. ”

“ He must return to those frozen fields, must face again the awful thing that held his soul in its grip, or he must renounce that part of his new fame that rested on his explorations, and, following Judge Herford’s lead, must plunge into the field of politics. He had thought the choice assured—home and easy preferment, the presence of Diane and the approval of her father; but of late, loving her as he did, he was still curiously aware of a mysterious power that had laid hold of him. He felt the lure of those frozen depths, the gray sky, the blue peaks of giant ice—and the soul of Overton! ”

“ As she walked blindly on, hearing Overton’s step behind her once more, feeling his presence, it seemed incredible that they were separated forever, that her own act had made an impassable gulf between them. She struggled with herself. She had believed in her love for Faunce; she believed in it still. If she did not love him, why should she suffer so deeply at the horrible doubt of him that had assailed her? She loved him, she must believe in him, and—if she could not believe in him—she must suffer with him. ”

“ Day after day, night after night, the horror of that frozen waste had haunted him. The deathlike face of Overton had appeared to him at nightfall and at daybreak. When Faunce, against his own better judgment, had undertaken the new command, he had merely yielded to the mysterious lure that draws a murderer back to the scene of his crime. He had felt as if unseen hands clutched at him and drew him; as if a shadowy presence, standing at his elbow, demanded this sacrifice, this hideous march back on the trail; as if Overton, dead or alive, held his very soul in thrall. ”

“ If Overton lived, Faunce was no longer responsible for his death. No man could brand him with the mark of Cain. He was liberated from the thing that had hung upon him as fearfully as the slaughtered albatross once hung upon the neck of the Ancient Mariner.
There was relief, then—a relief that sent the blood rushing to his heart and the fire to his brain; [195] but with the relief came the awful certainty of ruin. He could never hold up his head again among the men who had so lately hailed him as a friend and a hero. It might be worse to be a confessed craven than a secret felon. ”

“ Sitting beside Diane on the train, their close proximity accentuated by the soft touch of her sleeve against his and by the faint, elusive perfume of her hair, aware that his ring gleamed on the slender finger of her left hand, he felt no thrill of exultation, only an intense bitterness of soul. He could never look his wife in the face without fear [157] that she would read his soul, find the hideous secret hidden there, and scorn him.
If some trick of fate, inexplicable as it was inexorable, had indeed brought Overton back from the dead, Faunce could already foresee the end. ”

“ She thrust that away with an unconscious gesture of pride. She would not distrust Faunce; and to believe that Overton might still survive was to doubt his word. She battled against that with all her remaining strength, and tried to concentrate her thoughts on the beauty about her.
Summer was in the air, and the forces of nature, surviving the long conflict with the bitter winter, had gathered themselves together in a new [170] and beautiful conquest of the earth. At her feet young blades of grass thrust themselves up through the black loam with been new life. ”

“ Tenderness was born in her at last, a tenderness new and beautiful—as the beginnings of life in the springtime, the budding of flowers, and the song of the bird to its mate. Alone on her knees in the twilight, Diane lifted her soul to that distant star, the thought of Overton passed away from her, the struggle ceased, even her father and his anger were forgotten, she remembered only her husband, and the eternal purposes of the Creator who had made them man and woman in the Garden of Eden. ”

“ The narcotic had done its work—the tortured man slept.
Gerry rose quietly, extinguished the lamp, and pulled aside the curtains. It was morning. The storm had passed, and the earth lay under a white mantle. Every tree and every branch bore its feathery burden of snow. Through an exquisite lacework of sparkling ice he could see the wonder of a magnificent sky, still pink with sunrise.
He turned back and looked at the sleeper on the lounge. Faunce lay with one arm above his head, the other across his breast, an elaborate seal-ring on one of the white fingers. ”

“ She was well aware that a heart is often caught on the rebound, and she knew that, next to Diane, she was an object of interest to Faunce. The question therefore resolved itself into the more complex problem of the state of Diane Herford’s heart. Did she, or did she not, care for Faunce?
If, as Fanny suspected, Diane had loved Overton, she might be unable to reconcile herself to a man who must inevitably recall a dead lover. On the other hand, this might also be Faunce’s strongest appeal—the fact that he was Overton’s chosen comrade, his closest friend, and the man who had last seen him alive. ”

“ Faunce raised his eyes reluctantly to her face, and she saw a strange expression in them—an expression that baffled her.
“Such things aren’t easy to describe, Diane. It’s like anything else that’s terrible and awe-inspiring—it leaves one speechless. There’s something about the polar wastes that makes a man’s soul numb and mute. I can imagine that any one lost there might become—well, just a brute!”
As he spoke, he rose from his chair, went to the mantel, and, opening his cigarette-case, selected a cigarette and lit it. ”

“ Some girls would have been silent when there had been no actual engagement; but she could not deceive a man who loved her as Arthur Faunce did. When she gave him her heart, she gave him the right to know that she had loved Overton first. Yet did he, could he, really understand how much—how very much—it had mattered to her? In the midst of her walk Diane stopped short.
“What am I doing?” she cried to herself. “What am I doing? I’ve just promised to marry one man, and—and I’m crying out here in broad daylight over another!” ”

“ He had, indeed, been trying to break an ugly habit, but the horror of sleeplessness was greater than the horror of sleep. Sleep had its horror, for it brought dreams. Either he dreamed of the ice and snow and fog, of the unforgettable face of Overton, or he dreamed of sunshiny fields and the scent of spring flowers, and saw Diane coming to him, holding out her hands, with her eyes shining, as he had seen them shine once with love—as he would never see them again! ”

“ It had been a day of conflict for Faunce, a day of trial, for he had had to face the publicity and the questions, but he had shown a strength and composure that amazed himself. As he had told Diane, his confession had freed him, he was no man’s slave, he had nothing to fear, and he faced the future with a courage so high that it transformed him. ”

“ Had the torch of Psyche been lifted by unsteady hands and fallen into an abyss between them?
Unable to endure her own thoughts, Diane thrust aside her work and went out. She needed to escape the thraldom of four walls and try—in the open—to vanquish the haunting spirits that might well have escaped from the secret caverns of those lovely hills to assail her with a fantom host of doubts.
She walked rapidly, avoiding the road to the little hamlet, and turning into a path that led her past the old house where Overton was born. ”

“ She could see him as he had looked that night in the cottage; she could hear his voice making the confession. The letter was like him. It seemed to fall short; it had not even the courage of his love; and yet she knew he loved her. His very weakness in this hour, when he so needed strength, touched her woman’s heart. Her abhorrence of his deed had clouded her own perception of his misery, but now, in a flash, she saw it. It was as great as hers.
She was still standing there, her head bowed, when she heard steps on the piazza and her father’s latch-key in the door. ”

“ Price hurried up the long driveway to the seminary. She was going home, and, being small and round and oldish, she panted and bubbled a little in her haste. Even her exactly appropriate garb, patterned closely on “correct and distinctive styles for more mature figures,” and her very sober little hat, shaped like a sugar-bowl, palpitated with undue excitement.
She burst in upon the dean and Fanny, who were quietly enjoying a cup of tea in the sunny little sitting-room, where a yellow rose showered its golden buds against the wide stone sills of the bay window. ”

“ She lifted her face toward it, the soft wind stirring the tendrils of hair on her white forehead, and touching her feverish cheeks and lips.
Gradually, silently, with infinite beauty, the afterglow touched the soft sky with all the colors of rose and violet, and the earth below sank gently and deeply into the shadow, as if it had dropped from sight. It seemed to Diane that, in that silence, in the tenderness, the infinite beauty of that moment between sunset and twilight, the spiritual struggle ceased. ”

“ It was unlike a woman to bid her lover go into such perils. He began to believe that she did not love him—it was Overton still who stood between! Jealousy laid hold of him and rent him.
A prey to contending feelings, he turned and fought again with the gale, plunging on into the [75] drifting snow. She had told him that she loved Overton. He was second in her heart, second in the great expedition, second in the very honors he had won!
Yet—a shudder ran through him—what right had he to be jealous of Overton? What right had he, indeed, to any honor, or to high repute, or to Diane’s love? ”

“ Then, suddenly as if the unseen wrestler had successfully thrown her in the conflict, she saw herself as the type of woman she most abhorred—the [269] woman who divorces one man because she is in love with another.
But that could not be true, the inner voice cried; for though she loved Faunce, she had left him because she had found him to be a creature so unworthy, so cowardly, so cruel, that her soul had risen up and driven her from him. Overton had had nothing to do with it. It was Faunce himself who had torn away the thin veil that had obscured her idol’s feet of clay. ”

“ Her eyes followed the long, unbroken reaches of snow until they rested on the dark-blue line of the distant water. As she sensed the intense cold and saw the sparkle of ice, her mind went back to the polar wastes, and she found her eyes filling with tears as she thought of the man who had fallen exhausted and alone. The face of Overton, so unlike the face of Faunce, rose before her. ”

“ She drew away with a shudder, her large eyes fixed on his face. He saw the recoil, the outraged incredulity in her face.
“You—you couldn’t have done that, Arthur—it’s impossible! You’re ill, you’re not telling me the truth—it can’t be!”
He saw how she took it, saw that he had struck a death-blow at her love for him. Something seemed to give way in his heart. He turned and sank into a seat by the hearth with a groan.
“It’s true. You know it’s true, Diane. Overton’s here, isn’t he? You’ve seen him, and you remember that I told you myself that I was with him when he died? He isn’t dead. ”

“ When Faunce had confessed to her, when he had torn away the last shred of her illusion about him, she had left him, overwhelmed with horror and dismay. The revulsion of feeling had been so intense that it had carried her home and swept her along in the current of her father’s rage against her husband. She had been as eager as he to get Faunce to consent to a divorce. She did not wish to bear the name of a man who had so deeply disgraced himself. ”

“ Out of the stupor, the terrible frozen mist that had at last benumbed him, body and soul, had come the rescue—the sound of human voices, the touch of strong human hands—and he was saved. But his anger against Faunce, his scorn of the traitor, had survived. Now, as he tried to clear [182] his recollection of it, Overton felt sore that he had not spared him, but had told his rescuers the truth. He remembered their indignation—the indignation that brave men feel against a coward and a weakling. ”

“ With Diane things had reached a climax long before that culminating moment when she found that she had married not the man of her imagination, but a strange, abstracted, sleepless creature whose soul seemed to be retreating deeper and deeper into some hidden recess of his being. Following out their early plans they had spent months of waiting in Florida, but now the ship being nearly ready to sail, they had come north and gone to the Catskills. During their long stay at the south Diane had written occasionally to her father and heard from him at even rarer intervals. ”

“ Overton had become an acknowledged force in the world of adventure, and Faunce was aware that he had set his heart on the one girl who had remained to both of them the sweetest and most charming reminder of their young days at Mapleton. That Diane, too, had outgrown their early environment and matured into a gracious and accomplished woman of the world seemed only fitting and natural; and Faunce knew, long before the ill-fated ship sailed from New York, that the young leader had left his heart behind him. ”

“ He had passed through a long agony, and had paid—in his heart’s blood—for his craven act. He was still paying, doubtless he would pay until the day of his death; but a strange apathy had come over him. His emotion had spent itself in his attack upon Overton, and now shame had drowned him so completely that it had submerged even his resistance, and he was only intensely weary.
The physical man, worn down by want of sleep, racked by tortured nerves, keyed up to defend himself from discovery, to keep the place at which he had snatched with desperate hands, was ready to give up. ”