T. S. Arthur

“ And so his head is already frosted, Rose?"
"Yes."
"Though in years he has reached only manhood's ripened state. How I have marred his life! Better, far better, would it have been for him if I had been the bride of Death on my wedding-day!"
A shadow of pain darkened her face.
"No," replied Mrs. Everet; "it is better for both you and him that you were not the bride of Death. There are deeper things hidden in the events of life than our reason can fathom. We die when it is best for ourselves and best for others that we should die--never before. ”

“ Take her, Rose, to her own room, and God give you power to speak words of consolation; I have none."
Rose drew her arm within that of Irene, and said, "Come." But Irene lingered, looking tenderly and anxiously at her father.
"Go, my love." Mr. Delancy waved his hand.
"Father! dear father!" She moved a step toward him, while Rose held her back.
"I cannot help myself, father. The die is cast. Oh bear up with me! I will be to you a better daughter than I have ever been. My life shall be devoted to your happiness. In that I will find a compensation. All is not lost—all is not ruined. ”

“ If it fall, it will crush you beneath a mass of ruins; and not you only, but the one you have so lately pledged yourself before God and his angels to love."
"And I do love him as deeply as ever man was loved. Oh that he knew my heart! He would not then shatter his image there. He would not trifle with a spirit formed for intense, yielding, passionate love, but rigid as steel and cold as ice when its freedom is touched. He should have known me better before linking his fate with mine."
One of her darker moods had come upon Irene, and she was beating about in the blind obscurity of passion. ”

“ Now, so far as her bodily state was concerned, Irene never felt better in her life. So she could not plead indisposition.
"I feel well," she replied, glancing up into her husband's face in a cold, embarrassed kind of way.
"Then your looks belie your condition—that's all. If it isn't the body, it must be the mind. What's gone wrong, darling?"
The tenderness in Hartley's tones was genuine, and the heart of Irene leaped to his voice with a responsive throe. But was he not her master and tyrant? How that thought chilled the sweet impulse! ”

“ What more can a woman ask? Can you not wait until this love puts on its rightly-adjusted exterior, as it assuredly will. It is yet mingled with self-love, and its action modified by impulse and habit. Wait—wait—wait, my daughter. Bear and forbear for a time, as you value peace on earth and happiness in heaven."
"I will try, father, for your sake, to guard myself," she answered.
"No, no, Irene. Not for my sake, but for the sake of right," returned Mr. Delancy.
They were sitting in the vine-covered portico that looked down, over a sloping lawn toward the river.
"There is Hartley now!" ”

“ A wife should not sink her individuality in that of her husband, any more than a husband should sink his individuality in that of his wife. They are two equals, and should be content to remain equals. There is no love in subordination."
Mr. Delancy sighed deeply: "Is argument of any avail here? Can words stir conviction in her mind?" He was silent for a time, and then said--
"Better, Irene, that you stop where you are, and go through life alone, than venture upon marriage, in your state of feeling, with a man like Hartley Emerson." ”

“ No! But I am sorry. Ah, well! Husbands are free to go and come at their own sweet will--to associate with anybody and everybody. But wives--oh dear!"
She tossed her head in a wild, scornful way, as if on the verge of being swept from her feet by some whirlwind of passion.
"And so," said her husband, after a long silence, "you do not choose to answer my questions as to Major Willard?"
That was unwisely pressed. In her heart of hearts Irene loathed this man. His name was an offence to her. Never, since the night he had forced himself into her carriage, had she even looked into his face. ”

“ He looked anxious.
"You thought of Irene?"
"I did."
"We have talked and thought of Irene so much to-day," said Rose, "that your thought of her has made you present to her mind with more than usual distinctness. Her thought of you has been more intent in consequence, and this has drawn her nearer. You saw her by an inward, not by an outward, vision. She is now present with you in spirit, though her body be many miles distant. These things often happen. They startle us by their strangeness, but are as much dependent on laws of the mind as bodily nearness is dependent on the laws of matter." ”

“ Clear and softly blue as the eye of childhood bent the summer sky above them. There was not a cloud in all the tranquil heavens to give suggestion of dreary days to come or to wave a sign of warning. The blithe birds sung their matins amid the branches that hung their leafy drapery around and above Irene's windows, in seeming echoes to the songs love was singing in her heart. Nature put on the loveliest attire in all her ample wardrobe, and decked herself with coronals and wreaths of flowers that loaded the air with sweetness. ”

“ Must his will rule in everything? I can tell you what it is, Rose, this will never suit me. There will be open war between us before the honeymoon has waxed and waned, if he goes on as he has begun."
"Hush! hush, Irene!" said her friend, in a tone of deprecation. "The lightest sense of wrong gains undue magnitude the moment we begin to complain. We see almost anything to be of greater importance when from the obscurity of thought we bring it out into the daylight of speech."
"It will be just as I say, and saying it will not make it any more so," was Irene's almost sullen response to this. ”

“ Irene sighed again, and was again silent.
"What," she asked, "if the oppressor is so much stronger than the oppressed that successful resistance is impossible? that with every struggle the links of the chain that binds her sink deeper into her quivering flesh?"
"Every age and every land have seen noble martyrs in the cause of freedom. It is better to die for liberty than live an ignoble slave," answered the tempter.
"And I will die a free woman." This Irene said in her heart. ”

“ Eager had penetrated—and saw needs, states and yearnings there which must be filled or there could be no completeness of life. And now the still, pale face of Irene stood out distinctly; and her deep, weird, yearning eyes looked into his with a fixed intentness that stirred his heart to its profoundest depths.
Mr. Emerson was absent from his office all that day. But on the next morning he was at his post, and it would have taken a close observer to have detected any change in his usually quiet face. But there was a change in the man—a great change. ”

“ Hartley Emerson loved truly the beautiful, talented and affectionate, but badly-disciplined, quick-tempered, self-willed girl he had chosen for a wife; and Irene Delancy would have gone to prison and to death for the sake of the man to whom she had yielded up the rich treasures of her young heart. In both cases the great drawback to happiness was the absence of self-discipline, self-denial and self-conquest. They could overcome difficulties, brave danger, set the world at defiance, if need be, for each other, and not a coward nerve give way ”

“ Again the sun of peace smiled down upon them, but, as before, on something shorn of its strength or beauty.
"I will be more guarded," said Hartley to himself. "Knowing her weakness, why should I not protect her against everything that wounds her sensitive nature? Love concedes, is long suffering and full of patience. I love Irene—words cannot tell how deeply. Then why should I not, for her sake, bear and forbear? Why should I think of myself and grow fretted because she does not yield as readily as I could desire to my wishes?"
So Emerson talked with himself and resolved. ”

“ Delancy had heard from Irene. She did not, however, speak of this, for she saw that he was in an unhappy state on account of his daughter.
"Dreams are but shadows," she said, forcing a smile to her lips and eyes.
"Yes—yes." The old man responded with an abstracted air. "Yes; they are only shadows. But, my dear, was there ever a shadow without a substance?"
"Not in the outside world of nature. Dreams are unreal things—the fantastic images of a brain where reason sleeps."
"There have been dreams that came as warnings, Rose." ”

“ The blood leaped to the forehead of Irene, and her eyes, dilating suddenly, almost glared upon the face of her husband.
"Well, sir?" Irene drew her slender form to its utmost height. There was an impatient, demanding tone in her voice. "Speak!" she added, without change of manner. "What touching your associations when not in my company? As a wife, I have some interest in this matter. Away from home often until the brief hours, have I no right to put the question--where and with whom? It would seem so if we are equal. ”

“ As Emerson spoke thus, he noticed a sign of returning warmth in her pale face, and a dim, distant flash in her eyes. Her proud spirit did not accept this view of their relation to each other. He went on:
"If a wife has no confidence in her husband's manly judgment, if she cannot even respect him, then the case is altered. She must be understanding and will to herself; must lead both him and herself if he be weak enough to consent. But the relation is not a true one; and marriage, under this condition of things, is only a semblance."
"And that is your doctrine?" said Irene. ”

“ OFTEN, during that morning, did the name of Irene come to their lips, for the thought of her was all the while present to both.
"You must win her heart back again, Rose," said Mr. Delancy. "I will lure her to Ivy Cliff often this summer, and keep her here as long as possible each time. You will then be much together." They had risen from the dinner-table and were entering the library.
"Things rarely come out as we plan them," answered Rose. "But I love Irene truly, and will make my own place in her heart again, if she will give me the key of entrance." ”