To-morrow?
sides and the soft rolling dip of the valley, and the still September blue stretched cloudless overhead. It was the late aft
at morning, and before the ceremony my one sensation had been that of strain, during it tense anxiety, and afterwards reproach, and none of these are pleasant e
as I first caught sight of her. Never, except in death, and already with the coffin enclosing it, have I seen a face so pallid. She wal
tatue moving, and for a second I felt as if the church, the people, she, I, the whole scene were unreal, and
the hand she gave me for the ring was cold as the touch of snow, and trembled convulsively. How long it all seemed! and how I loathed the prayers and the hymns, and sickened at the address! What earthly good is it to match words against a man's passion? As it is, it is, and no admonitions will alter it. However, all was over at last, and we were in the vestry.
ng like a murderer as I looked into the blan
pen, and then the clergyman picked it up and finished the half-written name. I felt a sharp self-re
t state to be marri
e with; the burden of other's society had slipped from us, and the weight of my own oppression I seemed to have left, together with the sullen heat of town air. In all the journey down Lucia had been recovering. The scarlet had been coming back to her
nt to know, I feel
!" I said, smiling back
ling happy until now, and I am five-and-twenty. Think, a whole
aug
ng to begin now, a
ill curved in smiles. "But still it is late to begin. It
t?" I said
be h
ou get the chance; but I think most people do.
"People muddle away their chances of happiness in life. Ten years ago, when I was fifteen and you were twenty-well, we mig
into the eyes, and dar
en years have gone beyond recall, and, if you have not been happy
peated; "I have
that stirred my frame now was held in the ever-present thought that this day saw the birth of my work in Paris. Not for worlds would I have hinted this to Lucia.
easure in the woman beside me. The brain already intoxicated with one pleasant emotion lends itself more, not less, readily to another, just as a brutal lover inflames his love with wine. In precisely the same way, my passion for Lucia was inflamed by the wine of gratified ambiti
r kindly you may supply him with bread. Another line of thought that ran side by side with this in my brain, as I watched the shadow pass over the girl's face as she thought of her ten lost years, was, that had we had these
elieve!" said Lucia, suddenl
e, I know," I answered, looking throug
e line, and all but hidden behind a delicate, intricate profusion of light green foliage. Behind it rose a rolling slope, clothed half-way up with a copse of young larch trees, whose slender stems sent lon
cent of tennis-courts and similar abominations, were planted here and there single trees. It had been the fancy of the owner that no
its narrow shadow straight as a spear across the emerald turf; and farther on a small squat tree, from China, unfurled smooth, glossy, polished leaves of lightest green,
a pretty house,
supposed to be a ve
e, and the side light from the window caught the curly
I answered, laughing, and looking straight into those eyes of lapis lazuli and then
th difficulty and turned to the window, so that I could not see her face; her ear, however, betrayed her all
ing in hardly seemed to disturb the sleepy stillness that hung over the strips of asphalt, the beds of hollyhocks and lilac bushe
and a few market women, with white aprons and baskets of eggs on their arms, stared wonderingly at Lucia as she stood with th
our luggage. As I walked back up the platform she was standing three-quarter ways towards me, the attitude
e two curves of the hips, and the long fall of the skirt beneath. All my frame-every limb and muscle-quickened with keen pleasure as my eye met the fami
anked heaven Lucia was not one of the horrible, modern women, if indeed they exist outside a lady's novel, who are always analysing you and your emotions, and testing the depth of your inferiority to themselves. I believed she was only s
think I have made that idiot underst
arm, impetuously, and said, as we turned to follow
u are so go
ge door, and the servant was holding it open. I waited to answer her till we had started, but when she had got in, and I had follo
w, of course; but all the sa
e, that I turned and looked at her in startled silence. Her
n't matter what I say to you now, does it! Oh, I am so glad that all this terrible repression and restrain
own tolerably well-governed feelings to a painful intensity, and I felt only too sharply that I, at any rate, had not done with sel
, perhaps, being a woman. The waist yielded gladly, and the w
lassic urns to remind one irresistibly of graveyards, but honest, bright, terracotta, human-looking flower-pots, from which rose or trailed the loveliest plants a skilful gardener could wrest from September. A white peacock paced majestic
's quick eye, and I heard an instinctive
now than in making sketches, and we both
or us to remind us of clothes and the serious duties of life. I saw Lucia carried
out from end to end, too restless to sit down to glance at the papers that lay on the different tables,
ng to the front and the carriage-drive, and another at the side, opening, wi
across the lawn, with its tropical trees standing motionless in the golden haze. Everything around me was very still, and
ame on to the terrace,
a light dinner-silk. The bodice was modest-I mean by that, it was unobtrusive-very. Excess of nervous excitement, the we
a rush of hot colour came into her face,
he exclaimed. "I told Celine
ng against me? I declared the dress was perfect, that I would not have the bodice half an inch higher for anything, that she looked adorable, and so on, un
tamped on the soft, delicate face. I saw that it would require all my tact and care to make this evening a success, and I determined that it should be one for her. Standing there beside her, looking down on her light head, I made a rough, m
y back upon it with a movement of tired relief. We neither spoke, and the perfect, sunny calm of the evening air, the silence, and the physical r
this want of confidence, this lack of familiarity she seemed to have. This sort of hesitation before she made the simplest request, the start and flush when
been conquered then; her will and desire had been broken down to mine; she had been forced to yield and to suffer; she had appealed to me and found me inflexible, relentles
ain. I got up from the table feeling my face grow white with sharp distress. I hardly knew at the moment how to express my thoughts; besides, I knew words would be of no ava
, dearest?" I said, merely,
ing almost in the same moment; "only I feel so restless
n the banister and my left arm round her waist, and the whole sweet figure beside me, and the white neck and ear so near
st beneath my own. In the subdued light of the staircase she lifted her lids, and I saw her eyes, gleaming and s
r my arm now! You won't push it a
into my arms. All the supple form yielded at my touch, till it leaned hard against my own; the face, pallid with excitement, was raised to mine; the glitter of her eyes swam before my vision as I caught it from ben
nd felt those lips under mine, her heart beat under my heart, her weak arms twisted round my throat. When
don't know ho
o on, but I hardly heard, my head was reeling, and all my senses dull, her figure leant a little against me, and the pressure of her arm was upon mine. After the drawing-room, the reading-room, an
felt her arm start violently in mine, and sh
n upon her a
oom, d
hing it, and tears startled into the dismayed eyes, which she
deeper as a grey pallor succeeded to the burning flush, and she
she said, hurriedly, fo
-start
rced herself to enter the room with me, but I collected
and look at it," I said, quietly, in a light, indifferent
body and mind, the gay exuberance of careless passion, with all the vigour of youth and health in it, that had leapt up to meet my caress a year ago,-and been refused. We passed on to a door on the other side of the corridor, which opened to another sitting-room. A lovely evening had given way to a lovelier night. Beyond the lo
y?" she said, with her
not well, dearest
exciting or embarrassing her. I stood beside the window frame watching her. Aft
does happen to me, you will remember you have your work and your talent to turn to,
as she looked up smiling for her answer. The bright light in the room fell full upon her, and I looked down upon this brilliant piece of l
ing back into her eyes. "I refus
hing, the colour leaping up in her cheeks, and the vivid blue deepening
ervals to escape each other's eyes, and laughed at nothing, and talked a very extraordinary astronomy. At last, with her soft fingers in my hair and on my throat, and her white arm above the elbow clasped in my h
es. I looked at my watch. I hardly know why I did it then. It was an involuntary action rather than a consci
rn wide open by it, in the faint gleam of sweat that showed on the white forehead. I was not blind to it, b
skirt dragged backwards and forwards over the carpet almost soundless, the moonlight and gaslight alternately gleaming on its folds. Each time that she came between me and the table my eyes followed with dizzy delight the soft side curve of her breast, the lines
walk about s
ng is going to happen. I never felt quite like this befo
llowed her, and pu
arest! What do you m
pale. There was a distressed and strangely absent look upon her
dering away from my anxious ones looking do
hed away my arm and
quite so bad as this before." And then, catching the distress upon my face, she added, "I daresay this is nothing.
ntinued to move slowly round the room, both hands pressed beneath her left breast,
ter-well, after I came to you in Paris. I shall take a long rest now. I hope I s
e stopped suddenly, and looked acro
dy I could have?"
flask of brandy there. In two seconds I had got it out
r come back to her lips-they were apart and grey. She set the glass down on the table with a wande
g!" and her head fell he
think there was any serious danger. I thought she was hysterical, as she had said; over-strained, and over-exc
breeze came blowing in upon her face. My hand followed hers to her bodice, and I loosened all the delicate lace ruffles round it
eyes. At intervals, it seemed to me, her heart gave great si
d them in an unreasoning agony upon me. A straining
etly, trying to recall her to her
u! I have lost my sight!
oming. My heart seemed turned into stone. Only Reason rejected the truth. The gong stood on the table close beside us. I stretched out my arm and struck it fu
id to him, "quic
reach us, she would have gone fro
k," I said wildly, raising the
t. A frightful agony was reflected in the bloo
l never paint again! Oh, don't let m
he only prayer of my life broke then in a
, keep me, Vict
you are
y backwards on my arm. I looked into her eyes. They were black as I had seen them long ago in the studio. Fearfully, terribly dilate
k to me once m
swered me. Her eyes were still fixed upon me in helpless horror, terror, and despair; but they knew me no longer. The unwilling soul had already started on its journey, and its eart
farewell, without a word, without any knowledge of the second when the life had fled, without a sound beyond that despairing, terrified appeal to me to keep her. I sto
down flat
ent over her. I drew back and stood beside the curtain motionless. Everything was swaying before my eyes in darkened confusion. Was this my wedding night? There was the ro
hade grew colder on his face. There was an intense silence in the room, then the words came across it, "Quite extinct." My ears seemed to fill wi
aid, and I heard my own voi
face and everything aroun
f this room?" I repeated,
rbed laces of her dress, and on the parted gleaming satin of her stays fell a flood of rose-coloured light. One shoulder rose from it and caught a shadow; another shade lay lower in the dimples of the elbow; the inside of the arm looked warm. The throat, the round soft throat, seemed glowi
upon my arm as I pushed it round her neck and pressed her breast to mine. It came softly and unresistingly, just
, pulseless, and cold, colder than any snow. Slowly it chilled through my fingers. I smoothed one passive arm-how cold
eternal coldness pierced through my quivering, l
a corpse. I strained my eyes down up
uc
estion; and the sweet mouth seemed to smile
ia, and you po
y veins, and engulfed me; my burning arms interlaced her, my weight pressed upon her, my trembling lips, full of
eing, I went to the cemetery to see all that now remained to me beyond my own fearful memory. Dick was beside me. He had insi
it a double one. A heavy iron chain, swinging great balls, studded with spikes, was linked from post
dless hands, the unspeakable yearning for that, once more, which has been freely ours and we have flung away, rose like a swelling tide within me, and rolle
ength to bear. That spiked iron linked round the helpless dust seemed like the chains of repression that had tortured and crushed the soft ardent nature. That arrogant cross, stretching its arms threateningly abo
Great God! that that word
took
ay be a to-morrow;" at wh
ing from the stone. "If she had been,
a time he urged me to c
him; and we both stood sil
ll, and tells me I shall refind the zest of lif