Barriers Burned Away Part 40

REGRET

The next day was the Sabbath, and a long, dreary one it was to Christine. But late in the afternoon Susie Winthrop came with a pale, troubled face.

"Oh, Christine, have you heard the news?" she exclaimed.

Christine's heart stood still with fear, but by a great effort she said, composedly, "What news?"

"Mr. Fleet has gone home very ill; indeed, he is not expected to live."

For a moment she did not answer, and when she did it was with a voice unnaturally hard and cold: "Have you heard what is the matter?"

Miss Winthrop wondered at her manner, but replied, "Brain fever, I am told."

"Is he delirious?" asked Christine, in a low tone.

"Yes, all the time. Ernst, the little office-boy, told me he did not know his own mother. It seems that the boy's father is with Mrs. Fleet, helping take care of him."

Christine's face was averted and so colorless that it seemed like marble.

"Oh, Christine, don't you care?" said Susie, springing up and coming toward her.

"Why should I care?" was the quick answer.

Susie could not know that it was in reality but an incoherent cry of pain--the blind, desperate effort of pride to shield itself. But the tone checked her steps and filled her face with reproach.

"Perhaps you have more reason to care than you choose to admit," she said, pointedly.

Christine flushed, but said, coldly: "Of course I feel an interest in the fate of Mr. Fleet, as I do in that of every pa.s.sing acquaintance.

I feel very sorry for him and his friends"; but never was sympathy expressed in a voice more unnaturally frigid.

Susie looked at her keenly, and again saw the tell-tale flush rising to her cheek. She was puzzled, but saw that her friend had no confidence to give, and she said, with a voice growing somewhat cold also: "Well, really, Christine, I thought you capable of seeing as much as the rest of us in such matters, but I must be mistaken, if you only recognized in Dennis Fleet a pa.s.sing acquaintance. Well, if he dies I doubt if either you or I look upon his equal again. Under right influences he might have been one of the first and most useful men of his day. But they need not tell me it was overwork that killed him. I know it was trouble of some kind."

Christine was very pale, but said nothing; and Susie, pained and mystified that the confidence of other days was refused, bade her friend a rather cold and abrupt adieu.

Left alone, Christine bowed her white face in her hands and sat so still that it seemed as if life had deserted her. In her morbid state she began to fancy herself the victim of some terrible fatality. Her heart had bounded when Susie Winthrop was announced, believing that from her she would gain sympathy; but in strange perversity she had hidden her trouble from her friend, and permitted her to go away in coldness. Christine could see as quickly and as far as any, and from the first had noted that Dennis was very interesting to her friend.

Until of late she had not cared, but now for some reason the fact was not pleasing, and she felt a sudden reluctance to speak to Susie of him.

Now that she was alone a deeper sense of isolation came over her than she had ever felt before. Her one confidential friend had departed, chilled and hurt. She made friends but slowly, and, having once become estranged, from her very nature she found it almost impossible to make the first advances toward reconciliation.

Soon she heard her father's steps, and fled to her room to nerve herself for the part she must act before him. But she was far from successful; her pale face and abstracted manner awakened his attention and his surmises as to the cause. Having an engagement out, he soon left her to welcome solitude; for when she was in trouble he was no source of help or comfort.

Monday dragged wearily to a close. She tried to work, but could not.

She took up the most exciting book she could find, only to throw it down in despair. Forever before the canvas or the page would rise a pale thin face, at times stern and scornful, again full of reproach, and then of pleading.

Even at night her rest was disturbed, and in dreams she heard the mutterings of his delirium, in which he continually charged her with his death. At times she would take his picture from its place of concealment, and look at it with such feelings as would be awakened by a promise of some priceless thing now beyond reach forever. Then she would become irritated with herself, and say, angrily: "What is this man to me? Why am I worrying about one who never could be much more to me living than dead? I will forget the whole miserable affair."

But she could not forget. Tuesday morning came, but no relief. "Whether he lives or dies he will follow me to my grave!" she cried. "From the time I first spoke to him there has seemed no escape, and in strange, unexpected ways he constantly crosses my path!"

She felt that she must have some relief from the oppression on her spirit. Suddenly she thought of Ernst, and at once went to the store and asked if he had heard anything later. He had not, but thought that his mother would receive a letter that day.

"I want to see your father's picture, and will go home that way, if you will give me the number."

The boy hesitated, but at last complied with her wish.

A little later Christine knocked at Mr. Bruder's door. There was no response, though she heard a stifled sound within. After a little she knocked more loudly. Then the door slowly opened, and Mrs. Bruder stood before her. Her eyes were very red, and she held in her hand an open letter. Christine expected to find more of a lady than was apparent at first glance in the hard-working woman before her, so she said, "My good woman, will you tell Mrs. Bruder I would like to see her?"

"Dis is Mrs. Bruder," was the answer.

Then Christine noticed the letter, and the half-effaced traces of emotion, and her heart misgave her; but she nerved herself to say, "I came to see your husband's picture."

"It is dere," was the brief reply.

Christine began to expatiate on its beauty, though perhaps for the first time she looked at a fine picture without really seeing it. She was at a loss how to introduce the object of her visit, but at last said, "Your husband is away?"

"Yes."

"He is taking care of one of my father's--of Mr. Fleet, I am told.

Have you heard from him as to Mr. Fleet's health?"

"Dis is Miss Ludolph?"

"Yes."

"You can no read Sherman?"

"Oh, yes, I can. German is my native tongue."

"Strange dot him should be so."

"Why?"

"Der Shermans haf hearts."

Christine flushed deeply, but Mrs. Bruder without a word put her husband's letter into her hand, and Christine read eagerly what, translated, is as follows:

"MY DEAR WIFE--Perhaps before this reaches you our best friend, our human savior, will be in heaven. There is a heaven, I believe as I never did before; and when Mrs. Fleet prays the gate seems to open, and the glory to stream right down upon us. But I fear now that not even her prayers can keep him. Only once he knew her; then he smiled and said, 'Mother, it is all right,' and dropped asleep. Soon fever came on again, and he is sinking fast. The doctor shakes his head and gives no hope. My heart is breaking. Marguerite, Mr. Fleet is not dying a natural death; he has been slain. I understand all his manner now, all his desperate hard work. He loved one above him in wealth--none could be above him in other respects--and that one was Miss Ludolph.

I suspected it, though till delirious, he scarcely ever mentioned her name. But now I believe she played with his heart--the n.o.blest that ever beat--and then threw it away, as if it were a toy instead of the richest offering ever made to a woman. Proud fool that she was; she has done more mischief than a thousand such frivolous lives as hers can atone for. I can write no more; my heart is breaking with grief and indignation."

As Christine read she suffered her veil to drop over her face. When she looked up she saw that Mrs. Bruder's gaze was fixed upon her as upon the murderer of her best friend. She drew her veil closer about her face, laid the letter down, and left the room without a word. She felt so guilty and miserable on her way home that it would scarcely have surprised her had a policeman arrested her for the crime with which her own conscience, as well as Mr. Bruder's letter, charged her; and yet her pride revolted at it all.

"Why should this affair take so miserable a form with me?" she said.

"To most it ends with a few sentimental sighs on one side, and as a good joke on the other. All seems to go wrong of late, and I am destined to have everything save happiness and the success upon which I set my heart. There is no more cruel mockery than to give one all save the very thing one wants; and, in seeking to grasp that, I have brought down upon myself this wretched, blighting experience. On this chaotic world! The idea of there being a G.o.d! Why, I could make a better world myself!" and she reached her home in such a morbid, unhappy state, that none in the great city need have envied the rich and flattered girl. Mechanically she dressed and came down to dinner.

During the afternoon Ernst, while out on an errand, had slipped home and heard the sad news. He returned to Mr. Ludolph's office crying.

To the question, "What is the matter?" he had answered, "Oh, Mr. Fleet is dying; he is dead by dis time!"

Mr. Ludolph was sadly shocked and pained, for as far as he could like anybody besides himself and daughter, he had been prepossessed in favor of his useful and intelligent clerk, and he was greatly annoyed at the thought of losing him. He returned full of the subject, and the first words with which he greeted Christine were, "Well, Fleet will hang no more pictures for you, and sing no more songs."