Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories Part 20

"Emily, my darling," he said, while his voice shook with repressed feeling (the old affectionate names rose as of themselves to his lips, and it seemed an inconceivable joy to speak them once more); "you must have suffered much."

"I think I have deserved it, Edmund," she answered with a little pout and a little quiver of her upper lip. "After all, the worst was that I had to lose my baby. But you are very good to her, Edmund, are you not?"

Her eyes now filled with tears, and they began to fall slowly, one by one, down over her cheeks.

"Yes, darling," he broke forth,--the impulse of tenderness now overmastering all other thoughts. "And I will be good to you also, Emily, if you will only let me."

He had risen and drawn her lithe, unresisting form to his bosom. She wept silently, a little convulsive sob now and then breaking the stillness.

"You will not leave me again, Edmund, will you?" she queried, with a sweet, distressed look, as if the very thought of being once more alone made her shudder.

"No, Emily dear, I will never leave you."

"Can you believe me, Edmund?" she began suddenly, after a long pause.

"I have always been true to you."

He clasped her face between his palms, drew it back to gaze at it, and then kissed her tenderly.

"G.o.d bless you, darling!" he whispered, folding her closely in his arms, as if he feared that some one might take her away from him.

How he would love and keep and protect her--this poor bruised little creature, whom he had once so selfishly abandoned at the very first suspicion of disloyalty! As she stood there, nestling so confidingly against his bosom, his heart went out to her with a great yearning pity, and he thanked G.o.d even for the long suffering and separation which had made their love the more abiding and sacred.

The next day Storm and Emily were quietly married, and the baby and I were present as witnesses. They now live in a charming little cottage on the Jersey side, which is to me a wonder of taste and comfort. Out of my friend's miscellaneous a.s.sortment of ancient furniture his wife has succeeded in creating a series of the quaintest, most fascinating boudoirs and parlors and bedrooms--everything, as Storm a.s.sures me, historically correct and in perfect style and keeping; so that, in walking through the house, you get a whiff of at least three distinct centuries. To quote Storm once more, he sleeps in the sober religious atmosphere of the German Reformation, with its rational wood-tints and solid oaken carvings, dines amid the pagan splendors of the Italian Renaissance, and receives company among the florid conventionalities of the French rococo period.