Master of the Vineyard Part 36

[Sidenote: Murmur of Voices]

The peace of it came to Rosemary, as she walked, with the sense of healing, of balm. She saw plainly how Grandmother had wronged her, every day of her life, but set resentment aside, simply, as something that did not belong to her. The appointed thing came at the appointed time in the appointed way--there was no terror save her own fear. Outside herself was a ma.s.s of circ.u.mstance beyond her control, but, within herself, was the power of adjustment, as, when two dominant notes are given, the choice of the third makes either dissonance or harmony.

Tired, at last, for she had walked far upstream into the hills, Rosemary sat down upon a convenient rock to rest. The sh.o.r.es were steep, now, but just beyond her was a little cleft between two hills--a pleasant, sunny s.p.a.ce, with two or three trees and a great rock, narrowing back into a thicket. She went on, after a few moments, down the slope to the level place, lay at full length upon the thick turf, and drank thirstily from the river.

In a moment, she heard the slow splash of oars, and the murmur of voices, both low and deep, though one evidently belonged to a man and one to a woman. Boats were infrequent upon the river, and, not caring to be seen, she stepped back into the thicket until it should pa.s.s.

[Sidenote: Mute and Frightened]

The voices came nearer and nearer, the man's full-toned and vaguely familiar, the woman's musical, vibrant, and, in a way, familiar too.

A single powerful stroke brought the boat into view, as it rounded the curve. It was Alden and Edith. The girl stepped back still farther into the sheltering thicket, repressing the cry of astonishment that rose to her lips. Acutely self-conscious, it seemed that the leaves were no protection; that she stood before them helpless, unconcealed.

Trembling, she sat down on a low, flat stone, for she had suddenly become too weak to stand. Much to her dismay, Alden swung the head of the boat toward the sh.o.r.e. They were going to land!

Mute and frightened, she watched him as he a.s.sisted her to the sh.o.r.e, saw him return to the boat for a basket covered with a white cloth, and draw the oars up to the bank.

Rosemary instantly comprehended the emotions of an animal in a trap. She scarcely dared to breathe, much less move. Unwilling to listen, she put her fingers in her ears and turned her head away, but presently the position became so strained and uncomfortable that she had to give it up. Their voices were plainly audible.

[Sidenote: A Picnic]

"I thought I heard a rustle behind that thicket," said Edith. She was lovely in her gown of pale green linen, and carried a white linen parasol instead of wearing a hat.

"It's a bird, or a squirrel," he a.s.sured her. "n.o.body ever comes here."

"Are we n.o.body?"

"Indeed not--we're everybody. The world was made just for us two."

"I wish I could believe you," Edith returned, sadly. Then she added, with swift irrelevance: "Why do people always take hard-boiled eggs to picnics?"

"To mitigate the pickles," he responded. "There always are pickles--see?

I knew Mother would put some in."

"Wine, too," commented Edith, peering into the basket. "Why, it's almost a party!"

Alden's face took on a grave, sweet boyishness. "I did that myself," he said. "Mother didn't know. Wait until I tell you. The day I was born, my father set aside all the wine that was that day ready for bottling.

There wasn't much of it. All these years, it's been untouched on one particular shelf in the storeroom, waiting, in dust and cobwebs. At sunset he went to Mother, and told her what he had done. 'It's for the boy,' he said. 'It's to be opened the day he finds the woman he loves as I love you.'"

"And--" Edith's voice was almost a whisper.

[Sidenote: The Time Has Come]

"The time has come. I may have found her only to lose her again, but she's mine--for to-day."

He filled two small gla.s.ses, and, solemnly, they drank. The light mood vanished as surely as though they had been in a church, at some unwonted communion. Behind the leafy screen, Rosemary trembled and shook. She felt herself sharply divided into a dual personality. One of her was serene and calm, able to survey the situation unemotionally, as though it were something that did not concern her at all. The other was a deeply pa.s.sionate, loving woman, who had just seen her life's joy taken from her for ever.

Alden, leaning back against the rock near which they sat, was looking at Edith as a man looks at but one woman in all his life. To Rosemary, trembling and cold, it someway brought a memory of her father's face, in the faded picture. At the thought, she clenched her hands tightly and compressed her lips. So much she had, made hers eternally by a grave. No one could take from her the thrilling sense of kinship with those who had given her life.

Edith looked out upon the river. Her face was wistful and as appealing as a child's. "Found," she repeated, "though only to lose again."

"Perhaps not," he answered, hopefully. "Wait and see."

[Sidenote: Never Again]

"Life is made of waiting," she returned, sadly--"woman's life always is." Then with a characteristically quick change of mood, she added, laughingly: "I know a woman who says that all her life, before she was married, she was waiting for her husband, and that since her marriage, she has noticed no difference."

Alden smiled at the swift anti-climax, then his face grew grave again.

He packed the few dishes in the basket, rinsed the wine gla.s.ses in the river, brought them back, and gave one to Edith.

"We'll break the bottle," he said, "and the gla.s.ses, too. They shall never be used again."

The shattered crystal fell, tinkling as it went. The wine made a deep, purple stain upon the stone. He opened his arms.

"No," whispered Edith. "It only makes it harder, when----"

"Beloved, have you found so much sweetness in the world that you can afford to pa.s.s it by?" She did not answer, so he said, pleadingly: "Don't you want to come?"

She turned toward him, her face suddenly illumined. "I do, with all my soul I do."

"Then come. For one little hour--for one dear hour--ah, dearest, come!"

Rosemary averted her face, unable to bear it. When she turned her miserable eyes toward them again, allured by some strange fascination she was powerless to a.n.a.lyse, Edith was in his arms, her mouth crushed to his.

[Sidenote: Yours Alone]

"Dear, dearest, sweetheart, beloved!" the man murmured. "I love you so!"

There was a pause, then he spoke again. "Do you love me?"

"Yes," she breathed. "A thousand times, yes!"

"Say it," he pleaded. "Just those three words."

"I love you," she answered, "for everything you have been and everything you are and everything you are going to be, for always. I love you with a love that is yours alone. It never belonged to anybody else for the merest fraction of a second, and never can. It was born for you, lives for you, and will die when you need it no more."

"Ah," he said, "but I need it always. I've wanted you all my life."

"And will," she sighed, trying to release herself.

"Edith! Don't! I can't bear it! Take the golden hour as the glittering sands of eternity sweep past us. So much is yours and mine, out of all that is past and to come."

"As you wish," she responded. Then, after another pause, she said: "Don't you want to read to me?"

Rosemary, dumb and hopeless, saw them sit down, close together, and lean against the rock, where the sunlight made an aureole of Edith's hair.

He slipped his arm around her, and she laid her head upon his shoulder, with a look of heavenly peace upon her pale face. Never had the contrast between them been more painful than now, for Edith, with love in her eyes, was exquisite beyond all words.

[Sidenote: The Red Book Again]