Hearts Afire

THE BETRAYAL.

Alone in his little house, Harleigh Daly read Charlotte’s letter twice through, slowly, slowly. Then his head fell upon his breast. He felt that he was lost, ruined; that Charlotte was lost and ruined.

At that late morning hour the “Universal Store” of Lady Denham, white with stucco, rich with gold ornamentation, with softly carved marbles and old pictures, was almost empty. A few pious old women moved vaguely here and there, wrapped in black shawls; a few strained their eyes toward the latest fashions. Charlotte and her mother, were standing in the middle of the store, with their eyes bent on the latest hats from Paris. Lysbet Morgan had a worn, sunken face that must have once been delicately pretty, with that sort of prettiness which fades before fifty. Charlotte wore a dark serge frock, with a jacket in the English fashion; and her brown hair was held in place by a comb of yellow tortoise-shell. The warm pallor of her face was broken by no trace of color. Every now and then she bit her lips nervously.

Presently the young girl rose.

“I am going to outside for a moment,” Charlotte said, walking toward the door.

Lysbet Morgan did not seek to detain her. With a light step she crossed the store and made it to front door without incident.

Charlotte stole swiftly out of the store into the street, where she hailed a carriage, and bade the good-man drive to Kalchhook Hill garden. She drew down the blinds of the carriage windows, and there in the darkness she could scarcely suppress a cry of mingled joy and pain to find herself at last alone and free.

The carriage rolled on and on; it was like the movement of a dream. The only thing she could think of was this beautiful and terrible idea, that she, Charlotte, had abandoned forever her home and her family, carrying away only so much of her savings as the purse in her pocket could hold, to throw herself into the arms of Harleigh Daly. No feeling of fear held her back. Her entire past life was ended, she could never take it up again; it was over, it was over.

In that sort of somnambulism which accompanies a decisive action, she was as exact and rigid in everything she had to do as an automaton. At the street by the garden she paid her driver, and mechanically bid him a good day.

She descended from the carriage when the driver tipped his hat, and followed the street toward the meeting place.

She went on, looking neither to right nor left, up the narrow, dusty lane that leads from the street to the garden’s gate. Neither hide nor hair noticed her; the solitary young woman, with the warm, pale face, and the great brown-black eyes that gazed straight forward, without interest in what they saw, the eyes of a soul consumed by an emotion. When she arrived at the meeting place, she ensconced herself on a bench near the garden, and looked out upon the path she had followed, as if waiting for somebody, or as if wishing to turn back.

And Charlotte was praying for the safe coming of Harleigh. If she could but see him, if she could but hear his voice, all her doubts, all her pains, would fly away.

“I adore him! I adore him! “She thought, and tried thus to find strength with which to combat her conscience. Her heart was filled with a single wish—to see Harleigh; he would give her strength; he was the reason for her life—he and love. She looked at her little child’s watch, the only jewel she had brought away; she had a long time still to wait before half past one.

Charlotte was strangely fatigued; she had exhausted her forces in making the journey hither; the tumult of emotion she had gone through had prostrated her. Now she felt utterly alone and abandoned —a poor, unfortunate creature bearing through this dead city a heavy burden of solitude and weariness: and when, after a long rest, she got up to stretch herself a great sigh broke from her lips.

Suddenly a feeling of some watching her swept across her body. She looked up, and saw Harleigh across the street, gazing down on her with an infinite despairing tenderness.

Charlotte, unable to speak, ran toward the open garden gate. And a smile of happiness, like a great light, shone from her eyes, and a warm color mantled her cheeks. Harleigh had never seen her so beautiful. In an ecstasy of joy, feeling all her doubts die within her, feeling all the glory of her love spring to full life again, Charlotte could not understand why there was an expression of sorrow on Harleigh’s face.

“Do you love me—a great deal?”

“A great deal” Whispered Harleigh.

“You will always care for me?”

“Always.”

It was like a sad, soft echo, but the girl did not notice that; a veil of passion dimmed her perceptions. They walked on together, she close to him, so happy that her feet scarcely touched the earth, enjoying this minute of intense love with all the force of feeling that she possessed, with all the self-surrender of which human nature is capable. They walked on through the streets of the small town, without seeing, without looking. Only again and again she said softly: “Tell me that you love me— tell me that you love me!”

Two or three times he had answered simply, “Yes,” then he was silent.

Suddenly, Charlotte, not hearing his answer, stood still, and taking his arms in her hands, looked deep into his honest eyes, and asked, “ What is the matter ? “

Her voice trembled. He lowered his eyes.

“Nothing,” he said.

“Why are you so sad?”

“I am not sad,” Harleigh answered with an effort.

“You’re telling the truth?”

“I’m telling the truth.”

“Swear that you love me.”

“Do you need me to swear it?” He exclaimed with such sincerity and such pain that she was convinced, perceiving the sincerity, but not the pain.

But she was still troubled; there was still a bitterness in her joy.

“Let us go away, let us go away,” Charlotte said impatiently.

“We have time; we’ve plenty of time.”

“Let us go away! I don’t want to stay here any longer. I beg of you, let us go.”

He obeyed her passively and was silent. They entered the inn on their way to the carriage station. Charlotte was frightened; she didn’t care to talk of love to Harleigh before such witnesses, but she looked at him with fond, supplicating eyes. The two lovers were near the window, looking through the glass at the road that leads to the carriage station; and Charlotte was holding on to Harleigh’s arm, and he, confused, nervous, asked her if she would not like to dine, taking refuge from his embarrassment in the commonplace. No; she did not wish to dine, she wasn’t hungry. Afterwards, by-and-by.” And her voice failed her as she looked at the two diners sitting close to them.

“I wish” she began, whispering into Harleigh’s ear.

“What do you wish?”

“Take me away somewhere else, where I can say something to you.”

He hesitated; she blushed; then he left the room to speak to the landlord; returning presently, “Come,” he said.

“Where are we going?”

“Upstairs.”

“Why upstairs?”

“You will see.”

They went upstairs to the second floor, where the waiter who conducted them opened the door of an apartment consisting of a bedroom and sitting-room—a big bedroom, a tiny sitting-room—both having balconies that looked off over the town, and there the waiter left them alone.

Each of them was pale, silent, confused.

She looked round. The sitting-room was vulgarly furnished with a green sofa, two green easy-chairs, a center-table covered with a nut-colored jute tablecloth, and a marble console. The thought of the many strangers who had inhabited it inspired her with a sort of shame. Then she glanced into the bedroom. It was very large, with two beds at the farther end, a dressing-table, a sofa, and a wardrobe. These pieces of furniture seemed lost in the vast bare-looking chamber. It gave her a shudder merely to look into it; and yet again she blushed.

She raised her eyes to Harleighs, and she noticed anew that he was gazing at her with an expression of great sadness.

“What is the matter?” Charlotte asked.

He did not answer. He sat down and buried his face in his hands.

“Tell me what it is,” she insisted, trembling with anger and anguish.

He remained silent. Perhaps he was weeping behind his hands.

“If you don’t tell me what it is, I’ll go back home,” she said.

He did not speak.

“You despise me because I have left my home.’'

“No, Charlotte,” Harleigh murmured.

“You think I’m dreadful—you think of me as an abandoned creature.”

“No, dear one—no.”

“Perhaps—you—love another woman.”

“You can’t think that.”

“Perhaps — you have—another tie—without love.”

“None; I am bound to no one.”

“You have promised yourself to no one?” “To no one.”

“Then why are you so sad? Why do you weep? Why do you tremble? It is I who ought to weep and tremble, and yet I don’t weep unless to see you weep. Your weeping breaks my heart, makes me desperate.”

“Charlotte, listen to me. By the memory of what is good I implore you to listen, to understand. I am miserable because of you, on your account— in thinking of what I have allowed you to do, of how you are throwing away your future, of the unhappiness that awaits you; without a home, without a name, persecuted by your family.”

“If you loved me, you wouldn’t think these things; you wouldn’t say them.”

“I have always said them, Charlotte; I have always repeated them. I have ruined you. For three days I have been in an agony of remorse; it is the same today. Though you are the love of my life, I must say it to you. Today I can’t forgive myself; tomorrow you will be unable to forgive me. Oh, my love! I am a man of good upbringing, I am a man of morals; and yet I have been weak enough to allow you and me to commit this sin, this fault.”

Speaking thus, with an infinite earnestness, all the honesty of his noble soul showed itself, a soul bowed down by remorse. She looked at him and listened to him with stupefaction, amazed at this spectacle of a rectitude, of a virtue that was greater than love, for she believed only in love.

“I don’t understand you” Charlotte said.

And yet you must—you must. If you don’t see the reasons for my conduct you will despise me, you will hate me. You must try, with all your heart, with all your mind, to understand. You mustn't let yourself be carried away by your love. You must be calm, you must be cool headed.”

“I can’t.”

“O Charlotte!” he said in despair.

Again he was silent. She mechanically, to overcome the trembling of her hands, pulled at the fringe of the tablecloth. She tried to reflect, to understand. And always, always, she had the same feeling, the same idea, and she could not help trying to express it in words: “You don’t love me enough.” She looked into his eyes as she spoke, concentrating her whole soul in her voice and in her gaze.

“It is true, I don’t love you enough,” he answered.

She made no sound: she was cut to the heart. The little sitting-room, the inn, the room, the whole world appeared to go whirling round her dizzily. She had a feeling as if her temples would burst open, and pressed her hands to them instinctively.

“Ah, then,” she said, after a long pause, in a broken voice—“ah, then, you have deceived me?”

I have deceived you,” he murmured humbly.

“You haven’t loved me?”

“Not enough to forget everything else. I have already said so.”

“I understand. What was the use of lying?”

“Because you were beautiful and good, and you loved me, and I didn't see this danger. I didn’t dream that you would wish to give up everything in this way, that I should be unable to prevent.”

“Words, words. The essential is, you don’t love me.”

“As you wish to be loved, as you deserve to be loved—no.”

“That is, without blind passion?”

“Without blind passion.”

“That is, without fire, without enthusiasm?”

“Without fire, without enthusiasm.”

“Then, with what?”

“With tenderness, with affection, with devotion.” “It is not enough, not enough, not enough,” Charlotte said monotonously, as if talking in her sleep. “Don’t you know how to love differently? More—as I love?”

“No, I don’t know how.”

“Do you think you never can? Perhaps you can tomorrow, or in the future?”

“No, I never can, Charlotte. I shall always prefer duty to happiness.”

“Poor, weak creature “Charlotte murmured with immense scorn.

Harleigh lifted his eyes towards heaven, as if seeking strength to endure his martyrdom.

“So,” Charlotte went on, slowly, “if we were to live together, you would be unhappy?”

“We should both be unhappy, and the sight of your unhappiness, of which I should be the cause, would kill me.”

“Well, then?”

“It’s for you to say what you wish.”

The cruel, the terrible reality was clear to her; there was only one thing to be said, and that was so unexpectedly dreadful that she hesitated to say it. The truth was so horrible, she could not bear to give it shape in speech. She looked at him— at this man who, to save her, inflicted such inexpressible pain upon her. And he understood that Charlotte could not pronounce the last words. He himself, in spite of his great courage, could not speak them, those last words, for he loved the girl truly. The terrible truth appalled them both.

Charlotte e got up stiffly and went to the window and leaned her forehead against the glass, looking out over the town and down the road that led to the little carriage station. Twice before that day she had looked at the same silent landscape; but in the early afternoon, when she was alone, waiting, thrilling with hope, and again, only an hour ago, leaning on Harleigh’s arm, she had possessed entire the priceless treasure of a great love. Now, now all was over; nevermore, nevermore would she know the delight of love: all was over, all, all.

Harleigh had not moved from where he sat with his face buried in his hands. Suddenly Charlotte seized him by the shoulders, forced him to raise his head, and began to speak, so close to him that he could feel her warm breath on his cheek.

“And yet you did love me” she said, passionately, “You can’t deny it; I know it. I have seen you turn pale when you met me, as pale as I myself. If I spoke to you my voice made your eyes brighten, as your voice made my heart leap. You looked for me everywhere, as I looked for you, feeling that the world would be colorless without love. And your letters bore the imprint of a great tenderness. But that is love, true love, passionate love, which isn’t forgotten in a day or in a year, for which a whole lifetime is not sufficient. It isn’t possible that you don’t love me anymore. You do love me; you are deceiving me when you say you don’t. I don’t know why. But speak the truth—tell me that it is impossible for you to have got over such a passion.”

He felt all his courage leaving him under this tumult of words.

“Harleigh, Harleigh, think of what you are doing in denying our love. Think of the two lives you are ruining; for you yourself will be as miserable as I. Harleigh, you will kill me; if you leave me here, I shall kill myself. Let us go away; let us go away together. Take me away.”

It seemed for a moment as if he were on the point of giving way, He was a man with a man’s nerves, a man’s senses, a man’s heart; and he loved her ardently. But when again she begged him to fly with her, and he felt himself almost yielding, he made a great effort to resist her.

“I can’t, Charlotte; I cannot,” he said in a low voice.

“Then you wish me to die?”

“You won’t die. You are young. You will live to be happy again.”

“All is over for me, Harleigh. This is death.”

“No, it’s not death, Charlotte.”

“You talk like father” she cried, moving away from him. “You speak like a skeptic who has neither love nor faith. You are just like him.”

“You insult me; but you’re right.”

“I am dishonored: do you realize that? I am a fugitive from my family; I am alone here with you in a hotel. I am dishonored, dishonored, coward that you are. You can go home quietly, having had an amusing adventure; but I—I have no home any more. I was a good girl; now I am lost.”

“Your people know where you are and what you have done—that you have done nothing wrong. They know that you have done it in response to a generous impulse for one who was not worthy of you, but who has respected you.”

“And who told them?”

“I did.”

“When?”

“This morning.”

“To whom did you tell it?”

“To your mother and your father.”

“Did they come to ask you?”

“No, I went to them.”

“And what did you agree upon amongst you?”

“That I should come here and meet you.”

“And then?”

“That I should leave you.”

“When?”

“When your father was ready to come and fetch you.”

“It’s a beautiful plan,” Charlotte said, icily. “The plan of calm, practical men. Bravo, bravo! You—you ran to my family, to exculpate yourself, to accuse me, to reassure them. Good, good! I am a mad child, guilty of a youthful escapade, which fortunately hasn’t touched my reputation. You denounced me, told them that I wanted to elope with you; and you are a gentleman! Good! The whole thing was wonderfully well combined. I am to return home with father as if I had made a harmless little excursion, and what’s done is done. You’re right, of course; Father is right, mother is right; you are all right. I alone am wrong. Oh, the laughable adventure! To attempt an elopement, and to fail in it, because the man won’t elope. To return home because your lover has denounced you to your family! What a comedy! You are right. There has been great catastrophe. The solution is immensely humorous: I know it. I am like a suicide who didn’t kill herself. You are right. I am wrong. And she looked Harleigh full in the face, withering him with her glance. “Be gone! I despise you. Be gone!”

“Charlotte, Charlotte, don’t send me away like this.”

“Be gone! The cowardly way in which you have behaved is past contempt. Be gone!”

“We mustn’t part like this.”

“We are already parted, utterly separated. We have always been separated. Go away.”

“Charlotte, what I have done I have done for your sake, for your good. Now you send me away. Afterwards you will do me justice. I am an honorable man—that is my fault.”

“I don’t know you. Good-day.”

“But what will you do alone here?”

“That doesn’t concern you. Good-day.”

“Let me wait for your father.”

“If you don’t go at once I’ll open the window and throw myself from the balcony,” Charlotte said, with so much firmness that he believed her.

“Good-bye, then.”

“Good-bye.”

Charlotte stood in the middle of the room, a small red spot burning in each of her cheeks, and watched him go out, heard him descend the staircase, slowly, with the heavy step of one bearing a great burden. She leaned from the window and saw the shadow of a man issue from the door of the inn—it was Harleigh. He stood still for a moment, and then turned into the high road that leads back to the garden, and again stood still, as if to wait for somebody there. Charlotte saw him turn towards the windows of the hotel, and gaze up at them earnestly. At last he moved slowly away and disappeared.

Charlotte came back into the room, and threw herself upon the sofa, biting its cushions to keep herself from screaming. Her head was on fire, but she couldn’t weep—not a tear, not a single tear.

And in the midst of her trouble, constantly— whether, as at one moment, she was pitying herself as a poor child to whom a monstrous wrong had been done, or as, at the next, burning with scorn as a great lady offended in her pride; or again, blushing with shame as she thought of the imminent arrival of her father—in the midst of it all, through it all, constantly, one little agonizing, implacable phrase kept repeating itself: “All is over, all is over.”

By-and-by after Harleigh departed she heard her name called outside the door: “Charlotte! Charlotte!”

She fell on her knees before door, sobbing: “Forgive me father, forgive me father.”

Joris Morgan, with a tremor in his voice, murmured, “My poor child.”