Mary Greenway McClelland - Princess

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"I do not want the case to come into court here, Nesbit, and you know
that I do not! Why do you delight in tormenting me?"

"Listen to me, Ethel. I've no wish to torment you. I simply wished to
show you that I would abide by my rights, and that I have some
power--all the power which money can give--on my side. Our marriage
has been a miserable mistake from the first; we rushed into it without
knowledge of each other's characters and dispositions, and, like most
couples who take matrimony like a five-barred gate, we've come horribly
to grief. I shall not stand in your way; if you wish to go, I shall
not hinder you. This is what I propose: I'll help you in the matter,
will take all the trouble, make the arrangements, bear all the expense.
It will be necessary for one of us to go to Illinois, and see these
lawyers, if the divorce is to be gotten there. It may be necessary to
undergo a short residence in the state in order to simulate
citizenship, and make the divorce legal. I'll find out about this, and
if it's necessary I will do it. After the divorce, I'll allow you the
use of this house, and a sufficient income to support it; and also the
custody of our son as long as you remain unmarried. In return, you
must waive all right to the boy for the years you can legally claim
him, and must bind yourself to surrender him to me, or any person I
appoint, at least a month before any such marriage, and never, by word
or act, to interfere in his future life, or any disposition I may think
best to make of him. I should also strongly object to any future
marriage taking place from my house, and should expect legal notice in
ample time to make arrangements about the boy."

"Would you allow me to see the child whenever I wished?"

"Certainly. I'm no brute, and you are his mother. I shall only
stipulate that the meetings take place in some other house than yours.
You are at liberty to visit him as often as you like, so long as you
are faithful to our agreement and leave his mind unbiased. I will
never mention you unkindly to him, and shall expect the same
consideration from you. When he is old enough to judge between us, he
will decide as he thinks right."

"Suppose you marry again, yourself. What about the child then? You
are very hard and uncompromising in your dictation to me, Nesbit, but I
can have feelings and scruples as well as you."

Thorne was startled. He considered that he was behaving well to his
wife. He wanted to behave well to her; to let the past go generously,
so that no shadow of reproach from it might fall upon the future. Her
tart suggestion set the affair in a new light. It was an unpleasant
light, and he turned his back on it, thinking that by so doing he
disposed of it. There was the distance of the two poles between
Pocahontas Mason and Cecil Cumberland. _He_ surely was the best judge
of what would conduce to the welfare of his son.

"We were discussing the probability of your re-marriage, not mine," he
responded coldly; "the reports in circulation have reached even me at
last."

"What reports?" with defiant inquiry.

"That you are seeking freedom from your allegiance to one man, in order
to swear fealty to another. That your vows to me are irksome because
they prevent your taking other vows to Cecil Cumberland. I pass over
the moral aspect of the affair; that must rest with your own
conscience," (it is astonishing how exemplary Thorne felt in
administering the rebuke); "that rests with your conscience," he
repeated, "and with that I've nothing to do. The existence of such
reports--which lays your conduct as a married woman open to
censure--gives me the right to dictate the terms of our legal
separation. I'm obliged to speak plainly, Ethel. You brought about
the issue, and must abide by the consequences. I've stated my terms
and it's for you to accept or decline them."

Thorne leaned back in his chair and watched the flames eat into the
heart of the hickory logs. He had no doubt of her decision, but he
awaited it courteously. The broken log had burned completely away, and
a little heap of whity-gray ashes lay on each side of the hearth.

Ethel sat and pondered, weighing at full value all the advantages and
disadvantages of the proposal and deciding that the former outweighed
the latter. The object on which she was bent--the thing which appeared
the greatest earthly good, was the divorce. At any cost, she would
obtain _that_, and obtain it as quickly and quietly as possible; no
talk, no exposure, no disagreeable comments. This was the main point,
and to carry it, Ethel Thorne felt herself capable of more than the
surrender of one small child. The separation at worst would only be
partial; she could see the boy every day if she wished--even after her
marriage with Cecil Cumberland. Nesbit had promised, and in all her
experience of him she had never known him break his word. Then she
could retain the little fellow until all these troublesome affairs
should be settled, which would disarm criticism and save appearances,
and appearances _must_ be preserved on account of the Cumberlands.

That a divorced daughter-in-law would be none too welcome in that
stately, old-fashioned family, Mrs. Thorne was well aware. Perhaps it
would be as well to be unhampered by such a forcible reminder of her
former state as the child, while she was winning the Cumberland heart
and softening the Cumberland prejudice. Cecil, she knew already,
regarded the baby with scant favor, and would be unfeignedly rejoiced
to be quit of him. On the whole, Nesbit was behaving well to her. She
had expected far more difficulty, infinitely more bitterness, for, like
the world, she gave her husband credit for the scruples of his father's
faith. Her heart softened toward him a little for the first time in
years--or would have softened, but for the blow he had dealt her
egregious self-love in letting her go so easily.

She signified her acceptance of his proposal in a few brusque,
ungracious words, for she considered it due to her dignity to be
disagreeable, in that she was acceding to terms, not dictating them.

Thorne rose from his chair with a deep breath of relief. The interview
had been intolerable to him, and although he had carried his point and
acquitted himself well, his prominent feeling was one of unqualified
disgust. What a lie his married life had been! What a sepulcher
filled with dead, dry bones! For the moment all womanhood was lowered
in his eyes because of his wife's heartless selfishness. Had she shown
any feeling about the boy--any ruth, or mother-love, Thorne knew that
he would not have driven so hard a bargain; felt that he might even
have let his compassion rule his judgment. But she had shown none; all
her thought and care had been for herself, and herself alone. And for
her, and such as her, men wrecked their lives. A flood of anger at his
past folly, of resentful bitterness at the price he had been forced to
pay for it, passed over Thorne. He could scarcely constrain himself to
the formal bow which courtesy required.

As he left the room, the sound of a child's wailing came down to him,
mingled with the sound of a woman's voice soothing it. He glanced back
at his wife; she had moved nearer the fire, her fair head with its
golden glory of hair was thrown back against the dark velvet of the
chair; she was smiling and the sound of the child's grief fell on
heedless ears.

CHAPTER XV.

Thorne had even less difficulty with his legal arrangements than he had
anticipated. He had, hitherto, relegated the subject of divorce to the
limbo of things as little thought and spoken of as possible by
well-bred people. He knew nothing of the _modus operandi_, and was
surprised at the ease and celerity with which the legal machine moved.

"I'll have to prove my identity, and the truth of my statements to the
men out there, I suppose," he remarked to the lawyer, from whom he
obtained all necessary information.

The lawyer laughed; he was a Southerner by birth, and his voice was
gentle, his manner courteous.

"Of your identity, Mr. Thorne, these men will take excellent care to
inform themselves, and of your responsibility also," he answered. "For
the truth of your statements, they are apt to take your word, and the
depositions of your witnesses, without troubling themselves about
substantiating the facts. The soundness of your evidence is your
lookout, not theirs. If the case were to be contested, it would be
different, but, in this instance, there is consent of both parties,
which simplifies matters. This case is reduced to a matter of mere
form and business."

"Apparently, then, my statements may be a tissue of lies from beginning
to end, for all the difference it makes," observed Thorne, curious to
discover how small a penknife could now cut the bond which once the
scythe of death alone was held to be able to sever.

"For your veracity, Mr. Thorne, your appearance is a sufficient
voucher," responded the lawyer, with a ready courtesy. "And the
looseness on which you comment, recollect, is all in your favor. When
a man has an unpleasant piece of business in hand, it's surely an
immense advantage to be able to accomplish it speedily and privately."

Thorne walked in the direction of his hotel in a state of
preoccupation. He was sore and irritated; he disliked it all
intensely; it jarred upon him and offended his taste. Over and over he
cursed it all for a damnable business from beginning to end. He was
perfectly aware, reasoning from cause to effect, that the situation
was, in some sort, his own fault; but that was a poor consolation.
That side of the question did not readily present itself; his horizon
was occupied by the nearer and more personal view. He loathed it all,
and was genuinely sorry for himself and conscious that fate was dealing
hardly by him.

As he turned a corner, he ran against a tall, handsome young lady, who
put out her hand and caught his arm to steady herself, laughing gayly:

"Take care, Nesbit!" she exclaimed, "you nearly knocked me down. Since
when have you taken to emulating Mrs. Wilfer's father, and 'felling'
your relatives to the earth?"

"Why, Norma! is it really you?" he questioned, refusing to admit the
evidence of sight and touch unfortified by hearing.

He was genuinely delighted to see her, and foresaw that she would be a
comfort to him during the days that must elapse before it became
possible for him to start for Illinois. He needed sympathy and some
one to make much of him. And Norma, with her lustrous eyes aglow with
the pleasure of the meeting, appeared to divine it, for she set herself
to entertain him with little incidents and adventures of her journey
from Virginia, and with scraps of intelligence of the people at home.
She did not mention Pocahontas, save in reply to a direct inquiry, and
then simply stated that she had spent a night at Lanarth a day or so
before coming North, and that the family were all well.

She cheered Thorne wonderfully, for she seemed to bring Virginia and
the life of the last few months nearer to him--the peaceful life in
which new hopes had budded, in which he had met, and known, and loved
Pocahontas. Norma did him good, raised his spirits, and made the
future look bright and cheerful; but not in the way she hoped and
intended. She had come North with the hope of furthering her own
plans, of making herself necessary and agreeable, of keeping the old
days fresh in his memory. And she _was_ necessary to him, as a trusted
comrade who had never failed him; a clever adviser in whose judgment he
had confidence; a charming friend who was fond of him, and who had, but
now, come from the enchanted land where his love dwelt. Of her plans
he knew nothing, suspected nothing; and the days she brought fresh to
his thoughts were days in which she had no part.

In a little while, he went West, and there was a period of uneventful
waiting; after which Norma received a Western paper containing a short
and unobtrusive notice of the granting of a divorce to Nesbit Thorne
from Ethel, his wife.

She bore it away to her room and gloated over it greedily. Then she
took her pen and ran it around the notice, marking it heavily; this
done, she folded, sealed and directed it in a clear, bold hand--General
Percival Smith,--Wintergreen Co., Virginia. It would save elaborate
explanations.

CHAPTER XVI.

Spring opened very late that year in Virginia--slowly and regretfully,
as though forced into doing the world a favor against its will, and
determined to be as grudging and disagreeable over it as possible. The
weather was cold, wet, and unwholesome--sulking and storming
alternately, and there was much sickness in the Lanarth and Shirley
neighborhood. The Christmas had been a green one--only one small spurt
of snow on Christmas eve, which vanished with the morning. The negroes
were full of gloomy prognostications in consequence, and shook their
heads, and cast abroad, with unction, all sorts of grewsome prophecies
anent the fattening of the church-yard.

All through the winter, Mrs. Mason had been ailing, and about the
beginning of March she succumbed to climatic influences, backed by
hereditary tendency, and took to her bed with a severe attack of
inflammatory rheumatism. Pocahontas had her hands full with household
care and nursing, and perhaps it was as well, for it drove self into
the background of her mind, for a part of the time at least, and filled
with anxiety the empty days. Grace, living five miles away and loaded
down with family cares and duties of her own, could be of little
practical assistance.

The winter had been a hard one for Pocahontas, harder, perhaps, for the
gallant nature which forbade her to bewail herself. She suffered
deeply and dumbly through all the weary nights and days. Pride and
womanly reserve precluded all beating of the breast, and forced
principle and nature to the ceaseless fight. Right gallantly she bore
herself. The mortification, the anguish, the love, must be met, hand
to hand, eye to eye, foot to foot. She endeavored to keep cheerful--to
take the same interest in life as formerly, and in the main she
succeeded; but there would come times when the struggle would seem
greater than she could bear, and being a woman, with a woman's heart,
and a woman's nerves, she would be irritable and difficult. But these
moods were never of long duration, any more than the more desperate
ones, when she would lock herself in her chamber and cast herself on
the floor and lie there prone and quivering--heart and conscience
utterly at variance--heart crying out with mad insistence that the
struggle was in vain; for love was strengthened by repression; and
conscience sternly replying that it should not be; the struggle should
continue until the last vestige of love should be expunged from heart
and life. It was no wonder, as time went on, that the girl's cheek
paled and that a dumb pleading came into the pure gray eyes.

Sometimes the thought of Jim would come and place itself in contrast to
the thought of the other man, for, unconsciously to her, her old friend
was her standard in many things. Her recognition of the nobility of
Jim's love would force, in some sort, recognition of the selfishness of
Thorne's love. She put such thoughts from her fiercely, and girded at
Jim in her aching, unreasonable heart, because his love was grander and
truer than the love she craved. Once, when old Sholto--the great red
setter--came and laid his head lovingly upon her lap, she frowned and
pushed him roughly away, because he looked up at her with eyes whose
honest faithfulness reminded her of Jim.

And the mother watched her child silently; conscious, through the
divination of unselfish mother-love, that her daughter suffered, yet
powerless to help her, save by increased affection and the intangible
yet perceptible comfort of a delicate respect. She could trust her
child and would not force her confidence; if spoken sympathy were
needed, Pocahontas knew that her mother's heart was open to her, and if
to her silence should seem best, she should have her will. From long
experience Mrs. Mason knew that some sorrows must be left quietly to
time.

When at length the news of Thorne's divorce reached them, she warded
off with tender consideration all remark or comment likely to hurt the
girl, and gave straight-forward, hot-tempered Berkeley a hint which
effectually silenced him. In sooth, the honest fellow had small liking
for the subject. He bitterly resented what he considered Thorne's
culpable concealment of the fact of his marriage. He remembered the
night of the ball at Shirley, and the memory rankled. It did not occur
to him that the matter having remained a secret might have been the
natural result of an unfortunate combination of circumstances, and in
no sort the consequence of calculation or dishonor on Thorne's part.
Neither did it occur to him, large-minded man though he was, to try to
put himself in Thorne's place and so gain a larger insight into the
affair, and the possibility of arriving at a fairer judgment.
Berkeley's interest in the matter was too personal to admit of
dispassionate analysis, or any impulse toward mercy, or even justice.
His anger burned hotly against Thorne, and when the thought of him rose
in his mind it was accompanied by other thoughts which it is best not
to put into words.

During Mrs. Mason's illness, little Blanche was unremitting in her
attentions, coming over daily with delicacies of her own concoction,
and striving to help her friends with a sweet, unobtrusive kindness
which won hearty response from both ladies, and caused them to view
Berkeley's increasing attentions to the little maid with pleasure.
They even aided the small idyl by every lawful means, having the girl
with them as often as they could and praising her judiciously.

With her winsome, childish ways and impulsiveness, Blanche formed a
marked contrast to grave, reserved Berkeley Mason, and was perhaps
better suited to him on that account. When their engagement was
announced, there was no lack of congratulation and satisfaction in both
families. The general, as he gave his hearty approbation to her
choice, pinched her ears and asked what had become of her objections to
Virginia; and Percival tormented her unceasingly, twitting her with her
former wails of lamentation. Blanche did not care. She took their
teasing in good part, and retorted with merry words and smiles and
blushes. She had made her journey to the unknown, and returned with
treasure.

Mrs. Smith, in her chamber, smiled softly, and thought on muslin and
lace and wedding favors.

CHAPTER XVII.

The weeks rolled by, and gradually Mrs. Mason grew convalescent. She
was still confined to her room, but the worst of the pain was over, and
she could lie on the sofa by the fireside and have Berkeley read aloud
to her in the evenings. Blanche, if she happened to be there, would
sit on a low chair beside the sofa, busy with some delicate bit of
fancy work, and later in the evening Berke would take her home.
Sometimes Pocahontas would bring her work and listen, or pretend to
listen, with the rest, but oftener she would go into the parlor and
play dreamily to herself for hours. She had taken up her music
industriously and practiced hard in her spare moments.

She had been playing a long time one evening in April, and had left the
piano for a low chair beside the open fire. She was tired. Although
spring had come, the evenings were chill and the room was large. Her
hands were cold and she spread them out to the blaze. The heavy
curtains billowed and sank and billowed again, as intrusive puffs of
wind crept officiously through the crevices of the old casements.
Blanche and Berkeley were with her mother, and they were reading "Lorna
Doone." She had read the book a week ago, and did not care to hear it
over.

The front door opened quietly--it was always on the latch--and
footsteps came along the hall; quick, eager footsteps, straight to the
parlor door; the knob turned. No need to turn her head, no need to
question of her heart whose step, whose hand that was, to guess whose
presence filled the room.

Thorne came across the room, and stood opposite, a great light of joy
in his eyes, his hands outstretched for hers. Benumbed with many
emotions, Pocahontas half-rose, an inarticulate murmur dying on her
lips. Thorne put her gently back into her chair, and drew one for
himself up to the hearth-rug near her; he was willing to keep silence
for a little space, to give her time to recover herself; he was
satisfied for the moment with the sense of her nearness, and his heart
was filled with the joy of seeing her once more. The lamps were lit,
but burning dimly. Thorne rose and turned both to their fullest
brilliancy; he must have light to see his love.

"I want to look at you, Princess," he said gently, seeking her eyes,
with a look in his not to be misunderstood; "it has been so long--so
cruelly long, my darling, since I have looked on your sweet face. You
must not call the others. For this first meeting I want but you--you
only, my love! my queen!" His voice lingered over the terms of
endearment with exquisite tenderness.

Pocahontas was silent--for her life she could not have spoken then.
Her gray eyes had an appealing, terrified look as they met his; her
trembling hands clasped and unclasped in her lap.

"How frightened you look, my darling," Thorne murmured, speaking softly
and keeping a tight rein over himself. "Your eyes are like a startled
fawn's. Have I been too abrupt--too thoughtless and inconsiderate?
You would forgive me, love, if you knew how I have longed for you; have
yearned for this meeting as Dives yearned for water--as the condemned
yearn for reprieve. Have you no smile for me, sweetheart?--no word of
welcome for the man whose heaven is your love? You knew I would come.
You knew I loved you, Princess."

"Yes;"--the word was breathed, rather than uttered, but he heard it,
and made a half movement forward, the light in his eyes glowing more
passionately. Still, he held himself in check; he would give her time.

"You knew I loved you, Princess," he repeated. "Yes, you must have
known. Love like mine could not be concealed; it _must_ burn its way
through all obstacles from my heart to yours, melting and fusing them
into one. Don't try to speak yet, love, there is no need to answer
unless you wish. I can wait--for I am near you."

Pocahontas rallied her forces resolutely, called up her pride, her
womanhood, her sense of the wrong he had done her. If she should give
way an instant--if she should yield a hair's breadth, she would be
lost. The look in his eyes, the tenderness of his voice, appeared to
sap the foundations of her resolution and to turn her heart to wax
within her.

"Why have you come?" she wailed, her tone one of passionate reproach.
"Had you not done harm enough? Why have you come?"

Thorne started slightly, but commanded himself. It was the former
marriage; the divorce; she felt it keenly--every woman must; some
cursed meddler had told her.

"My darling," he answered, with patient tenderness, "you know why I
have come--why it was impossible for me to keep away. I love you,
Princess, as a man loves but once in his life. Will you come to me?
Will you be my wife?"

The girl shook her head, and moved her hand with a gesture of denial;
words she had none.

"I know of what you are thinking, Princess. I know the idea that has
taken possession of your mind. You have heard of my former marriage,
and you know that the woman who was my wife still lives. Is it not
so?" She bent her head in mute assent. Thorne gazed at her pale,
resolute face with his brows knit heavily, and then continued:

"Listen to me, Princess. That woman--Ethel Ross--is my wife no longer,
even in name; she ceased to be my wife in fact two years ago. Our
lives have drifted utterly asunder. It was her will, and I acquiesced
in it, for she had never loved me, and I--when my idiotic infatuation
for her heartless, diabolical beauty passed, had ceased to love her.
At last, even my presence became a trouble to her, which she was at no
pains to conceal. The breach between us widened with the years, until
nothing remained to us but the galling strain of a useless fetter. Now
that is broken, and we are free,"--there was an exultant ring in his
voice, as though his freedom were precious to him.

"Were you bound, or free, that night at Shirley?" questioned the girl,
slowly and steadily.

A flush crept warmly over Thorne's dark face, and lost itself in the
waves of his hair. He realized that he would meet with more opposition
here than he had anticipated. No matter; the prize was worth fighting
for--worth winning at any cost. His determination increased with the
force opposed to it, and so did his desire.

"In heart and thought I was free, but in _fact_ I was bound," he
acknowledged. "The words I spoke on the steps that night escaped me
unaware. I was tortured by jealousy, and tempted by love. I had no
right to speak them then; nothing can excuse or palliate the weakness
which allowed me to. I should have waited until I could come to you
untrammeled--as now. I attempt no justification of my madness,
Princess. I have no excuse but my love, and can only sue for pardon.
You will forgive me, sweetheart"--using the old word tenderly--"for the
sake of my great love. It's my only plea"--his voice took a pleading
tone as he advanced the plea hardest of all for a woman to steel her
heart against.

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