Chapter XXXIV: He Told Her That He Loved Her

Not a word had been said between Bertha and Waldon about meeting in the park at any time. But in his careless, poetic way, he had spoken of its greenness and luxuriant beauty, describing various leafy nooks and rocky points with rare enthusiasm, which made her feel as if it would be Heaven to see those places while his words were burning in her brain.

For two or three days, Bertha resisted the keen desire that possessed her, and kept away from the park—though it was not far off—for quiet, womanly delicacy was stronger in her than the mesmeric influence this man had cast upon her. But the fourth day found her in the rocky hollow about which he had been most eloquent. It was only a small ravine, adown which a blue-waved brook crept lakeward between a double fringe of fresh grasses, seeded ferns, and long, trailing ivy, which swung down into the shadows, and kept the moist air in perpetual motion. Above her, great masses of Virginia creeper covered the leaning rocks with curtains of crimson flame, and through them came a line of shimmering silver, which made the brook dimple and laugh among its shadows, like a healthy child aroused from sleep at daybreak.

In a cleft of the rocks, hidden away among the burning foliage of the creeper, a man sat, with a book in his hand, gazing quietly down upon Bertha’s bright face, as she turned it from object to object, searching out his description in the beautiful reality.

Waldon would not disturb her yet; her form came out so gracefully from the shadows. The queenly bend of her head—the light upon her cheek, which glowed like a sun-kissed carnation—the picture was perfect. He would have broken a statue, or dashed his hand through the superb coloring of a picture, rather than startle her from that exquisite pose. So he lay idly among the ripe leaves, enjoying the life and beauty of that vision; believing that it was thoughts of him which gave the rich coloring to her face.

So it was. In the depths of her heart she had expected to find him somewhere in this labyrinth of greenness and shadows, and shame that she did expect him burned in her face. She had not seen or heard from him in days, and a hungry desire to hear his voice possessed her.

All at once that living picture was broken up. Something had disturbed the girl. She started back, took a footpath that wound out of the ravine, and Waldon could just see the flutter of her garments, as the wind from one of the small lakes took them.

Waldon closed his book, seized hold of a mountain ash, and swung out of his leafy lair down to the ravine. Softly, and holding his breath, he picked his way through the clustering ferns, and stood close behind Bertha, who was searching the carriage-road on the other side that tiny lake, with the wistful earnestness of a person who waits for something dear as life itself.

“He will not come!” she muttered, dropping the hand that shaded her eyes, with a gesture of keen disappointment. “Perhaps those other days he waited as I have now.”

Waldon heard this, and a flash of triumph shot over his face. Back he stole into the ravine, softly as he had advanced, laughing gently to himself. There was no doubt of it now; the girl had come to meet him. All his anxiety of the last few days, when he lay among the red vine leaves watching for her, was over now. She had struggled against herself bravely, but had come at last, obeying the faint hint he had ventured to drop, unconsciously perhaps.

“Now, now!” he said, clenching and unclenching his hands in an ecstasy of delight. “Now she is mine! mine! mine!”

The footpath which Bertha had pursued in one direction led in another to a recess, or tiny cove, formed by two great round rocks striking against each other at their largest circumference, and leaving a mossy hollow underneath. In this hollow Waldon placed himself, and watched the unconscious girl from its shadows.

Bertha came slowly up the ravine, with a listless, saddened air, her feet, weary with disappointment, dragging through the grass, her figure drooping, and all the rich color quenched in her cheek. She broke off a bit of ivy from a branch that trailed over the rocks she was passing, and flung it with a passionate gesture into the brook. This brought her eyes into view, and he saw that tears flashed through their dusky disappointment.

Again his heart leaped with exultation. She had turned now, and stood with her shoulder toward him, looking down into the water.

“Bertha!”

She started, stifled a glad cry that sprang to her lips, and turning her back fairly upon Waldon, dashed a hand across her eyes.

“I did not expect you—I did not dream of—of seeing you at all,” she protested, angry with herself for crying, and at him for having seen her tears.

“But I did hope to see you.”

“Why, how could you? I never spoke of coming.”

“No; but men will sometimes hope against probabilities,” answered Waldon, smiling. “I have been in this neighborhood every day.”

“I never come here. How could any one suppose I did? Only to-day I had a headache, and—and thinking how beautifully you described this place, I thought the air would do me good.”

“I hope you are made better by coming,” he answered, enjoying her fluttering anger with infinite zest.

“No, I think, rather, that the sun makes me worse. My—my forehead aches yet, and my eyes feel hot with fever.”

She turned her eyes upon him with audacious courage, thinking to carry off their flushed condition by this plea of fever; but tears hung thickly on their lashes yet, and one dropped upon her cheek, which instantly took fire.

“Sit down,” said Waldon, pausing by a fragment of rock which lay bedded among the ferns. “The shadows are cool, and there is music in the water.”

Bertha sat down, burning with shame.

“You are angry with me, Bertha. Why?”

“Angry! No. What have you done that I should care about?”

“Intruded on you when you wished to be alone, perhaps.”

“I did not care about being alone. This is no intrusion; only,” she added, attempting to account for her tears by another feminine device, “something had gone wrong. I was not well, and finding myself in this sweet solitude, gave way, and make a baby of myself.”

Waldon laughed pleasantly, and she joined him, quick mirth flashing out from her tears, as sunshine strikes dew.

“Quiet, and the sweet air drawing through here, will soon make your head all right.”

“Will it?” answered Bertha, demurely. “I’m sure I hope so.”

Waldon threw himself among the grasses at her feet, and resting one elbow on the rock, lay supinely, with his eyes upon her face, not caring to speak.

Bertha grew restless; her lashes drooped; through the soft red cleft of her mouth the breath came in delicious little sighs. To avoid his gaze she pulled up tufts of grass, and sent them floating down the brook.

She had cast half a dozen little emerald rifts upon the eddies, when Waldon caught her hand, tossed the grass it held into the water, and fell to kissing it tenderly, as if her palm had been the heart of a rose.

She trembled a little at the first touch of his lips, and struggled to get up from her seat; but his elbow was planted in the thick folds of her dress, and held her down.

“I most go!” she said, breathless. “They will be expecting me home.”

“Not yet. I have something to say; but this silence is so delicious. Why must we break it?”

Bertha settled back to her seat, trembling and half afraid. Her blushes were all gone; her mouth began to tremble as if she were about to cry again; he had made her his prisoner.

“This smoky air is so soft. The brook never had sweeter sounds, and the perfume about us is heavenly. It comes from the frost-bitten ferns. Where on earth could we find a more lovely spot?”

Bertha did not answer. He held her hand firmly; his eyes searched hers, as the sun penetrates deep water.

“It is beautiful, but getting a little—a little cold,” she said, with another faint struggle to free herself.

“Cold!”

He imprisoned her other hand, and said, again:

“Cold! Promise never to be cold to me! Girl, promise!”

She wrung her hands away from him, and arose from her seat.

“Mr. Waldon, by what right do you ask such things of me?”

“By the right of a man who loves you better than his own soul!”

She was struggling in his arms; her head was pressed to his bosom; the kisses that he rained upon her face and hair terrified her. She pushed him away in fierce anger.

“We are alone, and you insult me!”

“Insult you!—insult the woman whom I entreat to become my wife!”

“You say this here?”

“Yes, girl, my wife! I, who have avoided marriage—laughed at it—reviled it—ask no better thing on earth than that you should become mine forever and ever!”

All anger went out from her face. She could not lift her eyelids, but the sparkle of diamonds flashed out from under their thick lashes.

“Your wife!”

Her lips grew redder; the soft, panting breath came through them unsteadily and gave a pure, ringing sweetness to these two little words, which thrilled the very air. She began to comprehend their meaning in all its passionate force.

“You will not refuse me. It is impossible,” he said, reaching forth his arms again. “Love like mine must have love back again. Girl, girl, I adore you—soul and body I adore you!”

She did not resist him now. Her lips turned to his for the kisses which had stirred her wrath a moment before.

“Say that you love me, Bertha!”

“I do! I do!”

“That you will love me forever and ever!”

She tried to say “forever and ever,” but the words stopped in her throat. She could hot utter them, but gave him kisses instead.

“Again—say that you love me—again and again!” cried the man, in his strong, wooing passion, holding her from him, and searching her face with his shining eyes.

“Again and again, I love you!”

Her face was buried in his bosom. Her lips thrilled with the sweet confession.

He gloried in her agitation, and holding back her head with his two hands, feasted on her blushes.

“You love me surely, fully?” he questioned again, not in doubt, but because the insatiate feeling within him demanded new homage every moment.

“How can you ask?” she answered.

“Because I would hear it over and over again, till the sweet truth pervades my whole being—because worship demands worship.”

Happiness like this would be pain if the capacities of humanity did not limit it. Bertha felt poverty-stricken because she had no language with which to express the joy that sung at her heart.

“What can I say—how can I act?” she whispered, shaking her head. “A child of three years would answer you better.”

“A child of three years could not be more innocent or more lovely! It ought to be enough that your lips tremble and your eyes speak; but what man ever was contented with dumb assurances?”

“But such things seek a language of their own, which I have had no time to learn,” she answered, with deprecating playfulness.

“Not as the birds learn it when they sing among the apple blossoms?”

“That music is here,” answered the girl, pressing one hand to her heart; “but I have no power to utter it.”

“Heavens! what a child she is!—what a glorious woman!” he exclaimed, never at a loss for words.

“No! no! You frighten me with these praises! Even my mother does not think so highly of me as that. I have ten thousand faults.”

“Each one a charm, I will be sworn! No, no, Bertha, even your own lips shall not convince me that the woman I love so can be anything less than perfect!”

Bertha shook her head a little mournfully.

“Even now I am doing wrong. Not one word of all this does my mother know. Until the last few weeks she was all I had to love in the world. Now I am keeping secrets from her.”

“And why?”

“Because I _could_ not tell her that which seems even now like a vision that will float away when you and I leave these shadows. Even to one’s mother it is not easy to speak things that are so sweet and seem so unreal: besides, what had I to tell?”

“Having kept your secret so long, perhaps it would be well to let it rest between us.”

“I don’t know,” answered the girl, looking up quickly. “It will be a joy to give her pleasant news.”

“Will this news be pleasant?” said Waldon, with some earnestness. “Women are not always eager to part with only children.”

“Part—part from my mother! Does love for you mean that?” inquired Bertha, with a startled look.

“Perhaps not. Who can tell? Remember I know but little of your mother. She might look upon me as an enemy, if she knew what we were planning. Give me an opportunity to win her kind feelings, or it may turn out that she will not think our engagement good news.”

Bertha became thoughtful. She remembered now that her mother had always shrunk nervously from the subject of her marriage with any one, and the especial interest she had expressed about her first meeting with Waldon flashed on her mind with depressing force.

“She might be grieved—but not after she knew him. Yes, it is better so!”

With these thoughts, Bertha strove to excuse herself for doing that which her lover desired, and which conscience smote her for.

A flash of crimson light shot down to the ravine, Bertha started up, breathless.

“It is sunset! We have been here hours and hours!”

“No, minutes—only minutes. Thank Heaven! for a little time we have forgotten to count hours!”

“But now I must go—mother will be anxious.”

She held out her hand, but he folded her gently to his heart and blessed her.

“Good-by, Bertha. I ask no greater blessing of God than that you should be my wife!”

He spoke solemnly, for poetic devotion formed the finer part of his strange nature; and Bertha left him with happy tears in her eyes.

That night the girl lay awake in her white bed, like some fair Undine dreaming among restful water-lilies. The moonbeams came through a window close by, and threw their shimmering silver all over her so clearly, that you could see her lips move, and almost hear her whispers as she told herself over and over again, “He loves me—he loves me! He will love me forever and ever,” exactly as Clara Anderson had done!

While the soft moonbeams were shedding divine smiles on her, they were shut out from the supper-room in which Waldon and young Lane sat after the other guests had retired, and, in their place, came down a flood of gas-light from the overhanging chandelier. Lane was leaning with both arms on the table, looking at Waldon, who spoke eagerly:

“I hope to Heaven, Lane, that you have made no mistake about the property, for I have committed myself to-day beyond recall; had no control of myself, in short. Are you certain?”

“My authority was her mother’s banker and her own trustee,” answered Lane. “If better is to be found, I do not know where to seek for it.”