Chapter XLI: Margaret's Conflict

Margaret had sent Philip back to the Ampezzo Valley as soon as she reached Berne, and before Rachel Goldsmith could join her there. The feeling that she had left her husband apparently in anger--though it was no ordinary anger that had possession of her--made her anxious that their son should return to him as soon as possible. Philip was disinclined to leave her; but they talked together quietly and fully of this terrible discovery, and of all its consequences, and she pointed out to him what, in her eyes, his path of duty clearly was. He must accept the past, with all its present outgrowth, and not make the harvest more bitter than it was by ineffectual reproaches and regrets. What did it really matter, for the brief span of this life, whether he passed through the world as a poor man or rich, distinguished or obscure? He was running the race set before him, and far other eyes than those of man were witnessing his career. Margaret, from her lofty point of view, was nearer Philip in his youthful idealism than Sidney could be, and his mother's counsels gave to him the courage and hopefulness which seemed to his father so strange and pathetic.

But Margaret herself was passing through the fiercest and most painful crisis of her life. The blow that had fallen had struck at the deepest roots of her being. It seemed as if she had linked her whole existence, down to its innermost fibers, with a nature absolutely at variance with it. This husband, whom she loved so perfectly, had been living all these years beside her a life of base treachery and dissimulation. She marveled as she thought of his daily intercourse with her maid Rachel, Sophy Goldsmith's aunt, and of his constant friendliness toward Andrew. How could he bear to see their grief and suspense, nay, even pretend to share it, and to pursue the search after their lost child? Was it possible that human nature contained such depths of duplicity? He had kept silence amid all their mourning, and made his silence seem full of sympathy. To be guilty of such infamy, for any reason whatever, seemed inexplicable to her. But to do it for the sake of money and position! If he had not owned it with his own lips, no force of accumulated evidence could have compelled her into belief.

Yet her heart was very tender toward him. His sin seemed to stain her own soul, so closely was she bound to him; for still she loved him. Rather she felt as if she loved him with a deeper fullness, because of her unutterable pity for his misery. She did not know for certain what he would do; but she would hope, even against hope, that he would pass through this gulf that lay between them, and reach her on the clear heights from which she looked down upon his wrong-doing. He was fallen indeed; but she would rather be his wife than fill any other position in the world. He could never be less dear to her than he had always been.

She blamed herself for her too great reticence and silence as to her own spiritual experience. It was so sacred, and yet so natural to her, that she had rarely attempted to put it into words. If she loved her husband's soul it must show itself in deeds, not speech. Her love to God, her discipleship toward Jesus Christ, must be displayed in the same way; if those around her could not see it in her daily life, it would be useless to proclaim it. What she felt herself she attributed to others. God was nearer to every soul than any fellow-creature could be, and his dealings with each soul was wrapped in a veil impenetrable to the understanding or comprehension even of those closest and dearest to it. What God was saying to her husband's soul she could not know. And no action of Sidney's life had taught her that they were worlds apart in their spiritual experience.

Now she saw in a new light that sin which Christ denounced above all sins--hypocrisy. In a book she had read a short time before she had come across these sentences: "Howbeit now I know well that Jesus came not to prophesy smooth things, but to teach us the truth. Therefore was it most needful that he should speak the truth, and nothing less than the truth, concerning the Pharisees, to the intent that the eyes of all mankind might be opened, even to the generation of generations, that they might discern that the sin of sins is hypocrisy. For other sins wound, but this sin slayeth, the conscience. Peradventure, also, Jesus foresaw that a time might come when certain even among his own disciples would err as the Pharisees erred, shutting their eyes against the truth, as being unfit and not convenient. He, also, that came to redeem all the children of men from all evil, was it not most necessary that he should make clear in the sight of all men what was the greatest evil? For if men knew it not, how could he redeem them from it?"

This had been Sidney's crowning sin. He had so acted a part that, unawares, he had grown to consider it his real nature; it had almost ceased to be hypocrisy, save in the sight of God, whose eye saw the false foundation on which the building was raised. For surely Sidney had not altogether feigned his enjoyment of the privileges and duties of Christianity. He had gone with her to the table of the Lord; he had given generously, not only of his wealth, but of his time and talents, to the service of his fellow-men. He had taken his stand in public life as a religious man. "Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity." This was the condemnation of her Lord against the man who was dearer to her than her own soul.

She felt that she was right in facing this crisis alone, free from the distracting affection of Sidney. To have stayed near him would have taxed her strength too heavily; for all life was under an eclipse! Was it not an abiding darkness, which could not pass away on this side of the grave? Was he not in an abyss of gloom, into which she must go down, and dwell with him there? Gloom and sorrow and remorse she would share with him, but not the infamy of a new sin.

Even in the deepest abyss God would be with her. This was the hope she clung to. She recalled the vision she once had of the love of God. There was absolutely no limit, no change, in that Divine love, though it might take the form of an apparent vengeance. "Even in hell thou art there!" she said, and she felt strong enough to go down to the nethermost depths, if underneath her she were still to feel the Everlasting Arms.

The nethermost depth to her would be to separate herself from Sidney. But if he persisted in carrying out his threat, and being guilty of this new iniquity, even if her heart broke she would no longer live with him. She knew what the world would say of it: that it was only a foolish woman's jealousy and prejudice, a straining at a gnat, if she could not forgive so boyish a sin as that of which he would seem to have been guilty. But she took no account of the world. If he persisted in his threatened injustice to Sophy's memory, if he brought this bitter shame upon the heads of her dear old friends, it would be a base act of perfidy, showing him absolutely unrepentant toward God and man. It would be impossible to her to resume her former wifehood with him.

Rachel Goldsmith could not be ignorant of the fact that her beloved mistress was passing through some great sorrow. But she was a reticent woman, with great natural refinement, and she said nothing either to express her own sympathy or to lead Margaret to confide her troubles to her. She was older than her mistress by fifteen years, and she cared for no one in the world so much as for Margaret and her two sons. Philip and Hugh had grown up under her eyes, and she was almost like a second mother to them. To her strong affection was added that loyal and faithful respect with which an old servant looks upon the future masters.

Margaret spent most of her time in her own room in the hotel at Berne, through the windows of which she could see the wonderful range of snowy Alps, that stretched across the horizon, and, catching the evening light, looks so unearthly in its marvelous purity and beauty. It seemed to her as if beyond those white and rosy peaks lay "the land that is very far off." That strong yearning to be gone thither, safely shut in from the vanities and vexations of life, so often expressed in old Latin hymns, had taken possession of her, and it seemed to her as if she had only to will, to rise up, and cross over the invisible threshold of the other life. Should she go or stay? The choice was almost given to her. Would she depart at this moment, and be forever with the Lord? Or would she stay to fight the sore battle her beloved ones were engaged in? "Let me stay!" she said half aloud.

At that moment Rachel entered the room quietly with a letter. It was a thick packet, addressed to her in her husband's handwriting, and Margaret opened it with trembling fingers. A number of yellow, time-stained pages fell from it as she seized a little note written by Sidney.

"My Margaret," he said, "I have seen my son, and I will acknowledge him. But unless you stand by me my punishment will be greater than I can bear. I am like a man walking in darkness amid pitfalls, without guidance. I will be guided by you. Do not forsake me, my wife. The letter I enclose was written thirty years ago by Sophy to Rachel. Would to God it had been sent to her then! To-night we expect to find Martin, who has fled from us to the mountains."

Margaret gathered up the scattered leaves, and called to Rachel, who was just leaving her again alone.

"Rachel!" she cried, "I can tell you my sorrow and my secret now. It concerned you more than me, perhaps. And yet, no; it cannot, it cannot. We have found out what has become of Sophy."

"Oh, it is Mr. Martin!" exclaimed Rachel; "God bless him! I knew he would find it out some day; and how shall we ever thank him for it, Andrew and me?"

"Hush! hush!" said Margaret; "it is too dreadful. Rachel, he sends you this letter, which Sophy wrote to you before she died, thirty years ago, and he says, 'Would to God it had been sent to you then!' Take it away to read it: I cannot bear to see you reading it."

Rachel carried the faded letter away. She was an old woman now, with white hair, and eyes that were failing a little, and needing a brighter light than when Sophy had written that long letter. But she remembered Sophy's handwriting well, and tears blinded her dim eyes. Oh, what anguish of heart would have been saved them if this letter had but reached them thirty years ago! It was the suspense of the long, long years that had broken Andrew's spirit, and made an old man of him while still in the prime of life. Many fathers lose a beloved child by death, and they lay them in the grave, and go their way, and presently the sharp grief is healed. But he had lost her more cruelly, by that crudest way, an unaccountable and mysterious disappearance. It was well to make the discovery of her fate even now; but if it had only been made thirty years ago!

Rachel read the letter slowly, gathering in its many new impressions vaguely, like one puzzled and bewildered. It seemed a confusion to her. Who could this Sidney be of whom Sophy wrote--this young man who had deserted her in a passion, as it appeared, just the thoughtless passion of a young man? Sophy's temper had often been very provoking, and she freely confessed that she had provoked him out of all patience. Sidney? She knew only one man of that name.

And he was Sidney Martin, her master, the husband of her idolized mistress. He was the rich man, the magistrate, the member of Parliament, who belonged to quite another world from that lower world in which she and Andrew lived, the world to which Sophy had belonged. To think of him in connection with this young man, Sophy's husband, who had deserted her, was impossible; it was an unjustifiable liberty--a crime.

She put the letter down and took up some sewing, as if she could think more clearly while her fingers were busy. But her hands trembled too much, and a crowd of memories came rushing through her brain. O Sophy! Sophy! how sad an end to come to with your willful ways and foolish fancies! Dying there, alone, among strangers, who did not know what you were saying with your dying lips! No hand you knew to hold your hand as it grew cold, and no voice you could understand to speak words of comfort as you went down, step by step, into the chill river of death! Alone! utterly alone!

Then she read the letter again. And now the name came clearly to her--Sidney Martin. There must be some other man, then, of that name. It was incredible that Mr. Martin, who had joined them in their search and inquiry with such friendly sympathy, could have held the knowledge of her fate in his own heart. She thought of all his kindness to Andrew and herself--a kindness that had never failed. Yet--Sidney Martin! And a secret marriage! It was he, too, who had sent her this letter, and a strange message with it. If this could be true, what would be the end of it?

She made her way to Margaret's room with trembling limbs and a sinking heart. Margaret was still sitting where she had left her, with her face toward the window; but it was dark, and the long range of mountains, that seemed only a little while ago the glistening boundary of a brighter world, lay pallid as death against the somber sky.

"Miss Margaret!" cried Rachel in a voice of sorrowful uncertainty.

Margaret stood up and stretched out her arms, and the two women clung to one another in a passionate embrace, which seemed to knit together all the joys and sorrows of their lifelong affection. Rachel knew that her dreaded surmise was true.