Reade_White_Lies.txt topic ['13', '324', '378', '393']
and implored her to try and be calm
till they could see .
before dark he came riding fiercely home. flew down
the stairs. at sight of her forgot all his caution.
waved his cocked hat in the air. fell on her knees and thanked
. gasped out,--
"--exchanged for two lieutenants--sent home--they
say he is in !"
tears of joy gushed in streams from her.
days passed in hope and joy inexpressible; but the good doctor
was uneasy for . was always listening with
supernatural keenness and starting from her chair, and every fibre
of her lovely person seemed to be on the quiver.
was without a serious misgiving. husband and wife
ever meet? evidently looked on her as , and made it
a point of honor to keep away from .
had recourse to that ever-soothing influence--her child.
was settled in the village, and visited
her every day, and came back often with red eyes, but always
soothed.
day and she went to , and, entering the
house without ceremony, found the nurse out, and no one watching the
child.
" careless!" said .
stopped eagerly to kiss him. instead of kissing him,
she uttered a loud cry. was a locket hanging round his neck.
was a locket containing some of 's hair and 's.
had given it him in the happy days that followed their marriage.
stood gasping in the middle of the room. came
running in soon after. , by a wonderful effort over
herself, asked her calmly and cunningly,--
" is the gentleman who put this locket round my child's neck?
want to speak with him."
stammered and looked confused.
" soldier--an officer?--come, tell me!"
"," cried , "why do you hesitate?"
" am to do?" said . " made me swear never to
mention his coming here. goes away, or hides whenever you come.
since does not love the poor wounded gentleman, what can
he do better?"
" love him!" cried : "why, she is his wife, his lawful wedded
wife; he is a fool or a monster to run away for her. loves him
as no woman ever loved before. pines for him. dies for
him."
door of a little back room opened at these words of , and
there stood , with his arm in a sling, pale and astounded,
but great joy and wonder working in his face.
gave a cry of love that made the other two women weep, and
in a moment they were sobbing for joy upon each other's neck.
went sorrow, doubt, despair, and all they had suffered.
one moment paid for all. in that moment of joy and surprise, so
great as to be almost terrible, perhaps it was well for
that , weakened by his wound, was quite overcome, and nearly
fainted. was herself just going into hysterics; but, seeing him
quite overcome, she conquered them directly, and nursed, and
soothed, and pitied, and encouraged him instead.
they sat hand in hand. happiness stopped their very
breath. could not speak. told him all. never
owned why he had slipped away when he saw them coming. forgot
it. forgot all his hard thoughts of her. took him home in
the carriage. wife would not let him out of her sight.
years and years after this she could hardly bear to let him be an
hour out of her sight.
world is wide; there may be a man in it who can paint the sudden
bliss that fell on these two much suffering hearts; but am not
that man; this is beyond me; it was not only heaven, but heaven
after hell.
we the indescribable and the unspeakable for a moment, and go
to a lighter theme.
day 's character was so unexpectedly cleared, had no
opportunity of speaking to her, or a reconciliation would have taken
place. it was, he went home intensely happy. he did not
resume his visits to the chateau. he came to think calmly over
it, his vanity was cruelly mortified. was innocent of the
greater offence; but how insolently she had sacrificed him, his
love, and his respect, to another's interest.
generous thoughts prevailed by degrees. one day that her
pale face, her tears, and her remorse got the better of his offended
pride, he determined to give her a good lecture that should drown
her in penitent tears; and then end by forgiving her. one thing
he could not be happy till he had forgiven her.
walked into the room with a calm, dignified, stately air, and
before he could utter one word of his grave remonstrance, attacked
him thus: " wish to speak to me, sir. it is to apologize to
me, will save your vanity the mortification. forgive you."
" forgive !" cried furiously.
" violence, if you please," said the lady with cold hauteur. "
us be friends, as and are. cannot be anything
more to one another now. have wounded me too deeply by your
jealous, suspicious nature."
gasped for breath, and was so far out-generalled that he
accepted the place of defendant. "'t to believe your own
lips? not believe you?"
", that's excusable. did not know me. you were my lover;
you ought to have seen was forced to deceive poor .
dare you believe your eyes; much more your ears, against my truth,
against my honor; and then to believe such nonsense?" , with a
grand assumption of superior knowledge, says she, " little
simpleton, how could the child be mine when wasn't married at
all?"
this reproach, first stared, then grinned. " forgot
that," said he.
", and you forgot the moon isn't made of green cheese. ,
if saw you very humble, and very penitent, might, perhaps,
really forgive you--in time."
", forgive me at once. don't understand your angelical,
diabolical, incomprehensible sex: who on earth can? forgive me."
"! oh! oh! oh!"
! the tears that could not come at a remonstrance were flowing in
a stream at his generosity.
" is the matter now?" said he tenderly. cried away, but at
the same time explained,--
" a f--f--foolish you must be not to see that it is who am
without excuse. were my betrothed. was to you owed my
duty; not my sister. am a wicked, unhappy girl. you must
hate me!"
" adore you. , no more forgiving on either side. our
only quarrel be who shall love the other best."
", know how that will be," said the observant toad. " will
love me best till you have got me; and then shall love you best;
oh, ever so much."
, the prospect of loving best did not seem disagreeable to
her; for with this announcement she deposited her head on his
shoulder, and in that attitude took a little walk with him up and
down the : sixty times; about eight miles.
two were a happy pair. wayward, but generous heart never
forgot her offence, and his forgiveness. gave herself to him
heart and soul, at the altar, and well she redeemed her vow.
rose high in political life: and paid the penalty of that sort of
ambition; his heart was often sore. by his own hearth sat
comfort and ever ready sympathy. , and patient industry to read
blue-books, and a ready hand and brain to write diplomatic notes for
him, off which the mind glided as from a ball of ice.
thirty years she never once mentioned the servants to him.
", let eternal honor crown her name!"
was only a little bit of heel that had left in .
fortunate than his predecessor (), he got off with a
slight but enduring limp. so the army lost him.
married , and set them up in 's,
(deceased) auberge. shone as a landlady, and custom flowed
in. all that, a hankering after was observable in
her. favorite stroll was into the kitchen, and on
all fetes and grand occasions she was prominent in gay attire as a
retainer of the house. last specimen of her homely sagacity
shall have the honor to lay before you is a critique upon her
husband, which she vented six years after marriage.
" ," said she, "is very good as far as he goes. he has
felt himself, that he can feel : nobody better. come to him
with an empty belly, or a broken head, or all bleeding with a cut,
or black and blue, and you shall find a friend. if it is a sore
heart, or trouble, and sorrow, and no hole in your carcass to show
for it, you had better come to ; for you might as well tell your
grief to a stone wall as to my man."
baroness took her son to , and there, with keen eye,
selected him a wife. proved an excellent one. would have
been hard if she had not, for the baroness with the severe sagacity
of her age and sex, had set aside as naught a score of seeming
angels, before she could suit herself with a daughter-in-law.
first the very properly saw little of the ; but
when both had been married some years, the recollection of that
fleeting and nominal connection waxed faint, while the memory of
great benefits conferred on both sides remained lively as ever in
hearts so great, and there was a warm, a sacred friendship between
the two houses--a friendship of the ancient , not of the
modern club-house.
and were blessed almost beyond the lot of
humanity: none can really appreciate sunshine but those who come out
of the cold dark. so with happiness. years they could
hardly be said to live like mortals: they basked in bliss. it
was a near thing; for they but just scraped clear of life-long
misery, and death's cold touch grazed them both as they went.
they had heroic virtues to balance in the great
's eye.
wholesome lesson, therefore, and a warning may be gathered from
this story: and know many novelists who would have preached that
lesson at some length in every other chapter, and interrupted the
sacred narrative to do it. when read stories so mutilated,
think of a circumstance related by . .
" sojourning in some part of was afflicted
with many hairs in the butter, and remonstrated. was told, in
reply, that the hairs and the butter came from one source--the cow;
and that the just and natural proportions hitherto observed, could
not be deranged, and bald butter invented--for . ' be it,'
said the ; 'but let me have the butter in one plate, and
the hairs in another.'"
on this hint, have reserved some admirable remarks,
reflections, discourses, and tirades, until the story should be
ended, and the other plate be ready for the subsidiary sermon.
now that the proper time is come, that love of intruding one's
own wisdom in one's own person on the reader, which has marred so
many works of art, is in my case restrained--first, by pure fatigue;
secondly, because the moral of this particular story stands out so
clear in the narrative, that he who runs may read it without any
sermon at all.
who will not take the trouble to gather my moral from the
living tree, would not lift it out of my dead basket: would not
unlock their jaw-bones to bite it, were to thrust it into their
very mouths.