At Fault (23 page)

When consciousness came back to him, he found that he lay extended in
the flat, which was fastened to the shore. The confused sound of many
voices mingled with a ringing din that filled his ears. A warm stream
was trickling down over his cheek. Another body lay beside him. Now
they were lifting him. Thérèse's face was somewhere—very near, he saw
it dimly and that it was white—and he fell again into insensibility.

The air was filled with the spring and all its promises. Full with the
sound of it, the smell of it, the deliciousness of it. Such sweet air;
soft and strong, like the touch of a brave woman's hand. The air of an
early March day in New Orleans. It was folly to shut it out from nook
or cranny. Worse than folly the lady thought who was making futile
endeavors to open the car window near which she sat. Her face had
grown pink with the effort. She had bit firmly into her red nether
lip, making it all the redder; and then sat down from the
unaccomplished feat to look ruefully at the smirched finger tips of
her Parisian gloves. This flavor of Paris was well about her; in the
folds of her graceful wrap that set to her fine shoulders. It was
plainly a part of the little black velvet toque that rested on her
blonde hair. Even the umbrella and one small valise which she had just
laid on the seat opposite her, had Paris written plain upon them.

These were impressions which the little grey-garbed conventional
figure, some seats removed, had been noting since the striking lady
had entered the car. Points likely to have escaped a man, who—unless
a minutely observant one,—would only have seen that she was handsome
and worthy of an admiration that he might easily fancy rising to
devotion.

Beside herself and the little grey-garbed figure was an interesting
family group at the far end of the car. A husband, but doubly a
father, surrounded and sat upon by a small band of offspring. A
wife—presumably a mother—absorbed with the view of the outside world
and the elaborate gold chain that hung around her neck.

The presence of a large valise, an overcoat, a cane and an umbrella
disposed on another seat, bespoke a further occupant, likely to be at
present in the smoking car.

The train pushed out from the depôt. The porter finally made tardy
haste to the assistance of the lady who had been attempting to open
the window, and when the fresh morning air came blowing in upon her
Thérèse leaned back in her seat with a sigh of content.

There was a full day's journey before her. She would not reach
Place-du-Bois before dark, but she did not shrink from those hours
that were to be passed alone. She rather welcomed the quiet of them
after a visit to New Orleans full of pleasant disturbances. She was
eager to be home again. She loved Place-du-Bois with a love that was
real; that had grown deep since it was the one place in the world
which she could connect with the presence of David Hosmer. She had
often wondered—indeed was wondering now—if the memory of those
happenings to which he belonged would ever grow strange and far away
to her. It was a trick of memory with which she indulged herself on
occasion, this one of retrospection. Beginning with that June day when
she had sat in the hall and watched the course of a white sunshade
over the tops of the bending corn.

Such idle thoughts they were with their mingling of bitter and
sweet—leading nowhere. But she clung to them and held to them as if
to a refuge which she might again and again return to.

The picture of that one terrible day of Fanny's death, stood out in
sharp prominent lines; a touch of the old agony always coming back as
she remembered how she had believed Hosmer dead too—lying so pale and
bleeding before her. Then the parting which had held not so much of
sorrow as of awe and bewilderment in it: when sick, wounded and broken
he had gone away at once with the dead body of his wife; when the two
had clasped hands without words that dared be uttered.

But that was a year ago. And Thérèse thought many things might come
about in a year. Anyhow, might not such length of time be hoped to rub
the edge off a pain that was not by its nature lasting?

That time of acute trouble seemed to have thrown Hosmer back upon his
old diffidence. The letter he wrote her after a painful illness which
prostrated him on his arrival in St. Louis, was stiff and formal, as
men's letters are apt to be, though it had breathed an untold story of
loyalty which she had felt at the time, and still cherished. Other
letters—a few—had gone back and forth between them, till Hosmer had
gone away to the sea-shore with Melicent, to recuperate, and June
coming, Thérèse had sailed from New Orleans for Paris, whither she had
passed six months.

Things had not gone well at Place-du-Bois during her absence, the
impecunious old kinsman whom she had left in charge, having a decided
preference for hunting the
Gros-Bec
and catching trout in the lake
to supervising the methods of a troublesome body of blacks. So Thérèse
had had much to engage her thoughts from the morbid channel into which
those of a more idle woman might have drifted.

She went occasionally enough to the mill. There at least she was
always sure to hear Hosmer's name—and what a charm the sound of it
had for her. And what a delight it was to her eyes when she caught
sight of an envelope lying somewhere on desk or table of the office,
addressed in his handwriting. That was a weakness which she could not
pardon herself; but which staid with her, seeing that the same
trifling cause never failed to awaken the same unmeasured delight. She
had even trumped up an excuse one day for carrying off one of Hosmer's
business letters—indeed of the dryest in substance, and which, when
half-way home, she had torn into the smallest bits and scattered to
the winds, so overcome was she by a sense of her own absurdity.

Thérèse had undergone the ordeal of having her ticket scrutinized,
commented upon and properly punched by the suave conductor. The little
conventional figure had given over the contemplation of Parisian
styles and betaken herself to the absorbing pages of a novel which she
read through smoked glasses. The husband and father had peeled and
distributed his second outlay of bananas amongst his family. It was at
this moment that Thérèse, looking towards the door, saw Hosmer enter
the car.

She must have felt his presence somewhere near; his being there and
coming towards her was so much a part of her thoughts. She held out
her hand to him and made place beside her, as if he had left her but a
half hour before. All the astonishment was his. But he pressed her
hand and took the seat she offered him.

"You knew I was on the train?" he asked.

"Oh, no, how should I?"

Then naturally followed question and answer.

Yes, he was going to Place-du-Bois.

No, the mill did not require his presence; it had been very well
managed during his absence.

Yes, she had been to New Orleans. Had had a very agreeable visit.
Beautiful weather for city dwellers. But such dryness. So disastrous
to the planters.

Yes—quite likely there would be rain next month: there usually was in
April. But indeed there was need of more than April showers for that
stiff land—that strip along the bayou, if he remembered? Oh, he
remembered quite well, but for all that he did not know what she was
talking about. She did not know herself. Then they grew silent; not
from any feeling of the absurdity of such speech between them, for
each had but listened to the other's voice. They became silently
absorbed by the consciousness of each other's nearness. She was
looking at his hand that rested on his knee, and thinking it fuller
than she remembered it before. She was aware of some change in him
which she had not the opportunity to define; but this firmness and
fullness of the hand was part of it. She looked up into his face then,
to find the same change there, together with a new content. But what
she noted beside was the dull scar on his forehead, coming out like a
red letter when his eyes looked into her own. The sight of it was like
a hurt. She had forgotten it might be there, telling its story of pain
through the rest of his life.

"Thérèse," Hosmer said finally, "won't you look at me?"

She was looking from the window. She did not turn her head, but her
hand went out and met his that was on the seat close beside her. He
held it firmly; but soon with an impatient movement drew down the
loose wristlet of her glove and clasped his fingers around her warm
wrist.

"Thérèse," he said again; but more unsteadily, "look at me."

"Not here," she answered him, "not now, I mean." And presently she
drew her hand away from him and held it for a moment pressed firmly
over her eyes. Then she looked at him with brave loving glance.

"It's been so long," she said, with the suspicion of a sigh.

"Too long," he returned, "I couldn't have borne it but for you—the
thought of you always present with me; helping me to take myself out
of the past. That was why I waited—till I could come to you free.
Have you an idea, I wonder, how you have been a promise, and can be
the fulfillment of every good that life may give to a man?"

"No, I don't know," she said a little hopelessly, taking his hand
again, "I have seen myself at fault in following what seemed the only
right. I feel as if there were no way to turn for the truth. Old
supports appear to be giving way beneath me. They were so secure
before. It commenced, you remember—oh, you know when it must have
begun. But do you think, David, that it's right we should find our
happiness out of that past of pain and sin and trouble?"

"Thérèse," said Hosmer firmly, "the truth in its entirety isn't given
to man to know—such knowledge, no doubt, would be beyond human
endurance. But we make a step towards it, when we learn that there is
rottenness and evil in the world, masquerading as right and
morality—when we learn to know the living spirit from the dead
letter. I have not cared to stop in this struggle of life to question.
You, perhaps, wouldn't dare to alone. Together, dear one, we will work
it out. Be sure there is a way—we may not find it in the end, but we
will at least have tried."

One month after their meeting on the train, Hosmer and Thérèse had
gone together to Centerville where they had been made one, as the
saying goes, by the good Père Antoine; and without more ado, had
driven back to Place-du-Bois: Mr. and Mrs. Hosmer. The event had
caused more than the proverbial nine days' talk. Indeed, now, two
months after, it was still the absorbing theme that occupied the
dwellers of the parish: and such it promised to remain till supplanted
by something of sufficient dignity and importance to usurp its place.

But of the opinions, favorable and other, that were being exchanged
regarding them and their marriage, Hosmer and Thérèse heard little and
would have cared less, so absorbed were they in the overmastering
happiness that was holding them in thralldom. They could not yet bring
themselves to look at it calmly—this happiness. Even the intoxication
of it seemed a thing that promised to hold. Through love they had
sought each other, and now the fulfillment of that love had brought
more than tenfold its promise to both. It was a royal love; a generous
love and a rich one in its revelation. It was a magician that had
touched life for them and changed it into a glory. In giving them to
each other, it was moving them to the fullness of their own
capabilities. Much to do in two little months; but what cannot love
do?

"Could it give a woman more than this?" Thérèse was saying softly to
herself. Her hands were clasped as in prayer and pressed together
against her bosom. Her head bowed and her lips touching the
intertwined fingers. She spoke of her own emotion; of a certain sweet
turmoil that was stirring within her, as she stood out in the soft
June twilight waiting for her husband to come. Waiting to hear the new
ring in his voice that was like a song of joy. Waiting to see that new
strength and courage in his face, of whose significance she lost
nothing. To see the new light that had come in his eyes with
happiness. All gifts which love had given her.

"Well, at last," she said, going to the top of the steps to meet him
when he came. Her welcome was in her eyes.

"At last," he echoed, with a sigh of relief; pressing her hand which
she held out to him and raising it to his lips.

He did not let it go, but passed it through his arm, and together they
turned to walk up and down the veranda.

"You didn't expect me at noon, did you?" he asked, looking down at
her.

"No; you said you'd be likely not to come; but I hoped for you all the
same. I thought you'd manage it some way."

"No," he answered her, laughing, "my efforts failed. I used even
strategy. Held out the temptation of your delightful Creole dishes and
all that. Nothing was of any avail. They were all business and I had
to be all business too, the whole day long. It was horribly stupid."

She pressed his arm significantly.

"And do you think they will put all that money into the mill, David?
Into the business?"

"No doubt of it, dear. But they're shrewd fellows: didn't commit
themselves in any way. Yet I could see they were impressed. We rode
for hours through the woods this morning and they didn't leave a stick
of timber unscrutinized. We were out on the lake, too, and they were
like ferrets into every cranny of the mill."

"But won't that give you more to do?"

"No, it will give me less: division of labor, don't you see? It will
give me more time to be with you."

"And to help with the plantation," his wife suggested.

"No, no, Madame Thérèse," he laughed, "I'll not rob you of your
occupation. I'll put no bungling hand into your concerns. I know a
sound piece of timber when I see it; but I should hardly be able to
tell a sample of Sea Island cotton from the veriest low middling."