The White Sister Part 28

Do you remember?'

'Yes. I remember.'

'Did you "wait for ever," Angela?'

She looked at him again, and then came forward a little, drawn by an impulse she could not resist.

'Did I love another man, that you reproach me?' she asked. 'Such as my life has been, have I lived it as a woman lives who has forgotten? I know I have not. Yes, Giovanni, I have waited, but as one waits who hopes to meet in heaven the dear one who is dead on earth. Do you still find fault with me? Would you rather have had me go back to the world and to society after mourning you as long as a girl of nineteen could mourn for a man to whom she had not been openly engaged? Was I wrong? If you had really been dead and could have seen me, would you have wished that I were living differently?'

For a moment he was moved and held out one hand towards her, hoping that she would come nearer.

'No,' he answered--'no, dear----'

'But that was the only question,' she said earnestly, 'and you have answered it!'

She would not take his hand and Giovanni dropped his own with a gesture of disappointment.

'No,' he replied, in a colder tone, 'it is not the question, for you have not told me all the truth. If I had not been gone five years, if I had come back the day before you took the last vows, would you have taken them?'

'No, indeed!'

'If I had come the very next day after, would you not have done your best to be set free?'

There was an instant's pause before she spoke; then the answer came, clear and distinct.

'No.'

Severi turned from her with an impatient movement of his compact head, and tapped the carpeted floor with his heel. His answer broke from his lips harshly.

'You never loved me!'

She would have done wisely if she had been silent then; but she could not, for his words denied the truth that had ruled her life.

'Better than I knew,' she said. 'Better than I knew, even then.'

'Even then?' The words had hope in them. 'And now?' He was suddenly breathless.

'Yes, even now!' The tide of truth lifted her from her feet and swept her onward, helpless. 'Giovanni! Giovanni! Do you think it costs me nothing to keep my word with G.o.d?'

But he had been disappointed too often now, and he could not believe at once.

'It costs you less than it would to keep your faith with me,' he answered.

'It is not true! Indeed, it is not true!'

'Then let the truth win, dear! All the rest is fable!'

He was at her side now. She had tried to resist, but not long, and her hand was in his, though her face was turned away.

'No--no----' she faltered, but he would not let her speak.

'All a fable of sorrow and a dream of parting, sweetheart! And now we have waked to meet again, your hand in my hand, my heart to your heart--your lips to mine----'

She almost shrieked aloud in terror then and threw herself back bodily, as from the edge of a precipice. She might have fallen if he had not still held her hand, and as she recovered herself she tried to withdraw it. In her distress, words came that she regretted afterwards.

'Do you think that only you are human, of us two?' she cried, in pa.s.sionate protest against pa.s.sion itself, against him, against life, but still twisting her wrist in his grip and trying to wrench it away.

'For the love of heaven, Giovanni----'

'No--for love of me----'

She broke from him, for when he felt that he was hurting her his fingers relaxed. But she could not stay her own words.

'Yes, I love you,' she cried almost fiercely, as she stepped backwards. 'Right or wrong, I cannot unmake myself, and as for lying to you, I will not! G.o.d is my witness that I mean to love you living as I have loved you dead, without one thought of earth or one regret for what might have been! But, oh, may G.o.d forgive me, too, if I wish that we were side by side in one grave, at peace for ever!'

'Dead? Why? With life before us----'

'No!' She interrupted him with rising energy. 'No, Giovanni, no! I was weak for a moment, but I am strong again. I can wait for you, and you will find strength to wait for me. You are so brave, Giovanni, you can be so generous, when you will! You will wait, too!'

'For what?'

'For the end that will be the beginning, for G.o.d's great To-morrow, when you will come to be with me for ever and ever, beyond the world, and all parting and all pain!'

There was a deep appeal to higher things in her words and in her voice, too, but it did not touch him; he only knew that at the very moment when she had seemed to be near yielding, the terrible conviction of her soul had come once more between him and her.

'There is no beyond,' he answered, chilled and sullen again. 'You live in a lying legend; your life is a fable and your sacrifice is a crime.'

The cruel words struck her tormented heart, as icy hailstones bruise the half-clad body of a starving child, out in the storm.

'You hurt me very much,' she said in a low voice.

'Forgive me!' he cried quickly. 'I did not mean to. I forget that you believe your dreams, for I cannot live in visions as you do. I only see a blind force, striking in the dark, a great injustice done to us both--a wrong I will undo, come what may!'

'You know my answer to that. You can undo nothing.'

'I am not answered yet. You say you love me--prove it!'

'Only my life can,' said the nun; 'only our two lives can prove our love, for we can live for each other still, perhaps we shall be allowed to die for each other, and in each other we shall find strength to resist----'

'Not to resist love itself, Angela.'

'No, not to resist all that is good and true in love.'

'I cannot see what you see,' he answered. 'Nothing human is beyond my comprehension, good or bad, but you cannot make a monk of me, still less a saint--a Saint Louis of Gonzaga, who was too modest to look his own mother in the face!'

He laughed roughly, but checked himself at once, fearing to hurt her again.

She turned to him with a look of gentle authority.

'In spite of what you have done to-night,' she said, 'you are such a manly man, that you can be the man you will. Listen! If another woman tried to get your love, could you resist her? Would you, for love of me?'