_ "Then said I, 'Woe is me! For I am undone;... for mine
eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts.'"
David'S servant drove out early upon the following morning to tell
him of a strange woman who had been asking for him in the village;
they sent the man back for a doctor, and it was found that the poor
creature was really dead.
They wished to take the body away, but David would not have it; and
so, late in the afternoon, a grave was dug by the lake-shore near
the little cottage, and what was left of Mary was buried there.
David was too exhausted to leave the house, and Helen would not stir
from his side, so the two sat in silence until the ceremony was
over, and the men had gone. The servant went with them, because the
girl said they wished to be alone; and then the house settled down
to its usual quietness,--a quietness that frightened Helen now.
For when she looked at her husband her heart scarcely beat for her
terror; he was ghastly white, and his lips were trembling, and
though he had not shed a tear all the day, there was a look of
mournful despair on his face that told more fearfully than any words
how utterly the soul within him was beaten and crushed. All that day
he had been so, and as Helen remembered the man that had been before
so strong and eager and brare, her whole soul stood still with awe;
yet as before she could do nothing but cling to him, and gaze at him
with bursting heart.
But at last when the hours had passed and not a move had been made,
she asked him faintly, "David, is there no hope? Is it to be like
this always?"
The man raised his eyes and gazed at her helplessly. "Helen," he
said, his voice sounding hollow and strange, "what can you ask of
me? How can I bear to look about me again, how can I think of
living? Oh, that night of horror! Helen, it burns my brain--it
tortures my soul--it will drive me mad!" He buried his face in his
hands again, shaking with emotion. "Oh, I cannot ever forget it," he
whispered hoarsely; "it must haunt me, haunt me until I die! I must
know that after all my years of struggle it was this that I made, it
is this that stands for my life--and it is over, and gone from me
forever and finished! Oh, God, was there ever such a horror flashed
upon a guilty soul--ever such fiendish torture for a man to bear?
And Helen, there was a child, too--think how that thought must goad
me--a child of mine, and I cannot ever aid it--it must suffer for
its mother's shame. And think, if it were a woman, Helen--this
madness must go on, and go on forever! Oh, where am I to hide me;
and what can I do?"
There came no tears, but only a fearful sobbing; poor Helen
whispered frantically, "David, it was not your fault, you could not
help it--surely you cannot be to blame for all this."
He did not answer her, but after a long silence he went on in a
deep, low voice, "Helen, she was so beautiful! She has lived in my
thoughts all these years as the figure that I used to see, so bright
and so happy; I used to hear her singing in church, and the music
was a kind of madness to me, because I knew that she loved me. And
her home was a little farm-house, half buried in great trees, and I
used to see her there with her flowers. Now--oh, think of her
now--think of her life of shame and agony--think of her turned away
from her home, and from all she loved in the world,--deserted and
scorned, and helpless--think of her with child, and of the agony of
her degradation! What must she not have suffered to be as she was
last night--oh, are there tears enough in the world to pay for such
a curse, for that twenty years' burden of wretchedness and sin? And
she was beaten--oh, she was beaten--Mary, my poor, poor Mary! And to
die in such horror, in drunkenness and madness! And now she is gone,
and it is over; and oh, why should I live, what can I do?"
His voice dropped into a moan, and then again there was a long
silence. At last Helen whispered, in a weak, trembling voice,
"David, you have still love; can that be nothing to you?"
"I have no right to love," he groaned, "no right to love, and I
never had any. For oh, all my life this vision has haunted me--I
knew that nothing but death could have saved her from shame! Yes,
and I knew, too, that some day I must find her. I have carried the
terror of that in my heart all these years. Yet I dared to take your
love, and dared to fly from my sin; and then there comes this
thunderbolt--oh, merciful heaven, it is too much to bear, too much
to bear!" He sank down again; poor Helen could find no word of
comfort, no utterance of her own bursting heart except the same
frantic clasp of her love.
So the day went by over that shattered life; and each hour the man's
despair grew more black, his grief and misery more hopeless. The
girl watched him and followed him about as if she had been a child,
but she could get him to take no food, and to divert his mind to
anything else she dared not even try. He would sit for hours
writhing in his torment, and then again he would spring up and pace
the room in agitation, though he was too weak to bear that very
long. Afterwards the long night came on, and all through it he lay
tossing and moaning, sometimes shuddering in a kind of paroxysm of
grief,--Helen, though she was weary and almost fainting, watching
thro the whole night, her heart wild with her dread.
And so the morning came, and another day of misery; and in the midst
of it David flung himself down upon the sofa and buried his face in
his arms and cried out, "Oh God, my God, I cannot stand it, I cannot
stand it! Oh, let me die! I dare not lift my head--there is no hope
for me--there is no life for me--I dare not pray! It is more than I
can bear--I am beaten, I am lost forever!" And Helen fell down upon
her knees beside him, and tore away his hands from his face and
stared at him frantically, exclaiming, "David, it is too cruel! Oh,
have mercy upon me, David, if you love me!"
He stopped and gazed long and earnestly into her face, and a look of
infinite pity came into his eyes; at last he whispered, in a low
voice, "Poor, poor little Helen; oh, Helen, God help you, what can I
do?" He paused and afterwards went on tremblingly, "What have you
done that you should suffer like this? You are right that it is too
cruel--it is another curse that I have to bear! For I knew that I
was born to suffering--I knew that my life was broken and dying--and
yet I dared to take yours into it! And now, what can I do to save
you, Helen; can you not see that I dare not live?"
"David, it is you who are killing yourself," the girl moaned in
answer. He did not reply, but there came a long, long silence, in
which he seemed to be sinking still deeper; and when he went on it
was in a shuddering voice that made Helen's heart stop. "Oh, it is
no use," he gasped, "it is no use! Listen, Helen, there was another
secret that I kept from you, because it was too fearful; but I can
keep it no more, I can fight no more!"
He stopped; the girl had clutched his arm, and was staring into his
face, whispering his name hoarsely. At last he went on in his cruel
despair, "I knew this years ago, too, and I knew that I was bringing
it upon you--the misery of this wretched, dying body. Oh, it
hurts--it hurts now!" And he put his hand over his heart, as a look
of pain came into his face. "It cannot stand much more, my heart,"
he panted; "the time must come--they told me it would come years
ago! And then--and then--"
The man stopped, because he was looking at Helen; she had not made a
sound, but her face had turned so white, and her lips were trembling
so fearfully that he dared not go on; she gave a loud, choking cry
and burst out wildly, "Oh, David--David--it is fiendish--you have
no right to punish me so! Oh, have mercy upon me, for you are
killing me! You have no right to do it, I tell you it is a crime;
you promised me your love, and if you loved me you would live for my
sake, you would think of me! A thing so cruel ought not to be--it
cannot be right--God could never have meant a human soul to suffer
so! And there must be pardon in the world, there must be light--it
cannot all be torture like this!" She burst into a flood of tears
and flung herself upon David's bosom, sobbing again and again, "Oh,
no, no, it is too fearful, oh, save me, save me!"
He did not answer her; as she looked up at him again she saw the
same look of fearful woe, and read the cruel fact that there was no
help, that her own grief and pleadings were only deepening the man's
wretchedness. She stared at him for a long time; and when she spoke
to him again it was with a sudden start, and in a strange, ghastly
voice,--"And then, David, there is no God?"
He trembled, but the words choked him as he tried to respond, and
his head dropped; then at last she heard him moan, "Oh, how can God
free my soul from this madness, how can he deliver me from such a
curse?" Helen could say no more--could only cling to him and sob in
her fright.
So the day passed away, and another night came; and still the
crushed and beaten soul was writhing in its misery, lost in
blackness and despair; and still Helen read it all in his white and
tortured features, and drank the full cup of his soul's fiery pain.
They took no heed of the time; but it was long after darkness had
fallen; and once when the girl had gone upstairs for a moment she
heard David pacing about, and then heard a stifled cry. She rushed
down, and stopped short in the doorway. For the man was upon his
knees, his face uplifted in wild entreaty. "Oh God, oh merciful
God!" he sobbed; "all the days of my life I have sought for
righteousness, labored and suffered to keep my soul alive! And oh,
was it all for this--was it to go down in blackness and night, to
die a beaten man, crushed and lost? Oh, I cannot bear it, I cannot
bear it! It cannot--it must not be!"
He sank forward upon the sofa, and buried his head in his arms, and
the girl could hear his breathing in the stillness; at last she
crept across the room and knelt down beside him, and whispered
softly in his ear, "You do not give me your heart any more, David?"
It was a long time before he answered her, and then it was to moan,
"Oh, Helen, my heart is broken, I can give it to no one. Once I had
strength and faith, and could love; but now I am lost and ruined,
and there is nothing that can save me. I dare not live, and I dare
not die, and I know not where to turn!"
He started up suddenly, clasping his hands to his forehead and
staggering across the room, crying out, "Oh no, it cannot be, oh, it
cannot be! There must be some way of finding pardon, some way of
winning Tightness for a soul! Oh God, what can I do for peace?" But
then again he sank down and hid his face and sobbed out: "In the
face of this nightmare,--with this horror fronting me! _She_ cried
for pardon, and none came."
After that there was a long silence, with Helen crouching in terror
by his side. She heard him groan: "It is all over, it is finished--I
can fight no more," and then again came stillness, and when she
lifted him and gazed into his face she knew not which was worse, the
silent helpless despair that was upon it, or the torment and the
suffering that had gone before. She tried still to soothe him,
begging and pleading with him to have mercy upon her. He asked her
faintly what he could do, and the poor girl, seeing how weak and
exhausted he was, could think of only the things of the body, and
begged him to try to rest. "It has been two nights since you have
slept, David," she whispered.
"I cannot sleep with this burden upon my soul," he answered her; but
still she pleaded with him, begging him as he loved her; and he
yielded to her at last, and broken and helpless as he was, she half
carried him upstairs and laid him upon the bed as if he had been a
little child. That seemed to help little, however, for he only lay
tossing and moaning, "Oh, God, it must end; I cannot bear it!"
Those were the last words Helen heard, for the poor girl was
exhausted herself, almost to fainting; she lay down, without
undressing, and her head had scarcely touched the pillow before she
was asleep. In the meantime, through the long night-watches David
lay writhing and crying out for help.
The moon rose dim and red behind the mountains,--it had mounted
high in the sky, and the room was bright with it, when at last the
man rose from the bed and began swiftly pacing the room, still
muttering to himself. He sank down upon his knees by the window and
gazed up at the silent moon. Then again he rose and turned suddenly,
and after a hurried glance at Helen went to the door and passed out,
closing it silently behind him, and whispered to himself, half
deliriously, "Oh, great God, it must end! It must end!"
It was more than an hour afterwards that the girl awakened from her
troubled sleep; she lay for an instant half dazed, trying to bring
back to her mind what had happened; and then she put out her hand
and discovered that her husband was no longer by her. She sat up
with a wild start, and at the same instant her ear was caught by a
sound outside, of footsteps pacing swiftly back and forth, back and
forth, upon the piazza. The girl leaped up with a stifled cry, and
ran out of the room and down the steps. The room below was still
half lighted by the flickering log-fire, and Helen's shadow loomed
up on the opposite wall as she rushed across the room and opened the
door.
The gray light of dawn was just spreading across the lake, but the
girl noticed only one thing, her husband's swiftly moving figure.
She rushed to him, and as he heard her, he turned and stared at her
an instant as if dazed, and then staggered with a cry into her arms.
"David, David!" she exclaimed, "what is the matter?" Then as she
clasped him to her she found that his body was trembling
convulsively, and that his hand as she took it was hot like fire;
she called to him again in yet greater anxiety: "David, David! What
is it? You will kill me if you treat me so!"
He answered her weakly, "Nothing, dear, nothing," and she caught him
to her, and turned and half carried him into the house. She
staggered into a chair with him, and then sat gazing in terror at
his countenance. For the man's forehead was burning and moist, and
his frame was shaking and broken; he was completely prostrated by
the fearful agitation that had possessed him. Helen cried to him
once more, but he could only pant, "Wait, wait," and sink back and
let his head fall upon her arm; he lay with his eyes closed,
breathing swiftly, and shuddering now and then. "It was God!" he
panted with a sudden start, his voice choking; "He has shown me His
face! He has set me free!"
Then again for a long time he lay with heaving bosom, Helen
whispering to him pleadingly, "David, David!" As he opened his eyes,
the girl saw a wonderful look upon his face; and at last he began
speaking, in a low, shaking voice, and pausing often to catch his
breath: "Oh, Helen," he said, "it is all gone, but I won, and my
life's prayer has not been for nothing! I was never so lost, so
beaten; but all the time there was a voice in my soul that cried to
me to fight,--that there was glory enough in God's home for even me!
And oh, to-night it came--it came!"
David sank back, and there was a long silence before he went on: "It
was wonderful, Helen," he whispered, "there has come nothing like it
to me in all my life; for I had never drunk such sorrow before,
never known such fearful need. It seems as if all the pent-up forces
of my nature broke loose in one wild, fearful surge, as if there was
a force behind me like a mighty, driving storm, that swept me on and
away, beyond self and beyond time, and out into the life of things.
It was like the surging of fierce music, it was the great ocean of
the infinite bursting its way into my heart. And it bore me on, so
that I was mad with it, so that I knew not where I was, only that I
was panting for breath, and that I could bear it no more and cried
out in pain!"
David as he spoke had been lifting himself, the memory of his vision
taking hold of him once more; but then he sank down again and
whispered, "Oh, I have no more strength, I can do no more; but it
was God, and I am free!"
He lay trembling and breathing fast again, but sinking back from his
effort and closing his eyes exhaustedly. After a long time he went
on in a faint voice, "I suppose if I had lived long ago that would
have been a vision of God's heaven; and yet there was not an instant
of it--even when I fell down upon the ground and when I struck my
hands upon the stones because they were numb and burning--when I
did not know just what it was, the surging passion of my soul flung
loose at last! It was like the voices of the stars and the
mountains, that whisper of that which is and which conquers, of That
which conquers without sound or sign; Helen, I thought of that
wonderful testament of Pascal's that has haunted me all my
lifetime,--those strange, wild, gasping words of a soul gone mad
with awe, and beyond all utterance except a cry,--'Joy, joy, tears
of joy!' And I thought of a still more fearful story, I thought that
it must have been such thunder-music that rang through the soul of
the Master and swept Him away beyond scorn and pain, so that the men
about Him seemed like jeering phantoms that He might scatter with
His hand, before the glory of vision in which it was all one to live
or die. Oh, it is that which has brought me my peace! God needs not
our help, but only our worship; and beside His glory all our guilt
is nothing, and there is no madness like our fear. And oh, if we can
only hold to that and fight for it, conquer all temptation and all
pain--all fear because we must die, and cease to be--"
The man had clenched his hands again, and was lifting himself with
the wild look upon his countenance; he seemed to the girl to be
delirious, and she was shuddering, half with awe and half with
terror. She interrupted him in a sudden burst of alarm: "Yes,
yes,--but David, David, not now, not now--it is too much--you will
kill yourself!"
"I can die," he panted, "I can die, but I cannot ever be mastered
again, never again be blind! Oh, Helen, all my life I have been lost
and beaten--beaten by my weakness and my fear; but this once, this
once I was free, this once I knew, and I lived; and now I can die
rejoicing! Listen to me, Helen; while I am here there can be no more
delaying,--no more weakness! Such sin and doubt as that of
yesterday must never conquer my soul again, I will not any more be
at the mercy of chance. I love you, Helen, God knows that I love you
with all my soul; and this much for love I will do, if God spares me
a day,--take you, and tear the heart out of you, if need be, but
only teach you to live, teach you to hold by this Truth. It is a
fearful thing, Helen; it is madness to me to know that at any
instant I may cease to be, and that you may be left alone in your
terror and your weakness. Oh, look at me,--look at me! There is no
more tempting fate, there is no more shirking the battle--there is
life, there is life to be lived! And it calls to you now,--_now!_
And now you must win,--cost just what it may in blood and tears! You
have the choice between that and ruin, and before God you shall
choose the right! Listen to me, Helen--it is only prayer that can do
it, it is only by prayer that you can fight this fearful
battle--bring before you this truth of the soul, and hold on to
it,--hold on to it tho it kill you! For He was through all the ages,
His glory is of the skies; and we are but for an instant, and we
have to die; and this we must know, or we are lost! There comes
pain, and calls you back to fear and doubt; and you fight--oh, it is
a cruel fight, it is like a wild beast at your vitals,--but still
you hold on--you hold on!"
The man had lifted himself with a wild effort, his hands clenched
and his teeth set. He had caught the girl's hands in his, and she
screamed in fear: "David, David! You will kill yourself!"
"Yes, yes!" he answered, and rushed on, chokingly; "it is coming
just so; for I have just force enough left to win--just force enough
to save you,--and then it will rend this frame of mine in two! It
comes like a clutch at my heart--it blinds me, and the sky seems to
turn to fire----"
He sank back with a gasp; Helen caught him to her bosom, exclaiming
frantically, "Oh, David, spare me--wait! Not now--you cannot bear
it--have mercy!"
He lay for a long time motionless, seemingly half dazed; then he
whispered faintly, "Yes, dear, yes; let us wait. But oh, if you
could know the terror of another defeat, of sinking down and letting
one's self be bound in the old chains--I must not lose, Helen, I
dare not fail!"
"Listen, David," whispered Helen, beginning suddenly with desperate
swiftness; "why should you fail? Why can you not listen to me, pity
me, wait until you are strong? You have won, you will not
forget--and is there no peace, can you not rest in this faith, and
fear no more?" The man seemed to Helen to be half out of his mind
for the moment; she was trying to manage him with a kind of frenzied
cunning. As she went on whispering and imploring she saw that
David's exhaustion was gradually overcoming him more and more, and
that he was sinking farther and farther back from his wild
agitation. At last after she had continued thus for a while he
closed his eyes and began breathing softly. "Yes, dear," he
whispered; "yes; I will be quiet. There has come to my soul to-night
a peace that is not for words; I can be still, and know that He is
God, and that He is holy."
His voice dropped lower each instant, the girl in the meantime
soothing him and stroking his forehead and pleading with him in a
shuddering voice, her heart wild with fright. When at last he was
quite still, and the fearful vision, that had been like a nightmare
to her, was gone with all its storm and its madness, she took him
upon her lap, just as she had done before, and sat there clasping
him in her arms while the time fled by unheeded. It was long
afterwards--the sun was gleaming across the lake and in at the
window--before at last her trembling prayer was answered, and he
sank into an exhausted slumber.
She sat watching him for a long time still, quite white with fear
and weariness; finally, however, she rose, and carrying the frail
body in her arms, laid it quietly upon the sofa in the next room.
She knelt watching it for a time, then went out upon the piazza,
closing the door behind her.
And there the fearful tension that the dread of wakening him had put
upon her faculties gave way at last, and the poor girl buried her
face in her hands, and sank down, sobbing convulsively: "Oh, God,
oh, God, what can I do, how can I bear it?" She gazed about her
wildly, exclaiming, "I cannot stand it, and there is no one to help
me! What _can_ I do?"
Perhaps it was the first real prayer that had ever passed Helen's
lips; but the burden of her sorrow was too great just then for her
to bear alone, even in thought. She leaned against the railing of
the porch with her arms stretched out before her imploringly, her
face uplifted, and the tears running down her cheeks; she poured out
one frantic cry, the only cry that she could think of:--"Oh, God,
have mercy upon me, have mercy upon me! I cannot bear it!"
So she sobbed on, and several minutes passed, but there came to her
no relief; when she thought of David, of his breaking body and of
his struggling soul, it seemed to her as if she were caught in the
grip of a fiend, and that no power could save her. She could only
clasp her hands together and shudder, and whisper, "What shall I do,
what shall I do?"
Thus it was that the time sped by; and the morning sun rose higher
in front of her, and shone down upon the wild and wan figure that
seemed like a phantom of the night. She was still crouching in the
same position, her mind as overwrought and hysterical as ever, when
a strange and unexpected event took place, one which seemed to her
at first in her state of fright like some delusion of her mind.
Except for her own emotion, and for the faint sound of the waves
upon the shore, everything about her had been still; her ear was
suddenly caught, however, by the noise of a footstep, and she turned
and saw the figure of a man coming down the path from the woods; she
started to her feet, gazing in surprise.
It was broad daylight then, and Helen could see the person plainly;
she took only one glance, and reeled and staggered back as if it
were a ghost at which she was gazing. She crouched by a pillar of
the porch, trembling like a leaf, and scarcely able to keep her
senses, leaning from side to side and peering out, with her whole
attitude expressive of unutterable consternation, and even fright.
At last when she had gazed until it was no longer possible for her
to think that she was the victim of madness, she stared suddenly up
into the air, and caught her forehead in her hands, at the same time
whispering to herself in an almost fainting voice: "Great heaven,
what can it mean? Can it be real--can it be true? _It is Arthur!_" _