The Odd Women Part 80

'It was only for you. I thought--if you felt able to let Mr. Barfoot know that you had no longer any--'

A flash of stern intelligence shot from the listener's eyes.

'You have seen him then?' she asked with abrupt directness.

'Not since.'

'He has written to you?'--still in the same voice.

'Indeed he has not. Mr. Barfoot never wrote to me. I know nothing whatever about him. No one asked me to come to you--don't think that.

No one knows of what I have been telling you.'

Again Rhoda was oppressed by the difficulty of determining how much credit was due to such a.s.sertions. Monica understood her look.

'As I have said so much I must tell you all. It would be dreadful after this to go away uncertain whether you believed me or not.'

Human feeling prompted the listener to declare that she had no doubts left. Yet she could not give utterance to the words. She knew they would sound forced, insincere. Shame at inflicting shame caused her to bend her head. Already she had been silent too long.

'I will tell you everything,' Monica was saying in low, tremulous tones. 'If no one else believes me, you at all events shall. I have not done what--'

'No--I can't hear this,' Rhoda broke in, the speaker's voice affecting her too powerfully. 'I will believe you without this.'

Monica broke into sobbing. The strain of this last effort had overtaxed her strength.

'We won't talk any more of it,' said Rhoda, with an endeavour to speak kindly. 'You have done all that could be asked of you. I am grateful to you for coming on my account.

The other controlled herself.

'Will you hear what I have to say, Miss Nunn? Will you hear it as a friend? I want to put myself right in your thoughts. I have told no one else; I shall be easier in mind if you will hear me. My husband will know everything before very long--but perhaps I shall not be alive--'

Something in Miss Nunn's face suggested to Monica that her meaning was understood. Perhaps, notwithstanding her denial, Virginia had told more when she was here than she had permission to make known.

'Why should you wish to tell _me_?' asked Rhoda uneasily.

'Because you are so strong. You will say something that will help me. I know you think that I have committed a sin which it is a shame to speak of. That isn't true. If it were true I should never consent to go and live in my husband's house.'

'You are returning to him?'

'I forgot that I haven't told you.'

And Monica related the agreement that had been arrived at. When she spoke of the time that must elapse before she would make a confession to her husband, it again seemed to her that Miss Nunn understood.

'There is a reason why I consent to be supported by him,' she continued. 'If it were true that I had sinned as he suspects I would rather kill myself than pretend still to be his wife. The day before he had me watched I thought I had left him forever. I thought that if I went back to the house again it would only be to get a few things that I needed. It was some one who lived in the same building as Mr.

Barfoot. You have met him--'

She raised her eyes for an instant, and they encountered the listener's. Rhoda was at no loss to supply the omitted name; she saw at once how plain things were becoming.

'He has left England,' pursued Monica in a hurried but clear voice. 'I thought then that I should go away with him. But--it was impossible. I loved him--or thought I loved him; but I was guiltless of anything more than consenting to leave my husband. Will you believe me?'

'Yes, Monica, I do believe you.'

'If you have any doubt, I can show you a letter he wrote to me from abroad, which will prove--'

'I believe you absolutely.'

'But let me tell you more. I must explain how the misunderstanding--'

Rapidly she recounted the incidents of that fatal Sat.u.r.day afternoon.

At the conclusion her self-command was again overcome; she shed tears, and murmured broken entreaties for kindness.

'What shall I do, Miss Nunn? How can I live until--? I know it's only for a short time. My wretched life will soon be at an end--'

'Monica--there is one thing you must remember.'

The voice was so gentle, though firm--so unlike what she had expected to hear--that the sufferer looked up with grateful attention.

'Tell me--give me what help you can.'

'Life seems so bitter to you that you are in despair. Yet isn't it your duty to live as though some hope were before you?'

Monica gazed in uncertainty.

'You mean--' she faltered.

'I think you will understand. I am not speaking of your husband.

Whether you have duties to him or not I can't say; that is for your own mind and heart to determine. But isn't it true that your health has a graver importance than if you yourself only were concerned?'

'Yes--you have understood me--'

'Isn't it your duty to remember at every moment that your thoughts, your actions, may affect another life--that by heedlessness, by abandoning yourself to despair, you may be the cause of suffering it was in your power to avert?'

Herself strongly moved, Rhoda had never spoken so impressively, had never given counsel of such earnest significance. She felt her power in quite a new way, without touch of vanity, without posing or any trivial self-consciousness. When she least expected it an opportunity had come for exerting the moral influence on which she prided herself, and which she hoped to make the enn.o.bling element of her life. All the better that the case was one calling for courage, for contempt of vulgar reticences; the combative soul in her became stronger when faced by such conditions. Seeing that her words were not in vain, she came nearer to Monica and spoke yet more kindly.

'Why do you encourage that fear of your life coming to an end?'

'It's more a hope than a fear--at most times. I can see nothing before me. I don't wish to live.'

'That's morbid. It isn't yourself that speaks, but your trouble. You are young and strong, and in a year's time very much of this unhappiness will have pa.s.sed.'

'I have felt it like a certainty--as if it had been foretold to me--ever since I knew--'

'I think it very likely that young wives have often the same dread. It is physical, Monica, and in your case there is so little relief from dark brooding. But again you must think of your responsibility. You will live, because the poor little life will need your care.'

Monica turned her head away and moaned.

'I shall not love my child.'

'Yes, you will. And that love, that duty, is the life to which you must look forward. You have suffered a great deal, but after such sorrow as yours there comes quietness and resignation. Nature will help you.'