E. Phillips Oppenheim

"Farewell to the dead ashes of life."

The path which I had been following led straight up to the bare, arched door of the building. I had reached it unmolested, and rang the bell.

What a hoarse, clanging sound! I shivered as I stood there listening to its gloomy echoes until they died away. No one came. The place seemed wrapped in an austere silence. I listened, but I could hear no sound within; only the dull, melancholy sighing of the wind amongst a sickly avenue of firs behind.

I stretched out my hand, and rang again. Almost before the echoes had died away I heard footsteps within. A heavy bolt was withdrawn, and a dark-robed monk stood on the threshold before me. He recoiled for a moment at seeing a woman, and I thought that he would have closed the door, but he did not.

"What would you have at this hour, sister?" he asked sternly. "The chapel is closed, and morning is the time for dispensing charity."

"I have come in search of a priest who is only a visitor here," I said. "Father Adrian he is called!"

He seemed still indisposed to admit me. "Is your business urgent?" he asked doubtfully. "Father Adrian is at his devotions, and must not be lightly disturbed."

"It is urgent," I answered.

He beckoned me to follow him, and in silence led me a few yards down a bare stone corridor. Then he threw open the door of a small room, and bade me enter.

"This is the guest-chamber," he said. "Wait here, and I will summon Father Adrian!"

He closed the door and disappeared. The interior of the room in which he had left me was bare and chilling. I turned from it to the window. Almost opposite was a small eminence, and at its summit a rude cross of Calvary. A dark figure, with clasped hands and bent head, was slowly descending the path.

Even at that distance I thought I recognised the walk, and as he came nearer I saw that he was wearing the ordinary garb of a Roman Catholic priest instead of the monk's robes. I stood close to the window watching him, and as he crossed the open space before the door he raised his eyes and saw me. How he started, and how his eyes seemed to burn in their sockets! Doubtless he would have turned paler, but he was already deathly white. He stood there, swaying from side to side, with his eyes fastened wildly upon me, as though an apparition had appeared before him. Then he took a quick step forward; I heard the great front door creak and groan upon its hinges, and almost as soon as I could turn round he was on the threshold before me.

"Adrea! Adrea!" he cried, in a low, suppressed whisper which shook with passion. "You here! What has happened? Stand in the light! Let me see your face!"

I moved a step towards him, and raised my veil. "I am lonely," I said softly. "Was it very wrong of me to come here?"

He stood before me, with hungry, incredulous eyes fastened upon my face, as though he would see through it into my false heart. Yet I did not flinch; I was actress enough for my part. I watched him tremble—watched the colour flush into his face and die away. It was a very storm of passion which shook him before he could find the words to answer me.

"Adrea! Adrea! have you come here to mock me? As you are a woman, I implore you to spare me! Speak the truth!"

I answered him softly, with my eyes fixed upon the ground. "I came because I was lonely. Let us go away from here! Come home with me!"

"Home with you! Home with you!" He repeated my invitation. He scarcely seemed to understand.

"Yes! I was very silly the other day! I did not understand you! I did not understand myself! And you see I have humbled myself very much! I have come to tell you so! Am I forgiven?"

I raised my eyes to his, and added in a half whisper: "Won't you come home with me, and read aloud, as we used to on the rocks at Cruta?"

He stood there as though fascinated. I began to feel impatient, but I dared not show any signs of it.

Suddenly he took a quick step towards me, and before I could prevent it he had thrown himself at my feet on the cold stone floor, and was holding my hands tightly in his.

"Adrea!" he cried, his voice choked with passion, "is this thing true? My brain reels with the delight of it; but, oh, forgive me if I seem to doubt! I know nothing of women, but surely your lips could never lie! You are not mocking me? Oh, Adrea, my love, lift up your eyes and swear that this is no dream. I am dizzy with joy! Speak to me! Let me look into your face! I am not doubting you, yet say it once more! Tell me it is not a dream!"

I lied to him with my face, and with my eyes, and with my lips. "It is no dream," I said softly. "I have come to you, Adrian, because I want you. No one else would do."

He stood up, pale and shaken. His voice was still full of deep, throbbing earnestness. "Adrea!" he cried, "to-day I have been fighting a grim fight. Look into my face and mark its traces. I am desperate! For hours I have knelt on what was once a hallowed spot. In vain! In vain! On my knees before the cross of Calvary I have striven to pray, as a man wrestles for his life with the waves of a great ocean. Alas! alas! In the twilight I fancied always that your face was moving amongst the shadows, and even the breeze which rustled in the shrubs around seemed ever to be murmuring your name. Oh, my love, my love, sometimes I wonder that I have lived through the anguish of these days. But it is over! You have come to me, and the evil days are past. I renounce my priesthood! It has become only a barren farce to me! Heaven or hell, what matters it? I leave here with you to-night never to return! Never! never! never!"

He pressed hot kisses upon my hands; they stung me like molten lead, but I did not withdraw them. Then he rose up and held out his arms to me with a great yearning stealing into his dark eyes. But I kept him away.

"Not here! not here!" I cried. "I heard footsteps outside. Let us go!"

"You are right," he answered. "Wait for me; I have but few preparations to make."

He left me, and I breathed freely again. I had no fears, no hesitation. I never dreamt of turning back; but I began to find my task more difficult even than I had imagined. It was his touch, his passionate looks and words which were so hard to endure. My lips could lie, but it was hard to govern my looks; and oh, how I hated him!

Soon he was back—too soon for me; and then we left the place. He had changed his clothes, and, to my surprise, he wore an ordinary dark walking suit and a long ulster. He had discarded the priest altogether.

At the bend he looked back. There was a rift in the clouds just behind the hill of Calvary, and the rude cross stood out vividly against the sky. "At last!" he murmured; "at last! Farewell to the dead ashes of life! It is rest to have ended the struggle, even to have fallen. My new life is here!"

He touched my hand fondly, and held it within his own. "How deathly cold your hand is, Adrea!" he said. "It is the night air. You are well, are you not?" he added anxiously.

"Quite well; only tired."

He took my arm. I could not resist him, only I walked the more swiftly. He tried to check me, but I shook my head. "I am cold and tired," I told him. "This desolate walk frightened me, and even with you I think I am a little nervous. Let us hurry. Hark! What was that?"

"A bittern in the marshes! Why, Adrea, how frightened you are! It is not like you!"

"I know it," I answered; "but to-night—to-night the air seems full of whisperings and strange sounds. Yes, I am frightened."

I shivered as I spoke. He would have drawn me closer to him, but I waved him away. How could he know anything of the horrors of that walk for me! Strange phantoms seemed ever rising from the sea, stalking across the path, and away over the moor, and passing and repassing, grinning and whispering in my ear. Sometimes it seemed as though I could have touched them by stretching out my hand; but when I tried, my fingers closed upon thin air. What were they? Why had they come to torment me? Was it because they scented an evil deed? Would they haunt me for ever like this? What folly! If I gave way so I should soon be altogether unnerved, and my task was still before me. I closed my eyes and opened them again. They had gone! It was good! I had conquered!

It was late, and we had eaten and drunk together. He was lying back in an easy-chair, flushed, and strange to say, wonderfully handsome. The hollows in his cheeks seemed suddenly filled up, and his eyes were soft and bright. I sat at his feet looking into the firelight.

"Will you answer me some questions, Adrian?" I asked. "There has been so much mystery around us lately, and, like a woman, I am curious."

"Yes, I will tell you anything," he answered. "Am I not your slave, dearest? Only ask me them quickly. There are many things I have to talk about. What was that?" he added quickly. "Is there any one else in this room?"

I shook my head. "No one; it was fancy. Tell me, who was Madame de Merteuill?"

"My mother!"

"Your mother?"

"Yes; and the old Count of Cruta is my grandfather. Madame de Merteuill is his daughter. But that is not her real name!"

There was a high screen just behind his chair,—a japanned one, which seemed to have been badly used, for there was a great hole in it. While we had been talking a strange thing had happened. A man's hand had slowly been thrust through, and a crumpled piece of paper was dropped upon the carpet. I moved to his side, and raised the cushion in his chair. Before I could help it he had caught my face, and pressed a hot, burning kiss upon my cheek. I dared not struggle. I had to yield, and endure for a moment his passionate embrace. Then I dropped my handkerchief upon the piece of paper, and picked up both hastily.

"Will you tell me something else, please?"

"Anything you ask! You know that I will!"

"The De Vaux estates——"

"Are mine. I am the son of Martin de Vaux. Paul de Vaux has no claim at all. If I had remained in the Church, it was my intention to found a great monastery here. But now——"

"Well?"

"Everything is yours!"

There was a moment's silence. I drew the piece of paper from my pocket, as though by accident, and read it to myself. There were only a few hastily scrawled lines:—

"I dare not do it. I am afraid. I will put the knife on the floor."

I glanced towards the hole. The hand was there, holding a long, gleaming dagger. It laid it noiselessly upon the carpet, and was withdrawn. I went over to his side, and knelt down there.

"And what will become of Paul de Vaux?" I asked.

He laughed grimly. "He must take his chance. He knows the whole story. He has known since last night. Adrea, tell me once more," he pleaded: "you never loved him really,—say that you never did!"

"Are you jealous, sir?" I asked lightly. My left hand was wandering down his side! Ah! there was his heart! How it was beating! My right hand was on the floor, cautiously feeling its way towards the screen. It reached the dagger! I clutched it by the hilt! Now was the time. There was his heart. I knew the exact spot.

"Adrea, are you ill?" he asked. "How white and strange you look! Ah!"

It was done! Lucrezia Borgia could not have bungled less! He lay doubled up in the chair, with a long Genoese dagger buried in his heart, and it was I who had done it!

Gomez crawled from behind the screen, and looked first at him and then at me with protruding eyes. He tried to speak, but his teeth chattered.

"It is done!" I said calmly, "and you are saved, Paul, my love," I whispered to myself. "Be a man, Gomez. We must carry it into the wood. Lift him gently; there must be no blood here."

It took all our strength to move him, and we had to drag him, yard by yard, down the avenue and across the road into the little wood.

My pen is weary of horrors. The memory of that hour is not to be written about. But when he turned away I took the flowers which he had begged for from my corsage and threw them down amongst the wet leaves. It was my sole moment of relenting.