CHAPTER XXII—FROM THE POST-BAG.
I.
Sir George Craik, Bart., to Alma Craik.
My dear Niece,-The receipt of your letter, dated ‘Lucerne,’ but bearing the post-mark of Geneva, has at last relieved my mind from the weight of anxiety which was oppressing it. Thank Heaven you are safe and well, and bear your suffering with Christian resignation. In a little time, I trust, you will have left this dark passage of your experience quite behind you, and return to us looking and feeling like your old self. George, who now, as always, shares my affectionate solicitude for you, joins me in expressing that wish. The poor boy is still sadly troubled at the remembrance of your misconception, and I sometimes think that his health is affected. Do, if you can, try to send him a line or a message, assuring him that your unhappy misunderstanding is over. Believe me, his one thought in life is to secure your good esteem.
There is no news—none, that is to say, of any importance. We have kept our promise to you, and your secret is still quite safe in our custody. The man to whom you owe all this misery is still here, and still, I am informed, prostituting the pulpit to his vicious heresies. If report is to be believed, his utterances have of late been more extraordinary than ever, and he is rapidly losing influence over his own congregation. Sometimes I can scarcely conquer my indignation, knowing as I do that with one word I could effectually silence his blasphemy, and drive him beyond the pale of society. But in crushing him I should disgrace you, and bring contempt upon our name; and these considerations, as well as my pledge to keep silence, make any kind of public action impossible. I must therefore wait patiently till the inevitable course of events, accelerated by an indignant Providence, destroys the destroyer of your peace.
In the mean time, my dear Alma, let me express my concern and regret that you should be wandering from place to place without a protector. I know your strength of mind, of course; but you are young and handsome, and the world is censorious. Only say the word, and although business of a rather important nature occupies me in London, I will put it aside at any cost, and join you. In the absence of my dear brother, I am your natural guardian. While legally your own mistress, you are morally under my care, and I would make any sacrifice to be with you, especially at this critical moment of your life.
I send this letter to the address you have given me at Lucerne. I hope it will reach you soon and safely, and that you will, on seeing it, fall in with my suggestion that I should come to you without delay.
With warmest love and sympathy, in which your cousin joins, believe me as ever,—Your affectionate uncle,
George Craik.
II.
From Alma Craik to Sir George Craik, Bart.
My dear Uncle,—I have just received your letter. Thank you for attending to my request. With regard to your suggestion that you should come to me, I know it is meant in all kindness, but as I told you before leaving London, I prefer at present to be quite alone, with the exception of my maid Hortense. I will let you know of my movements from time to time,—Your affectionate niece,
Alma Craik.
III.
Alma Craik to the Rev. Ambrose Bradley.
Your letter, together with one from my uncle, found me at Lucerne, and brought me at once grief and comfort: grief, that you still reproach yourself over what was inevitable; comfort, that you are, as you assure me, still endeavouring to pursue your religious work. Pray, pray, do not write to me in such a strain again. You have neither wrecked my life nor broken my heart, as you blame yourself for doing; I learned long ago from our Divine Example that the world is one of sorrow, and I am realising the truth in my own experience, that is all.
You ask me how and where I have spent my days, and whether I have at present any fixed destination. I have been wandering, so to speak, among the gravestones of the Catholic Church, visiting not only the great shrines and cathedrals, but lingering in every obscure roadside chapel, and halting at every Calvary, in southern and western France. Thence I have come on to Switzerland, where religion grows drearier, and life grows dismaller, in the shadow of the mountains. In a few days I shall follow in your own footsteps, and go on to Italy—to Rome.
Write to me when you feel impelled to write. You shall be apprised of my whereabouts from time to time.—Yours now as ever,
Alma.
P.S.—When I sat down to write the above, I thought I had so much to say to you; and I have said nothing! Something numbs expression, though my thoughts seem full to overflowing. I am like one who longs to speak, yet fears to utter a syllable, lest her voice should be clothed with tears and sobs. God help me! All the world is changed, and I can hardly realise it, yet!
IV.
Ambrose Bradley to Alma Craik.
Dearest Alma,—You tell me in your letter that you have said nothing of the thoughts that struggle within you for utterance; alas! your words are only too eloquent, less in what they say than in what they leave unsaid. If I required any reminder of the mischief I have wrought, of the beautiful dream that I have destroyed, it would come to me in the pathetic reticence of the letter I have just received. Would to God that you had never known me! Would to God that, having known me, you would have despised me as I deserved! I was unworthy even to touch the hem of your garment. I am like a wretch who has profaned the altar of a saint. Your patience and devotion are an eternal rebuke. I could bear your bitter blame; I cannot bear your forgiveness.
I am here as you left me; a guilty, conscience-stricken creature struggling in a world of nightmares. Nothing now seems substantial, permanent, or true. Every time that I stand up before my congregation I am like a shadow addressing shadows; thought and language both fail me, and I know not what platitudes flow from my lips; but when I am left alone again, I awaken as from a dream to the horrible reality of my guilt and my despair.
I have thought it all over again and again, trying to discover some course by which I might bring succour to myself and peace to her I love; and whichever way I look, I see but one path of escape, the rayless descent of death. For, so long as I live, I darken your sunshine. My very existence is a reminder to you of what I am, of what I might have been.
But there, I will not pain you with my penitence, and I will hush my self-reproaches in deference to your desire. Though the staff you placed in my hand has become a reed, and though I seem to have no longer any foothold on the solid ground of life, I will try to struggle on.
I dare not ask you to write to me—it seems an outrage to beg for such a blessing; yet I know that you will pity me, and write again.—Ever yours,
Ambrose Bradley.