§ 23
Sylvia wrestled this problem out with her own soul. The only person who ever knew about it was Aunt Varina, and she knew only because she happened to awaken in the small hours of the morning and hear signs of a fit of hysteria which the girl was trying to repress. She went into Sylvia’s room and found her huddled upon the bed; when she asked what was the matter, the other sobbed without lifting her face—“Oh, I can’t marry him! I can’t marry him!”
Mrs. Tuis stared at her in consternation. “Why, Sylvia!” she gasped.
“Oh, Aunt Varina,” moaned Sylvia, “I’m so unhappy! It’s so horrible!”
“But, my child! You are out of your senses! What has happened?”
“I’ve come to realize the mistake I’ve made! I’d rather die than do it!”
Poor Aunt Varina was dumb with dismay. Sylvia had played her part so well that no one had had a suspicion. Now, between her bursts of weeping, she stammered out what she had learned. Frank was innocent. He had gone away forever—perhaps he had killed himself. At any rate, his life was ruined, and Sylvia had done it.
“But, my child,” protested the other, “you couldn’t help it. How could you know?”
“I should have found out! I should have trusted Frank; I should have known that he could not do what they accused him of. I have been faithless to him—faithless to our love. And now what will become of him?”
Aunt Varina sat gazing at her, tears of sympathy running down her cheeks. “Sylvia,” she whispered, “what will you do?”
“Oh, I love Frank Shirley!” moaned the girl. “I never loved anybody else—I never will love anybody else! And I know—what I didn’t know at first—that it’s wicked, wicked to marry without love!”
“But what will you do?” repeated the other, who was dazed with horror.
For a long time there was no sound but Sylvia’s weeping. “Sylvia dear,” began Aunt Varina, at last, “you must control yourself. You must not let these thoughts get possession of you. You will destroy yourself if you do.”
“I can’t marry him!” sobbed the girl.
“I can’t let you go on talking that way!” exclaimed the other, wildly. “Do you realize what you are saying? Look at me, child, look at me!”
Sylvia looked at her, wondering a little—for never had she seen such vehemence exhibited by this gentle and submissive “poor relation.” “Listen!” Mrs. Tuis rushed on. “How can you know that what you have heard is true? You say that Frank was innocent—but your Cousin Harley investigated, and he declared he was guilty. Mrs. Winthrop told you the same—she said everybody knew. And yet you take the word of one man! And you told me at Harvard that Mr. Bates was distressed at the idea of your marrying Mr. van Tuiver. You told me he warned you against him! Isn’t that so, Sylvia?”
“Yes, Aunt Varina, but—”
“He does not like Mr. van Tuiver, and he comes here at a time like this, and puts such ideas into your thoughts. Don’t you see that was not an honorable thing to do—when you were on the verge of being married and couldn’t get out of it! When you know that your father would be utterly ruined—that your whole family would be wrecked by it!”
“Surely it can’t be so bad, Aunt Varina!”
“Think how your father has gone into debt on your account! All the clothes you have bought—the bills at this hotel—the expenses of the wedding! Thousands and thousands of dollars!”
“Oh, I didn’t want all that!” wailed Sylvia.
“But you did! You insisted on coming here to New York, where a wedding would cost several times as much as at home! You have come out before all the world as Mr. van Tuiver’s fiancée—and think of the scandal and the disgrace, if you were to break it off! And poor Mr. van Tuiver—what a figure he’d cut! And when he loves you so!”
Sylvia’s sobbing had ceased during this outburst. When she spoke again, her voice was hard. “He does not love me,” she said.
“Why, what in the world do you mean by that?”
“I mean just what I say. He doesn’t love me—not as Frank loves me. He isn’t capable of it.”
“But then—why—for what other reason should he be marrying you?”
“I’m beautiful, and he wants me. But it’s mainly because I offended his vanity—yes, just that! I turned him down, I ridiculed him and insulted him. I was something he couldn’t get; and the more he couldn’t get me, the more the thought of me rankled in his mind.”
“Sylvia! How can you be so cynical!”
“I’m not cynical at all. I just won’t gild things over, as other women do. I won’t make pretences, I won’t cover myself and my whole life with a cloak of shams. I know right now that I’m being sold, just as much as if I were led out to an auction-block with chains about my ankles! I’m being sold to a man—and I was meant to be sold to a man from the very beginning of my life!”
There was a silence; for Aunt Varina was paralyzed by these amazing words. She had never heard such an utterance in her life before. “Sylvia!” she cried. “What do you mean? Who is driving you?”
“I don’t know! But something is!”
“How can you say it? Can you imagine that your good, kind parents—”
“Oh, no!” interrupted Sylvia, passionately. “At least—they don’t know it!”
Mrs. Tuis sat dumfounded. “Sylvia,” she quavered, at last, “let me implore you to get yourself together before your father arrives in New York. If he should hear what you have said to me to-night, he would never get over it—truly, it would kill him!”