§ 3
On the morning of the next day her mother came to her. “Has the letter come?” asked Sylvia.
The mother hesitated, and so Sylvia knew that it had come. “Give it to me!” she cried.
“It was addressed to your father, Sylvia——”
“Where is Papa?”
She started to the door. But “Miss Margaret” stood in her way. “Your father, my child, has asked your Uncle Basil to come over.” And then, as Sylvia persisted, “Sylvia, you can’t talk of such things to your father. He thinks it is a matter which your Uncle Basil ought to attend to. Please spare your father, Sylvia—he has been ill, and this has been such a dreadful blow to him!”
“But for God’s sake, Mamma, what is in the letter?”
“It justifies our worst fears, my child. But you must be patient—it is not a thing that a young girl can deal with. Where is your modesty, Sylvia? Your father will lose respect for you if you do not calm yourself. You ought to be hating the man who has so disgraced you—who cares no more for you—”
“Hush!” cried Sylvia. “You must not say it! You don’t know that it is true!”
“But it is true! You will see that it is true. And you ought to be ashamed of yourself, to cling to a man who has been willing to—to—oh, what a shameful thing it is! Sylvia, get yourself together, I implore you—do not let your father and your uncle see you in such a state about a man—an unworthy man!”
So there was another hour of distracted waiting, until the Bishop came up, his gentle face a picture of grief. “Miss Margaret” fled, and Sylvia shut and locked the door, and turned upon her uncle. “Now, Uncle Basil, let me see the letter.”
He put it into her hands without a word. There was also a newspaper-clipping, and she glanced first at that, and went sick with horror. There was Frank’s picture, and that of another man, with the label: “Harvard student who may die as a result of injuries received in a brawl.” Sylvia’s eyes sped over the reading matter which went with the pictures; it was from one of the sensational papers, the kind which revel in personal details, and so she had the whole story. Frank had got into a fight with a man in a “resort,” and had knocked him down; in falling, the man had struck his head against a piece of furniture, and the doctors had not yet determined whether his skull was fractured. In the meantime, Frank was held in three thousand dollars bail. The account went on to say that the arrested man had been prominently mentioned as candidate for class-president, on behalf of the “Yard” against the “Gold Coast;” also that he was the son of Robert Shirley, who had died in State’s prison under sentence for embezzlement.
It seemed hardly necessary to read any more; but Sylvia turned to Harley’s letter, which gave various additional details, and some comments. There was one point in particular which etched itself upon her mind: “There need be no doubt as to the character of the place. It is one of the two or three high-class houses of prostitution in Boston which are especially patronized by college men. This is not mentioned in the newspaper accounts, of course, but I know a man who was present and saw the row, so there can be no question as to that part of the matter.”
Sylvia let the letter fall, and sinking down upon the bed, buried her face in her arms. The Bishop could see her form racked and shuddering. He came and sat by her, and put his hand upon her shoulder, waiting in silence. “My poor child!” he began in a whisper, at last. “My poor, poor child!”
He dared not let her suffer too long without trying to help her. “My dear,” he pleaded, “let me talk to you. Make an effort, hear me. Sylvia, you have to bear it. My heart bleeds for you, but there’s no help—it has to be borne. Won’t you listen to the advice of an old man, who’s had to endure terrible grief, and shame—agony almost as great as yours?”
“Well?” she demanded, suddenly. Her voice sounded strange and hard to him.
“Sylvia, dear, I tried to prove God’s words to you by logic, and I could not. God was never proved by logic, my child—men don’t believe in Him for that reason. They believe because at some awful moment they could not face life alone—because suffering and grief had broken their hearts, and they were forced to pray. Sylvia, there is only one way of help for you—and that is through prayer.”
He waited to know what effect his words were having. Suddenly he heard the strange, hard voice again. “Uncle Basil.”
“Well, my child.”
“I want you to tell me one thing. I have to understand this, but I can’t—I can’t ask anybody.”
“What is it, Sylvia?”
“I want to know—do men do such things?”
The Bishop answered, in a low tone, “Yes, my child, I am sorry to say—many of them do.”
“Oh, I hate them!” she cried, with sudden fierceness. “I hate them! I hate life! It’s a shameful, hideous world, and I wish that I could die!”
“Ah, don’t say that, my child!” he pleaded. “I beg you not to take it that way. If we let affliction harden us, instead of chastening and humbling us, then we miss all the purpose for which it is sent. Who knows, Sylvia—perhaps this is a punishment which God in His wisdom has adjudged you?”
“Punishment, Uncle Basil? What have I done?”
“You have denied His word, my child. You have presumed to set your own feeble mind against His will and doctrine. And now——”
“Oh, Uncle Basil, stop!” she exclaimed. “Your words have no meaning to me whatever!” She buried her face in the pillow, and terrible sobbing shook her, burst after burst of it, as a tempest shakes a tree. “Oh, I loved him so! I loved him so!”
The old man had tried speaking as a Bishop; now he thought that the time had come for him to speak as a Castleman. His voice became suddenly stern. “Sylvia,” he said, “the man was not worthy of your affection, and you must manage to put him from your thoughts. You are the child of a proud race, Sylvia—the daughter of pure women! You must bear this trouble with character, and with the consciousness of your purity.”
“Uncle Basil,” she answered, “please go. I can’t bear to talk to anyone now. I must be alone for a while.”
He rose and stood hesitating. “There’s no way I can help you?” he asked.
“Nobody can help me,” she answered. “Thank you, Uncle Basil, but please go.”