Her foot was on the carved work of the balcony; her scarlet jacket gleamed through the plate-glass, and flashed its vivid red through the clustering ivy leaves. Breathless with excitement, she tried the window-sash with her hand. It gave way, and swung inward with a faint jar. She was in the room with her husband, yet afraid to approach him. There he was, lying upon a low couch, wrapped in the folds of an oriental dressing-gown, and pillowed on a cushion of silk, embroidered in so many rich colors, that the contrast made his white face ghastly.
What if, after all, he did not love her? What if he should wake up alarmed, and made angry by her intrusion?
There is no feeling known to a woman's heart so timid, so unreasoning, so exacting, as love: pride, devotion, humility—a dozen contending elements—come into action when that one passion is disturbed, and it would be rashness to say which of these emotions may predominate at any given time. Perfect confidence either in herself or the creature of her love is unusual in most characters—impossible in some.
Ruth had entered that room full of enthusiasm, ready to dare anything; but the sight of a sleeping man, one that she loved, too, with overpowering devotion, was enough to make a coward of her in a single moment. Still, like a bird fascinated by the glittering vibrations of a serpent, she drew toward the couch, and bent over the sleeper, holding her own breath, and smiling softly as his passed over her parted lips.
Ah, how pale he was! How the shadows came and went across his white forehead! Was he angry with her even in his sleep? Did he know how near she was, and resent it?
No, no! If he knew anything in that profound slumber, the knowledge was pleasant, for a smile stole over his face, and some softly-whispered words trembled from his lips.
"My darling! oh, my darling!"
Ruth dropped on her knees by the bed, and pressed both hands to her mouth, thus smothering the cry of joy that rose to it. Her movements had been noiseless as the flutter of a bird—so noiseless that the sleeper was not disturbed. After a while she lifted her head, stole her arms timidly over that sleeping form, and dropped a kiss, light as the fall of a rose-leaf, on those parted lips.
"Oh, my love, my love," she murmured, in sounds scarcely louder than a thought. "Look at me, look at me, if it is only for one moment."
Hurst opened his eyes, and smiling vaguely, as sick men smile in dreams. That instant a noise was heard at the door, footsteps and voices. Ruth snatched the letter from her bosom, crushed it into the invalid's hand, left a passionate kiss with it, and fled out of the window, and down the ivy-choked steps. There, trembling and frightened, she shrunk into an angle of the stone window-case, and dragging the ivy over her, strove to hide herself until some chance of escaping across the garden offered. She had left the sash open in her haste, and could hear sounds from the room above with tolerable distinctness. The first was the sharp exclamation of a man's voice. He seemed to be walking hurriedly across the room, and spoke in strong remonstrance.