She poured some wine into a glass, and drank it thirstily; but it brought no color into her cheeks, and none came there until she stood in the porch, after night-fall, and repeated to herself, "I must see him! I will see him! I must know the truth, or die!"
This resolve had made her stronger; perhaps the wine had helped, for she was not used to it, and so the effect was all the more powerful. At any rate, she drew the hood over her face, wrapped a dark mantle about her, and went out across the garden, into the path of the wilderness, and on to the home of which she might some day, God willing, become the mistress. When she thought of this, the shadow of that other picture, which had taken away so much of her life in the path she had trod only a few hours before, came with it, and that which had been to her a proud hope was blotted out.
"I will believe it from no lips but his," she thought, looking out from the shadows at the vast gray building that held her heart in its chambers. "Oh, that I knew what was in my father's letter!"
She left the shelter of the park, and walked cautiously across the lawn, concealing her progress as best she could among flowering thickets, or a great tree that spread its branches here and there in forest grandeur.
She entered the flower-thickets under that window, the only one she cared for in all that vast building. A faint light came through it, softened by falls of lace, tinted red by the glow of silken curtains, and broken into gleams by the ivy leaves outside. Her heart gave a wild leap as she saw that the shutters were unclosed; then a great fear seized upon her; some person might be within the chamber, or lingering in the grounds. Cautiously, and holding her breath, she crept toward the masses of ivy that wound its thick foliage up to the balcony. If it stirred in the wind she shrunk back terrified. Where it cast deep shadows downward, she fancied that some man was crouching.
Still the girl crept forward, her anxiety half lost in womanly dread of being misunderstood, even by the beloved being she sought. But, for the great agony of doubt at her heart, she would have turned even then, so strong was the delicacy of her pride.
She was under the balcony now, behind the ivy, which covered her like a mantle. Up the narrow steps she crept, and crouching by the window, looked in. No one was moving. A night-lamp shed its soft moonlight on a marble console, on which some wine and fruit cast shadows. In the middle of the room stood the couch she had seen but once, shaded with rich silk and clouds of lace, snow-white and filmy, seeming to cool the air, it was so frost-like. These curtains were flung back at the pillows, and there she saw her husband in a sound sleep. She held her breath, she laid her face close to the window. Then, with impotent fingers, tried the sash. It was fastened on the inside.
What could she do? How arouse the sleeper? Impatiently she beat her hand on the glass. Still more recklessly she called her husband's name.
"Walton! Walton!"