He did not know how truly he spoke.
"Come," said Edgar, in his turn, to Emma, "we have had all the horrors we want; now let us go down-stairs and have a little cheerful talk in the sitting-room."
And Emma yielded; but Hermione hung back.
"I dread to go down," said she; "this seems the only place in which I can say farewell."
But Frank was holding out his hand, and she gradually gave in to its seduction and followed him down-stairs into the sitting-room, which was fast growing dusky.
"Now," said he, without heeding Emma and the Doctor, who had retreated to one of the farther windows, "if you wish to say farewell, I will listen to you; but before you speak, hear what I have to say. In a certain box which came with me this day from New York, and which is now at Mr. Lothrop's, there lies a gown of snowy satin made with enough lace to hide any deficiencies it may have in size or fit. With this gown is a veil snowy as itself, and on the veil there lies a wreath of orange blossoms, while under the whole are piled garments after garments, chosen with loving care by the only sister I have in the world, for the one woman in that world I wish to make my wife. If you love me, Hermione, if you think my devotion a true one, fly from this nest of hideous memories and superstitious fears, and in that place where you are already expected, put on these garments I have brought you, and with them a crown of love, joy, and hope, which will mean a farewell, not to me, but to the old life forever."
But Hermione, swaying aside from him, cried: "I cannot, I cannot; the rafters would fall if I tried to pass the door."
"Then," said Frank, growing in height and glowing with purpose, "they shall fall first on me." And seizing her in his arms, he raised her to his breast and fled with her out of the room and out of the house, her wild shriek of mingled terror and love trailing faintly after them till he stopped on the farther side of the gate, which softly closed behind them.
Emma, who was taken as much by surprise as her sister had been, looked at the empty place where Hermione had so lately stood, and cowered low, as if the terrible loneliness of the house, now she was gone, crushed upon her like a weight. Then she seized Edgar by the hand and ran out also; and Edgar pulled the great door to behind them, and the Cavanagh mansion, for the first time in a year, was a shell without inmates, a body without soul.
They found Hermione standing in the dark shadows cast here in the street by the overhanging trees. Frank's arm was about her and she looked both dazed and pleased.