But in spite of her guardianship, something had evidently happened. What was it? Was this desire of Ruth's to be alone a good sign or a bad sign? Did it come from happiness or unhappiness? "If it is unhappiness, she will throw it off," Dolly told herself. "She hates suffering. She will manage, somehow, to rid herself of it." Thus she tried to reassure herself.
Ruth gave not only the afternoon but the evening to her pilgrimage; she visited all the places where she had been with Walter. When the twilight had deepened to night, she came back to town, and, still accompanied by Donato, she went to the old fort, and out the shell road; finally she paid a visit to Andalusia. A bright moon was shining; over the low land blew a perfumed breeze. Andalusia was deserted, Mrs. Kip had gone to North Carolina. Bribing Uncle Jack, the venerable ex-slave who lived in a little cabin under the bananas near the gate, Ruth went in, and leaving her body-guard, the old fisherman, resting on a bench, she wandered alone among the flowers. "You see that I love you. I myself did not know it until now"—this was the talisman which was making her so happy; two brief phrases uttered on the spur of the moment, phrases preceded by nothing, followed by nothing. It was a proof of the simplicity of her nature, its unconsciousness of half-motives, half-meanings, that she should think these few words so conclusive. But to her they were final. Direct herself, she supposed that others were the same. She did not go beyond her talisman; she did not reason about it, or plan. In fact, she did not think at all; she only felt—felt each syllable take a treasure in her heart, and brooded over it happily. And as she wandered to and fro in the moonlight, it was as well that Walter did not see her. He did not love her—no. He had no wish to love her; it would have interfered with all his plans. But if he had beheld her now, he would have succumbed—succumbed, at least, for the moment, as he had done before. He was not there, however. And he had no intention of being there, of being anywhere near Horace Chase's wife for a long time to come. "I'll keep out of that!" he had said to himself, determinedly.
It was midnight when at last Ruth returned home, coming into the drawing-room like a vision, in her white dress, with her arms full of flowers.
"Well, have you had enough of prowling?" asked her mother, sleepily. "I must say that it appears to agree with you!"
Even Dolly was reassured by her sister's radiant eyes.
But later, when Félicité had left her mistress, then, if Dolly could have opened the locked door, her comfort would have vanished; for the other mood had now taken possession, and lying prone on a couch, with her face hidden, Ruth was battling with her grief.
Pain was so new to her, sorrow so new! Incapable of enduring (this was what Dolly had hoped), many times during the last ten days she had revolted against her suffering, and to-night she was revolting anew. "I will not care for him; it makes me too wretched!" Leaving the couch, she strode angrily to and fro. The three windows of the large room—it was her dressing-room—stood open to the warm sea-air; she had put out the candles, but the moonlight, entering in a flood, reflected her white figure in the long mirrors as she came and went. Félicité had braided her hair for the night, but the strands had become loosened, and the thick, waving mass flowed over her shoulders. "I will not think of him; I will not!" And to emphasize it, she struck her clinched hand with all her force on the stone window-seat. "It is cut. I'm glad! It will make me remember that I am not to think of him." She was intensely in earnest in her resolve, and, to help herself towards other thoughts, she began to look feverishly at the landscape outside, as though it was absolutely necessary that she should now resee and recount each point and line. "There is the top of the light-house—and there is the ocean—and there are the bushes near the quarry." She leaned out of the window so as to see farther. "There is the North Beach; there is the fort and the lookout tower." Thus for a few minutes her weary mind followed the guidance of her will. "There is the bathing-house. And there is the dock and the club-house; and there is the Basin. Down there on the right is Fish Island. How lovely it all is! I wish I could stay here forever. But even to-morrow night I shall be gone; I shall be on the Dictator. And then will come Charleston. And then New York." (Her mind had now escaped again.) "And then the days—and the months—and the years without him! Oh, what shall I do? What shall I do?" And the pain descending, sharper than ever, she sank down, and with her arms on the window-seat and her face on her arms, and cried and cried—cried so long that at last her shoulders fell forward stoopingly, and her whole slender frame lost its strength, and drooped against the window-sill like a broken reed. Her despair held no plan for trying to see Walter, her destiny seemed to her fixed; her revolts had not been against that destiny, but against her pain. But something was upon her now which was stronger than herself, stronger than her love of ease, stronger than her dread of suffering. Dolly knew her well. But there were some depths which even Dolly did not know.
Dawn found her still there, her hands and feet cold, her face white; she had wept herself out—there were no more tears left. The sun came up; she watched it mechanically. "Félicité mustn't find me here," she thought. She dragged herself to her feet; all her muscles were stiff. Then going to the bedroom, she fell into a troubled sleep.
It would be too much to say that during the entire night her mind had not once turned towards her husband. She had thought of him now and then, much as she had thought of her mother; as, for instance—would her mother see any change in her face the next morning, after this night of tears? Would her husband see any at New York when he arrived? Whenever she remembered either one of them, she felt a sincere desire not to make them unhappy. But this was momentary; during most of the night the emotions that belonged to her nature swept over her with such force that she had no power, no will, to think of anything save herself.