"'We had lived together for three years when, without any warning, Irene left me. I came home one night from a dinner at the English Embassy, and found her gone. There was no message, not a single line of adieu, not a ghost of a clew by which I could trace her. It was a shock to me; but when the first wrench was over, I knew that it was something of a relief. In my heart I was tired of the irregular life we had been leading, and longing to return to England and my old home. Irene herself was no longer dear to me. While she had remained faithful to me, I had considered myself, in a certain sense, bound to her, although the bonds had commenced to gall. Now that she had left me of her own accord, I was free. I troubled little as to what had become of her; youth is always selfish. She had either gone home to her father, or had run away with Count Hirsfeld, I determined at once. Of the two, I was inclined to believe the latter, from the fact of her having left no message for me, and also as I found that he too had quitted Paris suddenly. I purposely did not attempt to find out, for had I discovered the latter to be true, I should have felt bound to call Count Hirsfeld out the next time I met him, and I hated duelling. So, with a light heart, I disposed of my Paris establishment, selling even the house, and everything likely to remind me of a page of my history which I desired to blot out.
"'I returned to England, and settled down at Vaux Abbey. In a few months my life with Irene lay back in the past, like a troubled dream, and I did my best to forget it. It was all hateful and tiresome to me. My mind was full now of healthier and more wholesome thoughts and purposes. I felt like a man commencing life anew. Even my conscience had almost ceased to trouble me. Irene had left me of her own will, nor had she been driven to it by any unkindness on my part. I would forget her. I had the right to forget her.
"'About six months had passed, and I was in the full enjoyment of my altered life. One night, when the Abbey was full of guests, a servant whispered in my ear, as we sat at dinner, that a gentleman,—a foreigner, the man believed—had just been driven over from the nearest railway station, and was in the library waiting to see me. I knew in a moment that some sort of a resurrection of that buried past was at hand; and though I nodded carelessly and kept my countenance, my heart sank like lead. As soon as I could make an excuse, I left the table, with a brief apology to my guests, and made my way to the library.
"'I had expected to find there Irene's father. Judge of my surprise when I found Count Hirsfeld advancing to meet me, pale and travel-stained, from the shadows of the room. I stopped short, and stood with my hands behind me.
"'"Mr. de Vaux, I bring you a letter," he said simply; "I am here as a messenger, and as a messenger only. Nothing but the prayers of a dying woman would have induced me to stand beneath your roof!"
"'"Your presence certainly needs some explanation," I answered coldly. "Give me the letter!"
"'He handed it over, and I took it to the lamplight. The handwriting seemed unfamiliar to me; but when I glanced at the last page, I saw that it was signed "Irene." I read it through hastily.
"CRUTA.
"MARTIN:—
"I left you meaning never to speak or write your name again, but fate has been too strong for me. When you see my handwriting, you may fear that I want to burden you once more with my presence, which has grown so wearisome to you! You need not! Soon there will be nothing left of me but a memory; even that I know will not survive long. For I am dying. Life is only a matter of days and hours with me now. For me, only a few more suns will rise and set. I am dying, else I had not taken up my pen to write to you.
"Martin, one's last hours are a time for plain speaking. I have never suffered one word of reproach to pass my lips, but you have wronged me deeply! You have turned what should have been the sweetness of my life into bitterness and gall. I do not remind you of this to heap idle reproaches on your head; I remind you of it simply because on my deathbed I am going to ask you what in the past I scorned to do. I am going to ask you to marry me.
"I could not hope to make you understand all that I have suffered during these last few months of my illness. I would not if I could. It is not worth while! My father, although he knows that I am dying, will scarcely speak to me. He has forgotten that I am his daughter, save when he laments it. He sits alone day by day, brooding upon the dishonour of his race. The priest, who prays for me, speaks words of doubtful comfort, as though, after all, he doubted whether salvation were possible for me. The horror of it all has entered into my soul! The sin of the past is ever before my eyes,—black and threatening,—and a great desolation reigns in my heart.
"And from it all I turn to you, Martin, to save me! You can do it! You only! You lose nothing! You risk nothing! and you will throw some faint light of consolation upon this, my dreary passage through the shadow-land of death. Once you loved me, far off and dim though that time may seem to you. You would be faithful always, you swore, as side by side we stood on board your yacht on the night of our flight, and watched the shores of Cruta grow dimmer and dimmer, and the white-faced dawn break quivering upon the waters. You would be faithful always! The words come back to me as I lie here in this great, dreary bedchamber, with a cold-faced priest muttering comfortless prayers by my side; dying alone, without a single kindly face to lighten my passage to the grave. Yet, do not read this as a reproach! Read it only as the prelude to this my last appeal to you! Marry me, Martin! It would cost you so little: just a hurried journey here, a few sentences over my bedside, a week's waiting at the most, and you could see me in my grave, and feel yourself free again. Is it too great a thing to do, to make light the heart of a dying woman? I pray God that you may not think so! You have generosity! I appeal to it! Come, I beseech you! It is the prayer of a dying woman! I summon you to Cruta!
"IRENE."
"'Back again in the meshes of my old sin. The letter fluttered down from between my fingers on to the floor, and I stood with folded arms and bowed head, arraigned at the bar of my own judgment. I had marred a girl's fair young life! The memory of those old days—my passionate persuasions and prayers—swept in upon me. Yes! she had trusted me, and I had deceived her! Her sin and her death lay at my door! The hideous rascality of the thing oppressed me. I had been false to my name and traditions.