And oh! the fearful change that came over that beautiful but agonized face when the mask of smiles fell! She threw herself, all robed, and gemmed, and wreathed, as she was, prostrate upon the bed—her form convulsed, her bosom heaving with the suffocating anguish, which, from its very excess could not be vented.
“False! false! false!” she wailed. “False to Mark! false to my husband! falser than all, to myself! Lost! lost! lost! Lost, body, soul, and spirit! Would that I could die!”
A light, gay footstep on the stairs, a low, love-tuned voice near the door, and it opened, and St. Gerald Ashley entered, with a smile of confiding affection on his noble face.
How will that erring woman meet his manly, trusting love?
CHAPTER XIV.
ROSALIE.
“And I am blessed, to my mind.”—E. B. Browning.
Rosalie’s content was undisturbed and perfect. She had not witnessed India’s fainting. She knew of it, but ascribed it, as others did, to fatigue, heat, and over-excitement. She never once associated the swoon of the bride with the meeting with her former lover. It is true she had dreaded this meeting, for the sake of Mark, who, she feared, still cherished an affection for India; but she had no such fears for her. She could not have imagined—the simple integrity of her heart shielded her from imagining—that India could have given her hand to one man, while cherishing a thenceforth guilty preference for another. Of course, she had heard and read of ladies who desecrated marriage by making a legal sale of themselves for money, rank, or convenience; but then such were ladies of society, ladies of the great world—not highhearted women, not women of noble sentiments, like her friend India, who, if she were fickle, was at least truthful, even in her fickleness. No; the thought of India, while the wife of another, still loving Mark, and fainting at his sudden appearance, never entered the girl’s mind. She heard and entirely believed India’s own explanation of her swoon—“the closeness of the room”—and so, undisturbed by the suspicion of that suffering near her, which, had she known it, would have greatly troubled her peace, Rosalie yielded up her soul to serene joy. That night in her prayers she returned earnest thanks for the happiness accorded her. She sought her pillow in the fulness of content. Mark loved her! beyond this, she did not care to ask or hope any earthly good. Mark loved her! this was happiness enough for one long season. Mark loved her! the thought enveloped her soul in a benign sense of perfect protection, safety, and comfort. Mark loved her! the thought was perfect peace. Wrapped in it, she sweetly fell asleep.
She awoke in the morning, with a vague impression of a great happiness sleeping in her heart. Suddenly, with a shock of electric joy, she remembered what it was—Mark loved her! Again, in her morning worship, she offered up fervent thanksgiving for this priceless boon of love; and after she had made her simple morning toilet, she left her room, and went down stairs. Her self-assumed domestic duties claimed attention; but still the light of her inward joy brightened all her countenance.
Colonel Ashley, always an early riser, was in the hall when she descended. He met her, smiling. She was smiling, too.
“Well, my bonny girl!” he said, “spite of late hours, our mountain breezes are beginning to make the roses bloom on your cheeks. You look very pretty this morning!”