“How do you know?”
“I had it from his own lips.”
He gazed at her without speaking; something in her face awed and silenced him.
“Randolph, listen,” she said. “I must tell you all. Six weeks ago, the evening before that day, he was brought, shattered and dying, to Trevlyn; he had fallen from the cliffs, no skill could serve to prolong his life. I knew nothing then—he was profoundly unconscious, yet as the night wore away some strange intuition came upon me that he wanted me, that he was beseeching me to come to him. I went—he was still unconscious. I sent Wilberforce away and watched by him myself. Randolph, at dawn he awoke to consciousness—he told me all his awful tale—he said he had murdered you—I believed it was true. He was dying—dying in darkness and in dread, and he prayed for my forgiveness as if his salvation hung upon it. Randolph, Randolph, how can I tell you?—I cannot, no I cannot—no one could understand,” for a moment she pressed her hand upon her eyes, looking up again in a few seconds with a calm glance that was like a smile. “He was dying, Randolph, and I forgave him—I forgave him freely and fully—and he died in peace. Stop, that is not all. Randolph, as I knelt beside his bed, praying for the sin-stained spirit then taking its flight, I felt that you were with me; I had never before felt the strange overshadowing presence that I did then—you were there, your own self. I heard your voice far away, yet absolutely clear, like a call from some distant, snow-clad mountain-top, infinitely far—‘Monica! Monica! My wife!’ I think Conrad heard it too, for he died with a smile on his lips. Randolph, I am sure that you were with me in that strange, awful hour. I knew it then—I know it better now. Randolph, I think that love is stronger than all else—time, space, death itself. Nothing touched our love. I think it is like eternity.”
A deep look of awe had stamped itself upon Randolph’s face. He put his arm round Monica, and for a very long while they stood thus, neither attempting to speak or to move.
At last he woke from his reverie, and looked down at her with a strange light shining in his eyes.
“And you forgave him, Monica?”
She looked up and met his gaze unfalteringly.
“I forgave him, Randolph; was I wrong?”