“No,” Latimer answered, and putting them in his breast-pocket walked out of the room.
He passed down the stairs and into the avenue where the lamps were lighted and which wore its usual somewhat deserted evening air. He walked along quietly for some minutes. He did not quite know where he was going. Having left a line for Baird explaining his absence, he had time to spare. If he wished to be alone, he could be so until the hour of the beginning of the lecture. For certain reasons it would be necessary that he should see Baird before he went upon the platform. Yes, he must be alone. His mood required it. He would go somewhere and look at the two yellowed letters written twenty years ago. He did not know why it was that he felt he must look at them, but he knew he must. They would satisfy no curiosity if he felt it, and he had none. Perhaps it was the old tragic tender feeling for Margery which impelled him. Perhaps he unconsciously longed to read that this man had loved her—that she had not given her life for nothing—that the story had not been one of common caprice and common treachery. As he walked his varied thoughts surged through his brain disconnectedly. Every now and then he involuntarily put his hand to his breast-pocket to feel the envelope. Once there crossed his mind a memory of the woman whose boy had died and who dare not let herself recall him, and so be swept back into the black maelstrom of woe. To-night, with these things on his breast, it was not twenty years since he had heard Margery’s dying cries—it was last night—last night—and the odour of the pine-trees was in his nostrils—the sough of their boughs in his ears.
He stopped near the entrance to the grounds of the Smithsonian Institute. They were as secluded as a private park at this time, but here and there was a seat and a light. He turned in and found his way to the most retired part where he could find these things—a bench to sit down on, a light to aid him to read. He heard his own breathing as he sat down; he felt the heavy, rapid pulsations of his heart, as he took the papers from his breast his hand was shaking, he could not hold it still. He took out more papers than the envelope Stamps had given him. He drew forth with this the letter which had arrived from Baird, and which he had been reading when the messenger arrived. He had abstractedly put it in his pocket. It fell from his shaking hand upon the ground at his feet, and he let it lie there, forgetful of its existence.
Then he withdrew the two letters from the large envelope and opened one of them.
He read them through once—twice—three times—four. Then he began again. He had read them a dozen times before he closed them. He had read them word by word, poring over each character, each turn of phrase, as a man might pore over an enigma or a document written in a foreign language of which he only knew stray words. If his hands had shaken at first, he had not turned a page before his whole body was shaking and his palms, his forehead, his hair were damp with cold dew. He had uttered one sharp, convulsed exclamation like a suffocated cry—then he went on reading—reading—reading—and shuddering as he read. They were not long letters, but after he had read them once he understood them, and each time he read them again he understood them better. Yes, he could translate them. They were the farewells of a man tossed by a whirlwind of passionate remorseful grief. The child had been loved—her very purity had been loved while she had been destroyed and deceived. The writer poured forth heart-sick longing and heart-sick remorse. He had not at first meant to conceal from her that he was not a free man—then he had lost control over his very being—and he had lost his soul. When she had discovered the truth and had not even reproached him but had stood silent—without a word—and gazed at him with her childish, agonised, blue-flower eyes—he had known that if men had souls his was damned. There was no pardon—he could ask none—pardon would not undo—death itself would not undo what he had done. “Margery! Margery! Oh! child—God hear me if there is God to hear—I loved you—I love you—Death will not undo that either.”
He was going abroad to join his wife. He spoke of the ship he sailed on. Latimer knew its name and who had sailed in it. In the second letter he besought her to let him see and speak one word to her—but knew she would not grant his prayer. He had seen her in the street, and had not dared to approach. “I did not fear what a man might fear from other women,” he wrote. “I felt that it might kill you, suddenly to see me near when you could not escape.”
And after he had read it a third time Latimer realised a ghastly truth. The man who wrote had gone away unknowing of the blackness of the tragedy he had left behind. He plainly had not known the secret Death itself had helped to hide. Perhaps when he had gone Margery herself had not known the worst.
Latimer, having finished his reading, rested his head on his hand for a dull moment and stared down at the letter lying upon the ground at his feet—the letter he had dropped as he took out the others. He felt as if he had not strength or inclination to pick it up—he had passed through a black storm which had swept away from him the power to feel more than a dull, heavy, physical prostration.
But after a few minutes he stooped and picked the letter up. He laid it on his knee by the other two and sat gazing again.