Re-creations

by Grace Livingston Hill

This was a matter that Arthur could not ignore when his mother brought it to his notice, and Evadne was asked for an explanation.

Evadne met his questions with haughty contempt and then with angry tears and retired into an offended silence that seemed as impenetrable as a winter fog, from which she presently emerged like a martyr with vague explanations of a distant cousinship that seemed full and sufficient to his gallant, young spirit, till he tried to repeat them to his clear-eyed mother and then they did not seem so convincing.

The matter was finally smoothed over, however, and it seemed as if the mother was about to be called upon to set the seal of her approval upon a speedy marriage between the two, when there came a revelation through the medium of an old friend who had met Evadne abroad, and asked her quite casually, in the presence of the Maxwells where her husband was. Explanations followed, of course, and it appeared that Evadne was married already and had left her husband in South Africa without even the formality of a divorce.

There followed days of sore distress, of weepings and sobbed pleadings, Evadne telling the tale of her woes, a tale that gathered tragedy from the sympathy of the young lover who felt that life had reached its depths of sorrow for him and earth would never be bright again.

Gradually, however, the girl’s clever story broke down his indignation at her deception, as she told him sobbingly how lonely she was and how she longed for friendship and something real in life; and it took many days and nights of agonizing thought before the plummet of his soul was able to swing clear and tell him that no matter how lonely she was or who was to blame, or how much or when or why, there was one thing true, if Evadne was married, she was not for him, no, not even if she got a divorce. So much inheritance had he from long lines of Puritan ancestors, and from the high, fine teachings of his mother. It was a law of God, and it was right. He was not altogether sure just then that he believed in the God who had let all this tragedy come into his life, but he believed in the law and he must keep it. He had felt himself grow old in those days while he was coming to that inevitable conclusion that if it was not right for them to love one another, then they must not see one another.

For days he could not talk about it to his mother, and she spent the hours upon her knees, while he went about stern and white, and Evadne did all in her power to make him see that times had changed and modern ways did not accept those puritan laws any more which he was holding forth as final and inexorable. Sin! What was sin? There was no such thing! Law! She laughed. Why keep a law that everyone else was breaking? It was all of a piece with his old fogy notions about drinking wine and having a good time. He was the dearest in all the world of course, but he was narrow. She held out her lily arms from the sheath-like black velvet gown she had assumed and pleaded with him to come with her, come out into the broad, free air of a big life! She was clever. She had caught most of the modern phrases. She knew how to appeal to the finer things in him, and almost she won her point. Almost he wavered for just the fraction of a second, and thought, perhaps she is right—perhaps I am narrow. Then he lifted his eyes and saw his mother standing in the doorway, being shown in by a blundering servant, his fine patrician mother with her sweet, true eyes, and pure, sorrowful face, and he knew. He knew that Evadne was wrong, and his mother—yes his mother and he were right. There could be nothing but sin in a love that was stolen—a love that transgressed.

He had gone away then and left his mother to talk to the other woman, and something, somewhere in his manhood had kept him away after that. He had written her fully his final word, with so stern a renunciation that even Evadne knew it was unalterable. He had laid down the law that they must not meet again, and had then gone away to another part of the country and established himself in business and tried to forget.

That had been two years ago. Long years, he called it when he thought of them by himself. The haggard look of the gray young face had past away gradually, and the stern lines had softened as his fine mind and strong body and naturally cheerful spirit came back to normal, but there had been a reserve about him that made people think him a year or two older than he really was, and made some women when they met him call him “distinguished.” He had passed in the struggles of his soul, slowly away from the place where he regarded Evadne as a martyr, and had come at last to the time when he could look his experience squarely in the face and realize that she had been utterly untrue to all that was fine and womanly, and that he was probably saved from a life of sorrow and disappointment. Nevertheless, back in his soul there lingered his pity for her slender beauty, her pretty helplessness. A natural conclusion had come to him that all girls were deceitful, all beautiful women were naturally selfish and untrue. There were no more good, sweet, true girls nowadays as there were when his mother was a girl.

Away from home he drifted out of church-going. He immersed himself in business and began to be a brilliant success. He wrote long letters to his mother and enjoyed hers in return, but his epistles were not revealing. She sensed his reserves, and when they met she felt his playful gentleness with her was a screen for a bitterness of soul which she hoped and prayed might pass. And it did pass, gradually, until she had almost come to feel that his soul was healed, and the tragedy forgotten. More and more she prayed now that some day, when he was ready, he might meet a different kind of girl, one who would make him forget utterly the poor little vampire who had almost ruined his life’s happiness. In fact, the last time she had seen him on her recent trip to Philadelphia he had laughingly told her that she needn’t worry about him any more. He was utterly heart whole and happy.

But it is a question, whether if she had been permitted to look in on him this morning as he read Evadne’s letter, she would have felt that his words had been quite true.