Seth had gone up to his room in a state of wretchedness which, seeming insupportable at the outset, had grown steadily worse upon reflection. He said to himself that he had never before in his whole life been so humiliated and unhappy, and then smiled with pitying contempt for the inadequacy of such a statement of the case. One’s career must have been titanic in its tragic experiences to warrant such a comparison. “I have never known before what suffering was,” he thought, as he paced up and down his little room, scourging himself with the lash of bitter reflections.
To try to sleep did not enter his head. He sat for a long time on the side of the bed, seeking to evolve something like order from the chaos of his wits, but he could not think. Had he tried to write, to discuss the thing in a letter, the simple familiar operation of the pen might have led him out of the cul de sac. As it was, whichever turn his mind sought to take, there rose an impassable barrier of shame, or rage or self-recrimination. In whatever light he tried to view the situation, it was all pain. He had been curtly, cruelly thrown off by his brother—the man to whom he owed everything—and he had had to listen to the most cutting, insulting language from this brother before they parted. Then, as he clenched his fists and fumed with impotent anger at the recollection of this language, there would come to divert this wrath, and turn it back upon himself, the facts that he had interposed his own boyish vanity and conceit to balk this brother’s purposes, and had been caught trembling on the very brink of making love to this brother’s wife. Did he not richly merit Albert’s scorn? He could remember—should he ever forget?—the exact words of Albert’s contemptuous characterization: “A conceited, presumptuous, offensive fool.” Did he not deserve them all? He owed this brother everything: the honest boy insisted upon saying this to himself over and over again, as the basis of all argument on the subject; the opportunity came for him to repay something of this debt. How had he improved it? By setting himself up to oppose this brother in the chief object of his life, and, as if this were not enough, by yielding weakly to the temptation to rob him of his domestic honor as well! “I must be a villain as well as a fool, must I!” the youngster growled between his set teeth, as he threw himself from the bed, and began the gloomy pacing up and down again.
He had not lighted his lamp. The soft half-darkness of the starlight, sufficing barely to render objects visible in the room, suited his mood. He heard the sound of wheels now on the gravel below. Looking out, he could see that the grays were being driven out; as they turned the corner of the house, the full moonlight fell upon them and the carriage, and Seth saw distinctly that it was his brother who was driving, and that he was wrapped as for an all-night ride.
“He won’t even stay under the same roof with me!” he said half-aloud, with a fresh bitterness of self-accusation—and then the torment of reproaching voices began in his breast again.
As he turned from the window he heard a low rapping at his door; a minute later, he heard Isabel’s voice, almost a whisper:
“Seth! Don’t open the door, but tell me, who was it that went out with the carriage just now? I heard it, but from my window I could see nothing. Was it he?”
Seth answered, as calmly as he could: “Yes, I am sure of it. I recognized him.” He stood close to the door, and the thought that only the thin pine panels divided him from her was uppermost in his mind.
There was a little pause. Once his hand involuntarily moved toward the latch, but he drew it back. Then she spoke again:
“You had a terrible quarrel, didn’t you, and all for me! I heard your answer, Seth, way up here. How nobly you spoke! It went straight to my heart, to hear his brutality rebuked in that manly way. I shan’t forget it.”
There was a moment’s silence; then she whispered with a lingering softness, “Good night!” and he heard the faint rustling of her garments down the hall.