"The clear pool was soon teeming with live creatures thus reluctantly brought into close contact, and through the forest of delicate seaweed we watched some fierce and deadly battles; whilst the more lymphatic species lay around, allowing their bodies with equal complacency to be made the stepping-stones to victory or the shelter from defeat.
"Thus in childish pleasure the hours went by, till, tired out with our play, we sat down side by side to rest.
"'Whatever would people think if they could see us?' Vera said, covering up her bare feet in the warm sand.
"It may have been her action, or something in the tone of her voice. In a moment the happy, boyish feeling left me. The years began to hurry back, the innocent pleasure to fade, and in its place the passion of manhood came with overwhelming power, baffling and mocking me. I looked at my companion--child-playmate no longer. Her face was flushed, her uncovered head a mass of soft, light, waving curls; her eyes sparkled with merry mischief, but beneath the mischief there was that look I had surprised before, the reflection of my own feeling on the girl's nature; but how differently did it affect me now! When first I had seen it, Vera had promised to be my wife; now she was the wife of another. It seemed almost incredible that a mere legal formality, such as her marriage had been, could so entirely alter our relationship; but still stranger how the knowledge of this alteration strengthened all the lower passions of my nature, at the expense of the higher. Every feeling that had hitherto been sanctified by love was now sacrilege against that love. I made a desperate effort to regain the mastery over my weakness; but, alas! I had kindled a new fire of temptation.
"Vera came close to me, and laying her hand on mine, said--'Alan, I think that I will forgive you, after all. I like you better to-day than ever before.'
"What had I done? My object having been to help this girl, my want of success was pitiable. Having deprived her of the knowledge of her marriage, and caused her to hate her husband, I was now bringing her once more beneath the influence of a passion which could only end in misery and degradation. Yet, as I looked at her, it seemed impossible to withstand the temptation of taking her once more, if only once, into my arms. She was waiting for my kiss of reconciliation; and more than this, of the torrent of love long restrained. I was powerless, and knowing that no strength of my own could save me, with one last cry for help, I gave over the contest. At the same instant I was free.
"Of all the strange mysteries connected with our nature, nothing is more remarkable than what is called the efficacy of prayer. As long as a man fights against his temptations he but increases their force, especially in such a contest as this. But should his will be really against the temptation, a path is always open. Let him once acknowledge his own weakness, and allow for a moment his spirit to cry for assistance, and he will find himself lifted from the burden of the body, in a way that those who have never experienced the sensation would think impossible. One thing only is necessary, but that is essential: the cry must be an honest desire of the heart, and not a weak prompting of habit.
"It is not that strength to resist the evil is sent as an answer to the prayer, but that the temptation is utterly removed, the force of the body being, as it were, for the time annihilated; so at least have I ever found it, and so it proved in this case. I could look now at my companion without fear, and love her with a love that I knew was innocent. The very remembrance of my past thoughts filled me with a wondering horror. Summoning all my strength of will, I strove to recall to her mind the page which had been obliterated, and to bring back her natural feeling towards Vancome, which had changed to hatred.
"Whilst doing this, I repeated the story, hoping thereby to assist her memory, but, from a then unknown reason, I failed utterly, and the only impression which she formed was that I had gone mad. When I tried to take her hand in mine so as to gain more influence over her will, she rose and left me.
"I could see her in the distance evidently getting ready to start for home. I dared not follow her, knowing that had I done so, she would in her fear have run bare-headed and bare-footed over the moor, rather than let me come near her.