"Marry in May you'll rue the day; marry in Lent you'll live to repent——"
"Monday for wealth, Tuesday for health, Wednesday best of all; Thursday for crosses, Friday for losses, and Saturday no luck at all." It was Monday, and Nan must have known it when she fixed the day—but there was another important saying he recalled now:
"Happy is the bride the sun shines on——"
Perhaps these lowering clouds and the coming storm might cause her to hesitate and postpone the marriage. All morning he sat brooding by his window, watching the swaying branches of the trees in the Square—and though he knew at best that he was a fool—confidently expecting the miracle of a message. As the hour of noon approached, despair slowly settled over his heart.
How could he reconcile himself to the horrible reality? This woman and the dreams of her had become part of his very being. The memory of his hopes began to strangle him—the wonderful life they were to live together, whose pictured scenes stretched out now before him—of home, of love, of motherhood and fatherhood hallowed by adoration, the pain, the glory, the passion, the tenderness, the sanctity, the mystery of it all—and this the end. A marriage sordid, cold, vulgar to such a man—this little tobacco-stained, bead-eyed weasel.
And she had talked to him about her career. As if she didn't know that the career of any woman was immeasurably grander than that of any man—if she fulfil her destiny that links her to God in the creation of a child—a being whose simple word may mould a million wills and change the fate of centuries—and yet she had deliberately strangled her soul and chosen this little pig, who rooted in the dirt for gold, to be the father of her children.
He rose, breathing hard and brushed a tear from his eye—a tear that had come unbidden in spite of his iron will.
He wished he had not made the foolish promise to Bivens. He knew now that he had never really believed he would have to keep it. And yet the day had come and the hour had struck, and no miracle had been wrought.
He walked with leaden steps through Tenth Street to Broadway, stopped and gazed for a moment on the graceful spire of the church before whose altar Nan would soon stand and perjure herself for money. How could she! He had long felt that in every true man's religion was a supreme belief in himself—in a woman's, faith in some one else. He knew that she believed in him, not in the man to whom she was surrendering herself. And yet she wished to consummate this act of blasphemy—in the House of God before His high altar.
"Why? Why? Why?"