Who cared that her heart was broken? Who cared that the cruel stab had gone home to her tender, bleeding heart; that the sweet young face was whiter than the petals of the star-bells tossing their white plumes against the casement?
Slowly, blindly, with one hand grasping the balusters, she went up the broad staircase to her own room.
She tried to think of everything on the way except the one thing that had taken place. She thought of the story she had read, of a girl who was slain by having a dagger plunged into her breast. The girl ran a short distance, and when the dagger was drawn from the wound, she fell down dead. In some way she fancied she was like that girl––that, when she should reach her own room and stand face to face with her own pain, she should drop down dead.
The door was closed, and she stood motionless, trying to understand and realize what she had heard.
“Have my senses deceived me?” She said the words over and over to herself. “Did I dream it? Can it even be possible Pluma Hurlhurst is coming here, coming to the home where I should have been? God help me. Coming to comfort Rex––my husband!”
She could fancy the darkly beautiful face bending over him; her white jeweled hands upon his shoulder, or, perhaps, smoothing back the bonny brown clustering curls from his white brow.
“My place should have been by his side,” she continued.
It hurt and pained her to hear the name of the man she loved dearer than life mentioned with the name of Pluma Hurlhurst.
“Oh, Rex, my love, my love!” she cried out, “I can not bear it any longer. The sun of my life has gone down in gloom and chill. Oh, Rex, my husband, I have not the strength nor the courage to bear it. I am a coward. I can not give you up. We are living apart under the blue, smiling sky and the golden sun. Yet in the sight of the angels, I am your wife.”