“You've a d—d fine temper for a parson,” said Frere to himself. “However, if you won't, you won't. Hang me if I'll ask you again.” Nor, when he reached home, did he fare better in his efforts at reconciliation with his wife. Sylvia met him with the icy front of a woman whose pride has been wounded too deeply for tears.
“Say no more about it,” she said. “I am going to my father. If you want to explain your conduct, explain it to him.”
“Come, Sylvia,” he urged; “I was a brute, I know. Forgive me.”
“It is useless to ask me,” she said; “I cannot. I have forgiven you so much during the last seven years.”
He attempted to embrace her, but she withdrew herself loathingly from his arms. He swore a great oath at her, and, too obstinate to argue farther, sulked. Blunt, coming in about some ship matters, the pair drank rum. Sylvia went to her room and occupied herself with some minor details of clothes-packing (it is wonderful how women find relief from thoughts in household care), while North, poor fool, seeing from his window the light in hers, sat staring at it, alternately cursing and praying. In the meantime, the unconscious cause of all of this—Rufus Dawes—sat in his new cell, wondering at the chance which had procured him comfort, and blessing the fair hands that had brought it to him. He doubted not but that Sylvia had interceded with his tormentor, and by gentle pleading brought him ease. “God bless her,” he murmured. “I have wronged her all these years. She did not know that I suffered.” He waited anxiously for North to visit him, that he might have his belief confirmed. “I will get him to thank her for me,” he thought. But North did not come for two whole days. No one came but his gaolers; and, gazing from his prison window upon the sea that almost washed its walls, he saw the schooner at anchor, mocking him with a liberty he could not achieve. On the third day, however, North came. His manner was constrained and abrupt. His eyes wandered uneasily, and he seemed burdened with thoughts which he dared not utter.
“I want you to thank her for me, Mr. North,” said Dawes.
“Thank whom?”
“Mrs. Frere.”
The unhappy priest shuddered at hearing the name.
“I do not think you owe any thanks to her. Your irons were removed by the Commandant's order.”