There was the sound of wheels upon the gravelled road, and Col. Schuyler’s voice at the door, saying the carriage was waiting.
“Let it wait; I cannot go now,” Edith gasped, trying in vain to struggle to her feet, and then falling back among the cushions, weak and powerless to help herself.
Opening the door Mrs. Barrett bade Col. Schuyler enter, and then closing it again drew him quickly into the little dressing-room before he caught sight of Edith lying so still and helpless in her misery.
“I am sorry, but I suppose she cannot help it,” she began, “she is so weak and nervous; but something I said to her of that early affair, you know, has affected Edith so much as almost to bring on a faint, and she is there on the sofa, unable to sit up. Be very gentle with her, do. It is all my fault.”
For a man to be told that his two hours’ bride has fainted because reminded of a former love affair, is not very pleasant, and Col. Schuyler grew hot and cold, and a little annoyed. But he had known all the time that Edith’s love in its full extent was yet to be won, and so the humiliation was not nearly so hard, and his voice was very tender and kind as he bent over her, and said:
“Edith, my darling, it distresses me to see you thus. I had thought,—I had hoped,—Edith, you are not sorry you are my wife, when I am so glad?”
There was something pleading in his tone, and it roused Edith, and sitting up, she said:
“No, Col. Schuyler, I am not sorry, and Heaven helping me, I’ll be a good, true wife to you, but oh—oh—you must—bear with me, and if I am not all, or what you believe me to be, forgive me, will you? I am not to blame.”
He did not in the least know what she meant, nor did he care. She was excited and nervous, he thought, and he tried to comfort and soothe her, and laid her head on his shoulder and held her closely to him, and told her to calm herself, and motioned Mrs. Barrett away with a gesture of impatience, and when Godfrey came to the door, and said, “Hurry up, or you’ll be late,” he answered back, “Send the carriage away. We will take the next train. Mrs. Schuyler is suddenly ill and cannot go just yet.”
He had called her Mrs. Schuyler, she was his wife, and a feeling of reassurance and quiet began to steal over Edith as she sat with her head on her husband’s shoulder and his arm around her waist, and with this feeling came a sensation akin to love for the man who was so kind to her and who had been so deceived. But not by her; she was not to blame, and she meant to tell him all, but not then. It was neither the time nor the place. It should be when they were away alone, before the day was over, and then if he chose to put her from him, and go back without her, he could do so, and she would say it was right. She grew better rapidly after this decision was reached, and though her face was very pale, and there was a frightened look in her eyes, she met her friends at last with a smile, and gave some laughing excuse for her sudden faintness,—said the day was warm,—that she had not been well or slept much for weeks,—that she was subject to such attacks, but thought it most unfortunate that she should have one that day of all others.