“Mother—mother!” she cried, kneeling down impetuously by her side, winding her arms about the mourner, and laying her weary head on her breast.
And Mae, coming in presently in a dazed fashion, found them mingling their tears together.
She sat down helplessly a little apart, and began to weep, in a pitiful, noiseless way. She could not help it, her heart was so full with the thought of Rolfe, slain so cruelly in the splendor of his youth.
Viola, when she could find her voice, sobbed, plaintively:
“Why are you so angry with me still? Have you never forgiven me yet—you and Mae—because Rolfe loved me and made me his bride?”
The mother checked her sobs and sighed in answer:
“We could have forgiven you anything except that you did not love him in return, and were cruel to my noble boy!”
“Cruel—cruel!” cried Viola, in passionate agitation. “Who could be more cruel than Rolfe himself, going away from me—his wife—into exile, peril, and danger—and not even coming to bid me good-bye—never writing me one word while I lay ill on the very borders of death!”
They gazed at her in astonishment, the mature woman and the fair young girl, who exclaimed, indignantly:
“Why should Rolfe write to you when you had cast him off? When you refused to see him when he came to your father’s house to bid you farewell? When you sent him word by your father that you regretted the marriage and should sue for a divorce?”