At a glance Dawn perceived that although mentally brilliant, he had not the spiritual and moral compliment. By his side stood a woman of the world, whom Dawn at once knew to be his wife, and on her, she felt that involuntarily her look was steadily, almost immovably fixed.
She felt like testing the power of inner vision. It seemed to her that the woman was weighing heavily upon the man, holding him to earth rather than in any way uplifting him to heaven in his aspirations. She saw that the chain which bound them, was large, coarse, and flashed like gold. This led her to conclude that she married him for his wealth. She saw that the chain was wound around them both so tight that it was almost suffocating, and that the links that passed over the woman's heart were corroded and black.
At the instant that Dawn noticed this, some one approached the lady and asked her to seat herself at the piano. She consented, and after a great many excuses and unnecessary movements, began to play. A dark cloud took her place at the side of her husband when she left, which became greatly agitated as the music proceeded, and soon there issued from it a female form. That face Dawn had surely seen somewhere; she passed her hand over her brow and endeavored to recall the familiar features.
Like a flash it came; it was poor Margaret's face, white and glorified, but with a shade of sadness resting upon it.
Dawn's whole being quivered with emotion. She saw nothing now in the room but that form, and the earthly one beside it. The young man pressed his hand to his brow, as though in troubled thought, and moved from where he stood, shivering in every limb.
“Are you cold, Mr. Bowen?” some one inquired of him; the window was closed to shut out the chill air; but the chill which ran over his frame, no material substance could keep off, for it was caused by a spirit touching him.
“I declare, he looks as though he was frozen,” said his wife, rising from the instrument amid the usual applause, and drawing close to him, she whispered in his ear, “You look precisely as you did the day we met that hearse and one carriage. Come, it's a shame to be so abstracted.” Then, addressing Mrs. Austin, she expressed a wish to be introduced to the gentleman who came in last, and the introduction followed.
Nearer and nearer she went. She could not do otherwise, until at last Dawn stood beside Clarence Bowen, the destroyer of Margaret's earthly happiness. The face in the cloud grew brighter; hope seemed to glow from its features, as she stood there and found her way to his troubled soul, with all the native instinct and delicacy of a true woman. She talked of life and its beauties, its opportunities to do good, and of uplifting the down-fallen; still the face shone on, till it seemed to her that every person present must have seen it, as she did. Such presences are no more discernable by the multitude, than are the beautiful principles of life, which lie every day about us, but which though not seen by them, are none the less visible to the few.
A new interest glowed in the young man's face; he felt that he had met a woman divested of the usual vanities of most of her sex. His being awoke to life under the new current of earnest words which flowed in his own narrow stream of life. The waters deepened-he felt that there was something better, higher to live for, as he gazed on the glowing face before him.
During all the conversation, his thoughts kept flowing back to the green grove, and the sweet, innocent face of Margaret. There was surely nothing in the face before him to recall that likeness, yet the bitter waters of memory kept surging over him, each word reflecting the image of the wronged girl.