And she laid her hand in his which he stretched out towards her; and the man and the woman who had loved one another so much when their high noon of life threw no shadow, looked steadfastly at one another, and discoursed silently, he to her, she to him.
In that hour, heart told to heart all it had suffered—all it felt strong enough to do. Without a word being spoken, each knew what was passing through the other’s mind; and as their fingers locked together and then were withdrawn, Phemie comprehended that Basil had sworn to God he would strive in the future to make atonement for the past.
As he might have gripped a man’s hand in order to confirm a promise, to render verbal assurance unnecessary, Basil grasped with thin fingers the soft, small white hand, which she put in his.
And thus they buried the old love for ever; and so Basil returned from the darkness of the valley of death—death physical and mental—to take his place in the world, and to fulfil the duties which his wealth and his station entailed upon him.
As for Phemie, what more is there to tell, save that she is now a happy, and a contented, and a useful woman; still beautiful, and still a widow.
Suitors come to her, suitors such as she dreamed of when she built castles in the air among the Cumberland hills, but Phemie’s answer to one and all is—No.
If she could live her life over again with her present experience; if she could retrace the old road with a knowledge of its snares and its pitfalls, she would choose a second time as she chose the first, and take for her husband the man to whom she would strive to be a faithful and loving wife—the man who in the first chapter of this story, after toiling under the noontide heat, came suddenly within view of Tordale church, and who beside Strammer Tarn, amid the purple heather, within sound of the plashing waterfall, where ivy and lichens covered the face of the rocks, and ferns and foxglove grew between the stones, and the stream laved the mosses and the tender blades of grass, wooed and won, young, vain, fanciful, blue-eyed, auburn-haired Phemie Keller.
THE END.
BRADBURY, EVANS, AND CO., PRINTERS, WHITEFRIARS.