But old Ailie is stealing the door of the room open timidly, to break in on the first hour of Christian’s joy, and when she entered she did it with a look of sober cheerfulness, widely different from her late joyful frenzy.
“Miss Mary came in a while since,” she said, “and ran straight up to her own room, without speaking, or waiting till I telled her of Mr. Halbert’s home coming, and she looked pale and ill like; would you not go up, Miss Christian, and see?”
The Melvilles are Ailie’s own children, and she has a mother’s care of them in all their troubles, bodily or mental. So at her bidding Christian rose and went softly to Mary’s room: the door was closed, but she opened it gently, and standing hidden by the curtains of Mary’s bed, was witness to the wild burst of passionate sorrow and disappointed affection in which Mary’s breaking heart gushed forth, when she found herself once more alone. Herself unseen, Christian saw the scalding tears welling out from her gentle sister’s dim and swollen eyes, she saw the convulsive motions of her lithe and graceful figure, as she rocked herself to and fro, as if to ease or still the burning grief within: and she heard her broken murmurs.
“Had he but died before I knew this, I would have mourned for him all my life, even as Christian mourns, but now—but now!—such as he is”—and her burst of sobbing checked the voice of her sorrow. A moment after she started up and dashed the tears from her eyes, with some vehemence. “Should I not rather thank God that I have been saved from uniting myself with a godless man—with my poor brother’s seducer?” and she sank on her knees by the bedside. Poor Mary’s grief was too great for silent supplications, and Christian stood entranced, as that prayer, broken by many a gush of weeping, rose through the stillness of the quiet room. She had never, she thought, heard such eloquence before of supplicating sorrow, had never seen the omnipotence of truth and faith till then; gradually they seemed to subdue and overcome the wildness of that first grief, gradually attuned that sweet young sobbing, struggling voice, to sweetest resignation, and ere Christian echoed the solemn “Amen,” Mary had given thanks for her deliverance, though still natural tears, not to be repressed, broke in on her thanksgiving, and silent weeping followed her ended prayer. But when she bent her head upon her hands again, Christian’s kind arm was around her, Christian’s tears were mingled with her own, Christian’s lips were pressed to her wet cheek in tender sympathy, and the voice of Christian, like a comforter, whispered,
“I know all, Mary, I know all; may God strengthen you, my dear sister—you have done nobly, and as you should have done; may God bless you, dearest Mary.”
And Mary’s head, as in her old childish sorrows, nestles on Christian’s bosom, and Mary’s heart is relieved of half its heavy and bitter load. Poor Mary! the days of childhood have indeed come back again, and, as the violence of the struggle wears away, she weeps herself to sleep, for sorrow has worn out the strength of her delicate frame, already exhausted by the varied and contending emotions of the day, and now the tears slide slowly from beneath her closed eyelids even in her sleep.
But Halbert is at the door anxiously begging for admittance, and Christian leads him in to look at little Mary’s sleep. It was a child’s face, the last time he looked upon it, a happy girlish face, where mirth and quick intelligence rivalled each other in bringing out its expressive power; he sees it now, a woman’s, worn with the first and sorest struggle that its loving nature could sustain, and a kind of reverence mingled with his warm affection as he bent over his sleeping sister; he had yielded to temptations, oh, how much weaker, since his heart was not enlisted on the tempter’s side; he had made shipwreck of his faith and of his peace, for years, fascinated by attractions a thousand times less potent than those which this girl, her slight figure still trembling with her late emotions, still weeping in her sleep, had withstood and overcome; and Halbert bent his head, humility mingling with his rejoicing. Had he only been as steadfast as Mary, how much sorrow and suffering would they all have been saved.
They have left the room awhile with quiet footsteps, and there is much gladness in those two hearts, though trembling still mingles with their joy; for, if Christian fears the effect of this terrible shock on Mary’s health, at least she is delivered; there is great happiness in that certainty, she has found out Forsyth’s true character, though it passes all their guessing and conjectures to tell how.
And now Halbert is asking about his father, and James and Robert, and expressing his fears as to how they will receive him, the truant son. His brothers will be rejoiced; but Christian shakes her head half doubtful, half smiling, when Halbert, “and my father”—she cannot say, but an hour or two more will bring that to the proof.
“Do you know, Christian, I feel myself like one of the broken men of the old ballads, and I am in doubt, in perplexity, and fear, about this meeting.”