He read the letter again with a new interest, a terrible interest. He had gone away from Garde—sent away—with a stab in his heart, from which he had never been able to recover. He had thought at first she sent him away as a renegade, a fugitive from pseudo-justice, whom to have loved openly would be a disgrace. He had thought then that perhaps she loved Wainsworth, or even this Randolph. He had thought till he nearly went crazy, for circumstances had compelled him to flee from Boston for his life, and therefore to flee from all explanations which might have been made. Garde having released him from jail, he had been driven to think she believed him innocent. She had said she could do no less. Then he had been left no belief to stand on but that of her loving some one else more than she did himself. She had admitted that something had happened. Cornered thus, he had found the case hopeless, and thoughts of return to Boston then had seemed to him madness.
This letter, now in his hand, confirmed all those more terrible thoughts and beliefs. She had done some wrong to Randolph, too, as she here confessed in her letter. She had believed some infamous story against him, and now prayed his forgiveness. And what, in God’s name, had she then added to this first wrong to the man, that Randolph now was so bitter?
Terribly stirred, he raced his glance over the pages and so to the little quaintly affectionate ending. Then he read her signature, “Garde—John Rosella.”
John Rosella!—the name of that youth! She! Garde!
He felt he should suddenly go mad. That boy he had so learned to love—had been Garde! She had written this letter—she had signed that name, which meant so much to him and to her, and so little to any one else!
He made a strange little sound, and then he began to read the letter over again, from the first, letting every word, every syllable, sink into his soul with its comfort and its fragrance of love. He forgot that Randolph stood there before him. He was oblivious of everything. He was on that highroad again. He was standing with Garde in the garden at midnight, her kisses still warm on his lips.
“You see there is a bond between us,” said Randolph.
Adam ceased reading, galvanically. But for a second he did not raise his eyes. He folded the letter and held it in his hand. He arose to his feet and slowly moved between Randolph and the door.
“There is a bond between us,” he agreed, speaking with nice deliberation. “It is something more than a bond. It’s a tie of blood and bone and suffering.”
“I thought you would see it,” said Randolph. “This was all I came to tell you,—this, and my sense of having done you wrong.”