“It is you who will be lonely, child, when I am gone. Then you may think more favorably of—of the course that others follow, and welcome those natural ties, my Ada, that make the happiness of life.”
Ada answered, putting up a hand to hide her tears:
“When you are with God I shall be lonely, dearest, but not sorrowful, knowing you in His safe keeping. As for marriage, urge it upon me no more, my mother! For something tells me that these natural ties you speak of, sweet and pleasant as they are, are not destined for me.”
“Why not? You would make a noble wife and mother, Ada. You are young, and cultivated, and beautiful, and have so many other gifts and graces, that, were you possessed of no worldly advantages, my child, you might still expect to make what Society calls an advantageous match....”
“Mother—my mother!—let us forget the world and Society!... To-night I have heard both applaud a God-defying crime as a stroke of exquisite diplomacy, and exalt a murderer as the saviour of his country, and their plaudits ring in my ears yet.... And I have seen the change—the base, corroding, ugly change!—they can wreak upon a nature that was—how short a time ago!—brave, and chivalrous, and simple; and a character that was honorable, upright, and sincere. I have a quarrel with Society and the world, mother; let them go by! And speak to me of marriage no more, in the little time we yet may have on earth together. For without love—such love as God has created, and blessed, and sanctioned between men and women—such love as you and my father knew!—I will never take on me the name of wife, or be the mother of any man’s children. Do not be vexed, dear mother!” she begged, in sweet, entreating tones.
“My daughter,” the dying woman said, “I am only grieved for you.... For I have fancied—if, indeed, it was fancy?—that your heart was not quite free; that your imagination had been touched, your thoughts attracted, Ada, by someone of different religion, language, and nationality, met and known abroad. Someone, the recollection of whom—forgive me if I am wrong, dearest!—has made you indifferent to the good qualities of Englishmen of your own rank and social standing, cold to their merits and blind to their attractions——”
“Mother, are you not talking too much? Will you not try to sleep?”
“My dear, I have but little time left for talk, and in a very few hours my sleep will know no earthly waking. Answer my question now!”
Ada Merling laid down the thin, frail hand that she had clasped, rose up, and went to the window, moved the blind, adjusted the curtain, went a step or two about the room, and having, possibly, controlled some emotion that had threatened to master her, resumed her seat beside the pillow and took the feeble hand again, saying:
“Mother, there can be no concealment between us!... I have allowed myself to think too constantly of a man whom I met not quite three years ago; and who appeared to be, morally and mentally, as he undoubtedly is physically, as superior to the common run of men as Hector must have seemed, compared with the other sons of Priam; or the young David, set amongst the warrior-chiefs of Saul; or Kossuth, placed side by side with the man who rules in France to-day.” She added rather hurriedly, as the mother would have spoken: “Remember that I only said ‘appeared.’ For I was doomed to know the pain of disillusion, and witness the breaking of the idol I had made for myself.... I shall be better for the lesson, painful though it has been! And so, let us speak of this no more! Even to you it has been difficult to confess my absurdity. Now, will you not try to rest?”