Do what she might, act as she pleased, one fact alone showed itself to her. She was a disappointed and helpless woman, and she was in the power of a master against whom it was useless to rebel. The long dreary days went by, empty as a rifled grave, cold with the chill of an endless despair.
Such was her life; such would be her life for all the future now. Her soul might rebel as it would, and her heart grow sick within her as the sullen shadows of memory dogged her every footstep, but she was powerless to evade or resent. Her evil deeds had gained now their own reward—the vengeance she had planned for another had recoiled on her own head.
And where are the two about whom so much gossip is rife, concerning whom so many tongues are wagging?
Have the sundered lives been joined at last? Has fate done its worst, and, wearied of spite, grown callous now as to what may or may not ensue?
Two days after Lauraine had left him, Sir Francis Vavasour died. His presentiment had been true, but his sacrifice had in some way softened the bitterness of death.
Lauraine was smitten with terrible remorse. It seemed to her always as if she should have withstood his wishes and remained by his side until the end.
Even her husband's dying words—the message penned by his hand—failed to comfort her, and it took all Lady Etwynde's persuasions, and all Colonel Carlisle's strong common sense, and all Keith's tender reproaches to lessen the sharpness of her own self-accusation—to convince her that her fault, if fault it were, deserved no such harsh condemnation as she feared.
A year has passed since freedom came to her—a year so peaceful and so calm that sorrow and pain and self-accusing seem lulled to rest, and once again Keith whispers of happiness in store.
A year, and to-morrow she will wed her lover.
He kneels by her side in the summer moonlight—his heart too full of rapture for words—his eyes resting ever on her face with that adoration neither has wearied of yet.