But the long, dim road to yesterday was thronged with ghosts, and his destiny came swiftly upon him. Tortured, humiliated, helpless, he saw the lash that cut him fall also upon her.
Sooner or later, all that is secret of good or of evil shall be made manifest, here or elsewhere; and the suffering may not be abated. And he began to understand that reticence can not forever hide what has been; that no silence can screen it; no secrecy conceal it; that reaction invariably succeeds action; and not a finger is ever lifted that the universe does not experience the effect.
How he or fate might have spared her, he did not know. What she had learned about him he could not surmise. As far as Elena was concerned, he had been no worse than a fastidious fool dangling about a weaker and less fastidious one. If gossip of that nature had brought this grief upon her, it was damnable.
All he could do was to deny it. He had denied it. But denial, alas, was limited to that particular episode. He could not make it more sweeping; he was not on equal ground with her; he was at a disadvantage. Only spiritual equality dare face its peer, fearless, serene, and of its secrets unafraid.
Yet—she had surmised what he had been; she had known. And, insensibly, he began to feel a vague resentment toward her, almost a bitterness. Because she had accepted him without any illusion concerning him. That had been understood between them. She knew he loved her; she loved him. Already better things had been in sight for him, loftier aspirations, the stirring of ambition. And suddenly, almost at the altar itself, this thing had happened—whatever it was! And all her confidence in him, all her acquiescence in what had been, all her brave words and promises—all except the mere naked love in her breast had crashed earthward under its occult impact, leaving their altar on their wedding night shattered, fireless, and desolate.
He set his teeth and the muscles in his cheeks hardened.
"By God!" he thought. "I'll find out what this thing is, and who has done it. She knew what I was. There is a limit to humiliation. Either she shall again accept me and believe in me, or—or——"
But there seemed to present itself no alternative which he could tolerate; and the thread of thought snapped short.