CHAPTER XXI.
JIM O'REILLY.
Averil had just reached her own room when she remembered that she had not bidden Maud good-night. It was very late, and just for a moment she hesitated; then she crossed the passage and tapped softly at her door. There was no response. She knocked again, and then gently turned the handle. For the instant she thought the room was empty, until a sound of a low smothered sob from the bed arrested her. The moon had retired behind a cloud, and in the dim uncertain light Averil could just discern a dark form stretched across the bed. A great pang of pity crossed her as she groped her way to it—it was Maud; she had thrown herself down, fully dressed, upon the quilt, with her face buried in the pillow, and was trying to choke down the hysterical sobs that were shaking her from head to foot. The strain of the last few hours had been too great, and she had broken down the moment she found herself alone. The overmastering passion made her deaf to everything; and, as Averil stood beside her, the words, "Oh, Oliver, Oliver! cruel, cruel!" reached her ears distinctly.
There were pitying tears in Averil's eyes, and then with a sudden impulse she stooped over her and drew Maud's head to her bosom, and soothed her as one would soothe a broken-hearted child.
"Do not try to check it; you must give way at last. All this time you have borne it so bravely and alone. Why should you fear me, your sister Averil? Oh, my poor dear, I know how you have suffered. And then this last cruel blow!" Then, as bitter sobs only answered her, she went on, tenderly, "You have been so good to-day; you have not thought of yourself, but only of your poor mother. Do you think I do not know how terribly bad it has been for you?"
"Don't praise me; don't say anything kind," returned Maud, hoarsely, as her strong will forced down another quivering sob. "Poor mamma! how gladly would I change places with her! She is unhappy, but she has not this weight," putting her hands on her breast. "Averil, if anything has happened to Rodney, I shall have been my brother's murderer. Mamma would have let him go, only—" she stopped, and Averil's sisterly arms only pressed her closer.
"You must not say such things," she returned, gently. "You have been selfish and thoughtless; you did not think of his good, but only of your own; but if you had realized all this mischief, you would have been the first to bid him go."
"You say that to comfort me," she returned, in a broken voice. "But, Averil, you do not know. I shut my eyes willfully; I sacrificed Rodney to my own interests; I thought of nothing but Oliver; and now I am punished, for he has left me. He taught me to love him; he made me believe that he cared only for me; and now he is going to marry another woman!" and the poor girl shuddered as she said this.
"Dear Maud, he was not worthy of you."
"Not worthy of me?" with the old scorn in her voice. Then she broke down again, and buried her face on Averil's shoulder. "What does it matter if he were not worthy, when I loved him? I loved him! Oh, you are good to me, but you do not know—how can you know?—all I have suffered."