It was his head that struck the wall. His hands clutched air. He fell head-long stunned, bleeding, and—presently, he was dead.
The room was very still. Awesomely silent.
Margaret Joyce was in the air, with her Lord!
CHAPTER XXVI.
A CASTAWAY.
Madge and her husband left Albany on the Monday morning, ostensibly for a brief honey-moon, but, chiefly, with a view to recruit her husband’s health. They had gone to a tiny little house among the Catskills, kept by a coloured woman named “Julie.” The pastor had been there before, and had himself chosen this quiet retreat for their marriage trip.
The heart of Madge was broken, for her husband would not be friendly with her. He was barely civil when he spoke to her, and answered her in short, sharp monosyllables only. All the old natural pride, with which she would have met this treatment a fortnight ago, or less, was, fortunately, for him, swallowed up in her new found faith in, and her utter surrender to God. And with this there had come to her the patience and purifying, born of the Hope of the near return of the Lord, whom she now loved.
She had been alone, thinking over the whole position, for a couple of hours. The situation had become intolerable. She determined to make an appeal to him, though it hurt her natural pride even to contemplate it.
“Help me! Teach me! Guide me!” she cried unto her God. And in the strength of the divine promises of upholding and guidance, she decided to go to her husband.
He was alone, with a book before him on the table. But he was not reading. He was not even thinking. His mind was in a confused whirl, born of the inward rage of a much discomfited man. He had made a fool of himself, in public. He knew it, and he had been too proud to apologize. He had spurned and snubbed the woman, for whom he had professed to be dying of love, and who had made the greatest sacrifice any honest woman can make to man—since she had offered herself to him, in marriage.