“Reparation? To me?”
“Yes, to you. There was a time—a long while ago—when I thought hardly of you, because I thought you had deceived some one I loved. Well, perhaps you judged him better than I did; perhaps, after all, I was the poor fool who was deceived, and you—out of that love which teaches a woman more than anything else can do—found the better man, after all. You remember I came to you, pitying your loneliness, when he died, and I have been more than recompensed by your love and devotion to me since.”
“You have been very, very good to me,” said ’Linda in a low voice. “But for you I might have been left destitute.”
“There, there, we won’t talk of that,” said the old woman. “You know, since we have been abroad our good old friend the captain has written to us more than once. He mentioned in one of his letters to me about the statue which had been erected to your husband. I don’t want to trouble you with sad memories, but it has occurred to me that you might like to go again to the place where he was born and to the place where they love and remember him so well. Help me to be unselfish, child, for I fear that I have selfishly tried to thrust out of your memory any thought of him. I know you loved him, and he was, perhaps, a better man than I judged him to be. Will you forgive me if I have misjudged him?”
“Indeed, I have nothing to forgive,” replied ’Linda.
“Ah, you say that out of your good heart; but I reproach myself very much that I have not been gentler with you—that I have not considered your grief a little more. Now, listen to me. The captain told me in his letter—you remember you read it to me—he told me that on the anniversary of Brian Carlaw’s birth there was going to be a great celebration; that the people of the little town were going to put wreaths and flowers at the foot of the statue; that many celebrated people who had known and loved and admired him in life would be there to show their respect for his memory. And that has brought me back to England.”
’Linda sat quite still, listening. Before her mental vision passed a picture of a man lying dying at the foot of that statue; a man who had willingly and cheerfully given all he possessed in life for her; a man who had thought that God was good because the woman who had cast him aside kissed his lips at the last.
“And so, my dear child,” went on the unconscious old woman, “I have made up my mind that we will go down there at the time of this celebration, and you shall take your place as you should by the memorial of the man you loved. That is only fair and just and right; that has brought me back to England. Come, tell me that it will make you happy to go back to the old place again, to feel some pride—as you must feel—in the man whom all others are honouring.”
“I—I think—I fear the journey would be too much for you,” said ’Linda, striving to steady her voice. “Indeed, you must not do this for my sake.”