At midnight she would pace her room, wringing her little hands with remorse for the past. Her husband’s stern face would rise before her, blended with the beautiful, loving expression his countenance had worn during the delicious season of courtship. Then she would recall every noble, honorable trait in his character, and remember her own willful conduct. All, all was over, and henceforth she would have to live without him. This seemed impossible; and the poor girl would call on Heaven, agonizingly, to take her away from life or give her back her husband.
All her friends upheld her and blamed Mr. Murray. They called him stern, cold and heartless. The fashionable world thought her a lucky woman in possessing a rich old uncle to take care of her. Her quarrel with her cross husband had taken place in the very nick of time, they said; now she need not suffer from his mischances; when she would so willingly have borne the very heaviest burden poverty could impose. But what could she do but suffer idly?
Day after day passed by, still no message came from her husband. Her uncle had told her that the principal creditors had willingly and generously arranged matters; for, as every one said, the failure had resulted from misfortune, not from mismanagement, and that he had heard that a friend had offered Mr. Murray a situation in a commercial house out in the very farthest west, with a chance of becoming a partner in time. Then the next news that reached her was, that he was actually leaving for his new home. And would Ralph leave her without a word—a line? she asked herself over and again.
At last a letter came—a cold, stern, haughty letter, bidding her farewell, as if for ever. There were one or two tender passages in it; but the tone of the whole letter was so cold and unforgiving, that it crushed her to the earth. She had received it the day before our little sketch opens; and when her aunt urged her to drive out and shake off her trouble, she only buried her little head still deeper in the pillows and prayed still more agonizingly for death. The afternoon passed slowly enough to the poor sufferer. Then came the evening—the noisy, gay evening. As there was a ball in the saloon of the hotel, her thoughtless, butterfly aunt and uncle joined the merry crowd of triflers, after an earnest but unsuccessful persuasion of Edda to follow their example.
The merry music of the band sounded loudly in Edda’s lonely bed-room; but the lively dancing melodies seemed to her ears like the voices of taunting demons. She restlessly rose from her bed and walked into her little parlor, which opened on a balcony that swept around the house. She stepped out on this balcony, and listened to the pealing thunder of the ocean, which rolled unceasingly before her. Her agony increased, and a demon seemed to whisper in her ears:
“What is life but a torment? Death is an endless, dreamless sleep. Why suffer when you can so easily find relief?”
Shudderingly she put her little hands to her ears, and, closing her eyes, hastened into the room, fearing that in another instant she might be induced, by despair, to plunge headlong over the railings on the cliff beneath. For a while she laid on the lounge, as if stunned; but at last tears came to her relief, and she felt calmer. To avoid danger she closed the Venetian shutters of the door and window, but drew up under them the lounge, and threw herself on it, that the damp night air might cool her fevered, burning head. She had not been long there when she heard the sound of voices and laughter, but she was too weak to arise, and remained quiet—remembering that she could not be seen from the outside.
It was a little group of young girls, who were promenading after the dance, and who had concluded that the upper balcony commanded a finer view of the ocean. As chance would have it they selected that part of the balcony just under Edda’s window for their gossiping lounge. One, more sentimental than the others, pointed out the effect of the moon-beams which made the edges of the rolling, dashing waves shine like molten silver. But the beauty of the scene was quickly lost, even on this moon-struck damsel, for she, as well as the rest, were soon deeply interested in discussing a wedding that had lately taken place in the beau-monde.
“Oh, dear, there’s Mrs. Jones,” exclaimed one, “she just came from town yesterday, and can tell us all about it.”
The lady mentioned joined the group, and threw them into a state of perfect felicity by telling them she had actually been present at the wedding. Immediately she was called upon by a dozen eager voices to tell them “all about it.” Poor Edda, she was doomed to listen to the whole senseless detail, commencing at the bride’s India mull robe, and its heavy, elaborate embroidery, her “exquisite and graceful head-dress,” with the costly Honiton veil, the “rich splendid gifts” of the relatives, and ending with the list of bridemaids and their costume. How the whole description brought her own gorgeous wedding back to her thoughts! and she felt heart-sick.