"Too late? You know it can't be too late," exclaimed Adam, his old irritability getting the better of him: then, with a sudden revulsion of his overwrought susceptibilities, he cried, "Oh, Eve, Eve, bear with me to-night: I'm not what I want to be. The words I try to speak die away upon my lips, and my heart seems sunk down so low that nothing can rejoice it. To-morrow I shall be master of myself again, and all will look different."
"I hope so," sighed Eve tremulously. "Things don't seem quite between us as they ought to be. I sha'n't wait for Joan," she said, holding out her hand: "I shall go up stairs now; so good-night, Adam."
"Good-night," he said: then, keeping hold of her hand, he drew her toward him and stood looking down at her with a face haggard and full of sadness.
The look acted as the last straw which was to swamp the burden of Eve's grief. Control was in vain, and in another instant, with Adam's arms around her, she lay sobbing out her sorrow on his breast, and the tears, as they came, thrust the evil spirit away. So that when, an hour later, the two said good-night again, their vows had been exchanged and the troth that bound them plighted; and Adam, looking into Eve's face, smiled as he said, "Whether for good luck or bad, the sun of our love has risen in a watery sky."
CHAPTER XXI.
Most of the actions and events of our lives are chameleon-hued: their colors vary according to the light by which we view them. Thus Eve, who the night before had seen nothing but happiness in the final arrangement between Adam and herself, awoke on the following morning with a feeling of dissatisfaction and a desire to be critical as to the rosy hues which seemed then to color the advent of their love.
The spring of tenderness which had burst forth within her at sight of Adam's humility and subsequent despair had taken Eve by surprise. She knew, and had known for some time, that much within her was capable of answering to the demands which Adam's pleading love would most probably require; but that he had inspired her with a passion which would make her lay her heart at his feet, feeling for the time that, though he trampled on it, there it must stay, was a revelation entirely new, and, to Eve's temperament, rather humiliating. She had never felt any sympathy with those lovesick maidens whose very existence seemed swallowed up in another's being, and had been proudly confident that even when supplicated she should never seem to stoop lower than to accept. Therefore, just as we experience a sense of failure when we find our discernment led astray in our perception of a friend, so now, although she studiously avoided acknowledging it, she had the consciousness that she had utterly misconceived her own character, and that the balance by which she had adjusted the strength of her emotions had been a false one. A dread ran through her lest she should be seized hold upon by some further inconsistency, and she resolved to set a watch on the outposts of her senses, so that they might not betray her into further weakness.
These thoughts were still agitating her mind when Joan suddenly awoke, and after a time roused herself sufficiently to say, "Why, whatever made you pop off in such a hurry last night, Eve? I runned in a little after ten, and there wasn't no signs of you nowheres; and then I come upon Adam, and he told me you was gone up to bed."
"Yes," said Eve: "I was so tired, and my foot began to ache again, so I thought there wasn't any use in my sitting up any longer. But you were very late, Joan, weren't you?"
"Very early, more like," said Joan: "'twas past wan before I shut my eyes. Why, I come home three times to see if uncle was back; and then I wouldn't stand it no longer, so I went and fetched un."