"Enid," she whispered, with intense anxiety, "is this Bulford really an upright honourable man who will do the right thing, and cast her off; or is he a mean-spirited cur who will support his disgrace for the sake of the cash?"
They remained at the confectioner's until Mrs. Marsden could feel no doubt that her husband was now safe in his saloon; and then she took them back to the house.
She sent Mears a message to say that he and the shop must do without her this afternoon, and she sat for a couple of quiet hours hearing the remainder of Enid's grievous tale. Plainly it did Enid good to talk about her troubles; the longer she talked the calmer she grew; and while stage by stage she traced the history of her unhappy married life, Mrs. Marsden thought very often of her own experiences.
Jane, contented and replete, had fallen asleep upon granny's lap; and Mrs. Marsden softly rocked her to and fro, to make the sleep sweeter and easier.
Unhappy Enid! She recited all her pains and pangs and torments. She had loved the man, had thought him a fine gentleman, and had found him a cruel beast. She had dreamed and awakened. She had tried to reconstitute the dream, to shut her eyes to realities, and live in the dream that she knew to be unreal. But he would not let her. She had forgiven misdeeds, and even forgotten them; he had hurt her again and again and again; and each time she had healed her wounds, and presented herself to him whole and loyal once more.
While Mrs. Marsden listened, she was thinking, "Yes, that is the keynote, the apology, and the explanation. Love dies so slowly."
Now Enid had come to the end of her tale.
"Mother," she was saying, "I know I shall never see him any more;" and, saying it, she began to cry again. "He spoke to me so kindly when he was going from me.... And I looked at his poor face, all striped with the sticking-plaster, and I thought of what he had been to me. It all came back to me in a rush—the old feelings, mother,—and I begged him not to go. And I asked him at least to kiss me—and he did it—and I knew that he was sorry."
Very quietly and carefully Mrs. Marsden got up, and placed the sleeping child on her mother's lap.