“Honored Madam,
“We shall feel greatly flattered and obliged if you will kindly afford us a sitting for your photograph at your earliest convenience.
“We are, Honored Madam,
“With much esteem,
“Most respectfully yours,
“Scumley & Ripp.”
When these people address me, I am degraded indeed! My name a word of reproach in every household in the country; my story a thing to be whispered and hinted at, but not to be openly discussed, by reason of its very shame. My years of atonement held to be mere evidences of skillfully sustained hypocrisy. Myself a confessed counterfeit, a base and worthless imposition, a living fraud on the immaculate beings with whom I dared to surround myself. And Ruth—Ruth, to whom my heart opened—even Ruth has left me. Poor blind, wayward woman, you are of the world, worldly; your idol is shattered, and there is the end. So let it be; it is meet that such as I should be alone!
Enter Eve, who has overheard the last few lines. She approaches her mother quietly, and places her arms round her neck.
Eve. Mamma, you have many kind friends left to you; Dr. Athelney, who has given you a home; Edward and myself.
Mrs. V. B. A daughter’s love comes of honor. Can that love live without the honor that gives it sustenance?
Eve. Mamma, I am very young, and I know little of the world and its ways. Will you forgive me if I speak foolishly? Dear mamma, I think my love for you began with my life. It was born with me, and came of no other cause than that you are my mother. As I brought it with me into the world, so I believe I shall take it with me out of the world. Do you understand me? I mean, that if I had no other reason for loving than that you are my mother, I should still love you, for I am your child.
Mrs. V. B. A child to whom I have given a life that is worse than death; a life that brings with it a curse that will be flung in your teeth by all who know you, and first of all, and above all, by him who was to have married you.
Eve. No, no; your bitter sorrow has made you unjust. Remember, he loves me. I do not know why he loves me, but whatever he saw in me to love is there still. I am not changed, and why should he change? I trust his heart as I trust my own.