STATIONS OF SORROW
"I am his wife!" Heaven and earth have heard it. She had conquered. The tremendous deed, fear of which had led her to the verge of crime--love had now done in a single moment without conflict or delay. There was joy in heaven and on earth over the penitent sinner! And all the viewless powers which watch the way to the cross, wherever any human being treads it; all the angels, the guardian spirits of the now interrupted Play hastened to aid the new Magdalene, that she might climb the Mount of Calvary to the Hill of Golgotha. And as if the heavenly hosts were rushing down to accompany this bearer of the cross a gust of wind suddenly swept through the open space across the stage and over the audience, and the palms rustled in the breeze, the palaces of Jerusalem tottered, and the painted curtains swayed in the air. This one gust of wind had rent the threatening clouds so that the sun sent down a slanting brilliant ray like the dawn of light when chaos began to disappear!
A light rain which, in the golden streaks, glittered like dusty pearls fell, settling the dust and dispelling the sultriness of the parched earth.
Silence had fallen upon the people on the stage and in the audience, and as a scorched flower thirstily expands to the cooling dew, the sick man's lips parted and eagerly inhaled the damp, refreshing air.
"Oh--he lives!" said the countess in a tone as sweet as any mother ever murmured at the bedside of a child whom she had believed dead, any bride on the breast of her wounded lover.
"I have a right to be here--I am his wife!"
"He lives, oh, he lives!" all the spectators repeated.
Meanwhile the physician had come and examined the sufferer, who had been placed on a couch formed of cloaks and shawls: "It is a severe attack of heart disease. The patient must be taken to better lodgings than he has hitherto occupied. This condition needs the most careful nursing to avoid the danger. I have repeatedly called attention to it, but always in vain."
"It will be different now, Doctor!" said the countess. "I have already secured rooms, and beg to be allowed to move him there."