Chapter II A Dream and Its Ending
In my grief at the going of Eloise I remember little of what I did in the next few days. Then I received a note from Colonel Goff asking me to ride over to The Manor, as both he and Elsie wanted to see me.
On the way I stopped to see Tammas and Marget. In their worship of Elsie I believe they thought only of her and her happiness. They had certainly not understood about my relations with Eloise. Their happiness was plain to be seen, the very laughter which at times broke over their honest faces told me clearly their pride and happiness in the turn affairs had taken with Elsie and me.
But despite my efforts not to show what was crushing my heart, they perceived that something was very seriously wrong with me.
“Ay, Jackie, ’tis a hard time you have been having, my lad,” said Tammas, “and it’s unreasonable to think the old General would turn you out of home like this; but the final word in the book of every honest man’s life is the word good, and you’ll not be losing out in the end—na, na.”
“I think you are going now to see our lassie,” said Marget, smiling slyly, “and sure, Jackie, if ever man had recompense in the sweetness of love ’tis you. Never have I seen anything sae near an angel of light in spirit and sae beautiful in body, since she came up the hill to us that evening with her doubts all gone; ay, it is Tammas and I who are as happy as you, Jackie!”
She sighed. “I dinna ken that it’s a’ gladness,” she went on; “for the Earl is preparing to leave soon for his estate in the auld country, and he wants us to gang wi’ him—of course—but—” and she looked at me gravely as if seeking answer.
But I only shook my head sadly. “I do not know, Marget—I do not know. My plans—you see—Aunt Lucretia and Eloise—that awful accident!”
Marget started to speak, but Tammas stopped her quickly, whispering to her, “Wheest, wumman, dinna ye see, dinna ye understaun—she was as his ain sister. It’s that that’s saddening him.” And then he added louder, “Eh, but it was a terrible thing—she that was sae young an’ daring and sae bonnie—to be an invalid a’ her days—the bold beautiful thing that loved life sae weel! An’ it’s a’ but upset the Earl. I hae never kent him to be sae troubled, for he was unco fond o’ her, an’ a grand Countess she wad hae made him. An’ to think it was his ain horse! The puir man is nearly daft!”
I was silent. I could not speak. For once the kindly talk of these two good folks annoyed me. Marget saw this, and with a motherly tenderness that touched me deeply, said, “Weel—weel, Jackie, dinna take it sae to heart. When you go to her ain land an’ see what you have won in oor lassie, ye’ll be sayin’ with Rabbie Burns that ’tis the only place to live and love in. But awa’ ye gang,” she said, giving me a gentle push; “it’s near supper time a’ ready an’ fine I ken that she an’ the Earl are wanting ye at The Manor. For three days she has come ower here, wondering whit wey ye had na come; she kens aboot the accident an’ is sorrowfu’, tae, but she’s sae keen to see ye, Jackie, an’ she’ll be a bit o’ comfort till ye if ye will.”
Colonel Goff was already making preparations for his going. I found him more quiet and serious than I had ever seen him. I understood that he would give anything in the world to undo the accident, and that he now found that he cared more for Eloise since she was lost to us than he had himself known, and that, like me, he was in total ignorance as to where Aunt Lucretia had taken her.
“Jack, Jack!” he kept repeating as he walked the floor, “I can never forgive myself! That beastly, beastly ride! To have loved horses as I have all my life, to have done so much for them and their sport and to have my pride in them all thrown away and the whole of my life changed like that!... There is Elsie—go with her, Jack—the child wants you!” he added as he headed towards his stable.
I pitied him, but I pitied myself more. For, looking at him, hearing him talk, I saw that he did not know and would never know. God had not made him to know as Eloise and I knew, not even as Elsie would know. In spite of all that had passed before him, and all that he had seen, he did not know that as he talked of Eloise it was I who was suffering most. He did not even see remotely that it was I who loved her, not he.... There are fish in the deep sea which carry their own electric light.... There are others there which have not even eyes!...
Elsie was openly happy all the afternoon with me. Such dreams as she had dreamt of our future! Such dreams as had come true even in her own castle!
I let her talk and plan for our future. I did not know what it all meant, whither Fate was hurrying me. I could not see the end, but I knew that the end would be well. For the real architect of our lives is God. The very shadow of our doubt becomes pictures done in beauty.
It takes shadows to make pictures. In the foreground of every shadow already stands the picture from His hand. And as for the sorrows sent of Him, they are not sorrows; rather are they crowns of Great Joy for brows chosen of Martyrdom.... So I let her dream and love and plan, knowing that whatever was coming to me would be good, that behind the Wish of our own little dreams lay the larger Will of the Great Dreamer....
In the afternoon I had slipped away to a place where two great maples threw their shadows across the lawn. I was tired, and my heart was full of conflicts. I wanted to think of Eloise.
It was a quiet, sweet place. Then I heard Elsie coming, full of happiness, to judge from the very tread of her feet on the grass.
I was lying half propped against a tree. Looking up I saw she was kneeling above me, her eyes laughing as she shyly peeped from behind the trunk. There was a sofa pillow in her hands and she was trying to place it under my head. “You must sleep, now,” she said softly. “You are so tired and hollow-cheeked, Jack, my bonnie Jack. I am going to begin to learn now to take care of you. I will come to waken you in an hour, then we are going to drive into town, father and you and me!”
She lingered a moment slyly; then stooped to kiss my forehead and was gone.
I had not come to sleep, I had come to think of Eloise, to dream of her once more. I took her note from my pocket; I kissed it and with tears I read it. “I was widowed of love but I am wedded. Forgive me, forget me, but love me always, Jack, as I shall you,—Eloise.” How strange it is, this joy-sorrow! There can be but one explanation of it: down the endless chain of our ancestry so much sorrow has come that the taint of it lies sweetly in the pedigree of our own breast.
I kissed the withered heart’s-ease. Later I must have fallen asleep...
It was Colonel Goff who wakened me, coming on a run.
“Quick, Jack!” he cried.
I was up in an instant. He stood beside me panting, almost faint. He held a little slip in his hand. His face was white, his lips drawn, but a battle coolness that went like cold steel into my own soul was in his voice.
“Elsie, Jack! Stone’s River bridge—you may save her yet! She is drowning herself! Your horse, quick! I’ll follow as best I can!”
Instantly I understood. I glanced down. Eloise’s note was gone. Elsie’s hat lay on the grass instead.
Satan had been saddled for my ride to town and stood at the rack. In two quick leaps I was by his side. The next minute I held the reins.
“If you ever rode in your life,” I heard her father saying behind me, “if you ever rode in your life, Jack! You may save her yet—straight down the pike to the bridge!”
The horse seemed to know. He wheeled as the reins went over his head, pivoted, as I’d seen him so often do, on two legs, for quickness, up into the air, wheeling.
I held a good clutch on the pommel and as I rose his own great bound jerked me like a bolt into the saddle. I saw the old butler, bare-headed, running to open the gate, and Colonel Goff panting, helpless, crossing the grass. But even Satan knew we’d lose if we waited. It was only a four-foot rock wall; it was play for him to clear it. He landed squarely and already in a full run.
The bridge was a mile away. It was made of iron and its sides were protected by a railing. It was high where the pike reached it, spanning a gorge cut through the hills.
A rock fence ran along the pike up to the bridge on each side. There the bluff was sheer twenty feet straight down to the river. Satan ran like a tube of quick-silver down the long white pathway of the pike. As we flashed up the slope leading to it, I caught just a glimpse of a white gown going over the bridge from the middle railing. I had to throw all my weight on his left rein to send him over the rock fence at the foot of the bridge and I knew when he felt my heel go into his flank and my pull that shot his great game head into the fence, that he thought I was crazy, was sending us both to death!
But he never faltered. It all depended on how he cleared that four-foot fence and the twenty feet down to the river. I knew when he rose for the leap that he expected firm ground on the other side. Would he balk, falter and fail me when he saw?
I drove my heel into him. I felt him quiver just a moment beneath me. Then I held my breath. A white figure floated midway of the river before me. Up went his head, the water only flashed beneath him twenty full feet below. I watched the play of his ears for his thoughts. If they fluttered, wavered, showed fright, I knew he would balk and quit. For an instant I saw them flutter back and forth, little tell-tales of surprise, then down they came angrily, glued to his neck as one grits one’s teeth in a crisis, and he shot over the wall, balanced squarely, holding himself superbly, down!
I clutched the pommel with both hands, locking my legs under his chest as we struck the stinging, biting waters and went under. It seemed long before we came up and I could see the white gown going down again. I clutched it with one hand, drawing her head clear of the water against my breast. I felt the horse moving easily beneath me. Would he see the great bluffs and understand, or would he strike straight across for them and drown us all, whirling round and round, trying to find a passway up straight walls of rock? It all lay with him. It was correct instinct now or death.
I threw the reins over his head, crying, “Go out—your way, Satan!”
It was his good sense that saved us, his instinct rather, that is greater than sense. He lost no strength in useless floundering against steep walls for a landing. He seemed to know instantly. I felt him moving beneath me down stream while I held Elsie safe. Two, three, four hundred feet he swam, the great game chap, till we passed the bluff; then he floundered up and out on the bank like a great dog, shaking himself.