Page:Maud Howe - Atlanta in the South.djvu/278

 made one human being less wretched before he was admitted to the great calm. He was about to approach her, when the woman suddenly rose and walked rapidly to the brink of the river. She took her cloak, and drawing from her breast some small articles which he could not distinguish, knotted them in its folds and threw the bundle into the water. In an instant it was whirled away by the swift current. The woman watched the senseless thing swirling in the strong tide, and gave a low cry, as if the sight were painful to her.

"I wish I had not done that," he heard her say in an undertone, "it looks so horrible."

Philip, dimly understanding the import of the scene, had drawn unobserved close behind the woman. She could not make a movement which he could not check. The moon, which had been obscured, now broke through a mass of purple cloud, its light transforming the sombre river into an argent tide and making the dark river-bank as bright as day. It showed to Philip Rondelet the graceful outline of the figure before him. She shuddered at the sight of the moon, and muffling her head and face more closely in the folds of the lace mantilla which she wore, she made a sudden movement, throwing her arms above her head, as if to leap into the river. A strong arm was thrown about her, and she