Page:The Atlantic Monthly Volume 2.djvu/622

614 I would not be so cowardly as to fear to see Eleanor again, and perhaps it would be better for us both to meet in the presence of a third person.

"Mrs. Bickford was alone at the table. 'Miss Purcill would not come down tonight,—she was fatigued with her journey.'

"The good lady strove to entertain me with her conversation, but, finding that I neither heard, answered, nor ate, our meal was soon brought to a close. It is long past midnight. I have thought till I am sick and giddy with thinking. I cannot sleep, and have been writing here to control the wildness of my imaginings. I have been twice to Eleanor's chamber. The door is half ground-glass, and I can see her black shadow as she walks to and fro across the room. She has been walking so ever since she entered it.

"October 4.—What shall I do? Where shall I go? All night and all day Eleanor has walked her chamber-floor. I have been to the door. I have knocked. I have called her by name. I have turned the handle,—the door is locked. No answer comes to me,—nothing but the black shadow flitting across the panes. I sat down by the threshold and burst into tears.

"Mrs. Bickford found me there. 'Do not grieve so, Miss Elizabeth,' said she, kindly. 'It is dreadful, I know; but Miss Purcill walked the floor all night after her father died, and would admit no one to her room. She will be better to-morrow.'

"I shook my head. Could I believe that grief for the dead, and not sorrow for the conduct of the living, moved her thus, I should be happy. Then I could offer consolation and sympathy; but now, if I saw her, what could I say? Pity, sorrow for her grief, would be but idle words, which she would spurn with contempt,—and she would be right. There is but one thing left for me,—I must go from Ashcroft; then, perhaps, she and Thornton—But no, it cannot be; so wide asunder, they cannot come together again. And do I wish it? Is not his love as much mine now as it ever was hers? Ah, how some words once spoken cannot be forgotten! Before me now is the little picture of Hagar, which Eleanor had framed and hung in the library. Did she place it before my eyes as a warning to me? In Hagar's fate I see my own; for even now I hear Eleanor asking if the passion of a few hours is to thrust aside the love of long years. The bondmaid will go ere she is driven out. But Thornton—I cannot, will not, see him again. He has written to me to-day, saying that he cannot come here, and asking me to meet him at the well to-morrow. By that time I shall be far on my way to Madge. He will wait for me, and I shall not come. How can I leave him thus? He will believe me heartless and cruel. I grieve even now for his pain and grief. He will think that I did not love, but only sported with him. How dearly I love him words cannot tell; and I go that his way may be smoother, and that in my absence he may find—peace at last. A little dried flower lies on the page that I turned. It is one of those that grew in the well, that I wore on my bosom one day, that he might see and know it, and chide me for having been there again. His chiding was sweeter to me than others' praise. I will not be so unjust to myself. I will not go without one word. I jestingly told him once I would leave a token for him on the stone in the well when I went away from Ashcroft. I will put my journal there. He will see the box and remember it. He will learn that I have gone, and will know that I love, but that I leave and renounce him."

The remaining pages of the book were blank. Elizabeth Purcill's journal was ended. Bradford was busy with conjectures. Why had not Thornton found and kept the journal intended for him? Had it fallen at once to the bottom of the well, and lain there for years, while he waited in vain for her coming or her token? Her departure had not brought Eleanor Purcill and Thornton Lee together; for his aunt still remained