LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume II, Issue 189, 16 January 1875, Page 3

LITERATURE.

A SUMMER’S HISTORY. Concluded. ‘ No, Margaret, I never tried to make Robert Earl love me. Could I be so wicked and treacherous ? I liked him from the first too much, too much ; but, oh ! I could not help it: I did not tell the love to come ; and I never meant to let either of you find it out. But, someway, he did find it out, and I don’t know how it happened, Margie, but he said some things to-day before he thought. It’s all over now. I’m'not going to see him when he comes here any more, and he will forget all about me in a little while. He’s too good, to honorable to break his word with you, Maggie, even if he wanted to ; and I don’t think he ever thought of that. Forgive me, but I never meant to pain you. ’ Margaret bent down, and kissed the pale, suffering face tenderly: a tear from her eyelids fell upon May’s cheek. No, the poor young girl had not been intentionally cruel. ‘ Oh, Margie, you are so good ! ’ involuntarily burst from May, flinging her arms about her cousin’s neck, and hiding her face in her bosom. ‘ I don’t believe I could ever kiss anybody like that who had brought me the trouble that I have brought to you. ’ * But you did not wish to bring it,’ answered Margaret, softly, ‘ If you had tried to win Robert away, I think I should have hated you with a terrible hatred. As it is, I cannot blame you.’ ‘ And it’s all ended between Robert and me,’ May sobbed. ‘ He understands that. And I shall leave you for home, Margaret, as soon as I can. But there was no comfort for Margaret in May’s words. Perhaps, in one sense, it might be all ended between Robert and May. But, knowing of the love between them, could she accept such a sacrifice as he must make in giving up May ? If he loved May —as Margery believed he did—could he forget her ? And she herself, she could not marry him if his heart was another’s. ’ For a whole week Robert Earl did not come near the house. He knew not of any explanation; but he believed, as matters stood, he was better away from it. One morning a maid came upstairs to say Mr Earl was below. May would not see him. ‘You go, Margie,’she said. ‘I will not. He is yours only, and I will not come between you again. Remember that.’ Margaret went down to meet Robert, with a pale, grave face. She tried to be calm, and outwardly she succeeded. But her ■heart was full of a strange and wild excitement. At the first glance into her face he knew that what he had |hoped to keep secret from her was a secret no longer. It is only justice to Robert Earl to say that he meant to be honorable and true. He had resolved that neither May nor Margaret should discover the disloyalty of his heart; but in an unguarded moment his lips had got the better of his intentions, and in a few, swift, passionate words, he had told May that he loved her. He never, thinking it over afterwards, realised fully what his words to Margaret were that day, nor what her replies were. The first that he comprehended clearly was when Margaret came up to him, and put her hand upon his arm, and looked him steadily in the face. There was no anger in it. It was kind, and sadly earnest. ‘I know all, Robert,’ she said simply. ‘ May has told me. I do not blame either of you, because you could not help it. We cannot control our hearts. I am ready to give you back your ring, Robert—if yon want it!’ She could not help saying those last words. Some faint hope stirred in her heart yet—that selfish heart of hers, she told herself—that he would refuse to accept his freedom ; that he would prove to her that he loved her most. * Margaret!’ Robert Earl covered his face with his hands, and was silent for a long time. When he looked up his face was very pale. ‘I do not .want the ring,’he answered. ‘No.’ ‘But—if it should be rightly hers?’ gasped Margaret. He was nearly as agitated as she was. ‘ There must be truth between us now, Margaret, if nothing else. Believe me when I say that I do not understand my own heart. I believe I love you. I try to think of you always; but—but May’s face keeps coming between us.’ ‘Which is it?’ breathed Margaret, from between her bloodless lips. ‘ I don’t understand. ’ ‘Nor I,’ he murmured. ‘Margaret, I don’t deserve your kindness. I’m not half good enough for you, but I’ll try to be. I am going away, and shall stay away until May has left; and I shall try to forget her, and remember only you. Perhaps I shall understand my heart better when I come back. At any rate, it is better for all of us that I should leave. As to the ring, keep it, Margaret; at least, no one as yet has any better right to it. ’ ‘God bless you, Robert!’ Margaret said, softly, ‘ I will keep your ring; and oh! Robert!’—and her voice was full of the passionate yearning for the happiness which seemed slipping away from her-— ‘ I Vould wear it gladly, if your love could be given with it! But if you find that your heart is more May’s than mine, I will give it back to you. Unless your heart goes with the ring, it would be a fetter to me. ’ ‘ You are a noble woman Margaret, he said, putting his fingers on her hair in the old caressing way. ‘ I wonder how I ever could have cared for anyone else ?’ Then he did care for her ! The thought was so sweet! Margaret laid her head upon his shoulder, and he knew that she was weeping softly. Mr Earl went away, and the days crept on. Miss Callingford did not leave at present, some arrangements in her own family forbidding it. A strange, grieved look stole now and then into May’s face that was sorrowful to see. Margaret always wanted to get away by herself and cry, when she saw it: she knew what May was thinking of. Those were strange weeks to Margaret. Often it seemed to her as if she was a prisoner waiting for sentence. Would it be life or death ? Sometimes she was buoyant with wild hope; sometimes sunk in utter despondency. And now the end of May’s stay was really drawing near : and Margaret began to feel, in some strange and unaccountable way, that Robert would come back to her and tell

her that he had found out his own heart, and it was hers. The feeling clung to her, uid she began to be more like the Margaret of old than she had been for a long time. ‘ The morrow is very near,’ May said, on the last night of her visit, as she and Margaret were sitting by the window together. Everything was in readiness for her departure. ‘ But, Margaret, I do not want to leave you feeling that there is any bitterness in your heart towards me, any blame for the past. You are sure, quite sure, that there is not ?’ ‘ I am quite sure,’ Margaret answered. ‘ How could I blame you for that which you could not help?’ * I hope you will be very happy, Margie, you and Robert,’ May said, as she smoothed Margaret’s hair tenderly back from her face. There was a quiver of pain in her voice; and tears came in Margaret’s eyes as she heard it. ‘So young, so beautiful,’ ran her thoughts, ‘ and to have so dreadful a sorrow to carry with her into coming years. Poor May!’ ‘I hope so,’earnestly spoke Margaret, in answer. ‘ May God be as good to you, May, as I hope He will be to me!’. The same night, in the depth of sleep, Margaret was aroused by a voice of terror calling to her from the other bed. She started up. ‘ What is it?’ she asked. *ls anything the matter, May?’ ‘ I think the house is on fire. Don’t you hear it roar? And the room is full of smoke. They sprang out of bed, and ran to the door; but had to shut it again as soon as opened. The landing, close to their room, was one vast billow of flame.’ ‘ Oh! what shall we do—what shall we do?’ cried May, wildly. ‘ There is no way of getting down; no way of escape!’ ‘ Oh, Margaret! are we to die in this way?’ ‘ I don’t know, dear,’ answered Margaret, retaining her presence of mind, as she ran to the window. ‘ Perhaps we can escape in some way. See ! the neighbors are gathering. They will help us.’ Unfastening the window, she flung it open. ‘ Help ! Help ! ’ she cried. ‘ Get a ladder if you can. The house is full of fire.’ At that moment a man came rushing in at the gate, pushing the assembling people right and left. Margaret knew him, and her heart gave a great leap. ‘ Robert, Robert, you will save us ! * she cried. ‘ Oh, May, I think God has sent him ! He will dare what the others might not.’ The fire was inside the room now : the wood of the whole house was as tinder. The flames leaped and roared all about them. They heard the crash of falling timbers. Suddenly the ceiling above them fell, filling the room with a whirling mass of flame and smoke. ‘ Haste, haste ! ’ cried Margaret to the men below. ‘ The room is all on fire ! ’ Before the words left her lips, the end of a ladder appeared, and she heard a man’s feet moving swiftly up the rounds. ‘ Oh, May, courage, courage ! ’ she sobbed. ‘ They are coming to save us. ’ Even at that self-same moment, the man’s head was at the window, looking in. * May ! May ! ’ he cried, in an eager voice, that was full of wild passion, of love, and awful fear. ‘My darling, where are you ? ’ ‘ Here, here! ’ replied May, and sprang towards the window. ‘ Oh, Robert, save me, save me! ’ ‘ I will save you, or die with you,’ he said; and his voice was full of a deeper tenderness than Margaret had ever heard in his voice before. ‘ Cling to me, May; cling close, and trust me!’ * And so Robert Earl chose between them? Oh, Margaret, where was your hope, then? ‘ Let me die!’ she cried, with pallid lips: but it was not the fear of death which blanched them, ‘He does not love me. Let me die!’ And Margaret’s prayer was answered. The smoke reached out fierce hands, and overshadowed her, before help could arrive. It may have been—and the thought passed through her heart in dying—that Robert Earl did not know she was there. There is a grave in a churchyard on the hill-side on which the grass has only grown one summer. It is that of Margaret Wayne. ‘Almost the last words Margaret ever spoke were to tell me that she had no bitterness in her heart towards me,” sobbed May one day, as she stood by it with her husband. ‘ Dear Margaret! I think she is happier now than she would have been, even with you, Robert. ’ ‘Perhaps so,’ he answered, reverently. ‘ God knows best!’ •