LITMIR.BIZ

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"by one to whom I was a stranger till within the last few hours."

      "Do I know him?"

      "You know him well."

      For a moment she thought of the man who had brought her to this gulf of shame, but she dismissed the thought. It was impossible. He was too heartless and base to send a messenger to her on an errand of friendship, and Dr. Spenlove would have undertaken no errand of an opposite nature.

      "Who is the gentleman who takes such an interest in me?"

      "Mr. Gordon."

      She trembled, and her face grew white. She had wronged this man--the law might say that she had robbed him. Oh, why had her fatal design been frustrated, why was not this torturing existence ended?

      "You need be under no apprehension," continued Dr. Spenlove; "he comes as a friend." She tossed her head in scorn of herself as one unworthy of friendship. "He has but lately arrived in England from the colonies, and he came with the hope of taking you back with him as his wife. It is from him I learned the sad particulars of your life. Believe me when I say that he is desirous to befriend you."

      "In what way? Does he offer me money? I have cost him enough already; my father tricked him, and I have shamefully deceived him. To receive more from him would fill me with shame, but for the sake of my child I will submit to any sacrifice, to any humiliation--I will do anything, anything! It would well become me to show pride when charity is offered to me!"

      "Do not forget those words--'for the sake of your child you will submit to any sacrifice.' It is your duty, for her sake, to accept any honorable proposition, and Mr. Gordon offers nothing that is not honorable." He sighed as he said this, for he thought of the sacredness of a mother's love for her firstborn. "He will not give you money apart from himself. United to him, all he has is yours. He wishes to marry you."

      She stared at him in amazement. "Are you mad," she cried, "or do you think that I am?"

      "I am speaking the sober truth. Mr. Gordon has followed you here because he wishes to marry you."

      "Knowing me for what I am," she said, still incredulous, "knowing that I am in the lowest depths of degradation, knowing this"--she touched her child with a gentle hand--"he wishes to marry me!"

      "He knows all. There is not an incident in your career with which he does not seem to be acquainted, and in the errand with which he has charged me he is sincerely in earnest."

      "Dr. Spenlove," she said slowly, "what is your opinion of a man who comes forward to pluck from shame and poverty a woman, who has been wronged as I have wronged Mr. Gordon?"

      "His actions speak for him," replied Dr. Spenlove.

      "He must have a noble nature," she said. "I never regarded him in that light. I took him to be a hard, conscientious, fair-dealing man, who thought I would make him a good wife, but I never believed that he loved me. I did him the injustice of supposing him incapable of love. I am not worthy of him, or of any man."

      "Set your mind not upon the past, but upon the future. Think of yourself and of your child in the years to come, and remember the fear and horror by which you have been oppressed in your contemplation of them. I have something further to disclose to you. Mr. Gordon imposes a condition from which he will not swerve, and to which I beg of you to listen with calmness. When you have heard all do not answer hastily. Reflect upon the consequences which hang on your decision, and bear in mind that you have to make that decision before I leave you. I am to take your answer to him to-night; he is waiting in my rooms to receive it."

      Then, softening down all that was harsh in the proposal and magnifying all its better points, Dr. Spenlove related to her what had passed between Mr. Gordon and himself. She listened in silence, and he could not judge from her demeanor whether he was to succeed or to fail. Frequently she turned her face from his tenderly searching gaze, as though more effectually to conceal her thoughts from him. When he finished speaking she showed that she had taken to heart his counsel not to decide hastily, for she did not speak for several minutes. Then she said plaintively:

      "There is no appeal, doctor?"

      "None," he answered in a decisive tone.

      "He sought you out and made you his messenger, because of his impression that you had influence with me, and would advise me for my good?"

      "As I have told you--in his own words as nearly as I have been able to recall them."

      "He was right. There is no man in the world I honor more than I honor you. I would accept what you say against my own convictions, against my own feelings. Advise me, doctor. My mind is distracted--I cannot be guided by it. You know what I am, you know what I have been, you foresee the future that lies before me. Advise me."

      The moment he dreaded had arrived. The issue was with him. He felt that this woman's fate was in his hands.

      "My advice is," he said in a low tone, "that you accept Mr. Gordon's offer."

      "And cast aside a mother's duty?"

      "What did you cast aside," he asked sadly, "when you went with your child on such a night as this toward the sea?"

      She shuddered. She would not look at her child; with stern resolution she kept her eyes from wandering to the spot upon which the infant lay. She even moved away from the little body so that she should not come in contact with it.

      A long silence ensued, which Dr. Spenlove dared not break.

      "I cannot blame him," she then said, her voice now and again broken by a sob, "for making conditions. It is his respectability that is at stake, and he is noble and generous for taking such a risk upon himself. It would be mockery for me to say that I love my child with a love equal to that I should have felt if she had come into the world without the mark of shame with which I have branded her. With my love for her was mingled a loathing of myself, a terror of the living evidence of my fall. But I love her, doctor, I love her--and never yet so much as now when I am asked to part with her! What I did a while ago was done in a frenzy of despair; I had no food, you see, and she was crying for it; and the horror and the anguish of that hour may overpower me again if I am left as I am. I will accept Mr. Gordon's offer, and I will be as good a wife to him as it is in my power to

       be--but I, also, have a condition to make. Mr. Gordon is much older than I, and it may be that I shall outlive him. The condition I make is--and whatever the consequences I am determined to abide by it--that in the event of my husband's death and of there being no children of our union, I shall be free to seek the child I am called upon to desert. In everything else I will perform my part of the contract faithfully. Take my decision to Mr. Gordon, and if it is possible for you to return here to-night with his answer I implore you to do so. I cannot close my eyes, I cannot rest, until I hear the worst. God alone knows on which side lies the right, on which the wrong!"

      "I will return with his answer," said Dr. Spenlove, "to-night."

      "There is still something more," she said in an imploring tone, "and it must be a secret sacredly kept between you and me. It may happen that you will become acquainted with the name of the guardian of my child. I have a small memorial which I desire she shall retain until she is of age, say until she is twenty-one, or until, in the event of my husband's death, I am free to seek her in years to come. If you do not discover who the guardian is I ask you to keep this memorial for me until I reclaim it--which may be never. Will you do this for me?"

      "I will."

      "Thank you for all your goodness to me. But I have nothing to put the memorial in. Could you add to your many kindnesses by giving me a small box which I can lock and secure? Dear Dr. Spenlove, it is a mother who will presently be torn from her child who implores you."

      He bethought him of a small iron box he had at home, which contained some private papers of his own. He could spare this box without inconvenience to himself, and he promised to bring it to her--and so, with sincere words of consolation, he left her.

      In the course of an hour he returned. Mr. Gordon had consented to the condition she imposed.

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