As she stood, and looked upon him going away, her face was so like Marion's as it had been in her later days at home, that it was wonderful to see.He took the child with him.She called her back - she bore the lost girl's name - and pressed her to her bosom.
The little creature, being released again, sped after him, and Grace was left alone.
She knew not what she dreaded, or what hoped; but remained there, motionless, looking at the porch by which they had disappeared.
Ah! what was that, emerging from its shadow; standing on its threshold! That figure, with its white garments rustling in the evening air; its head laid down upon her father's breast, and pressed against it to his loving heart! O God! was it a vision that came bursting from the old man's arms, and with a cry, and with a waving of its hands, and with a wild precipitation of itself upon her in its boundless love, sank down in her embrace!
'Oh, Marion, Marion! Oh, my sister! Oh, my heart's dear love!
Oh, joy and happiness unutterable, so to meet again!'
It was no dream, no phantom conjured up by hope and fear, but Marion, sweet Marion! So beautiful, so happy, so unalloyed by care and trial, so elevated and exalted in her loveliness, that as the setting sun shone brightly on her upturned face, she might have been a spirit visiting the earth upon some healing mission.
Clinging to her sister, who had dropped upon a seat and bent down over her - and smiling through her tears - and kneeling, close before her, with both arms twining round her, and never turning for an instant from her face - and with the glory of the setting sun upon her brow, and with the soft tranquillity of evening gathering around them - Marion at length broke silence; her voice, so calm, low, clear, and pleasant, well-tuned to the time.
'When this was my dear home, Grace, as it will be now again - '
'Stay, my sweet love! A moment! O Marion, to hear you speak again.'
She could not bear the voice she loved so well, at first.
'When this was my dear home, Grace, as it will be now again, Iloved him from my soul.I loved him most devotedly.I would have died for him, though I was so young.I never slighted his affection in my secret breast for one brief instant.It was far beyond all price to me.Although it is so long ago, and past, and gone, and everything is wholly changed, I could not bear to think that you, who love so well, should think I did not truly love him once.I never loved him better, Grace, than when he left this very scene upon this very day.I never loved him better, dear one, than I did that night when I left here.'
Her sister, bending over her, could look into her face, and hold her fast.
'But he had gained, unconsciously,' said Marion, with a gentle smile, 'another heart, before I knew that I had one to give him.
That heart - yours, my sister! - was so yielded up, in all its other tenderness, to me; was so devoted, and so noble; that it plucked its love away, and kept its secret from all eyes but mine -Ah! what other eyes were quickened by such tenderness and gratitude! - and was content to sacrifice itself to me.But, Iknew something of its depths.I knew the struggle it had made.Iknew its high, inestimable worth to him, and his appreciation of it, let him love me as he would.I knew the debt I owed it.I had its great example every day before me.What you had done for me, Iknew that I could do, Grace, if I would, for you.I never laid my head down on my pillow, but I prayed with tears to do it.I never laid my head down on my pillow, but I thought of Alfred's own words on the day of his departure, and how truly he had said (for I knew that, knowing you) that there were victories gained every day, in struggling hearts, to which these fields of battle were nothing.
Thinking more and more upon the great endurance cheerfully sustained, and never known or cared for, that there must be, every day and hour, in that great strife of which he spoke, my trial seemed to grow light and easy.And He who knows our hearts, my dearest, at this moment, and who knows there is no drop of bitterness or grief - of anything but unmixed happiness - in mine, enabled me to make the resolution that I never would be Alfred's wife.That he should be my brother, and your husband, if the course I took could bring that happy end to pass; but that I never would (Grace, I then loved him dearly, dearly!) be his wife!'
'O Marion! O Marion!'
'I had tried to seem indifferent to him;' and she pressed her sister's face against her own; 'but that was hard, and you were always his true advocate.I had tried to tell you of my resolution, but you would never hear me; you would never understand me.The time was drawing near for his return.I felt that I must act, before the daily intercourse between us was renewed.I knew that one great pang, undergone at that time, would save a lengthened agony to all of us.I knew that if I went away then, that end must follow which HAS followed, and which has made us both so happy, Grace! I wrote to good Aunt Martha, for a refuge in her house: I did not then tell her all, but something of my story, and she freely promised it.While I was contesting that step with myself, and with my love of you, and home, Mr.Warden, brought here by an accident, became, for some time, our companion.'
'I have sometimes feared of late years, that this might have been,'
exclaimed her sister; and her countenance was ashy-pale.'You never loved him - and you married him in your self-sacrifice to me!'
'He was then,' said Marion, drawing her sister closer to her, 'on the eve of going secretly away for a long time.He wrote to me, after leaving here; told me what his condition and prospects really were; and offered me his hand.He told me he had seen I was not happy in the prospect of Alfred's return.I believe he thought my heart had no part in that contract; perhaps thought I might have loved him once, and did not then; perhaps thought that when I tried to seem indifferent, I tried to hide indifference - I cannot tell.
But I wished that you should feel me wholly lost to Alfred -hopeless to him - dead.Do you understand me, love?'
