第131章 CHAPTER XXV SMOULDERING COALS(2)

"It was only another of the mistakes and misunderstandings that divided us all at that time, my dear," Miss Clendenning answered. "This dreadful war could have been averted, if people had only come together and understood each other. I did not think so then, but I do now."

"And you don't think me wicked, Cousin Lavinia?"

Margaret asked with a sudden relaxation of her figure and something infinitely childlike and appealing in her tone. "You really don't think me wicked, do you?"

"Not wicked, dear; only human, as I said a moment ago. Yet you have been stronger than I. You have held on and won; I let go and lost."

Margaret bent forward and laid her finger on Miss Clendenning's knee.

"Lost what, Cousin Lavinia?" she asked, in surprise.

"My lover."

"When?"

"When I was just your age."

"Did he die?" asked Margaret in awed tones, overcome all at once with the solemnity of the hour and a strange new note in Miss Lavinia's voice.

"No, he married someone else."

"He never--never loved you, then." There was a positiveness now in her intonations.

"Yes, he did, with all his heart. His mother came between us."

Again silence fell on the room. Margaret would not look at Miss Clendenning. The little old maid had suddenly opened the windows of her heart, but whether to let a long-caged sorrow out or some friendly sympathy in, she could not tell.

"May I know about it!" There was a softer cadence now in the girl's voice.

"It would only make you unhappy, dear. It was all over forty years or more ago. Sallie, when she saw you, put her arms about you. You had only to come together. The oftener she sees you, the more she will love you. My lover's mother shut the door in my face."

"In your face? Why?"

Margaret moved closer to Miss Clendenning, stirred by a sudden impulse, as if she could even now protect her from one who had hurt her.

Miss Lavinia bent forward and picked up the brass tongs that lay on the fender at her feet. She saw Margaret's gesture, but she did not turn her head. Her eyes were still watching the smouldering embers.

"For no reason, dear, that you or any other Northern woman could understand. An old family quarrel that began before I was born."

Margaret's cheeks flushed and a determined look came into her face.

"The coward! I would not have cared what his mother or anybody else did, or how they quarrelled.

If I loved you I would have married you in spite of everything."

"And so would he." She was balancing the tongs in her hand now, her eyes still on the fire. She had not looked at Margaret once.

"What happened then?"

Miss Clendenning leaned forward, spread the tongs in her little hands, lifted an ember and tucked it closer to its neighbor. The charred mass crumbled at the touch and fell into a heap of broken coals.

"I am a Clendenning, my dear; that is all," she answered, slowly.

Margaret stared at her with wide-open eyes. That a life should be wrecked for a mere question of family pride was something her mind could not fathom.

"Have you regretted it since, Cousin Lavinia?" she asked, calmly. She wanted to follow it out now to the end.

Miss Clendenning heaped the broken coals closer together, laid the tongs back in their place on the fender, and, turning to Margaret, said, with a sigh:

"Don't ask me, my dear. I never dare ask myself, but do you keep your hand close in Oliver's.

Remember, dear, close--close! Then you will never know the bitterness of a lonely life."

She rose from her seat, bent down, and, taking Margaret's cheeks between her palms, kissed her on the forehead.

Margaret put her arms about the little lady, and was about to draw her nearer, when the front door opened and a step was heard in the hall. Miss Lavinia raised herself erect, listening to the sound.

"Hark!" she cried, "there's the dear fellow, now"--and she advanced to meet him, her gentle countenance once more serene.

Oliver's face as he entered the room told the story.

"Not worse?" Margaret exclaimed, starting from her chair.

"Yes--much worse. I have just sent word to Uncle Nat"--and he kissed them both. "Put on your things at once. The doctor is anxious.

Miss Lavinia caught up her cloak, handed Margaret her shawl, and the three hurried out the front-door and along the Square, passing the Pancoast house, now turned into offices, its doors and windows covered with signs, and the Clayton Mansion, surmounted by a flag-pole and still used by the Government.

Entering the park, they crossed the site of the once lovely flower-beds, now trampled flat--as was everything else in the grounds--and so on to the marble steps of the Horn Mansion.

Mrs. Horn met them at the top of the stairs. She put her arms silently about Margaret, kissed her tenderly, and led her into Richard's room. Oliver and Miss Clendenning stood at the door.

The master lay under the canopy of the four-post bedstead, his eyes closed, the soft white hair lost in the pillows, the pale face tinged with the glow of the night lamp. Dr. Wallace was standing by the bed watching the labored breathing of the prostrate man. Old Hannah sat on the floor at Richard's feet.

She was rocking to and fro, making no sign, crooning inaudibly to herself listening to every sound.

Margaret sank to her knees and laid her cheek on the coverlet. She wanted to touch something that was close to him.

The head of the sick man turned uneasily. The doctor bent noiselessly down, put his ears close to the patient's breast, touched his pulse with his fingers, and laid his hand on his forehead.

"Better send for some hot water," he whispered to Mrs. Horn when he had regained her side. Margaret overheard, and started to rise from her knees, but Mrs. Horn waved her back. "Hannah will get it," she said, and stooped close to the old woman to give the order. There was a restrained calmness in her manner that sent a shiver through Margaret.

She remembered just such an expression on her mother's face when her own father lay dying.