The Chain of Destiny, Bram Stoker [best romantic novels to read txt] 📗

>mine beat for her. She only showed pity and tenderness in her

acts and words, but still I hoped and longed for something more.

 

Those days of my long-continued weakness were to me sweet,

sweet days. I used to watch her for hours as she sat opposite to

me reading or working, and my eyes would fill with tears as I

thought how hard it would be to die and leave her behind me. So

strong was the flame of my love that I believed, in spite of my

religious teaching, that, should I die, I would leave the better

part of my being behind me. I used to think in a vague imaginative

way, that was no less powerful because it was undefined, of what

speeches I would make to her—if I were well. How I would talk to

her in nobler language than that in which I would now allow my

thoughts to mould themselves. How, as I talked, my passion, and

honesty, and purity would make me so eloquent that she would

love to hear me speak. How I would wander with her through the

sunny-gladed woods that stretched away before me through the

open window, and sit by her feet on a mossy bank beside some

purling brook that rippled gaily over the stones, gazing into the

depths of her eyes, where my future life was pictured in one long

sheen of light. How I would whisper in her ear sweet words that

would make me tremble to speak them, and her tremble to hear.

How she would bend to me and show me her love by letting me tell

her mine without reproof. And then would come, like the shadow

of a sudden rain-cloud over an April landscape, the bitter,

bitter thought that all this longing was but a dream, and that

when the time had come when such things might have been, I would,

most likely, be sleeping under the green turf. And she might,

perhaps, be weeping in the silence of her chamber sad, sad tears

for her blighted love and for me. Then my thoughts would become

less selfish, and I would try to imagine the bitter blow of my

death—if she loved me—for I knew that a woman loves not by the

value of what she loves, but by the strength of her affection and

admiration for her own ideal, which she thinks she sees bodied

forth in some man. But these thoughts had always the proviso that

the dreams of happiness were prophetic. Alas! I had altogether

lost faith in dreams. Still, I could not but feel that even if I

had never frightened Miss Fothering by telling my vision, she

might, nevertheless, have been terrified by the effect of the

moonlight upon the flowers of the pampass tufts, and that, under

Providence, I was the instrument of saving her from a shock even

greater than that which she did experience, for help might not have

come to her so soon. This thought always gave me hope. Whenever I

thought of her sorrow for my death, I would find my eyes filled

with a sudden rush of tears which would shut out from my waking

vision the object of my thoughts and fears. Then she would come

over to me and place her cool hand on my forehead, and whisper

sweet words of comfort and hope in my ears. As I would feel her

warm breath upon my cheek and wafting my hair from my brow, I

would lose all sense of pain and sorrow and care, and live only

in the brightness of the present. At such times I would cry

silently from very happiness, for I was sadly weak, and even

trifling things touched me deeply. Many a stray memory of some

tender word heard or some gentle deed done, or of some sorrow or

distress, would set me thinking for hours and stir all the tender

feelings of my nature.

 

Slowly—very slowly—I began to get stronger, but for many days

more I was almost completely helpless. With returning strength

came the strengthening of my passion—for passion my love for Diana

had become. She had been so woven into my thoughts that my love

for her was a part of my being, and I felt that away from her my

future life would be but a bare existence and no more. But strange

to say, with increasing strength and passion came increasing

diffidence. I felt in her presence so bashful and timorous that

I hardly dared to look at her, and could not speak save to answer

an occasional question. I had ceased to dream entirely, for such

day-dreams as I used to have seemed now wild and almost sacrilegious

to my sur-excited imagination. But when she was not looking at me

I would be happy in merely seeing her or hearing her speak. I could

tell the moment she left the house or entered it, and her footfall

was the music sweetest to my ears—except her voice. Sometimes she

would catch sight of my bashful looks at her, and then, at my

conscious blushing, a bright smile would flit over her face. It

was sweet and womanly, but sometimes I would think that it was no

more than her pity finding expression. She was always in my thoughts

and these doubts and fears constantly assailed me, so that I could

feel that the brooding over the subject—a matter which I was

powerless to prevent—was doing me an injury; perhaps seriously

retarding my recovery.

 

One day I felt very sad. There had a bitter sense of loneliness

come over me which was unusual. It was a good sign of returning

health, for it was like the waking from a dream to a world of fact,

with all its troubles and cares. There was a sense of coldness and

loneliness in the world, and I felt that I had lost something

without gaining anything in return—I had, in fact, lost somewhat

of my sense of dependence, which is a consequence of prostration,

but had not yet regained my strength. I sat opposite a window

itself in shade, but looking over a garden that in the summer had

been bright with flowers, and sweet with their odours, but which,

now, was lit up only in patches by the quiet mellow gleams of the

autumn sun, and brightened by a few stray flowers that had survived

the first frosts.

 

As I sat I could not help thinking of what my future would be.

I felt that I was getting strong, and the possibilities of my life

seemed very real to me. How I longed for courage to ask Diana to

be my wife! Any certainty would be better than the suspense I now

constantly endured. I had but little hope that she would accept

me, for she seemed to care less for me now than in the early days

of my illness. As I grew stronger she seemed to hold somewhat

aloof from me; and as my fears and doubts grew more and more, I

could hardly bear to think of my joy should she accept me, or of

my despair should she refuse. Either emotion seemed too great to

be borne.

 

To-day when she entered the room my fears were vastly

increased. She seemed much stronger than usual, for a glow,

as of health, ruddied her cheeks, and she seemed so lovely

that I could not conceive that such a woman would ever

condescend to be my wife. There was an unusual constraint

in her manner as she came and spoke to me, and flitted round

me, doing in her own graceful way all the thousand little

offices that only a woman’s hand can do for an invalid. She

turned to me two or three times, as if she was about to speak;

but turned away again, each time silent, and with a blush. I

could see that her heart was beating violently. At length she

spoke.

 

“Frank.”

 

Oh! what a wild throb went through me as I heard my name from

her lips for the first time. The blood rushed to my head, so that

for a moment I was quite faint. Her cool hand on my forehead

revived me.

 

“Frank, will you let me speak to you for a few minutes as

honestly as I would wish to speak, and as freely?”

 

“Go on.”

 

“You will promise me not to think me unwomanly or forward,

for indeed I act from the best motives—promise me?”

 

This was said slowly with much hesitation, and a convulsive

heaving of the chest.

 

“I promise.”

 

“We can see that you are not getting as strong as you ought, and

the doctor says that there is some idea too much in your mind—that

you brood over it, and that it is retarding your recovery. Mrs.

Trevor and I have been talking about it. We have been comparing

notes, and I think we have found out what your idea is. Now, Frank,

you must not pale and red like that, or I will have to leave off.”

 

“I will be calm—indeed, I will. Go on.”

 

“We both thought that it might do you good to talk to you

freely, and we want to know if our idea is correct. Mrs. Trevor

thought it better that I should speak to you than she should.”

 

“What is the idea?”

 

Hitherto, although she had manifested considerable emotion,

her voice had been full and clear, but she answered this last

question very faintly, and with much hesitation.

 

“You are attached to me, and you are afraid I—I don’t love you.”

 

Here her voice was checked by a rush of tears, and she turned

her head away.

 

“Diana,” said I, “dear Diana,” and I held out my arms with what

strength I had.

 

The colour rushed over her face and neck, and then she turned,

and with a convulsive sigh laid her head upon my shoulder. One

weak arm fell round her waist, and my other hand rested on her

head. I said nothing. I could not speak, but I felt the beating of

her heart against mine, and thought that if I died then I must be

happy for ever, if there be memory in the other world.

 

For a long, long, blissful time she kept her place, and

gradually our hearts ceased to beat so violently, and we

became calm.

 

Such was the confession of our love. No plighted faith, no

passionate vows, but the silence and the thrill of sympathy

through our hearts were sweeter than words could be.

 

Diana raised her head and looked fearlessly but appealingly

into my eyes as she asked me—

 

“Oh, Frank, did I do right to speak? Could it have been better

if I had waited?”

 

She saw my wishes in my eyes, and bent down her head to me. I

kissed her on the forehead and fervently prayed, “Thank God that

all was as it has been. May He bless my own darling wife for ever

and ever.”

 

“Amen,” said a sweet, tender voice.

 

We both looked up without shame, for we knew the tones of my

second mother. Her face, streaming with tears of joy, was lit up

by a sudden ray of sunlight through the casement.