Chapter LXIX

Aline’s momentous bridal day waned slowly to its close.

The physicians remained with Mr. Delaney all day, then left him to Mrs. Griffin’s care and went away. He was better, they said, but he must have careful nursing.

The wintery day was fading into darkness. Mrs. Griffin had slipped out for the tea and toast again, and Mr. Delaney lay among his snowy pillows, gazing thoughtfully into the bright fire. His lips moved, and he murmured, sadly:

“She will hate me, perhaps.”

The door opened softly. His bride of a day came gliding in, clad in her simple dark-blue dress, the loose curls falling on her shoulders.

“You are better?” she said, coming up to him. “Ah, I thought you were dead this morning!”

She sat down in a low chair by the side of the bed, very close to him. His heart beat with sudden rapture.

“Yes, I thought that I was dying, too,” he said. “You remember that moment when I kissed your cheek? Well, just then I had a sensation as of falling from a great height. I thought it was the last of earth, that I had looked my last on your beloved face, that I was surely dying!”

“We all thought so,” she replied, calmly and gravely.

He reached out and took her hand in both his own.

“Aline, will you look at me?” he asked.

She lifted the shyly drooping lashes from her violet eyes and gazed into his face, frankly and steadily.

“Aline, do you realize that you are really my wife?—that you belong wholly to me?” he asked her.

“Yes,” she answered quietly.

“Is there any sorrow, any regret, any repulsion in the thought?” he inquired, and she answered in a low voice:

“No.”

“I have something to tell you,” he said, “but oh, Aline, I am afraid.”

She grew very pale at those words from his lips. She looked at him anxiously.

“You need not be afraid to tell me. Go on. I will try to bear it,” she said, with a falter in her voice.

“But, Aline, my own, my darling, you must not hate me for this,” he said, passionately. “Indeed I did not know! I believed I was surely doomed! And, now, now if only you could forgive me for my unconscious deception, I should be the happiest man in the world.”

She bent her blue eyes on him full of reproach and pain.

“Happy—at dying? Happy—at leaving me?” she said, in a low, strange, bewildered voice.

And for a moment they gazed wonderingly at each other. Then he spoke—almost incredulously:

“Aline, have you misunderstood me? I have been trying to tell you that the doubt is over. I have rallied from my illness! Love and joy have wrought a miracle! I shall live!”

“You—will—live?” she gasped, and stared at him, speechless.

“Oh, my dear, are you so sorry? Do you regret that you gave yourself to me? Oh, I would far sooner have died than this!” cried out Oran Delaney, in a passion of despair.

But she caught the hand he threw out in his frenzy of despair and pressed her lips upon it.

“Ah, Heaven, how glad I am!” she cried; and he answered, wonderingly:

“And you are not sorry—you do not hate me, Aline?”

“No, no, I love you,” she answered, hiding her face against his hands. “I think I must have loved you long, but I did not know it until I believed you dying. Oh, I thank Heaven that it has so kindly granted my prayer!”

“Your prayer, darling?” he said, gathering her in both arms tightly, as if he never meant to let her go again.

She whispered, with her lips against his cheek:

“I have been locked into my room all day, Oran, praying, praying, on my knees, that your life might be spared to me. And Heaven has granted my prayer. You will live for me, my husband!”

THE END.