TALE ELEVEN. A STORY OF SUICIDE BRIDGE.

It was a blustering winter day and a heavy snow was falling, making the streets exceedingly disagreeable to traverse. State street was crowded with shoppers evidently bent on taking advantage of the annual clearing sale which always takes place at the beginning of the new year.

I was elbowing my way through the crowd on the east side of the street, about as uncomfortable as a man could be, when I passed Kehoe’s. I had not gone a dozen steps when it occurred to me that a cup of hot chocolate would taste good. I turned abruptly and encountered an umbrella, which flashed dangerously close to my eyes. Somewhat confused, I entered the door behind a woman. She had pushed the door open and dropped her skirts directly in front of me. It was too late for me to catch myself and in less time than it takes to tell it, I had stepped on them. The suddenness with which she let that door swing back was appalling. It took me squarely on the nose, a fact which I do not now regret, inasmuch as it led to a very pleasant acquaintance. She glanced around to learn the cause of all the trouble and accepted my humble apologies with good grace, and seemed to feel sorry when she saw her carelessness was the cause of a great deal of suffering, for I could not well disguise the fact as the tears ran down my cheeks.

All the tables but one were taken and that was a small one in the corner, at which there were two chairs. She made her way to it quickly and when she saw me waiting she sent the waitress to me to tell me to come to her table. I bowed in response and crossed the room.

“I feel that I owe you some consideration for the unfortunate occurrence of a few moments ago,” she said, “and I hope you’ll accept my apologies in turn.”

I replied that it was my own stupidity and assured her that I already began to feel it was rather a fortunate than unfortunate occurrence.

She smiled, yet at the same time drew herself up with a quiet dignity that was unmistakable, and I knew I had taken the wrong tack when I made my gallant speech.

By this time my eyes were somewhat cleaned of tears and I was able to get a distant view of my vis-a-vis. I had already discovered that she was of medium height and quite slender. Her face was oval, her eyes large and brown, and looked liquid in the half light of our corner; her chin was round, her mouth was rather large and when she smiled her full, red lips disclosed a set of well kept teeth; her nose was neither long nor short, but quite in keeping with the contour of her face. Her eyebrows were dark and beautifully arched. Her forehead was high and full and an abundance of real golden hair was drawn back and concealed under the large, black beaver hat she wore so becomingly.

The real beauty of her face, however, was in its expression. Every emotion was clearly defined in the wonderful eyes and, though when smiling they would light up with a merry laughter, their general expression was one of sweet sadness.

When I assisted her to remove her coat, can I be blamed for feasting my eyes on the beautiful bust and shoulders with which nature had endowed her?

We chatted idly on the topics of the day as we sipped our chocolate, and when we had finished I handed her my card, saying, “If you ever need services in my line, I shall be pleased to render them.”

She thanked me and said as she read “Attorney at Law,” “I might have been grateful for your proffered aid a few years ago, but now, thank God, I do not need such aid, and I hope I shall never need it.”

Then she handed me her card. “Mrs. Geoffrey Nye Melville.” As I read I could not restrain the exclamation that arose to my lips.

“Why, I once had a friend by that name who was an official on the St. Paul road. He and I were the best of friends in St. Paul five years ago. I was at that time their attorney.”

“It is certainly my husband whom you know,” she said, “and you must come and call on us at your earliest convenience.”

I thanked her and on the strength of my friendship for her husband asked to escort her to the train.

I was not long in taking advantage of her invitation, and felt doubly free to do so, inasmuch as her husband had hunted me up the very next day after our meeting, and had insisted on my coming as soon as possible.

It happened that the night I called her husband was away, having been unexpectedly summoned to St. Paul on business.

I found her alone and looking almost beautiful in the bright red crepe gown she wore. Her skin was fair but pale and her cheeks reflected just enough of the color to enhance the effect. We had a long talk on generalities and gradually drifted to personalities.

“I am quite surprised at Geoffrey’s marrying again,” said I. “I had begun to think him proof against the fair sex five years ago, and it seems to me he added four more to that, with all due respect for you, my charming hostess.”

“Well,” she sighed, “he might still have remained single had not he met me in my forlorn condition, and I often think pity was the deepest sentiment he felt until we had been married several months. Well, you see, like most Chicago women, I have a story, and mine is a long one, but probably not an unusual one.”

“Dare I presume to ask you for it, on the strength of my long friendship for your husband?”

She was gazing dreamily into the grate and did not reply for a moment, then she turned her glorious eyes toward me and said slowly, “Yes, I will tell you if you think it will interest you.”

I assured her it would and asked her to proceed.

“I was married once before, too,” she said, “but was so unhappy that I left my husband and secured a divorce on the grounds of cruelty. I was granted a small alimony, enough to supply my modest wants.

“As time went on, I became rather dissatisfied with my quiet life and was filled with a desire to enter the business world. It was just about this time that a friend of mine, being too ill to go down town, asked me to do an errand for her. It took me into an office building, and when I entered the reception room I was told that the party for whom I inquired was not in, but was expected soon, so I sat down and waited.

“While I was waiting a man came out of one of the private offices, and as he saw me waiting he stopped and asked me whom I wished to see. When I told him he asked me into his office to wait, saying I would find it more pleasant there than in the reception room.

“As I think of it now, I wonder why I did not always adhere to my first impression of him, which presented itself so forcibly. It must have been fate, I guess. He was not at all handsome; he, in fact, was homely, especially his mouth, which was too coarse, yet when he spoke his countenance lighted up and there was an earnestness about him that partially restored my confidence. He had a fine physique, a large, brainy head, and carried himself with dignity. Well, we drifted into the discussion of literature, and I found this was a well chosen subject, for we were both deeply interested in it.

“After visiting an hour or more with him, I decided to wait no longer for the man I had called to see, and I left. Not long after this my friend called at the same suite of offices and she met Mr. Ferris. She seemed very favorably impressed with him, so much so that she asked him to call, and I must say that in spite of my prejudice I enjoyed the evening. He called often after that and my friend said that he was in love with me. I did not believe it at the time, probably because I was so utterly indifferent to him at that time. He interested me greatly, however, for many reasons, not least among which was the fact that he was in touch with the business world and I thought I saw possibilities through him.

“It was not a month after this that he proposed to me. We were sitting on the couch together, and I had been telling him of the unexpected visit of a little friend of mine from Buffalo. He suddenly took my hand in his and said, ‘Claire, I want you, and before anyone comes into this home to rob me of you, I want your promise to be mine, all mine.’

“I felt within myself that he had endeared himself to me considerably, but did not feel at all sure that I wanted to marry him, and told him so, so we left the matter in that way, although I accepted his ring, but it was with the understanding that if in the course of a few months I wished to retract, I was at liberty to do so.

“On the following Wednesday Gretta came. Dear little Gretta. Pretty, petite and winsome, so sweet yet so frivolous.

“I introduced Mr. Ferris to her and they soon became good friends; no one could help being nice to her. I was slightly indisposed at this time and was very glad that Ned could take her out, for it relieved me of the burden of entertaining her, for a burden it was, in my present condition.

“One night, while I was confined to my room, she came to me and told me that she loved Ned, and that she believed he loved her, for he had kissed her and called her his dear little girl.

“As if by magic, the demon of jealousy reared his head and began to sting me. I loved him now, I knew it, for I was unmistakably jealous. I was jealous of a pretty, voluptuous, little doll, with no thought beyond her present gratification, be it a new gown or a dinner, both of which she enjoyed with all the fervor of her nature. They had not one thing in common, unless it was their passionate natures. I tried to reason with myself, to assure myself of the fact that a man of his calibre could not really love so frivolous a creature as she; that it was merely a passing fancy. But having been married, I knew a man’s nature so well, knew how often a magnetic personality lured them on to mistakes fatal to the happiness of both, that my theory of incompatibility was not altogether a consolation.

“During this period of uneasiness, I did not mention the matter to him. I was too proud to mention it to him, and felt it would be beneath my dignity to admit that I had a possible rival in one so shallow. Perhaps that is where I made my mistake; I don’t know.

“I tried to lull my suspicions to rest, but they would none of it, and one night after they had gone to the theater I dragged myself wearily down stairs to the library, which was off the parlor and separated from it by heavy portieres. I became tired of reading at last and turned out the gas and laid down determined to await their return and be convinced that my suspicions were groundless, if possible; at least I wanted to hear how he made love to her and decide for myself whether he meant it or not.

“I must have fallen asleep, for the first thing I remember was his saying in most pleading tones, ‘Come in here a moment, dear, and let me love you, as only I can love you.’

“She danced into the darkened room beside him and he led her across it to the large leather couch. He picked her up bodily and laid her on the couch, and before she could demur, had she been so inclined, he was bending over her and raining fervent kisses upon her and she nestled up to him and sighed in an abandonment of ecstacy, fearing nothing, hoping nothing, only living in the delight of the moment.

“I don’t know how I expected her to resist him; in fact, I’m sure I didn’t. I would have saved her, but for the fact that I seemed as if in a nightmare, unable to move or utter a sound. I lived hours in those moments.

“After awhile I heard a sobbing. Then his voice, all tenderness and commiseration, ‘There, there, dear, don’t cry. You are all right. Don’t feel so badly; we are just human, and are no worse than hundreds of others.’

“‘Humph!’ thought I, suffering though I was, ‘there is a great deal of consolation in that!’

“Gradually the sobs ceased, and then he bade her good-night. I knew she would not go into my room this night, so had no need to fear my absence from my room would be discovered.

“What I suffered that night, only God knows. I laid there all night in my misery, freezing and burning by turns. It seemed to me my hair must be gray. My idol was shattered, it lay in fragments at my feet, but alas! as with the shattered vase, round which the scent of the roses still clung, so did the virtues with which I had endowed this being continue to obtrude themselves to the complete obliteration of the crime he had committed before my very eyes.

“At daybreak I went to my room and bathed my haggard face and tried to make myself presentable, at least, to Gretta when she should come in to see me. I had not decided what to do for the immediate present, only that I would say nothing.

“Much to my surprise, Gretta came in beaming as usual, her volatile spirits were incapable of more than momentary depression, and I wondered vaguely if it could all be a horrible dream.

“Out of the chaos of my brain one idea resolved itself, and that was to tell him all after she left, unless he, in his desire to right the wrong, asked for his release.

“She went. A week passed and nothing was said, and I knew then nothing would be said. He was going out of the city and I determined to tell him about it on his return Sunday night.

“He came and after he had chatted awhile he got up and said he would go out and order an ice sent up from the drug store around the corner. As he bent to pick up his hat, a letter fell unnoticed from his pocket. Perhaps I should not have done so, but I concealed it with my skirt until he left the room. It was from Gretta, I found, and I have it yet,” she said, as she crossed the room to the little inlaid writing desk, and took from it a plain white envelope bordered in black.

“I am going to let you read it,” she said, handing it to me.

“Dearest Ned:—

“I am going to die, I am sure. I am grieving myself to death over you. The sun never shines brightly any more and my heart aches all the time now. I am disgraced, or soon will be. Oh, Ned, come and take your poor, little Gretta away. Tell Claire what you did and she is so good and sweet she will send you to me, I know. Please take me away and marry me and I will tell them all that we went to St. Joe and were married when I was there visiting in Chicago. Come, dear, or I shall surely die. I ordered this black bordered paper because I am sure mamma will have use for it soon; anyway I am in mourning for the loss of what even you, with all your tenderness, cannot give back to me.

“Come, Ned, for baby’s sake.

“Your heart broken

Gretta.”

“When I had finished my head swam, and I felt but one mad desire, and that was to fly. I acted on the impulse and after pinning a note to the letter saying, ‘Ned, I knew some of this before, now I know all. I am going away where you will never see me or hear from me again. You must do your duty no matter what the sacrifice. A lifetime of devotion cannot repay her for her loss.

Claire.’

“I put on my hat and left by the side entrance. I had not the remotest idea of where I was going or what I was going to do. I was numb with agony and wandered aimlessly on until I came to a car line, then the thought flashed across my mind to go to ‘Suicide Bridge,’ and thither I went.

“It was yet early in the evening and many people were lingering in the park. I walked onto the bridge with perfect calmness, the calmness of despair (for what was there now to live for), and on to my fate. I walked to the center of the bridge, as nearly as I can remember, and looking carefully around and seeing no one, I climbed upon the railing and jumped.

“God must have raised up that man at that particular moment from mere nothingness, for I was so sure I was the only one on the structure at the time. He caught my skirt and by an almost superhuman effort drew me back onto the bridge. He did not ask a question, but took me in his arms and carried me until he met a policeman, to whom he said, ‘My wife became dizzy and fainted. Please call a carriage.’

“He took me to the Virginia hotel, and when I had sufficiently recovered to talk he said with decision, ‘I feel you were sent to me this night, raised up from the ashes of my buried hopes, and if you are free to marry I want you for my wife. I care not what your past has been or what caused you to try such a rash act. Your sweet, refined face tells me you are good and for the rest I care naught. I do not profess to love you, neither do I expect you to love me, but we will try to make life endurable together. You saved my life as much as I saved yours, for by saving you I saved my own, for I went there tonight for the very purpose of doing what you tried to do. Come now, what do you say?’ he said earnestly.”

“And what did you say?”

“I said I was willing to try, and thank God that I did, for I have never regretted it. We were married that night between eleven and twelve.”

“And what about Gretta?”

“Ned made what reparation he could; that is, he married her, and they have a dear little Ned eight months old.”