“Yes, thus my husband.  I will not rise till thou say’st thou canst forgive; wilt take the loving and the weak back to thy heart, if not to love as thou hast loved, to strengthen and forgive.  I have not wronged thee.  Were I false in word or thought I would not kneel to ask forgiveness, but crawl to thy feet and die!  If thou couldst but know the many, many times I have longed to confess all; the agony to receive thy fond caress, thy trusting confidence, and know myself deceiving; the terror lest thou shouldst discover aught from other than myself; oh! were it not for thy deep woe, I could bless this moment, bidding me speak Truth once more!”

“And say thou hast never loved me?  Wert true from duty, not from love?  Marie, can I bear this?”

“Yes—­for I do love thee.  Oh! my husband, I turn to thee alone, under my God, for rest and peace.  If I might not give thee the wild passions of my youth, when my heart was sought, and won ere I was myself conscious of the precipice I neared, I cling to thee now alone—­I would be thine alone.  Oh, take me to thy heart, and let me lie there.  Ferdinand, Ferdinand! forgive me!—­love—­save me from myself!”

“Ay, now and ever!  Come to my heart, beloved one!” answered her husband, rousing himself from all of personal suffering to comfort her; and he drew her to him till her head rested on his bosom.  “Now tell me thy sorrowing tale, to me so wrapt in mystery.  Fear not from me.  It is enough thou clingest to me in such sweet guileless confidence still.”

She obeyed him; and the heavy weight of suffering years seemed lightening as she spoke.  From her first meeting Arthur, to that morning’s harrowing interview, every feeling, every incident, every throb of reproach and dread were revealed with such touching and childlike truth, that even in his suffering, Morales unconsciously clasped his wife closer and closer to him, as if her very confidence and truth, rendered her yet dearer than before, and inexpressibly soothed at the very moment that they pained.  Their interview was long, but fraught with mutual comfort.  Morales had believed, when he entered his closet that day, that a dense cloud was folded round him, sapping the very elements of life; but though he still felt as if he had received some heavy physical blow, the darkness had fled from his spirit, and light dawned anew for both, beneath the heavenly rays of openness and Truth.

“And Arthur?” Marie said, as that long commune came to a close; and she looked up with the fearless gaze of integrity in her husband’s face.  “Thou wilt forgive him, Ferdinand? he knew not what he said.”

“Trust me, beloved one.  I pity and forgive him.  He shall learn to love me, despite himself.”