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The Tryst Of The White Lady
by
“He’s bewitched,” she muttered. “I know the signs. He’s seen her–drat her! It’s time she gave up that kind of work. Well, I dunno what to do–thar ain’t anything I can do, I reckon. He’ll never marry now–I’m as sure of that as of any mortal thing. He’s in love with a ghost.”
It had not yet occurred to Roger that he was in love. He thought of nothing but Isabel Temple–her lovely, lovely face, sweeter than any picture he had ever seen or any ideal he had dreamed, her long dark hair, her slim form and, more than all, her compelling eyes. He saw them wherever he looked–they drew him–he would have followed them to the end of the world, heedless of all else.
He longed for night, that he might again steal to the grave in the haunted grove. She might come again–who knew? He felt no fear, nothing but a terrible hunger to see her again. But she did not come that night–nor the next–nor the next. Two weeks went by and he had not seen her. Perhaps he would never see her again–the thought filled him with anguish not to be borne. He knew now that he loved her–Isabel Temple, dead for eighty years. This was love–this searing, torturing, intolerably sweet thing–this possession of body and soul and spirit. The poets had sung but weakly of it. He could tell them better if he could find words. Could other men have loved at all–could any man love those blowzy, common girls of earth? It seemed impossible–absurd. There was only one thing that could be loved–that white spirit. No wonder his uncle had died. He, Roger Temple, would soon die too. That would be well. Only the dead could woo Isabel. Meanwhile he revelled in his torment and his happiness–so madly commingled that he never knew whether he was in heaven or hell. It was beautiful–and dreadful–and wonderful–and exquisite–oh, so exquisite. Mortal love could never be so exquisite. He had never lived before–now he lived in every fibre of his being.
He was glad Aunt Catherine did not worry him with questions. He had feared she would. But she never asked any questions now and she was afraid of Roger, as she had been afraid of his uncle. She dared not ask questions. It was a thing that must not be tampered with. Who knew what she might hear if she asked him questions? She was very unhappy. Something dreadful had happened to her poor boy–he had been bewitched by that hussy–he would die as his uncle had died.
“Mebbe it’s best,” she muttered. “He’s the last of the Temples, so mebbe she’ll rest in her grave when she’s killed ’em all. I dunno what she’s sich a spite at them for–there’d be more sense if she’d haunt the Mortons, seein’ as a Morton killed her. Well, I’m mighty old and tired and worn out. It don’t seem that it’s been much use, the way I’ve slaved and fussed to bring that b’y up and keep things together for him–and now the ghost’s got him. I might as well have let him die when he was a sickly baby.”
If this had been said to Roger he would have retorted that it was worthwhile to have lived long enough to feel what he was feeling now. He would not have missed it for a score of other men’s lives. He had drunk of some immortal wine and was as a god. Even if she never came again, he had seen her once, and she had taught him life’s great secret in that one unforgettable exchange of eyes. She was his–his in spite of his ugliness and his crooked shoulder. No man could ever take her from him.
But she did come again. One evening, when the darkening grove was full of magic in the light of the rising yellow moon shining across the level field, Roger sat on the big boulder by the grave. The evening was very still; there was no sound save the echoes of noisy laughter that seemed to come up from the bay shore–drunken fishermen, likely as not. Roger resented the intrusion of such a sound in such a place–it was a sacrilege. When he came here to dream of her, only the loveliest of muted sounds should be heard–the faintest whisper of trees, the half-heard, half-felt moan of surf, the airiest sigh of wind. He never read Wordsworth now or any other book. He only sat there and thought of her, his great eyes alight, his pale face flushed with the wonder of his love.