CHAPTER XX

HOW THE TIME CAME TO AN END

Thirty little days to the crowning of their lives. Since Hope last saw her husband a thousand long days had passed, wearily and full of sorrows. Since Paul last saw his friend, two-thirds as many. And the only news they had had of him in all that time had been reports of his death. Yet, to both of them, these thirty days seemed freighted with all possibilities.

It was no mere whim or wish to feel her power which had dictated Hope's decision to wait this one month more.

She believed they had waited long enough. In her heart she had not a doubt that Serge was dead. But, with a desire to act with the most scrupulous fairness to his memory, she would give Providence this final chance of intervention, if that was to be. Her conscience was perfectly clean in the matter, and happiness was within her reach. Yet, with a womanly instinct against over-haste in such a case; with a womanly abnegation of herself where her own happiness depended on her own out-reaching for it; and, perhaps, unconsciously to some extent, as a final justification of herself should such ever be needed, she deliberately imposed the bar of her will upon him for those thirty days and watched their passage with very mingled feelings.

As for Paul, he was happier than he had ever believed it possible for mortal man to be. So very happy was he that momentary fears of the reality of it all would flit across his heart.

Could it be possible that Fate would trick them in those thirty days and dash the full cup from their thirsty lips?

Yet surely they were justified in the step they were about to take. They had waited and hoped--yes, hoped, he for her sake, and she for Serge's--till hope had died of sheer starvation. Now that a new cup of happiness was held out to them should they not drink it? And yet, being no more than mortal man, he could not wholly still his fears. For when the cup is filled to running over, filled so full that heaven shines through the brimming rim and rings it with a crown of light, man, being at best but of limited faith, must, always and inevitably, fear lest the instability of all things earthly should spill it ere he drink.

He believed they were justified, and in those final days of waiting he drank deep of her love, deep draughts of pure delight which never could be taken from him, come what might.

His thoughts overleaped the days to the last one of all--and the one beyond it. And he thought deeply, for the circumstances in which they were placed were very extraordinary, and his whole desire was for the smoothing of Hope's path into this new sweet life.

In the eyes of the law, and of the circumscribed world in which their lives were cast, they were already husband and wife.

In the sight of God, and in the firm belief that Serge Palma was dead, they knew of no adequate reason why they should not become in reality that which they outwardly seemed to be.

And again, in the sight of the law of the land, Hope was free to marry whom she would, since exile is legal death and death breaks all legal ties, though he knew she would never dream of marrying if the faintest hope remained to her of Serge's being alive.

Since no priest was available, and no formal ceremony was possible, they must marry themselves; and if ever they reached a land of freedom they would, for the satisfaction of the proprieties, go through any such ceremony as the law of that land might require to legalise their union there.

And so those thirty days passed slowly, swiftly. Slowly, to the thoughts that would outrun them. Swiftly, for the happiness that was compressed into them.

Each thought each had known the other, yet no day passed without its new revelation. They looked at one another with new eyes and each found the other changing day by day.

Paul found new beauties of winsomeness in Hope each time he looked at her, for the outward reflects the inward and her soul was at the Spring, and in truth all she had gone through had fined her like gold in the fire.

And to Hope, her lover's passionate devotion and high self-control brought a depth of loving trustfulness which would have led her to his bidding whatever it had been.

Their perfect faith in one another grew with the days. Their love expanded like a glorious flower when the winter of discontent is passed, and the quickening rains and sunshine of the spring have worked in it, and the summer of delight is come.

Their tiny rough house of logs and clay became a very shrine of loveliness. Its half-opaque windows were diamonds, its furnishings of cedar-wood, its commonest utensils rarest china and purest gold. For love transforms the world.

At times when he was away--for there was still much work for him in the prison and the hospital--she would turn out her scanty stock of clothing and set to work on it with the true womanly instinct for adornment. And many times she laughed at herself and her futile attempts at turning old things into new, for fashions at Kara ran to warmth and comfort and knew no other considerations.

But to him she was robed like a princess and her beauty increased with the hours. When he was away from her he hungered to be back. When she placed his supper on the board he would bend and kiss the fingers that held the plate, and throw an arm round her and draw her close, and kiss her waist, her arm, anything that was part of Hope Ivanovna.

For his heart had starved valiantly and without complaint for years, and now the time of plenty had arrived.

How nervous and excited she was that last day of the thirty! With what passionate worship he had kissed her in the morning before he left her. And then he had come back and caught her to him again, and strained her close, and closer still. And then he flung up his arms and cried "Ah God! Ah God!" and went quickly.

And she could do no work that day, but fluttered restlessly about the house, and stood and looked at the driving snow, and made futile attempts at further cleaning up of the diamonds and the cedar-wood and the gold, which were already polished beyond the polishing of ordinary human hands.

And so the day passed somehow, but how she hardly knew. She had no desire for ordinary human food, and yet she ate, and prepared for him a meal beyond the wont.

And when at last he came in, later than usual and smothered in snow, his face was all aglow, with the whipping of the wind may be, and the diamond windows hid their sparkles at sight of his eyes.

He was quieter than usual while he ate that night, and it is possible that if he had been asked, five minutes later, on what he had fared, he would not have known, for he was thinking of greater things.

Out of a full heart the mouth speaketh, but there are times when the heart is overfull for speech.

When life is at its starry point speech is a desecration, and so they sat before the stove in silence and gazed into its glowing heart, while the minutes ran out and each one brought the new life nearer.

He drew her hand between his two hands, and felt the full tide of her love pulsing through it as she felt his.

A solemn sense of expectation was on them. The vague unrest was gone. The happy riot of their love-making was stilled. Their time had come. The past lay a-dying, and the new life lay cradled within the hour.

The very depth of their gladness filled them with a sense of awe. It was in no light humour that these two came together.

As the little German clock on the shelf told midnight, Paul stood up, and she stood facing him on the instant, as though they two were indeed already one, as though one thought and one heart already moved them both.

"Dearest!" he said, in those deep tones that came right from his heart and set her own heart thrilling in response. "The time we have waited for is come. I do not ask if your heart is changed. I know it is not."

Her eyes were like stars as he looked deep into them, and found there nothing but pure love and steadfast faith.

"You trust me, Hope Ivanovna?"

"With my life."

"We have no priest. We can have no witnesses. What we do is in the sight of God alone."

"I am content."

"Kneel with me, dearest."

And they knelt by a chair--a chair that had been made by a carpenter who had murdered his wife, and so had been sent to build up the empire in the East. But it was a well-made chair in spite of its origin, and for these two it became a solemn altar.

They had no candles, no crowns, no carpet, no incense, no choir. Nothing but the convict's chair and the rough wood floor, and their two selves, and God. But the chair was clean, and the floor was clean, and their hearts were clean.

They knelt in silence for a time, such time as the priest, had he been there, would have been praying over them. And the little German clock on the shelf cried "Quick! Quick! Quick! Quick!" as though he feared that something might step in between them even now.

But nothing was abroad that night. The wind howled round the corners of the house, and rumbled in the clay chimney. It piled the snow high against the windward side, and snapped the long icicles that hung to the ground on the other side. But inside there was a great silence.

Then Paul took her right hand in his and said, in the voice that came from his heart, "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, I, Paul Ivanuitch Pavlof, take thee, Hope Ivanovna Arskaïa"--she noticed it--"to be my lawful wedded wife. Before Almighty God I swear to honour and serve thee, body and soul, and to defend thee against the world so long as life is left to me."

And she, sweetly and firmly, "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, I, Hope Ivanovna Arskaïa, take thee, Paul Ivanuitch Pavlof, to be my lawful wedded husband. Before Almighty God I pledge myself to honour and serve thee, body and soul, so long as life is left to me."

"Amen!" he said solemnly, and she "Amen!"

They remained kneeling for a time, such time as the priest, had he been there, would have been invoking many strange blessings on their union.

Then, still kneeling, they kissed as they had never kissed before.

He raised her gallantly, and stood, and looked deep into her eyes again, and now they swam like stars in the sea, steadfast stars in a calm, deep sea.

"My dearest, my wife, you shall never regret this that we have done," he said.

"I shall never regret it," she said, in a voice that set his heart leaping to peals of silvery bells. And she put up her arms, and drew him down, and kissed him sweetly on the lips.