CHAPTER XXXIII.

THE DEAD ALIVE.

--"Am I already mad? And does delirium utter such sweet words Into a dreamer's ear?"--LADY OF LYONS.

In the little forest cottage, the evening preceding that night of storm, Christie stood in the humble doorway, watching the sun go down.

Those weary months have sadly changed our little favorite. The thin, wan face, has grown thinner and wanner than ever; the angel brow paler and more transparent; the dark, loving blue eyes darker, larger, and wearing ever a look of deep, gentle, unchanging melancholy; the fair, golden hair falls like threads of raveled silk around her pearly cheek; the light step is slow and languid; and the hectic crimson spot that each afternoon burns on those usually colorless cheeks, bespeaks the ravages of that fell destroyer--consumption. Slowly but surely she is passing away, bending her meek head to the stroke of the destroyer, and only sighing for the time when her weary head may find rest at last in some little woodland grave. Little Christie will never live to see the midsummer rose blow.

With a quiet, fervent joy, she thinks of this as she stands in the door-way, the last fiery ray of the red sunlight falling, like a shadow of the glory that awaits her, on her bent head. With those dark, radiant, starry eyes fixed on the fast-coming clouds, her mind strays back to that night of deepest woe--that last night spent in her island home. The coming of every storm recalls it, but never so vividly as it does to-night. All the old tide of her deep, unchanging love for Willard, for her destroyer--so strong and fervent, that time, absence, and the belief in his guilt has no power to change it--swells back to her heart, crowned with blissful memories of the time when she first knew and loved him, until an almost passionate longing to be with him once more, to throw her arms around his neck, to seal her forgiveness on his lips, to feel his heart swelling and throbbing against her own once more, to gaze into those dark eyes again, and heave her last expiring sigh on that loved breast, took possession of her. Then came the bitter recollection that long ere this another must be his bride, and she could never feel the strong, fervent clasp of those dear arms again; and with a grief that death alone could ever still, she hid her face in her hands to keep back her fast falling tears, while her white bosom rose and fell with convulsive sobs. A slow, heavy step, crashed over dried branches around her, and she looked up, to behold the kind, honest face of Uncle Reuben.

"Ah, thee is grieving again. This will never do, little Christie," he said, sorrowfully.

"Oh, I cannot help it! It all comes back so strangely to-night!" said Christie, in a voice full of unshed tears.

"What does, little one?"

"Oh, the past, the past! the sad, beautiful past."

"Thee must forget the past, daughter, and live in the present, and for the future," said Uncle Reuben, laying his hand on her head. "Thee knows what the good book says: 'Blessed are they that mourn for they shall be comforted.'"

"Yes, yes, I know; that promise has often sustained me in my darkest hours. Dear Uncle Reuben, I know I am wicked to murmur, but bear with me a little while until I go where the promise will be fulfilled."

"Oh, thee is sad, to-night, Christie," said Uncle Reuben, forcing a smile, "thee must be cheerful, thee knows. Where is Bertha?"

"She went out more than an hour ago," replied Christie, "to ramble in the woods, according to her usual habit. I hope she will return before the storm rises!"

"The storm will be on us in half an hour," said Uncle Reuben, looking uneasily at the darkened sky; "and, as thee knows, a storm always rouses Bertha into a state of wildness bordering on frenzy, and sends her rambling off in all directions. I had better go and look for her."

"Where is the use, Uncle Reuben?" said Christie, seating herself languidly in her rocking-chair. "You often went in search of her before, and hardly ever found her until she chose to come home herself, you know."

"Yes; but one does not feel so uneasy when searching for her, as sitting here in the house while she is exposed to the storm. However, I'll wait and get the supper, and if she is not here then, I will go and look for her," said Uncle Reuben, as he proceeded to light the fire and hang on the kettle.

The night deepened and darkened, the sky grew blacker and gloomier, the moments waned rapidly, but the maniac Bertha came not.

"Oh, I wish she were here!" anxiously said good Uncle Reuben, opening the door and looking out into the gloom. A wailing gust of wind from the dark forest, followed by a vivid flash of lightning and flood of rain, made him hastily re-enter and close the door.

"And she is exposed to it all!" he exclaimed, in deepest trouble.

"Oh, she will soon come, I know she will," said Christie, hopefully.

But still the moments glided away, the lonesome night lingered and lingered, and the maniac came not.

"I must go and seek for her," said Uncle Reuben, at last, in desperation, as he took down his great-coat and buttoned it on, and started for the door.

But just at that instant it was burst violently open, and the woman Bertha, with streaming hair and dripping garments, her wild, black eyes dilating with terror, stood panting before them.

"Oh, Bertha, where has thee been?" cried Uncle Reuben, in distress and alarm.

"Hush! he is there!" said the maniac, in a terrified whisper. "They killed him and left him in the forest; but I found him! Come, come, come!"

She caught Reuben by the hand, and attempted to draw him with her from the house.

"Who is killed? I don't know what thee means, Bertha," he said, perplexed.

"Come, I tell you--he is there!" she cried, with an impatient stamp of her foot, "out among the trees where they left him. Come!"

And, with the grasp of steel, she caught the surprised Reuben by the arm, and forcibly drew him with her from the house.

Left alone, Christie, somewhat amazed at first, soon forgot the circumstance, and gazing into the expiring coals, listened to the wild ravings of the storm, as it raged through the forest, with that lulling sense of security one falls into when comfortably housed. There were strange pictures in the red, dying embers, to her that night--faces lost to her forever peering out in fitful flame--now Willard's, now the dark, threatening one of handsome Sibyl Campbell, now the brisk, sharp, cheery countenance of Mrs. Tom, all fading, one after another, to give place once more to Willard's, best loved of all.

The night was wearing on apace--the last glowing ember had faded away in darkness; and, rousing herself from her dreamy reverie, as an unusually violent gust of wind shook the doors and windows, Christie raised her head, wondering uneasily what could have detained Uncle Reuben.

Just as she was beginning to get seriously anxious, the door was impetuously thrown open, and Bertha entered, followed by Uncle Reuben, bearing in his herculean arms the seemingly lifeless form of a man. Christie sprang up, and stood gazing from one to another, in terror.

"There!" said Uncle Reuben, placing the rigid form on the bed in the corner, and wiping the perspiration off his brow, "I had some trouble, strong as I am, in carrying him so far, through all this storm. She led me to the very spot," he said, with a sort of triumph, as he looked at Bertha; "and I found him lying bleeding and senseless on the ground."

"Who is he?" said Christie, for, with the dark hair falling over the blood-clotted face, the features were undistinguishable.

"That, I do not know, but some traveler, I imagine, who has been thrown from his horse, judging from the looks of his wounds. Get me some warm water and a sponge until I wash the blood off his face."

As Christie obeyed, something in the wounded stranger struck her, and with a sudden thrill she leaned against the wall and pressed her hands to her panting heart. Not perceiving her emotion, the man Reuben reverently lifted the dark, heavy masses of hair, and wiped the blood off his pale, handsome face. As if fascinated, Christie's eyes were fixed on those cold, rigid features, every one of which was indelibly imprinted on her heart; her eyes dilating, her lips parted, and breathless; her face deadly pale; her heart beating as tumultuously as though it would break from its prison and force its way to him. With a cry that resounded through the house--a cry that made even the maniac Bertha start in terror, she sprang forward, and clasped the cold form in her arms with a wild and passionate shriek.

"Willard! Willard!" she exclaimed, "Oh, Father in heaven! Willard!"

Transfixed with amazement, Reuben stood gazing upon her, unable to speak, while, with a hysterical laugh, she covered the cold, marble-like face with hot, burning, passionate kisses, still crying out at intervals that loved name.

"Willard! Willard! Willard!"

"So thee knows him, Christie?" said Uncle Reuben, as last, in a voice of intense astonishment.

She looked up, with another hysterical laugh, and then overtaxed nature gave way to a burst of blessed, soothing tears.

"Well, I am surprised!" slowly said Uncle Reuben.

"Oh, Uncle Reuben, he is my husband!" said Christie, in a voice choked with vehement sobs.

"_Thy husband!_" said Uncle Reuben, in a tone that plainly bespoke his fears that Christie had lost her reason.

"Oh! yes, yes, my husband! my long-lost husband! whom I never expected to meet again on this side of the grave. Oh, Uncle Reuben, you did not know I was married, but so it is! I never meant to tell you, but the surprise--the shock--forced it from me. Oh, Uncle Reuben, do not look as if you thought me insane; for indeed, indeed, I speak the truth." And again Christie's voice was lost in sobs, as she bowed her head on the cold breast before her, and thought how warmly and tumultuously it had once throbbed for her.

Uncle Reuben was not one to give way long to any emotion; so, with a look of intense surprise and perplexity, he recalled his scattered faculties, and once more approaching the bed, said, slowly:

"Well, if he _is_ thy husband, thee is anxious, no doubt, for his recovery, and had better go away for the present, and let me attend to him and bring him to."

"Oh, Uncle Reuben, do you think he is dead?" said Christie, in a tone of piercing anguish.

"By no means, little one; he is only in a swoon at present, from which he will shortly recover. And there are no bones broken, either," added Uncle Reuben, after a short examination, "only this ugly cut in his head, which has bled so profusely, and which I must bind up now. We'll have to cut the hair off just round the temple, you see, to get at it. It's Heaven's mercy it wasn't half an inch lower, or he would have been a dead man now."

A convulsive shudder at the bare idea agitated the slender form of Christie; and she lifted the silky waves of dark hair with a fond superstition as they were severed, all matted with blood, from his head.

And thus, while Uncle Reuben sat down to bathe his temple and forehead with water, she took the cold hands in her own burning ones to chafe them, with her eyes still fixed, as if she could never remove them more, on that cold, white, handsome face, as still and fixed as though immovable in death, looking whiter still in contrast with the wet black hair.

"And so thee is a wife, little Christie," said Uncle Reuben, looking thoughtfully and wonderingly upon the two faces before him.

"Oh, yes, yes! forgive me for not telling you before; but it was a secret. No one knew of it; we were married in private."

"Ah, those hidden marriages never come to any good," said Uncle Reuben, as he shook his head and glanced at Bertha, who all this time had been standing at the foot of the bed, gazing with a sort of vague interest and curiosity from one face to the other. "What if her fate had been thine?"

"It has scarcely been more happy," said Christie, without lifting her eyes; "but this moment, to see him once more, to touch his hand, to know I am near him again, almost repays me for all I have suffered. Now, at least, I can die happy, since I have the opportunity of telling him I forgive him all."

"Forgive him! Then he has wronged thee?"

"Hush!" said Christie, turning, if possible, paler than before. "He loved me once, and I wish to forget everything but that. But, Uncle Reuben, are you sure he will recover? I see no signs of it yet," said Christie, in rising alarm.

"I do; even now consciousness is returning," said Uncle Reuben, as a slight movement of the muscles of the face became perceptible.

"Willard! Willard! dearest Willard, look up!" she said, bending anxiously over him.

Was it the startling sound of that well-remembered voice--that voice he imagined forever stilled in death--that awoke him? The large dark eyes slowly opened, wandered wildly around, and the first object on which they rested was Christie.