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MENTAL HEALTH IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

Voices in the History

of Madness
Personal and Professional
Perspectives on
Mental Health and Illness
Edited by Robert Ellis
Sarah Kendal · Steven J. Taylor
 Mental Health in Historical Perspective

Series Editors
Catharine Coleborne
School of Humanities and Social Science
University of Newcastle
Callaghan, NSW, Australia

Matthew Smith
Centre for the Social History of Health and Healthcare
University of Strathclyde
Glasgow, UK
Covering all historical periods and geographical contexts, the series
explores how mental illness has been understood, experienced, diagnosed,
treated and contested. It will publish works that engage actively with con-
temporary debates related to mental health and, as such, will be of interest
not only to historians, but also mental health professionals, patients and
policy makers. With its focus on mental health, rather than just psychiatry,
the series will endeavour to provide more patient-centred histories.
Although this has long been an aim of health historians, it has not been
realised, and this series aims to change that.
The scope of the series is kept as broad as possible to attract good qual-
ity proposals about all aspects of the history of mental health from all
periods. The series emphasises interdisciplinary approaches to the field of
study, and encourages short titles, longer works, collections, and titles
which stretch the boundaries of academic publishing in new ways.

More information about this series at

http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/14806
 Robert Ellis • Sarah Kendal
Steven J. Taylor
Editors

Voices in the History

of Madness
Personal and Professional Perspectives on Mental
Health and Illness
Editors
Robert Ellis Sarah Kendal
School of Arts and Humanities School of Healthcare
University of Huddersfield University of Leeds
Huddersfield, UK Leeds, UK

Steven J. Taylor
School of History
University of Kent
Canterbury, UK

ISSN 2634-6036     ISSN 2634-6044 (electronic)

Mental Health in Historical Perspective
ISBN 978-3-030-69558-3    ISBN 978-3-030-69559-0 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-69559-0

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer
Nature Switzerland AG 2021
Chapter 4 is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). For further details see licence
information in the chapter.
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of
translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on
microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval,
electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now
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The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are
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publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to
the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The
publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and
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Cover illustration: agefotostock / Alamy Stock Photo

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature
Switzerland AG.
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
 Acknowledgements

The origins of this volume lay in the Voices of Madness conference, hosted
by the Centre for Health Histories at the University of Huddersfield, UK,
in September 2016. We would like to express our gratitude for the finan-
cial support that we received for that event from the Centre and from the
School of Human and Health Sciences.
The aim of the conference was to stimulate new interdisciplinary con-
versations on the theme of ‘voice’, and we are grateful for all the contribu-
tions to what were a very rich and fruitful two days. In organising the
conference, and in editing this collection, we wanted to reflect the breadth
of chronologies and methodologies of new research taking place in a range
of contexts and locations. Ultimately, we have incorporated contributions
that reflect innovative research on four continents, contributed by writers
who speak from diverse perspectives. We would like to say thank you to
our contributors for their diligence, patience and collegiality.
Thanks are also due to Catharine Coleborne and Tommy Dickinson,
whose conference keynotes influenced the discussions leading to this col-
lection. Professor Coleborne generously agreed to add a Coda to this vol-
ume. We are grateful to Andrew Clifton for his helpful notes on Chap. 18.
At Palgrave Macmillan we want to acknowledge Molly Beck, Maeve
Sinnott, Lucy Kidwell and Joe Johnson for their support, as well as series
editors Catharine Coleborne and Matthew Smith and their peer reviewers
for their helpful and encouraging comments.

v
vi Acknowledgements

Finally, a big thank you to Rob Piggott for his important administrative
support at the closing stages of this project and to Vipin Kumar Mani and
the team at Springer Nature for their patient and professional handling of
the various typesetting and proofing amendments.
 Contents

1 Voices in the History of Madness: An Introduction to

Personal and Professional Perspectives  1
Robert Ellis, Sarah Kendal, and Steven J. Taylor
Part I Shifting Perspectives in the Industry of Madness   4
Part II Reconstructing Patient Perspectives   8
Part III The Visual and the Material  11
Part IV Mad Studies and Activism  13

Part I Shifting Perspectives in the Industry of Madness  23

2 Accepted and Rejected: Late Nineteenth-Century

Application for Admission to the Scottish National
Institution for the Education of Imbecile Children 25
Iain Hutchison
Early Ethos and Evolution  27
Selected and Rejected: Outcomes  31
Beyond the Gates of the SNI  38
Conclusions  42

vii
viii Contents

3 Mental Health in the Vernacular: Print and Counter-­

Hegemonic Approaches to Madness in Colonial Bengal 49
Pradipto Roy
Prelude: Epistemic Challenges in the Concept of Psyche in
Modern South Asia  49
The Concept of Madness in Premodern South Asia  51
The World of Print in Colonial Bengal  52
Medical Books in the Vernacular  54
Mental Health in Vernacular Health Periodicals  55
Closing Remarks  64

4 “The Root of All Evil is Inactivity”: The Response of

French Psychiatrists to New Approaches to Patient Work
and Occupation, 1918–1939 71
Jane Freebody
Introduction  71
Historiography  73
Patient Work before 1918  73
The Aftermath of World War I  75
Criticisms of Patient Work  75
“More Active Therapy”—A New Theory Regarding Patient
Occupation  78
The Effect of the New Theory on Practice in Asylums  81
Impediments to the Adoption of More Active Therapy  82
Conclusion  88

5 Distant Voices: Treatment of Mentally Ill Children at the

Copenhagen University Hospital in Denmark, c.
1935–1976 95
Jennie Sejr Junghans
Introduction  95
Admission  99
Conflicts 101
Diagnostic Tools and Treatment 104
Distant Voices? 107
Concluding Remarks 110
 Contents  ix

Part II Reconstructing Patient Perspectives 115

6 Experiences of the Madhouse in England, 1650–1810117

Leonard Smith
To the Madhouse 119
In the Madhouse 123
Perceptions of the Proprietor 127
Conclusions 130

7 “Tells his Story Quite Rationally and Collectedly”:

Examining the Casebooks of the Grahamstown Lunatic
Asylum, 1890–1910, for Cases of Delusion Where
Patients Voiced their Life Stories137
Rory du Plessis
The Life Stories and Testimonies of Sanity Given by the Patients 139
Cross-examination of a Patient’s Personal Account of Restored
Sanity 143
Personal Accounts of Institutionalisation 146
Conclusion 149

8 Dehumanizing Experience, Rehumanizing Self-Awareness:

Perception of Violence in Psychiatric Hospitals of Soviet
Lithuania155
Tomas Vaiseta
Patient View and Medical Gaze 158
The Hidden Power of Medical Discourse: The Externalization of
the Self 161
In Alignment with Medical Discourse: Violence as a Result of
Disorder 164
Shelter of Medical Discourse: Violence as an Enforcement of
Madness 166
Conclusions 168

9 “I Like My Job because It Will Get Me Out Quicker”:

Work, Independence, and Disability at Indiana’s Central
State Hospital (1986–1993)173
Emily Beckman, Elizabeth Nelson, and Modupe Labode
Work and Disability 175
Central State Hospital 176
x Contents

Methodology 178
Results: Patient Goals and Experiences of Work 179
Staff Goals and Policy Changes During the Closure 182

10 “More than Bricks and Mortar”: Meaningful Care

Practices in the Old State Mental Hospitals191
Verusca Calabria, Di Bailey, and Graham Bowpitt
Introduction 191
Background 192
Methodology 194
Contested Meanings of Institutional Care 196
Community Psychiatry at the Nottingham Mental Hospitals 197
Fragmentation of Services in Community 200
Experiencing Neglect in Community 204
Conclusion 206
Data Access Statement 208

Part III The Visual and the Material 217

11 Tracking Traces of the Art Extraordinary Collection219

Cheryl McGeachan
Archives, Voices and Traces 223
Gym Hall, Barlinnie Prison 225
An Unmarked Grave, Sleepyhillock Cemetery 229
Conclusions 232

12 Patient Photographs, Patient Voices: Recovering Patient

Experience in the Nineteenth-Century Asylum237
Katherine Rawling
Introduction 237
The ‘Voice’ of a Photograph 239
A Picture Tells a Thousand Words? 243
Multiple Voices 253
Conclusion 258
 Contents  xi

13 A Boundary Between Two Worlds? Community

Perceptions of Former Asylums in Lancashire, England263
Carolyn Gibbeson and Katie Beattie
Introduction 263
An Image of Fear and Isolation 264
Methodology 265
Lancaster Moor and Whittingham Hospitals: A Brief History 266
Memory and Legacy 267
Former Asylums as Heritage 272
Conclusions 275

Part IV Mad Studies and Activism 285

14 Brutal Sanity and Mad Compassion: Tracing the Voice of

Dorothea Buck287
Elena Demke
On Voice and the Obstacles to Voicing Madness 287
Historiography and Framing the Study of the Voice of the Mad 289
Biographical Aspects 290
Towards a Genealogy of Dorothea’s Voice 293
Past and Present Intertwined: Researching Literature and
Searching for Allies 293
Seeking Allies 295
Voice and Emotional Labour: Dealing with the Challenge of
Power Structures 297
Framing in Terms of Contradictions and Paradoxes: Her
Memoirs 299
Voicing Mad Wisdom 300
In Conclusion: Emergence of a New Expertise 301

15 Mad Activists and the Left in Ontario, 1970s to 2000307

Geoffrey Reaume
Introduction: Mad Activists, Identity Politics and the Left 307
Deinstitutionalization in Canada 312
Disability and Mad Movement Activists in Ontario 313
Race, Gender, Sexual Orientation and Ontario’s Mad
Movement 316
Class, Unions and Mad People’s Civil Rights 319
Conclusion 325
xii Contents

16 Knowing Our Own Minds: Transforming the Knowledge

Base of Madness and Distress333
Alison Faulkner
Finding Our Voices: A Brief History 334
Letting Stories Breathe: The Power of Personal Narratives 337
Finding Safe Spaces 338
Experiential Knowledge 341
The Role of Survivor Research 343
The Challenges… 345
Looking to the Future 349
Conclusions 350
References 351

17 Making Public Their Use of History: Reflections on the

History of Collective Action by Psychiatric Patients, the
Oor Mad History Project and Survivors History Group359
Mark Gallagher
Introduction 359
The Disappearance of Patient Views and Voices in the History
of Medicine 362
A Twentieth-Century Turning Point: From Formal Systems
and Functionalist Grids to the Insurrection of Subjugated
Knowledges 365
A ‘Question of Levels’: Doing History from ‘A Level Below
Which You Cannot Sink’ 369
Conclusion: Making Public Use of History Requires Embracing
That Sinking Feeling of Difficulty and Conflict 372
References 377

18 Often, When I Am Using My Voice… It Does Not Go Well:

Perspectives on the Service User Experience383
Megan Alikhanizadeh, Corey Hartley, Sarah Kendal, Liz Neill,
and Gemma Trainor
Introduction 383
The Social and Political Background to Contemporary Models
of Mental Health Care 384
The Policy Context 390
 Contents  xiii

Is Social Media the Future for Youth Mental Health Support? 391

Mitigating the Risks of Social Media 392
The Voice of Lived Experience 393
Conclusion 397

19 Coda: Speaking Madness: Word, Image, Action403

Catharine Coleborne
Making Sense of Madness 406
Word, Image, Action 408

Name Index413

Place Index421

Subject Index425
 Notes on Contributors

Megan Alikhanizadeh is involved with local and national projects work-

ing alongside young people, currently in the role of MindMate Project
Worker, and is an advisor for Common Room North www.commonroom.
uk.com. With lived experience of mental illness and accessing services,
Megan is extremely passionate about using her insight and empathy to try
to help others and improve the situation for young people’s mental health,
and also amplifying unheard voices in an uncensored way, enabling profes-
sionals and services to better support young people, and generally reduc-
ing stigma through education and awareness of the realities of mental
illness.
Di Bailey is Professor of Mental Health and Academic Director of Research
and Innovation in the School of Social Sciences at Nottingham Trent
University, UK. Di has extensive experience in mental health practice. She
has particular research expertise in participatory-action-research, systematic
reviews, evaluation research. Di was Calabria’s PhD supervisor.
Katie Beattie is a graduate of the BSc Real Estate course at
Sheffield Hallam.
Emily Beckman is Director and Assistant Professor of Medical
Humanities and Health Studies in the School of Liberal Arts at Indiana
University-Purdue University, Indianapolis (IUPUI), and co-Director of
the Scholarly Concentration in Medical Humanities at the Indiana
University School of Medicine.

xv
Discovering Diverse Content Through
Random Scribd Documents
child, but she had, in a way, recovered the son until then lost to her.
She spoke tenderly of Neville, sending him messages, and, sitting at
Angela’s table, wrote him a few lines eloquent with a mother’s love.
“It seems to me,” said Angela, with tender superstition, as Mrs.
Tremaine handed her the letter to Neville, “that Richard’s spirit must
have spoken for Neville, and since I must be the bearer of such
heavy grief to Neville as Richard’s death will be, isn’t it good of God
that I should, at the same time, be able to tell him that you and his
father forgive him and love him?”
“God is ever good,” replied Mrs. Tremaine. She had a deep and
consistent piety, which had never, until the breaking out of the war,
had any real test, but it sufficed her when the moment came in
which all faith, all love, is tested.
Madame Isabey and Adrienne had kept to themselves that day,
except for joining the funeral procession to Richard’s grave. They
rightly judged that there was little room for strangers in those
heartbreaking hours, and although their sympathy was deep with
those under whose roof they lived, they lacked the means and even
the language in which to express it. Angela went to their rooms to
bid them farewell. Madame Isabey, whose heart was deeply
sympathetic, kissed her and wept over her. Adrienne could not
remain unshaken by those tragic and fateful hours which had seen
two sons taken from Harrowby, one by death and one by war, and
another restored, at least in affection.
For the first time in their lives Angela and Adrienne kissed each
other. Adrienne had scarcely spoken a word to Isabey during that
whole sad day. It was to her as if she saw his shade and not the real
man moving about, helpful to others, forgetful of his own grief, and
only remotely conscious of Adrienne’s presence. From her window,
as the moon rose, she saw Angela and Isabey mount and ride away.
The deep blue heavens were gloriously starred, while a faint rosy
glow still lingered on the western edge of the world.
Lyddon, who had been more moved and agitated that day than ever
in his life before, shut himself up in the old study. As he sat in the
great worn leather chair all the scenes which had passed in that old
room returned to him and the flight of time was like a dream in the
night. He recalled Angela in her white frock climbing up on his knee
and, when he would have turned away from her, thrusting the odd
volume of the “Odyssey” in his face and asking him in a wailing,
babyish voice: “Do, pray, Mr. Lyddon, read me something out of this
nice old book.” How childishly clever it was of her to find out that the
“Odyssey” was the spell through which she was to conjure him! And
she was gone, perhaps never to return. Then Archie, but yesterday a
lad and now a man, was gone to take his place upon the firing line.
Neville was Lyddon’s first pupil at Harrowby, a handsome, gentle,
silent stripling, fond of reading and fonder still of mathematics,
which he mastered with a marvelous ease and precision that
delighted Lyddon. And Richard, the most brilliant of them all, his
character as admirable as his mind, his superiority affectionately
proclaimed by Neville and laughingly denied by Richard. Never were
there two brothers’ souls more closely knit together. And the pride
and joy of Colonel and Mrs. Tremaine in their children, for Angela
was a child to them, had always seemed to Lyddon one of the most
beautiful things in existence. Into this exquisite family life had come
in the twinkling of an eye a dissension and division, a separation, the
most frightful that could be imagined—as much worse than death as
disgrace is worse than death. To-day only had that great gaping
wound been healed. It did not seem fanciful to Lyddon that Richard
Tremaine, lying stark in his new-made grave under the bare
branches of the weeping willows which made dappled shadows in
the moonlight, should in the far-off land of spirits know of this
healed wound. It seemed to Lyddon as if Richard’s life were like a
broken melody, and at the thought he groaned aloud. Presently he
took down a battered volume and read from it those words of Sir
Walter Raleigh: “O eloquent and mighty Death! Whom none could
advise, thou hast persuaded; what none have dared, thou hast
done; and whom all the world hath flattered, thou hast cast out of
the world and despised. Thou hast drawn together all the far
scattered greatness, all the pride, cruelty, and ambition of man, and
covered it all over with these two narrow words: ‘Hic jacet.’”
Everything in the room seemed to speak Richard’s name to Lyddon,
to cry aloud his virtues, his gifts, his graces, and Lyddon, to escape
from them, flung out of doors.
The moon shone in pale splendor over the autumn woods and the
river was a sheet of silver. Lyddon, looking toward the garden, saw
Adrienne’s slender black figure pacing up and down the Ladies’ Walk
under the black shadows of the yew hedge. It suddenly came to him
that this woman was suffering a sort of death in life—the death of
love and hope. He had seen long ago how things were with Adrienne
and with Isabey as plainly as he had read what was passing in
Angela’s soul, for Lyddon was acute and it is impossible for people
who live under the same roof to successfully practice disguises one
to another. Adrienne was young, had far more of positive beauty
than Angela, had grace and splendid accomplishments and wealth,
which gave her leisure to think over all she had not. Her first
marriage had been loveless and childless and Lyddon felt sure she
would never make another. There was in her life none of those
stupendous griefs, shocks, alienations, and losses which had shaken
the family at Harrowby; but there was a silent, aching
disappointment, an aridity which had become her portion at the time
when most women know the joy of living and which would be hers
through all time. In the midst of his own desolation Lyddon felt pity
for Adrienne, and joining her the two walked together up and down
the flagged walk. He talked to her of Richard, and she listened to
him with a sympathy which was touching and consoling. But through
all her words rang a note of patience without hope of joy.
“Death is not the worst of evils,” she said, with perfect sincerity. “For
one who has suffered, life merely as life is nothing. If one can work
and can be happy and can give happiness in return, that alone is
living. We grieve, not because Richard Tremaine is dead, but
because so much that he might have done remains undone.”
Lyddon, whose agitation was deep, found himself calmed and even a
little comforted by Adrienne.
After an hour they saw candles gleaming through the library window
and knew it was time to go within. As they turned toward the house
Adrienne said suddenly:
“They must be well on their way by this time. They will grow more
intimate in these few hours than in half an ordinary lifetime. The tie
established between them will be very strong.”
Lyddon knew, although she spoke no name, that she referred to
Isabey and Angela.
“Quite true,” he said briefly; “but the tie was strong between them
long ago.” And then, realizing that, like Adrienne, he had said what
he never meant to utter, he stopped aghast and spoke no more until
he was assisting Adrienne up the steps. Then he added: “Luckily,
both of them have remarkable self-control. It is not enough in these
fateful cases merely to have a high sense of honor. Some of the
wildest and most unfortunate things on earth are done by people
who have honor but no discretion. Those two, however, have both
honor and discretion.”
“You are right,” was Adrienne’s response.
They went together into the library, where the few remaining
servants were now collecting for family prayers.
The stand, with the open Bible on it and two wax candles in silver
candlesticks, was in its usual place, and in a moment the door
opened and Colonel and Mrs. Tremaine entered and took their
accustomed seats. Colonel Tremaine, in an unshaken voice, read
from the Gospels, and Mrs. Tremaine made the usual prayer for all
under the roof of Harrowby, and then uttered another prayer which
had not passed her lips since the April night, eighteen months
before, when Neville Tremaine had been ordered from his father’s
roof, an outcast:
“We ask Thy mercy and guidance for the sons of this house, Neville
and Archibald.”
 CHAPTER XXII
LOVE AND LIFE

AT the same hour of the night Angela and Isabey were riding
steadily along the moonlit open road toward the Federal lines. The
flat and peaceful country was bare with the bareness of autumn and
the wind rustled over the broad fields of stubble and through the
melancholy woods. There was little evidence of the warfare which
was raging only a short distance away. The homesteads were silent
and dark; there were not many lights kept burning in those
troublous times.
As Isabey and Angela rode along the highway through a world all
white moonlight and black shadows, they spoke little. Whenever
Isabey looked at her he noticed that there were tears on her cheeks,
which she brushed away with her little gloved hand. When they were
an hour from Harrowby they entered a great stretch of sandy road
through which they walked their horses. Isabey, knowing it would
relieve Angela’s overflowing heart to speak of Richard Tremaine,
encouraged her to do so, and they talked of the dead man. Isabey
told of their student life together, both in Virginia and in Paris.
“I have no other friend like Tremaine,” he said. “It seems to me that
among all who loved him there is no one who can quite fill Richard’s
place. Mr. Lyddon told me to-day that Richard was an unforgettable
man. I replied that he was an unforgettable friend.”
“But he is gone,” cried Angela, who had never seen death before,
and who knew for the first time the strangeness which comes with
the absence of the beloved. “He will never come into the study any
more and sit in the great chair opposite Mr. Lyddon and talk with him
on deep and profound things. His father will never again have
Richard’s arm to lean upon when he walks up and down the hall in
the twilight. They often did that together. And his mother will never
again have him at her side when she makes the prayer at night.
Richard always sat on her left and Neville on her right. Archie sat by
Uncle Tremaine, because he was such a restless little boy. Everybody
—Mr. Lyddon, Uncle Tremaine, and Aunt Sophia—thought Richard
more brilliant than Neville, although his mother certainly loved
Neville best. But now all love and pride is turned into anguish. I have
been asking myself ever since I knew that Richard was gone, ‘Where
is he now? How far has he fared? Does he know how broken-
hearted we are?’”
“Ah,” replied Isabey, putting his hand upon the pommel of Angela’s
saddle, “you have got hold of that great question, ‘Whence goes the
soul?’ Every thinking human being traverses this problem; you will
not be able to escape from it. You will turn it over and over and read
the thoughts of many minds concerning it. After all, soldiers and
saints take the same view of this great matter. We do our duty,
expecting to render an account to the Great Commander. We know
no more and it is certain we can do no more.”
Isabey smiled a little at his brief preachment to Angela, but she was
so young and had read so few pages in the book of life that in many
ways she was a child in her questioning.
“I never talked with anyone about this,” she said. “It seemed to me
always as if it was impossible that anything could separate us at
Harrowby. Yet you see what has come—a frightful separation for
Neville, and Richard gone we know not where or how or even why.”
Both fell silent and remained so for a long time.
They had left Harrowby before seven o’clock and Isabey had thought
they would be able to make the whole distance, including an hour’s
rest for the horses, before midnight. But when at nine o’clock they
had still half the distance before them, he noticed how pale and tired
Angela looked. They stopped their horses to drink of a little brook
that ran silvery in the moonlight and then rippled darkling under a
rude bridge and into a thicket beyond where the autumn leaves still
hung withered upon the overhanging branches. Beyond lay a belt of
pine woods, and when they came to a little clear space within it
Isabey said: “Here is a spot where you may rest in safety and
unseen. You can scarcely sit your horse.”
“It is true,” replied Angela, wearily.
Isabey’s horse picked his way, followed by Angela’s, under the
odorous feathery branches of the pine trees where the ground was
softly carpeted with brown pine needles. When they were out of
sight of the road and well in the heart of the woods, Isabey
dismounted and took Angela from her horse. Her young strength
had given out and she was so fatigued that she sank, rather than
sat, upon a fallen tree. Isabey quickly tied the horses and unsaddled
them; then with the saddles and blankets he made a kind of rude
couch for Angela. She lay down upon it, and Isabey, after arranging
her, began to walk up and down among the tree trunks close by.
“Don’t leave me,” Angela called softly, in a voice like a frightened
child.
“I shan’t leave you,” replied Isabey, coming back and standing
before her, “nor even take my eyes off you. Hear the horses blowing
and snorting. Listen to them a little while. They are exactly like tired
human creatures in their complaining.”
“And I can listen also to the water under the bridge. Hear it as it
ripples past.” Angela listened a while, about five minutes, and then
Isabey, coming up softly to her again, found that the little stream to
which she had listened had become the river of forgetfulness and
she had fallen into a sudden sweet sleep.
The air was sharp, and Isabey, taking off his military cape, wrapped
it around her. Angela was so worn out with the fatigues and
agitations of the day that she slept as soundly as if she were in her
own great four-posted bed at Harrowby. Isabey, sitting on the fallen
tree trunk, kept watch over her. There were still tears upon her
cheeks, and, taking out his white handkerchief, he gently wiped
them away without waking her. Her face was pale at first, but as she
felt the warmth of the cape the blood returned to her cheeks, which
in a little while were overspread with a rosy glow like that of a
sleeping child. Her long braided hair had become loosened, and
Isabey, lifting it gently from where it had fallen against a half-bare
bush, carefully disengaged it. The silky locks fell over his hands, and
he held them in his clasp for a minute or two, then involuntarily
pressed his lips upon them and laid them upon Angela’s breast,
covered with his cloak.
It seemed to Isabey the most solemn hour of his life when he found
himself alone with Angela in the darkness of the heart of the forest.
It was as if a kindly fate had given him this last farewell. He never
expected, or even desired, to see her as Neville Tremaine’s wife. He
could not disguise from himself what Angela, in her simplicity, had
not been able to disguise from him—that her soul answered to his as
the echo answers to the voice and a lake reflects the sky. She was
so little sophisticated, so frank, so fearless, that she betrayed herself
in every word and glance to his practiced eye. But not to others did
she betray herself. Though innocent she was not ignorant, and
Isabey felt a lofty pride in the same discretion of which Lyddon had
spoken. He remembered with a smile how she always brought in
Neville’s name, as if it were a talisman, when they found themselves
on dangerous ground. Isabey himself had been enough on his guard
to escape a rebuff from her or even a rebuking glance. He could look
Neville Tremaine in the eye without fear or reproach. Then, not
being a man to dwell wholly upon his own sufferings, his mind
turned to Richard Tremaine. Ah, there again was loss without repair!
In war men grow not only familiar with but contemptuous of death.
Isabey had, however, but one Richard Tremaine to lose, and when
he remembered this he stopped in his halting and stealthy walk up
and down upon the pine needles and felt as if a bolt had entered his
heart. It was not meant, he thought, that he should ever have wife
or friend.
At ten o’clock, when he intended to rouse Angela, he went close to
her and found her sleeping so soundly he had not the heart to
waken her. It would, perhaps, be just as well if they reached the
lines at six o’clock in the morning. That would still give him time to
return within twenty-four hours.
The moon, hanging high in the heavens, increased in radiance, but
only here and there a patch of moonlight penetrated the plumelike
branches of the pine trees. The night grew suddenly cold and Isabey
was forced to quicken his noiseless walk. But Angela slept warmly
and sweetly. How very pretty she was, Isabey thought, in her
irregular, piquant way. She did not resemble any person or any
picture that he had ever seen. Her beauty was illusive, so dependent
upon her mood that it was difficult to reproduce. Isabey had tried
often to sketch her, but he had always thrown away the sketches in
disgust. They were like Angela and yet unlike her, having little
beauty of any kind. Her charm was one which could not be
transferred through any medium whatever. Isabey had never rated
her actual beauty highly nor had it even impressed his greatly; but
when he considered her extraordinary power to interest, to charm,
to claim love as her heritage, he realized that she was one of those
women whom age could not wither nor custom stale. At first his
thoughts, his feelings, his griefs, and disappointments were fierce
and tempestuous, but as the night wore on he grew composed and
even resigned. He would take as a soldier meets death this coming
blow of a parting with Angela—take it quietly and unflinchingly and
not degrade himself by making a useless outcry against fate or
fortune.
The moon grew wan and dropped out of sight and the pallid stars
heralded daybreak; it was that unearthly hour which is neither night
nor morning, when there is neither daylight nor moonlight nor
starlight, when Isabey, drawn against his will toward Angela, sat
near her and leaned over.
Suddenly she quietly opened her eyes and looked, wide awake, into
his. The hour, the place, the time, the circumstances, were such as
to give each insight into the soul of the other, and Angela saw
farewell in Isabey’s eyes. After a moment or two she spoke
involuntarily, still looking into his face: “This is the last time we shall
see each other.” She spoke softly, quietly, as if she were in a dream.
“Yes,” replied Isabey, in the same calm voice in which Angela had
spoken, “this is the last time.”
They sat quite still a minute longer, exchanging that unspoken but
intelligible language which both understood perfectly. Then Angela,
rising, held out her hand to Isabey. “Come,” she said, “we must go.”
Isabey rose, too, and they stood looking around them at the gloomy
pine trees in the faint cold light which was not light or darkness, as if
seeking to impress the spot forever upon their memories. Angela
noticed Isabey’s cloak lying at her feet, and she picked it up, saying:
“You wrapped me in your cloak; you shouldn’t have done it. But
perhaps that is why I slept in warmth and peace. I never had a
sweeter sleep in my life. I had no dream, but two or three times I
was near waking, and then I knew I was being watched over, and
that made me feel so safe and at peace, and I dropped asleep
again.”
Isabey, without a word, took up the blankets, and, going to the
horses, arranged the saddles; then, lifting Angela on her horse,
himself mounted and made his way, Angela following, back through
the thicket into the straight white road beyond. Isabey looked at his
watch. It was after four o’clock in the morning. The pale gray sky
was touched by the coming dawn and a fresh wind rushed in from
the sea, bringing with it a faint mist, as cloudlike as elfland, which
lay over the far-stretching flat country. The horses, feeling the cold,
were restless and struck a sharp gait. They were not checked. Both
Isabey and Angela had the desire, having said farewell to each other,
to flee from the place of parting. They rode rapidly, without speaking
to each other, except an occasional word referring to their
journeying. The wind of dawning rose and swept away the mists and
cleared the sky of clouds. All at once the earth and the heavens
were steeped in glory and the sunrise of a new day was at hand.
Isabey and Angela could see before them a long line of breastworks
and a white city of tents, and in the center a great flagstaff up which
a flag was climbing and then was flung to the breeze with the sound
of trumpets calling to one another.
Beyond the camp a great, broad, blue, rapid river flowed, and on the
opposite shore, which rose abruptly in cliffs, was another huge camp
gleaming whitely in the new-risen sun.
As they drew near the breastworks Isabey looked at Angela. She
was very pale, but she sat her horse well.
Isabey pulled up his horse. One more hateful thing remained to be
done—the delivery of General Farrington’s letter to Angela.
“I have a letter to give from General Farrington,” said Isabey gently.
“I need not say that nothing could induce me to give you such a
letter except the compulsion which is laid upon a soldier.”
He took the letter from his breast pocket and handed it to Angela,
who opened and glanced at it, her face lighting up with anger and
scorn as she read. Then, tearing the letter in half, she threw it
violently from her and, turning to Isabey, said in a trembling voice:
“I feel sorry that you should have been forced to give me such a
letter. I know what it must have cost you.”
“Thank you for saying so,” replied Isabey. “And let me speak one
more word. I would ask you not to say anything to Neville
concerning the reasons for your departure from Harrowby. It would
give him deep and unnecessary pain. Forgive me for mentioning
this.”
In the storm and stress of the last twenty-four hours the thought
had vanished from Angela’s mind. All at once it returned to her—that
she was being driven away from the place of her birth and rearing
by hatred and a persecuting suspicion. It roused in her soul a
tempest of resentment and brought the beautiful angry blood to her
cheeks.
“You need not ask my forgiveness,” she replied; “it is most
thoughtful to remind me, for otherwise I might have told Neville and
it would have been another pang for him, who has suffered so
much. There are, however, a few persons in the world who could
never believe me guilty of wrongdoing; Neville is one of them. No
one who knows Neville will ever dare to say one word against me
where he can hear of it. I shall always have the refuge of his love
and confidence.”
Angela felt at that moment glad that she was on her way to Neville.
She had ever fled to him in all her childish griefs and sorrows, and
now, when the whole universe appeared changed to her, when she
was brought face to face on the one hand with hate and obloquy
and on the other with an unspoken love and all its mysteries and
perplexities, it seemed as if she had but one refuge, Neville
Tremaine’s honest and tender heart. Isabey, acute by nature and
made more so by the prescience of love, seeing on Angela’s part this
turning to Neville, thought to himself, “It is better so. This may be
the beginning of love,” and then was stabbed to the heart by his
own thoughts. Only yesterday Angela had been among the
butterflies in the sun, and to-day she seemed like some beautiful
flowering plant cast upon the ocean. For so the great outside world
appeared to Angela.
When they came in sight of the sentry, Isabey, tying his white
handkerchief to the point of his saber, rode up and asked to see the
officer of the guard. He quickly appeared, a well-meaning, mild-
mannered young man who had recently exchanged the ferule of a
country schoolmaster for the sword of an officer. He looked keenly,
with unsophisticated admiration, at Angela, and, with the careless
ease of the volunteer, offered to pass Isabey and Angela to the tent
of the commanding officer.
When they reached, under this escort, the headquarters tent, the
commanding officer was standing before it. He was a gray-
mustached veteran who had been through the Florida wars, the
Mexican War, and that eternal warfare with the Indians on the
frontier. The unexpected presence of a lady did not disconcert him in
the least. He had escorted officers’ wives across the continent when
every man in the escort had been ordered to reserve a bullet for the
ladies in case the party should be overpowered by the Indians. He
had himself taken his young wife to a frontier post where she was
the only woman among five hundred men, and he secretly thought
the ladies of the present day rather wanting in the spirit of those
fearless women of forty years before.
Isabey introduced himself and then made the necessary
explanations with tact and briefness. The old general’s bearing was
courtesy itself, and with his expert knowledge of military and social
etiquette which was a part of his training everything went smoothly.
“I have the pleasure of knowing your husband, madam,” he said,
with old-fashioned grace, to Angela. “I was once his instructor at the
Military Academy. His command is, I judge, about forty miles from
here and I can readily communicate with him by military telegraph.
If Captain Isabey will allow me to take charge of you, I can have you
conveyed, under proper escort, to Captain Tremaine—or is it Major
Tremaine? Promotion is rapid in these days.”
“He is still Captain Tremaine,” replied Angela, a slight blush coming
into her face. There had been no promotion for Neville, and Angela
well knew why.
Nothing remained for Isabey to do. He had been directed to place
Mrs. Neville Tremaine in safe hands and he felt that he had done so
when he put her in charge of the chivalrous old general. Then came
the formal farewell, which each wished to make brief—their real
farewell had been said the dawn before under the whispering pines.
Angela put her hand in Isabey’s and, with a smile both of the lips
and eyes, said: “I thank you more than I can say, and I also thank
you in Nev—in Captain Tremaine’s name. He will express his
gratitude to you himself and far better than I can.”
“It is nothing,” responded Isabey, calmly and gracefully. “I shall
always be happy to do a service to any of the Tremaine family, and
particularly to Captain Tremaine, whom I consider only a little farther
off as a friend than Richard Tremaine. When I recall all your
kindness to me at the time that I was wounded, I feel that I can
never do enough to show my appreciation of it. Pray remember me
to Neville Tremaine. Adieu—or good-by, as you say.”
“Good-by,” replied Angela, gently pressing his hand. And in another
moment he was gone.
Then the general, with antique courtesy, himself showed Angela into
a compartment of the headquarters tent which he desired her to
consider her own until she should depart to join her husband. It held
a small iron bed and some boxes which did duty for a toilet table
and washstand. The general apologized to Angela for the plainness
of her surroundings, but reminded her that she was a soldier’s wife
and must not mind trifles.
Then, the general leaving her, an orderly brought in Angela’s
portmanteau and she exchanged her riding habit for a conventional
costume, and combed and plaited her long, fair hair. In half an hour
the orderly, who was deputed to be Angela’s lady’s maid, informed
her that the general sent his compliments and begged the honor and
pleasure of her company at breakfast with him alone. Angela went
into the outer tent, where she found a small table laid for two and
the gallant old general waiting to receive her.
“Everything is arranged, my dear madam,” he said, as they seated
themselves. “I have secured a conveyance for you, not very stylish,
perhaps, but it will do—a small carriage and a pair of army mules,
with a soldier-driver. Your escort will be Lieutenant Farley, a nephew
of mine. I think it fair to tell you what, of course, I could not
mention before Captain Isabey, that your husband’s command is on
the march, and there is fighting going on. But, nevertheless, there is
a point at which you can intercept Captain Tremaine about thirty
miles from here and can, at least, have a brief interview.”
“Thank you,” replied Angela. “As you say, I am a soldier’s wife and so
must learn to bear a little hardship in order to see my husband, even
for a short time. Then he will decide what I shall do.”
Nothing could exceed the delicacy, tact, and thoughtfulness of the
old officer. He told Angela that she could send a dispatch by military
telegraph to Neville which would reach him within a few hours and
prepare him for her arrival. Angela thanked him again and felt as if
she had found a second Colonel Tremaine in this gray-mustached,
soft-voiced general. She began to speak with the frankness of an
unsophisticated nature of Neville Tremaine and his action in
remaining in the United States army. The general listened with the
utmost suavity, but made no comment. Angela had expected high
commendation from him for Neville, but instead was merely this
smooth courtesy, an attitude gracefully sympathetic but wholly
noncommittal. Against Neville Tremaine was an iron wall of prejudice
which Angela’s soft hands could not batter down. Some intuitive
knowledge of this forced itself upon her mind and cut her to the
heart. The unspoken enmity of his own people against Neville was
easier than this secret distrust on the part of those to whom Neville
gave his service from the deepest principle of conscience. This
thought aroused something of the pride and sensitiveness of
wifehood in Angela. She changed from the attitude of a young girl to
that of a self-possessed woman, and told the general, with the
coolness and composure of twice her age, of the obloquy visited
upon Neville among his own people, “which,” she said, with dignity
and even stateliness, “is most undeserved. My husband lost his
inheritance; for that he does not grieve, but the disapproval of his
father and mother and of all those dear to him, except myself, is
very hard to bear. His brother Richard, who was killed only six days
ago, understood my husband better than anyone, and there was
never any breach between them. Richard Tremaine knew that only
the strongest conviction of his duty would keep his brother in your
army.”
To this the general bowed again politely and sympathetically, but
said no word. Suspicion, that impalpable poison, that nameless
destroyer, had gone forth against Neville Tremaine and was
withering him.
All at once the general’s kindness and hospitality grew irksome to
Angela. She asked when she could leave, and the general, who had
been all courtesy, felt that his guest wished to depart. He told her
that a boat was at her command, and the carriage would be waiting
on the other side. Then the general escorted her to the dock, his
orderly carrying her portmanteau, and there the young lieutenant,
the general’s nephew, who was to take charge of her for the next
twenty-four hours, met them.
The general introduced him. He was a pink-and-white boy who had
left Harvard, where he had luxuriated on a large allowance, in order
to become a soldier. The general had no mind to trust Angela with
any man not of her own class in life, and had selected the greatest
coxcomb, who was also one of the bravest of his youngsters, to
escort her.
Nothing could have pleased Farley better. He knew more of drawing-
rooms than of camps, and was delighted to figure as the guardian of
anything so charming as this young girl who was already a matron.
The general, assuming himself to be the obliged party and thanking
Angela for the privilege of serving her, put her into the boat in which
the river was crossed. On the other side was a rickety carriage
drawn by a couple of stout mules.
Farley took his seat by the side of the soldier who drove. The
coachman’s seat was on the same level as those within, and the roof
of the carriage overhung it. Farley had fully expected to be asked to
take a place within, but Angela totally forgot to ask him.
It was close upon ten o’clock when the carriage started off, and
soon, clearing the camp, passed through a flat green country,
interspersed with woods, along a road which had been cut up by
artillery and commissary wagons. The morning was beautifully fair
and bright, and Angela, leaning back in the carriage, had the feeling
that she was beginning a new volume of life. That other volume,
which had begun with her childhood as bright and fair as the
morning, and had closed in blood and tears and agony, was now
locked and laid away forever.
A new perplexity occurred to her. If Neville had not heard of
Richard’s death, should she tell him? She was too inexperienced to
know what was judicious, but some instinct of the heart told her that
the little time she could spend with Neville, that one hour of
brightness in his life of undeserved hardship, should not be marred
in any way. If he did not know of Richard’s death already, he would
learn it soon enough.
Thinking these thoughts, Angela, grave and preoccupied, with
downcast eyes, sat back in the corner of the carriage and took no
note of whither she went or how.
Farley had supposed that it was pure bashfulness which kept Mrs.
Neville Tremaine from inviting him to sit in the carriage with her, but
as they jolted steadily along the heavy road and the morning grew
into noon, and Angela was obviously unconscious of his existence,
he began to feel himself a much-injured man. He glanced back at
her occasionally and did not see her once look up, and, like most
men, every time he looked at her he thought her nearer to beauty.
But she was no nearer to conversation. Farley would have dearly
liked to find out if her talk were as interesting as her appearance,
but she gave him no opportunity of judging.
At sunset they reached a farmhouse where it had been arranged
that Angela should spend the night. It was a homely, tumble-down
place, and the mistress of it, Sarah Brown, a little withered,
bloodless creature, had clung to it, although it lay in the debatable
ground between contending armies. Sarah always ran away
whenever a shot was fired, but invariably trudged back to work and
tremble and palpitate until her fears drove her off again. She
welcomed Angela with a kind of furtive pleasure, she whose guests
were usually embattled men, and showed her a little plain room up a
rickety flight of stairs where Angela might rest for the night.
Farley thought it certain that he would meet Angela at supper, which
was served by Sarah in the kitchen. Angela, however, sent a polite
message asking to be excused from coming down and her supper
was served in her own little room.
Farley, reduced to his own society, soon went to his sleeping place,
which was on the floor of the “settin’ room.”
The next morning dawned mild and bright, and at eight o’clock the
mules were harnessed and the carriage was ready to start. Again
was Farley disappointed; he only saw Angela as she came tripping
down the narrow stair and bade him good morning.
She thanked Sarah Brown cordially, and, not daring to offer money
for her accommodation, took off a little gold brooch she wore, one of
her few ornaments, and handed it to Sarah. It was received in
speechless gratitude and admiration. Then Angela, smiling at Farley
but without seeing him, took her seat in the carriage. Farley by this
time was thoroughly exasperated with her for her want of
appreciation of his society, and he concluded that the surest
punishment would be to leave her to herself.
They drove on steadily through the same flat country, but around
them were evidences of fighting, past and to come. There were
dreary piles of brick, showing where humble houses had been
destroyed by the fortunes of war. The fences were all gone and
gates had ceased to exist. The people in the few homesteads they
passed kept within doors and the whole scene was one of
desolation.
Presently, however, the stillness of the autumn day was broken by
ominous sounds. Afar off could be heard the dull thunder made by
the movement of troops, and about midday the highroad was
suddenly blocked by artillery wagons. For the first time Angela
roused herself and asked Farley, with interest, what it meant.
“Fighting, madam,” he replied promptly and expecting Angela’s face
to grow pale. On the contrary, she showed no tremor whatever and
only said:
“I hope it will not interfere with my seeing Captain Tremaine, if only
for an hour.”
“I don’t think it will,” responded Farley. “This movement on the part
of the enemy is not entirely unexpected and we knew that Captain
Tremaine’s regiment would be on the march.”
Angela said no more and the carriage jolted on. The shadows were
growing long when the carriage, drawing up on the side of a wide
road leading through a belt of woods, stopped, and Farley, opening
the door and standing, cap in hand, said stiffly to Angela: “This is
the point, Mrs. Tremaine, where we are instructed to wait. Captain
Tremaine’s regiment will pass within a mile of us in half an hour and
he will be on the lookout for us.”
“Thank you,” Angela responded sweetly, and, accepting Farley’s
proffered hand, she descended from the carriage. “I think,” she said,
“I will walk a little way into the woods; but I shall keep within sight
of the road, so Captain Tremaine will see me as soon as he arrives.”
Farley, whose instructions were to remain with Angela and to place
himself at Neville Tremaine’s disposal, stood discontentedly watching
her as she walked daintily through the thicket, and he thought her
one of the most ungrateful women that ever lived.
When a little out of sight of the road Angela looked about her. It
might have been the same spot in which she had taken her real
farewell of Isabey—the same dark overhanging pine trees, their
resonant aroma filling the air, and the same slippery carpet of brown
pine needles lay under her feet. Angela, hitherto so calm, began to
feel a strange agitation. Neville Tremaine had been so much a part
of her life since her babyhood that she had never had any right
conception of him as her husband, but now all was changed. Her
whole life was cast behind her and Neville was her only refuge and
her sole possession.
She wished, however, to forget all the past and set about resolutely
at forgetting. She had put Isabey out of her mind so far as she
could, but it is quite possible to throttle a thought and yet hear it
breathing in one’s ear. So it was with Angela. She fixed her
consciousness upon Neville Tremaine, but her subconsciousness was
with Isabey. One thing was certain: she could ever count upon
Neville Tremaine’s tenderness, chivalry, and unshakable kindness.
As she walked up and down with her own peculiar and airy grace,
she kept her eyes fixed on the open roadway. A mile off she could
hear distinctly the clanking of ammunition wagons, the steady tramp
of thousands of feet, the dull beating of the earth by horses’ hoofs.
Ten minutes had passed when she saw a horseman coming at a
hard gallop along the woodland road. It was Neville Tremaine. In a
minute or two he reached the carriage and flung himself off his
horse. Farley spoke a word to him. Throwing his bridle toward the
soldier-driver, Neville made straight through the thicket to where
Angela stood. Angela felt herself taken in his strong arms and his
mustached lips against hers. She clung to him, and it seemed to her
as if it were Neville and yet not Neville. Only one thing was
unmistakable: the old sense of well-being and protection when he
was near came sweetly back to her. But of all else that passed in
those first few minutes she scarcely knew, except that Neville held
her to his strong beating heart and told her how dear she was to
him.
Then he put her off a little way and gazed at her with tender
admiration. Angela saw the great changes made in Neville by time
and war. He looked much older and his naturally dark skin had
grown darker with tan and sunburn. She could see, where his cap
was raised a little from his brow, the whiteness of his forehead
contrasted with the brownness of his face. He was campaigning, but
otherwise there was the same immaculateness about him—neatly
shaven, smartly uniformed, his accoutrement shining, all the marks
of the trained officer.
As for Neville, his admiration for Angela burst from him as he looked
at her. “Dearest,” he said, holding both her hands, “you have
become beautiful. You are a woman now and not a child. You have
grown up since that night on the wharf at Harrowby.”
“I have gone through that which makes a girl into a woman,” replied
Angela, softly. “Until two nights ago I had every night at family
prayers to hear every name called except yours, but I called your
name in my heart.”
“I know it, I know it.”
“Two nights ago all was changed. Your mother once more mentioned
your name and your father sent you his blessing.”
“Thank God!” replied Neville, lifting his cap.
“And here is a letter from your mother. They sent you a thousand
messages, and so did Archie and Mr. Lyddon and all the servants.
You are forgiven.”
“Yes, forgiven by all who thought that I acted dishonorably. One
person, however, I shall never need any forgiveness from, because
he knows and respects my motives—my brother Richard.”
Richard’s name, spoken so suddenly, disconcerted Angela for a
moment. She trembled a little and looked away and then her pitying
eyes sought Neville’s, but she replied calmly: “Yes, Richard never
said one word in condemnation of you.”
“That is like him. Of all men I ever knew in my life, I think best of
Richard. Not because he is my brother, but because he is better,
larger-minded, braver, than any other man I ever knew. I had a
letter from him by flag of truce a fortnight ago and managed to reply
by the same means. He has no doubt got my letter by this time. I
have so many things to ask you, so many things to tell you, the chief
of which is how much I love you; and I only have one hour with
you.”
And then Angela, with tender sophistry, replied: “I would not miss
the chance of spending this one hour with you; but surely I can be
near you—nearer than at Harrowby.”
“Yes,” answered Neville gravely; “we shall be fighting probably, if not
to-night, certainly from early in the morning, and a soldier cannot
look beyond the present hour. If I am alive, we shall meet again
within the week. If I am killed, you will return at once to Harrowby.”
Angela caught Neville’s arm. The thought of a world without him
staggered her. “Don’t say that,” she cried breathlessly, and then
stopped. In another moment the tragedy of Richard’s death would
have burst from her involuntarily.
Neville, thinking he saw in Angela’s face and words and tone that a
love for him, like his love for her, had been born in her soul, caught
her to his breast in rapture. The hour passed so quickly to Neville it
seemed as if they had but scarcely exchanged their first confidences
when it was time for him to go.
He gave Angela his last instructions—to remain for at least three
days, or until she should hear from him, at the little farmhouse
where she had spent the night.
“I shall do exactly as you say,” answered Angela quietly. “And you
may depend upon it that I shan’t fall into a panic and run away.”
“I know that you will never fall into a panic,” answered Neville,
smiling. “I think the Southern women are very like the great captain
who asked when he was a boy, ‘What is fear?’ I don’t think you
know as much about fear as I do.”
Then, as the moment of parting approached, their voices and eyes
grew grave, and presently Neville kissed Angela in the shade of the
pine trees. They walked through the purple shadows of the late
afternoon back to the road where the carriage still stood and the
orderly led Neville’s horse up and down.
Farley, consumed with chagrin and impatience, still maintained a
gentlemanlike outside. Neville thanked him with sincere gratitude,
and Angela added some graceful phrases without taking any more
interest in him than in the orderly, a fact which Farley bitterly
realized. Neville put Angela in the carriage, and, laying a letter upon
her lap, said to her:
“Good-by. Keep this letter, but do not open it unless you hear bad
news of me. You will hear something from me within three days, in
any event.”
Farley turned his back and the orderly looked hard in the opposite
direction as Neville kissed Angela for the last time.
When a soldier says good-by it may be the last farewell. Angela’s
heart was suddenly pierced with this thought, and when Neville
would have turned quickly away, she drew him back to her and
kissed him once again. The next moment he was gone.
The sun was setting when Angela found herself once more upon the
road. It seemed to her as if that brief hour with Neville had been a
dream; but all had been dreamlike with her of late. Until a year or so
ago nothing had happened. That had been her grievance: she had
so longed for life, movement, color, love, even grief, anything to
move the silent pool in which she thought herself, at twenty,
anchored for life.
All at once everything came. War, persecution, estrangement, love,
death, all those things most moving in human life. She looked at the
letter addressed to her in Neville’s firm handwriting, and knew well
enough what it meant—it was what she was to do in the event of his
death; but like most young creatures brimming with life, Angela
could scarcely believe in death. It seemed to her an anachronism so
frightful as to be almost incredible.
When the carriage reached once more the public road there was,
even to Angela’s untrained eyes, every sign of approaching battle. A
great, dark blue stream, with glittering muskets which the dying sun
tipped with fire, poured along the highroad. Officers were riding at a
steady pace with their commands, while constantly orderlies dashed
back and forth, silent, grimly concentrated upon their errands.
Over the quiet autumn landscape, which should have been all peace,
brooded the spirit of coming battle. The red sun itself seemed to
Angela’s mind a great bloody disk dropping behind the dreary
woods. How many of these men marching cheerfully along would
live to see another sun set?
Suddenly a sound, distant but unmistakable, smote Angela’s ear—
the reverberation across the distant hills and far-off wide river of
heavy guns. Angela had never before in her life heard a cannon
fired, but that menacing thunder, that wolfish howl before the
banquet of death begins, could not be misunderstood. Angela felt a
sensation of horror, but nothing like fear; she came of good fighting
stock, and the thought of battle did not intimidate her. Then the far-
off roar was overborne by a loud, quick crashing of guns within half
the distance. Instantly the thrill of conflict seemed to animate the
long blue line, and there were a few quick evolutions, like a lion
crouching before his spring.
Farley, who had been leaning forward listening intently, took the
whip out of the hands of the soldier-driver and laid it heavily on the
mules, and they sprang ahead. Then turning to Angela, sitting
upright within the carriage, and now fully awake to all that was
going on around her, he said:
“Pray, don’t be alarmed, Mrs. Tremaine. I can get you to the
farmhouse within an hour, where you will be quite safe and out of
danger.”
“Don’t disturb yourself on my account,” replied Angela. “I only regret
that I am giving you trouble when I am sure you wish to be with
your command.”
As she spoke, the soldier-driver, with the familiarity of the volunteer,
glancing back at her, said to Farley, above the rattle of the rickety
carriage: “I don’t believe she is afeered, but it’s more ’an some of
them fellows on both sides can say.”
Angela said no more, but watched with a fast-beating heart what
seemed to be tumult passing before her, but was really expedition
and apparent confusion which meant order.
In a little while the carriage struck off from the highroad and passed
into a region all quietude and peace. The distant roar of the guns
stopped for a time, and the intervening hill and valley shut off the
sounds of the marching troops. The red sun was gone and the short,
enchanted autumn twilight had fallen. When the carriage drew up at
the door of the farmhouse Angela, when Farley had assisted her to
alight, said: “I think that I should now release you from your kind
attendance on me. Captain Tremaine directed me to remain here
until I should hear from him. I shan’t need any protection, and I beg
that you will feel no hesitation in leaving me.”
Farley, whose orders were to place himself at Mrs. Tremaine’s
disposal and who had looked forward to days of inaction for himself
while fighting was going on, felt a thrill of gratitude.
“Thank you,” he replied, bowing low. “If I thought there was any
possibility of danger to you, I assure you I should not leave you; but
this place is well out of the way, and, besides, we hardly expect a
general engagement.”
Sarah Brown, slatternly, frightened, helpless, but sympathetic, came
out to greet Angela, and suddenly began to wring her hands. “I
thought,” she cried hysterically, “we would have a man here in case
the Yankees, or the Confederates either, wanted to burn the house
down, and then he would stand up for us and wouldn’t let ’em do it.
Oh, my, oh, my!”
“Nonsense!” cried Angela sharply, catching Sarah by the arm. “If
anything like that should happen, no one could help us. We are just
as well off alone. Good-by, Mr. Farley, and thank you.” And bowing
politely to the soldier-driver, she fairly dragged her hostess within.
Once inside, she managed to somewhat calm Sarah Brown’s chronic
trepidation. Sarah gave her supper, and then would, out of pure
good nature, have remained with her during the night, but this
Angela declined.
When darkness fell, all grew still, and Sarah Brown took Angela’s
advice and went to bed. Angela herself did not follow her own
recommendation, and felt a strange disinclination to go to bed.
Usually her strong young nerves had given her sleep whenever she
had desired it, but this night, when every nerve was on quivering
edge, sleep eluded and defied her. She threw her mantle around her
and sat for a long time at the open window watching the moon as it
rose in silvery splendor over the half-bare woods. How still and sad
and woe-begone was the aspect of the country! Only two nights
before she had been riding with Isabey through a region almost as
still and sad and woe-begone as this, along the weed-grown
highway and untraveled forest roads, and now that time was as far
removed as if æons had passed.
As the thought of Isabey occurred to her she put it resolutely out of
her mind and began to think of Neville—how he looked, what he
said.
She took from her pocket the letter he had given her, and then
thrust it back out of sight. She was not to open it unless she had
bad news of him. Existence with Neville absent had been strange
enough, but with him dead—Angela could scarcely conceive of a
world without him. Her heart was oppressed with a thousand griefs
and perplexities. If only Isabey had not come into her life, how much
easier would all things have been! She remembered Lyddon having
told her once, long ago, that human beings in this world suffer or
enjoy according to the imagination with which they are endowed,
and he had added, “You have a tremendous imagination.”
This and many other half-forgotten things came back to her memory,
and all suggested struggle and conflict. After midnight she lay down
across her hard, coarse bed and fell into a restless and uneasy sleep,
haunted by painful dreams. She was glad to waken from it, and,
looking at her watch, found that it was four o’clock. Just the time,
two nights before, when she had said farewell to Isabey. Life
appeared to her all farewells. She rose and went again to the open
window, and the scene of two nights before seemed to repeat itself
before her eyes, until the miracle of the dawning came. Then
Angela’s head dropped upon the window sill and she fell for the first
time into a quiet and dreamless sleep.
The sun rose in splendor, and the whole fresh and dewy world was
sparkling when Angela was awakened by a terrible sound—the crash
of bursting shells. She looked toward the woods a mile away and
heard through the stillness of the autumn morning the fearful
thunder, the shouts and cries of conflict. Almost immediately she
saw half a dozen ambulances with their attendants driving into the
open field and making straight for the farmhouse. She knew well
what it meant. Those were the wounded seeking a place of refuge.
As the ambulances reached the house she opened her door and ran
quickly down the narrow stair. The passage door was wide open,
and two soldiers, carrying a stretcher, were coming in. On it lay a
figure covered up in a blue cloak. They took their burden and laid it
down in the room to the right on the ground floor. Following them
came a surgeon, grimy, bloody, anxious-eyed, but cool. He scarcely
saw Angela, and paid no heed to her, but followed the stretcher into
the little room. Then Angela heard him say, in a quick voice: “He is
gone; there is nothing more to be done here, but plenty to be done
outside.”
He passed again through the hall, followed by the two soldiers.
Three stretchers, with wounded men groaning and moaning in their
agony, were carried into the narrow hall.
Something quite outside of her own volition made Angela walk
toward the room in which the dead officer lay. As she reached the
door she felt a hand upon her arm, and the surgeon was saying to
her: “Excuse me, but you had better not go in there. The officer is
dead and much disfigured.”
“What is his name?” asked Angela.
“Captain Neville Tremaine,” was the surgeon’s answer. “Killed leading
the Forlorn Hope; as brave a man as ever lived or died.”

One night, a week later, Colonel and Mrs. Tremaine sat together in
the library at Harrowby. Usually they were alone, but since the family
circle had grown so pitifully small, Lyddon had left his ancient
habitat, the old study, and sat with them in the evenings. He was
pretending to read, and so was Colonel Tremaine, but both were
really absorbed in reverie. Mrs. Tremaine, with more self-possession
than either, sat knitting. Lyddon, watching her furtively, thought how
like she was to those Spartan women who bade their sons return
with their shields or upon them. Only with Mrs. Tremaine this
sublime courage was accompanied with a gentleness and softness
like a Lesbian air.
The stillness remained unbroken for an hour, when there was a
sound of hoofs and wheels upon the carriage drive. As they listened
the hall door was quickly opened and some one entered.
“That is Angela,” said Mrs. Tremaine. And the next moment Angela
entered the library. She wore a black gown, which Mrs. Tremaine
instantly noticed. The two women, looking into each other’s eyes,
opened their arms, and then were clasped together.
“Neville is gone!” cried Angela. “He is with Richard.”
 CHAPTER XXIII
THE AFTERMATH

TWO years and a half afterwards, on an April afternoon, Isabey,

riding the ghost of a war horse, came in sight of the old manor
house of Harrowby. It was a soft, mild afternoon, as soft and sunny
as that day, now four years past, when he had first seen the place.
From the top of the cedar lane Isabey’s keen eyes could view the
whole scene in its minutest details. The broad fields, which he
remembered as green in spring and gold in summer with wheat,
were unfilled and grown up in blackberry bushes, wild roses,
poppies, and the blue cornflower, those bold marauders who seize
upon the earth as soon as it is no longer plowed or reaped. Over all
brooded a sad peacefulness, a quiet decay and mournful silence;
Nature seemed in a melancholy reverie. Spring had come in all the
soft splendor of its beauty, and yet no hand seemed uplifted to do
her bidding of cheerful toil. There were no sounds of jocund
plowmen or cheerful laborers, of laughing, brown-skinned milkmaids
who sang at their work. Isabey’s eyes traveled toward the old
graveyard in the field. The brick wall had fallen into still greater
decay than he remembered, and a few lean sheep were browsing
among the graves. Isabey looked farther on toward the house. The
fences were down, and the negro quarters, which were wont to be
alive with those merry, brown creatures, were silent and deserted.
The carriage drive was overgrown with weeds—there were no
carriages any more to traverse it. And the yew hedge was more
ragged and decrepit than ever before. The old brick mansion stood
out dark and clear against the violet sky, while the river, a darker
violet, went upon its ceaseless way singing its eternal refrain. Isabey
noticed that most of the shutters in the old mansion were closed;
one or two of them had fallen to the ground, and the top of one of
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