The Shield of Silence | Page 4

let him
blot out this ache for Merry." But that was not to be.
And Meredith wrote her letters to her sister and smiled upon her
husband--for after the third month of her marriage that was the best she
could do for either of them. All the ideals of her self-blinded life were
being swept away in the glaring flame of reality.
Thornton was still infatuated and went to great lengths to prove to his
pale, starry-eyed wife her power over him. He was delighted at the
impression she made upon the rather hectic but exclusive circle in
which he moved; but he dreaded, vaguely to be sure, her hearing, in a
gross way, references to his life before she entered it. So quite frankly
and a bit sketchily he confided it to her himself.
"Of course that is ended forever," he said; "you have led me from
darkness to light, you wonderful child! Why, Merry, you simply have
made a new and better man of me--I understand the real value of things
now."
But did he?
Merry was looking at him as if she were doubting her senses. Things

she had heard in her girlhood, things that floated about in the dark
corners of her memory, were pressing close. Dreadful things that had
been forced upon her against her will but which she reasoned could
never happen to her, or to any of her own.
"You mean," she faltered gropingly at last, "that another woman
has----" She could not voice the ugly words and Thornton was obliged
to be a little more explicit.
Then he saw his wife retreat--spiritually. He hastened after her as best
he could.
"You see, darling," he was frightened, "out here, where a fellow is cut
off from home ties and all that, the old code does not hold--how could
it? I'm no exception. Why, good Lord! child----" but Meredith was not
listening. He saw that and it angered him.
She was hearing words spoken long ago--oh! years and years ago it
seemed. Words that had lured her from Doris, from safety, from all the
dangerous peace that had been hers.
"Sweetheart," that voice had said, "there is one right woman for every
man, but few there be who find her. When one does--then there is no
time to be lost. Life is all too short at the best for them. Come, my
beloved, come!"
And she had heeded and, forsaking all else, had trusted him.
According to his lights Thornton had sincerely meant those words
when he spoke them. He was under the spell, still, as he looked at the
small frozen thing before him now.
If he could win her from her absurd, and almost unbelievable, position;
if he could, through her love and his, gain her absolutely; make her
his--what a conquest!
"My precious one, I am yours to do with what you will!" he was saying
with all the fervour of his being; but Meredith looked at him from a

great distance.
"You were never mine!" was what she said. Then asked:
"Is that--that woman here? Will I ever--meet her?"
Thornton was growing furiously angry.
"Certainly not!" he replied to her last question, incensed at the implied
lack of delicacy on his part. Then he added, "Don't be a fool, Merry!"
"No, I won't," she whispered, grimly. "I won't be a fool, whatever else I
am. Do you want me to leave you at once, or stay on?"
Thornton stared at her blankly.
"Good God!" he muttered; "what do you mean, stay on?"
"I mean that if I stay it will be because I don't want to hurt you more
than I must--and because things don't matter much, either way. I have
my own money--but, well, I'll stay on if it will help you in your
business."
Then light dawned.
"You will stay on!" Thornton snapped the words out. "You are my wife,
and you will stay on!"
"Very well. I will stay," Meredith turned and walked away.
Thornton looked after her and his face softened. Something in him was
touched by the spirit under the cold, crude exterior of the girl. It was
worth while--he would try to win her!
And that was the best hour in Thornton's life.
Could he have held to it all might have gone well, but Thornton's
successes had been due to dash and daring--the slow, patient method
was not his, and against his wife's stern indifference he recoiled after a

short time--she bored him; she no longer seemed worth while; not
worth the struggle nor the holding to absurd and rigid demands. Still,
by her smiling acquiescence, Meredith made things possible that
otherwise might not have been so, and she was a charming hostess
when occasion demanded.
During the second bleak year of their marriage Meredith accompanied