_"You have murdered a life!"_ Well, that was what prejudiced and hide-bound persons like Alfred Boyson said, and no doubt always would say. She could not help it; but for her own dignity's sake, that moral dignity in which she liked to feel herself enwrapped, she would give as little excuse for it as possible.
Then, as she stood looking eastward, a strange thought struck her. Once on that farther shore and she would be Roger's wife again--an English subject, and Roger's wife. How ridiculous, and how intolerable! When shall we see some real comity of nations in these matters of international marriage and divorce?
She had consulted her lawyers in New York before starting; on Roger's situation first of all, but also on her own. Roger, it seemed, might take certain legal steps, once he was aware of her being again on English ground. But, of course, he would not take them. "It was never me he cared for--only Beatty!" she said to herself with a bitter perversity. Still the thought of returning within the range of the old obligations, the old life, affected her curiously. There were hours, especially at night, when she felt shut up with thoughts of Roger and Beatty--her husband and her child--just as of old.
How, in the name of justice, was she to blame for Roger's illness? Her irritable thoughts made a kind of grievance against him of the attack of pneumonia which she was told had injured his health. He must have neglected himself in some foolish way. The strongest men are the most reckless of themselves. In any case, how was it her fault?
One night she woke up suddenly, in the dawn, her heart beating tumultuously. She had been dreaming of her meeting--her possible meeting--with Roger. Her face was flushed, her memory confused. She could not recall the exact words or incidents of the dream, only that Roger had been in some way terrible and terrifying.
And as she sat up in her berth, trying to compose herself, she recalled the last time she had seen him at Philadelphia--a painful scene--and his last broken words to her, as he turned back from the door to speak them:--
"As to Beatty, I hold you responsible! She is my child, no less than yours. You shall answer to me! Remember that!"