During the next half-hour her vivid imagination sketched and painted a vision of enchantment--of what might have been, if that motionless man below, there in the crimson-cushioned pew, had only kept his soul from grievous sins. A vision of a happy, proud, young wife reigning at Le Bocage, shedding the warm, rosy light of her love over the lonely life of its master; adding to his strong, clear intellect and ripe experience, the silver flame of her genius; borrowing from him broader and more profound views of her race, on which to base her ideal aesthetic structures; softening, refining his nature, strengthening her own; helping him to help humanity; loving all good, being good, doing good; serving and worshipping God together; walking hand and hand with her husband through earth's wide valley of Baca, with peaceful faces full of faith, looking heavenward.
"God pity them both! and pity us all, Who vainly the dreams of youth recall. For of all sad words of tongue or pen The saddest are these, 'It might have been!'"
At last, with a faint moan, which reached no ear but that of Him who never slumbers, Edna withdrew her eyes from the spot where Mr. Murray sat, and raised them toward the pale Christ, whose wan lips seemed to murmur: "Be of good cheer! He that overcometh shall inherit all things. What I do, thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter."
The minister, standing beneath the picture of the Master whom he served, closed the Bible and ended his discourse by hurling his text as a thunderbolt at those whose upturned faces watched him: "Finally, brethren, remember under all circumstances the awful admonition of Jesus, 'Judge not, that ye be not judged!'"
The organ peals and the doxology were concluded; the benediction fell like God's dew, alike on sinner and on saint, and amid the solemn moaning of the gilded pipes, the congregation turned to quit the church.
With both hands pressed over her heart, Edna leaned heavily against the railing.
"To-morrow I go away for ever. I shall never see his face again in this world. Oh! I want to look at it once more."
As he stepped into the aisle, Mr. Murray threw his head back slightly, and his eyes swept up to the gallery and met hers. It was a long, eager, heart-searching gaze. She saw a countenance more fascinating than of old; for the sardonic glare had gone, the bitterness, "the dare-man, dare-brute, dare-devil" expression had given place to a stern mournfulness, and the softening shadow of deep contrition and manly sorrow hovered over features where scoffing cynicism had so long scowled.