Zenobia had entirely forgotten me. She fancied herself alone with her
great grief. And had it been only a common pity that I felt for
her,--the pity that her proud nature would have repelled, as the one
worst wrong which the world yet held in reserve,--the sacredness and
awfulness of the crisis might have impelled me to steal away silently,
so that not a dry leaf should rustle under my feet. I would have left
her to struggle, in that solitude, with only the eye of God upon her.
But, so it happened, I never once dreamed of questioning my right to be
there now, as I had questioned it just before, when I came so suddenly
upon Hollingsworth and herself, in the passion of their recent debate.
It suits me not to explain what was the analogy that I saw or imagined
between Zenobia's situation and mine; nor, I believe, will the reader
detect this one secret, hidden beneath many a revelation which perhaps
concerned me less. In simple truth, however, as Zenobia leaned her
forehead against the rock, shaken with that tearless agony, it seemed
to me that the self-same pang, with hardly mitigated torment, leaped
thrilling from her heartstrings to my own. Was it wrong, therefore, if
I felt myself consecrated to the priesthood by sympathy like this, and
called upon to minister to this woman's affliction, so far as mortal
could?
But, indeed, what could mortal do for her? Nothing! The attempt would
be a mockery and an anguish. Time, it is true, would steal away her
grief, and bury it and the best of her heart in the same grave. But
Destiny itself, methought, in its kindliest mood, could do no better
for Zenobia, in the way of quick relief; than to cause the impending
rock to impend a little farther, and fall upon her head. So I leaned
against a tree, and listened to her sobs, in unbroken silence. She was
half prostrate, half kneeling, with her forehead still pressed against
the rock. Her sobs were the only sound; she did not groan, nor give
any other utterance to her distress. It was all involuntary.
At length she sat up, put back her hair, and stared about her with a
bewildered aspect, as if not distinctly recollecting the scene through
which she had passed, nor cognizant of the situation in which it left
her. Her face and brow were almost purple with the rush of blood.
They whitened, however, by and by, and for some time retained this
deathlike hue. She put her hand to her forehead, with a gesture that
made me forcibly conscious of an intense and living pain there.