Clara Hopgood
Page 34In a few days Madge received the following letter:
'FRANKFORT, O. M.,
HOTEL WAIDENBUSCH.
'My dearest Madge,--I do not know how to write to you. I have begun
a dozen letters but I cannot bring myself to speak of what lies
before me, hiding the whole world from me. Forgiveness! how is any
forgiveness possible? But Madge, my dearest Madge, remember that my
love is intenser than ever. What has happened has bound you closer
to me. I imploreyou to let me come back. I will find a thousand
excuses for returning, and we will marry. We had vowed marriage to
marriage at once. You will not, you cannot, no, you cannot, you must
see you cannot refuse. My father wishes to make this town his
headquarters for ten days. Write by return for mercy's sake.--Your
ever devoted 'FRANK.' The reply came only a day late.
'My dear Frank,--Forgiveness! Who is to be forgiven? Not you. You
believed you loved me, but I doubted my love, and I know now that no
true love for you exists. We must part, and part forever. Whatever
wrong may have been done, marriage to avoid disgrace would be a wrong
to both of us infinitely greater. I owe you an expiation; your
that I was deaf and blind. By some miracle, I cannot tell how, my
ears and eyes are opened, and I hear and see. It is not the first
time in my life that the truth has been revealed to me suddenly,
supernaturally, I may say, as if in a vision, and I know the
revelation is authentic. There must be no wavering, no half-
measures, and I absolutely forbid another letter from you. If one
arrives I must, for the sake of my own peace and resolution, refuse
to read it. You have simply to announce to your father that the
engagement is at an end, and give no reasons
Another letter did come, but Madge was true to her word, and it was
returned unopened.
For a long time Frank was almost incapable of reflection. He dwelt
on an event which might happen, but which he dared not name; and if
it should happen! Pictures of his father, his home his father's
friends, Fenmarket, the Hopgood household, passed before him with
such wild rapidity and intermingled complexity that it seemed as if
the reins had dropped out of his hands and he was being hurried away
to madness.