prompted by the want of natural love for life? [28] A sense of revelation swept over Monica at that moment. She had never really feared, because she had never truly loved. It was not death even now that she dreaded for herself, or for her husband, but separation. Danger, even to death, shared with him, would be almost welcome: but to think of his facing danger alone—that was too terrible. She pressed her hands closely together. It seemed as if her very soul cried to Heaven to keep [29]away this dire necessity. Why she suspected its existence she could not have explained, but the shadow that had hung upon her all day seemed wrapping itself about her like a cloud. [29] “Monica, how you tremble!” said Beatrice. “Are you cold? Are you afraid?” She was trembling herself, but it was with excitement and impatience. Monica did not answer, and Beatrice moved a little away. She was too restless to stand still. Monica did not miss her. A storm was sweeping over her soul—one of those storms that only perhaps come once in a life-time, and that leave indelible traces behind them. It seemed to her as if all her life long she had been waiting for this [30]hour—as if everything in her past life had been but leading up to it. [30] Had she not known from her earliest childhood that some day this beautiful, terrible, pitiless sea was to do her some deadly injury—to wreck her life and leave her desolate? Ay she had known it always—and now—had the hour come? Not in articulate words did Monica ask this question. It came as a sort of voiceless cry from the depths of her heart. She did not think, she did not reason—she only stood quite still, her hands closely clasped, her white face turned towards the sea, with a mute, stricken look of pain that yet expressed but a tithe of the bitter pain at her heart. But during those few minutes, that seemed a life-time to her, the battle had [31]been fought out and the victory won. The old calmness had come back to her. She had not faced this hour all her life to be a coward now. [31]
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