Beatrice looked at the
question more from the scriptural point of view, remembering that in
the Bible such fine divisions are expressly stated to be distinctions
without a difference.
Had she gone to Geoffrey and told him her whole story it is probable
that he would have defied the conspiracy, faced it out, and possibly
come off victorious. But, with that deadly reticence of which women
alone are capable, this she did not and would not do. Sweet loving woman
that she was, she would not burden him with her sorrows, she would bear
them alone--little reckoning that thereby she was laying up a far, far
heavier load for him to carry through all his days.
So Beatrice accepted the statements of the plaintiff's attorney for
gospel truth, and from that false standpoint she drew her auguries.
Oh, she was weary! How lovely was the falling night, see how it brooded
on the seas! and how clear were the waters--there a fish passed by her
paddle--and there the first start sprang into the sky! If only Geoffrey
were here to see it with her. Geoffrey! she had lost him; she was alone
in the world now--alone with the sea and the stars.
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