XV
Inthe hastened preparations for the wedding, Fanny Price came over to give her help. She and Diane directed the cards of invitation, and sorted out and arranged the presents that were to be displayed to the few intimates who could now witness the ceremony.
“You certainly have some lovely things,” was Fanny’s comment; “but it’s strange, isn’t it, the way people’s minds seem to run to oyster-forks? You’ve got eighteen dozen.”
Diane laughed.
“At least I can serve oysters! Here’s a beautiful fish-knife and fork, too. Perhaps they connect us with things from the sea because Arthur’s going to sail so soon!”
“I should think you were going to marry Neptune. Here are some fish-plates!”
“They ought to have added something especially for the expedition!”
Fanny occupied herself in arranging the silver.
“Aren’t you a little afraid of it, Diane? The thought of that frozen solitude frightens me. I’ve no courage!”
Diane made no immediate reply, and Fanny,giving her a sidelong look, discovered that she had stopped work and was looking out of the window with an absent air, her face quite colorless. The girl’s heart beat fast with a sensation almost of anger. She was sure, with her keen, girlish insight into such things, that at the moment Diane was thinking, not of Faunce, but of Overton.
Fanny’s heart leaped up in defense of her hero. She remembered him at her own fireside, with no eyes, no thought, for any one except Diane. She made a deliberate tinkle in spreading out more spoons and ladles.
“I should think he would hate to go. I’m sure he does, at heart—because of Overton,” she said a little sharply. “He loved Overton so much that I know he’ll feel it when he follows again in the same trail. He can’t help it!”
Diane turned slowly and resumed her own task of undoing endless packages.
“I thought, at first, he wouldn’t go,” she admitted quietly in a colorless voice; “but then something seemed to draw him back. I suppose it’s the lure of the pole. And I—I felt he had to go to finish the work.”
“But it wasn’t his work!”
“You mean——”
“It’s Overton’s. When he’s done it, he won’t get the credit of it. It’ll be finishing the work of Overton’s expedition, won’t it?”
“I—I suppose it will, in a way.”
Fanny laid down some teaspoons.
“You’ve got thirty-six dozen spoons and two soup-ladles. Yes, it’ll be finishing Overton’s work.” She looked up and met Diane’s eyes squarely. “Is that why you wanted him to go?”
Diane colored deeply, working hard at the knotted ribbon on another bundle.
“I hadn’t thought of it in that way, Fanny. I wanted Arthur Faunce to be something more than a—a second in the expedition. When a man is as great as Overton was, he overshadows everything.”
“I don’t see how you can feel that way when Mr. Faunce is so great himself. I don’t believe you really see it as it is, Di!”
“Oh, yes, I do! But then it wouldn’t do for me to say so much, would it?”
Fanny reflected.
“I think I should, if I were you,” she replied stubbornly.
Diane smiled.
“There’s one thing I’ve always loved in you, Fanny, and that’s your loyalty to your friends.”
“Oh, I get that from papa. It’s inherited, and hasn’t any original virtue. I’ve always said that papa would stick up for Satan himself if he happened to be an old acquaintance!”
It gave Diane a feeling of relief to laugh.
“I’m so glad,” she remarked, after a pause, which they spent in arranging the gifts, “that it’syour father who is going to marry us, Fan! I should hate to have a stranger do it. It seems to bring us all so close together, because I know your father loves us.”
“He loves you,” retorted Fanny with unconscious emphasis. “Diane, do you ever think about your father? What will he do when you’re away? Sometimes it seems so strange that we younger ones go off and make our lives as if they hadn’t mothered and fathered us so long.”
“It’s like birds going out of the nest, isn’t it, Fanny? I suppose it’s the law of life—what the scientists call evolution. But I do think of father. I hate to leave him. I shouldn’t leave him, if I didn’t know he would be well cared for. You know old Martha understands just how to cook for him. She knows what he likes better than I do—better, I think, than mama used to know; and old Henry takes care of him as faithfully as Dr. Gerry does. Besides, you’re all so near. It seems to me as if he would be better off. Arthur and I are going into a new land—a land of mist and mirage. I feel”—she was looking across at Fanny without seeming to see her—“that I am indeed setting out on a long journey. I’m taking with me the man who loves me; but I’m not sure—I’m not at all sure what’s beyond the soft, impalpable cloud that hangs like a veil just above the open sea of my dreams!”
Fanny was silent. After a moment Diane turnedand went on with her work; but, as she picked up another package, she added in a more natural tone:
“Why don’t you answer me, Fan? Don’t you understand?”
“Yes, I think I do; but if I were you, I’m certain that I should know. I mean, if I were going to marry the man I loved, I’d be sure that the sun was shining behind that cloud!”
Diane slowly and carefully unwrapped the tissue that enclosed an ancient Venetian vase. It was a beautiful thing in design and workmanship, but she made no comment on its perfection as she set it carefully down on the table.
“But I’m not sure,” she confessed softly.
Fanny had now reached the limit of her endurance, and her silence left Diane free to pursue her own train of thought. It was this, perhaps, which led her, later on, to her talk with her father.