CHAPTERIX.

He shook his head.“No—on land. He was hunting—it must have been the very hunt we were talking about—and wandered from his party. A fog came on, and they were unable to find him. Lopez telegraphs that they sent out search parties for a fortnight, but could find no trace.”He longed for a word from her, but none came.“At last they abandoned hope,” he concluded. “The expedition is now on its way home.”She had turned her back upon him, and he waited in misery to hear her sob, to see her shoulders shake with her weeping; but, instead, the whole figure seemed to stiffen, and, wheeling round, she faced him with blazing eyes.“The cowards!” she cried. “To abandon a man to starvation! What are they made of to do such a barbarous thing!”“We must not judge them unheard,” Stephen ventured. “Their search may have been exhaustive—they may have risked their own lives gladly—and you know,” he added, gently, “that beyond a certain time it would have been useless from the standpoint of saving life.”“It was inhuman to sail away and leave him,” she went on, beating her hands together in a sort of rage. “How can you defend them! You, who sent him off on this horrible journey—how can you sleep in your bed when you know Simeon in perishing by inches! I should think you would be on your way now—this moment—to search for him! Oh, do something—don’t just accept it in this awful way. Haven’t you any pity?” Unconsciously she laid her hand on his shoulder, as if she would push him from the room.Stephen bore her reproaches with a meekness that exasperated her.“Are there no cables to Magellan?” she asked. “There must be somebody there who for money would do your bidding. Don’t waste time,” she answered, stamping her foot.Stephen kept his temper. Perhaps he was shrewd enough to see that it was pity rather than love that gave the fierceness to her mood. It was the frenzy of a tender-hearted woman at hearing of an act of cruelty rather than the agony of one who suffers a personal bereavement.“Deena,” he said, not even knowing he had used her name, “do you really want me to go on this hopeless errand? Think of its utter uselessness—the time that has elapsed, the impossibility of penetrating into such a country in the advancing winter. It is the first of February, and I could not get there before March; it would be already their autumn. By this time he has either reached help or he is beyond it.”At the beginning of his speech Deena’s pale face flushed, but as he went on setting forth the obstacles to his going she seemed to harden in her scorn.“Oh, yes,” she sneered. “Let him die! It is cold in Patagonia for a gently nurtured person like Mr. French. Simeon is poor in friends—he only had one besides his wife, and that one is a fair-weather friend. But I’ll go—I am not afraid of privation. I’ll entreat the Argentine Government for help—I’ll make friends with the Indians—I’ll——”“Hush,” he said, “you have said enough—I will go.”Having gained her point, she burst into tears.“I am cruel,” she said, “selfishly cruel to you, who have been so good to me—but whom can I turn to except to you? How can we abandon Simeon without raising a finger to save him? Say you forgive me.”He held out his hand in mute acquiescence. Her sneers had stung him to the quick, but her appeal to his manhood for help in her distress moved him deeply.“Perhaps,” she went on, half to herself, “perhaps if I had been a better wife—if I had loved him more, I could bear it better—but it is so pitiful. He has always been alone in life, and now he is dying alone.”Stephen, who was pacing the floor, tried not to listen. He knew she was not thinking of him when she was confessing her shortcomings to her own conscience, but the admission that she felt herself lacking in love to Simeon filled him with a deep joy. He did not dare to linger.“I am going,” he said, gently. “Good-by, Deena. Will you pray God to send you back the man who loves you?”She stood staring at him dumb with misery, but as the door shut between them a cry of anguish burst from her very soul.“Come back!” she cried. “Oh, Stephen, come back! I can’t bear it! I can’tlet you go! Don’t you know I love you?—and I have sent you off to die!”She knew that he had gone—that her appeal was to the empty air, and she flung herself on the sofa in a frenzy of sobs. But the cry reached Stephen in the hall, where he stood battling with himself against his yearning for one more look, one more word to carry with him, and at the sound his resolution melted like wax in the flame of his passion. With a bound he was back in the room, on his knees beside her, soothing her with tenderest endearments—pouring out the fullness of his love.“Must I go, Deena?” he pleaded. “Must I leave you when I know you love me? And for what?—a search for the dead!”At his words her conscience woke with a stab of shame.“Yes, go!” she said. “Go quickly. A moment ago I sent you in the name of compassion; now I send you in expiation for this one intolerable glimpse of Heaven.”Stephen, eager to do her bidding, went straight to Mrs. Star’s house to take leave of the only person to whom he owed the obligations of family affection, and found that redoubtable lady on a sofa in her dressing room. In answer to his expressions of regret at this intimation of invalidism, she gave an angry groan.“Oh, yes!” she said. “Our medical friend has succeeded in providing another doctor with as pretty a case of water-on-the-knee—to say nothing of other complications—as he could desire. My only comfort is, he didn’t get the charge himself.”“But you have seen a specialist, surely?” exclaimed French, who feared her hatred of physicians might have prevented her calling in proper aid.“Don’t distress yourself,” she answered. “McTorture has me fast in his clutches; and for how long do you suppose? Two months! He will promise nothing short of two months, and even then objects to my going abroad, and the yacht ready to start this very week! I am waiting for Bob to come into lunch, to get him to send for the sailing master and break the news to him. He’ll be a disappointed man!”“I will take the yacht off your hands,” said Stephen, casually.“You!” she exclaimed. “Are you running awayfromorwithanybody, that you suddenly annex an ocean steamer? You were prosing only yesterday afternoon about work and duty, as if nothing could separate you from Harmouth. Is the attraction going to bolt with you, Stevie?”Stephen could have killed her as she lay there, allowing her tongue free play with his most intimate concerns, but the respect due to an old woman, to say nothing of an aunt, restrained his anger, and he answered, coldly:“If you want to get rid of the yacht for the rest of the year, say so. My friend, Simeon Ponsonby, is lost in the wilderness of Patagonia, and I am organizing a party to search for him. I shall have to resign my work at Harmouth, but I feel responsible for poor Ponsonby’s fate; I sent him on the expedition.”“Ah! did you?” she said, laughing wickedly. “Poor Uriah has been disposed of, and now the lady sends you to look for his bones. Don’t look too hard, Stevie, you might find he wasn’t lost, after all!”“Stop!” cried French, springing to his feet. “How dare you make a jest of other people’s misfortunes? Is there so little decency among your associates that you no longer recognize it when you see it?”She had the grace to look ashamed.“Take the yacht, my dear,” she said, kindly, “and if the expense is too great for your income, you can draw on me for what you like. Can’t you stand a little teasing from your old aunt?”“I will take the yacht, and pay for it,” said French. “As for the teasing, we seem to have different ideas about what is amusing.”“Then forgive me,” she pleaded, and there were tears in her eyes, “and be careful of yourself, my dear boy, in thisdismal expedition. Take plenty of furs, and beware of the cannibals.”She won a smile from him as he bent over her sofa to kiss her good-by, but she reserved further comments upon his errantry for Bob.“Quixotic nonsense!” she declared. “Was there ever a man so wise that a woman couldn’t make a fool of him?”CHAPTERIX.Could there be a crueler irony of fate than to be absolutely convinced of the widowhood of her you love and to be unable, practically, to establish the fact?Stephen French had expatriated himself, resigned the work he valued, put the seas between himself and Deena, only to be baffled at every turn. For two months he had used his utmost acumen in prosecuting the search without even finding a clew, and when finally he made his great discovery, it was by yielding to the impulse of the moment rather than the suggestions of reason.From March to May Mrs. Star’s great ocean-going yacht had steamed along the southeastern shores of Patagonia. Sometimes within the confines of the Straits, sometimes rounding its headlands into the Atlantic, and dropping anchor wherever the line of coast gave any facility for landing an exploring party, until the hopelessness of the quest was patent to everybody except Stephen.On his way down he had stopped at Buenos Ayres, where he provided himself with the charts and surveys made by the newly returned expedition, and secured Simeon’s personal effects left on theTintoretto, together with his diary, scientific memoranda and specimens, which had been carefully preserved, and were of rare value, from a botanist’s point of view.French was fortunate enough to induce both Lopez and the captain of theTintorettoto accompany him as guests, and they proved invaluable allies, especially the captain, whose topographical knowledge and recent experience were always to be relied upon. From him Stephen learned all the particulars of Simeon’s disappearance, though the last home letter dispatched by the poor fellow, on the eve of the guanaco hunt, covered the first part of the story. It appeared that Ponsonby had landed with a surveying party from the ship, one morning in January, on the Patagonian side of the Straits, and set out to botanize while his companions worked. He had climbed a steep bank, in order to secure a particular shrub just in flower, when he saw on the plain beyond a party of Indians gathered by the shore of a small, fresh-water lake. Most of them were watering their horses, but half a dozen were grouped round a man lying on the ground, apparently injured. Their sharp eyes quickly marked Simeon filling his vasculum with the coveted specimens, and, waving their hands in friendly greeting, two of them advanced at a gallop. One spoke fairly good Spanish, and explained that the son of their chief had broken his leg by a fall from his horse, and he begged Simeon—whom he conceived, from his occupation of gathering simples, to be a medicine man—to come to their assistance.Simeon’s own Spanish was too poor to undeceive them, but, thinking he might be of some use, he went back with them, and rigged out a set of splints, that made it possible to carry the young man to their encampment, about a mile away. In gratitude for his services, they accompanied him to the ship on his return, mounting him on one of their horses and forming a bodyguard round him. It was then that they proposed the guanaco hunt to the officers of the ship; their own visit to the Straits being simply in pursuit of game.The morning of the hunt the captain described as unusually warm for that region, even in January, and not particularly clear; there was a haze that was just not a fog. The Indians met them about a mile back from the shore, bringing a dozen extra horses for their guests. The quietest beast was selected for Ponsonby, but its docility was so questionable, and the rider’s inexperience so evident, that the captain persuadedhim to give up the chase, and content himself with a ride to the encampment to inquire about his patient. The last ever seen of him he was sitting on horseback watching the departing hunt.Guanacos in large numbers had been seen on the plains to the northwest, whereas the Indian camp lay to the northeast, and Ponsonby’s route was widely divergent to that of the hunters. All that was known is that he never reached the encampment; perhaps he mistook the trail, and, having left his compass in his cabin, had no means of ascertaining his direction—or perhaps his horse became unmanageable and bolted, carrying him far inland; at all events, his chance without a compass was poor, for a tremendous rain came on, which lasted for three days, leadening the sky to an even gray, with no mark of setting or rising sun.At the end of four days the horse he had ridden came into camp riderless; its saddle had been removed, probably by Simeon, to make a pillow at night, and its whole appearance bespoke long travel. For a fortnight the ship’s company and the Indians scoured the country seeking him. They sent up rockets at night, and lighted fires on the hilltops by day; they wearied themselves and the tireless Indians, and at last, knowing the limits of human endurance in a case like Ponsonby’s, they gave up in despair.All these incidents formed the main topics of conversation in the long evenings in the saloon of the yacht. In addition to Señor Lopez and the captain of theTintoretto, Stephen had secured the services of a young physician with a taste for adventure, and his own sailing master was a person of intelligence, so that the little party brought a variety of experience to the councils held on board ship or round the camp fire when their search carried them so far inland that it was impossible to return to the yacht at night. Several times, accompanied by Pecheray guides, they had been gone for ten days at a time, but never found a trace of the lost man. There was the faint possibility that he had been found and cared for by wandering Indians, but what was far more likely was that French might stumble upon the spot where he died. Even in that land of beasts and birds of prey something would be left in evidence.The daylight hours were now so few that little could be accomplished, and the cold was becoming severe. A violent snowstorm on the fifteenth of May decided French to give up the search and go home. Accordingly, they steamed out of the Straits of Magellan and turned the vessel northward, keeping as near the Patagonian shore as was prudent, in the hope of sighting canoes.They had been steaming in this direction for about three hours, going slowly and keeping a sharp outlook toward the land, when the captain called French’s attention to an opening in the coast line, where the Gallegos River empties into the sea. An impulse—perhaps it might more truly be called an inspiration—induced French to order the yacht brought to anchor in the bay. Although the shore seemed deserted, several canoes filled with Indians immediately put out for the yacht, as was, indeed, their invariable custom. The boats were large, capable of holding six or eight people in the two ends, while in the middle was the inevitable clay hearth, on which smoldered the fire of hemlock. As they approached the yacht, the Indians began begging for rum and tobacco, some by gestures and some in apatois, in which Spanish and Indian words were strangely blended; and French, whose policy was always to secure their good will, invited them on board and ordered the steward to bring spirits and tobacco, and also a plentiful supply of ship biscuit and sweets.The men were of medium size, and not bad looking, and for the most part dressed in loose-fitting mantles ofguanacoskins, stained bright red. In spite of the cold, this one garment was their only protection, and even this they would offer in exchange for rum. Knowing their customs, French was astonished to find the first man who stepped on board wearing the coat of civilization under his mantle, and hisastonishment gave way to alarm when he recognized an old checked cutaway of Simeon’s, which had done service for many a winter at Harmouth, and was as unmistakable as the features of its lost owner. While Stephen stared—too agitated to find a word of Spanish—-the Indian tossed off half a tumbler of raw whisky at a gulp and, drawing from the pocket of poor Simeon’s coat a silver flask, he presented it to the steward to be filled with the same genial fluid. The flask was Stephen’s parting gift to Simeon, and marked with his name.The excitement now became intense, for the Indians declared that the owner of the coat was alive, and the one who was wearing it, and who seemed to exercise some authority over the others, began an explanation in signs. He pointed to a cliff that overhung the stony beach at the mouth of the river, and, lifting his hand high above his head; brought it down with a violent gesture, as if to simulate a fall. He next motioned toward the canoes, talking volubly all the while, though his language was unintelligible to anyone except the captain of theTintoretto, who picked out a word here and there.The tribes of the Straits of Magellan and the adjacent coasts vary greatly in their characteristics; some have the impassive bearing we associate with the Indian, and some are imitative, reproducing sounds and gestures with surprising exactness.It was not difficult to guess that Simeon had fallen over the cliff and been found by the Indians, who are always skirting the shore in their canoes, and the Spanish captain made out that he was now in one of their boats higher up the river. When the Indian was asked whether he would guide them to the place, he hesitated until bribed by rum and provisions, and then he agreed to go in his own canoe and bring Simeon to the yacht, where the exchange was to be effected. Why he hesitated remained a mystery, unless Ponsonby’s knowledge of herbs had made him of value to the tribe.French immediately ordered the various tins and boxes, containing the supply of food promised, to be placed conspicuously on the deck as an earnest of his honesty in the barter, and when a small keg of rum was added, the satisfaction was complete; four or five Indians followed their leader into his canoe and paddled up the river.They were gone so long—over three hours—that French began to curse his folly in trusting them, and he was about to follow them up in the launch, when he saw their canoe coming round a bend in the stream. At the first glance it seemed filled with Indians only, and it was not until it was actually alongside that he detected a mummy-like form lying in the stern, which he guessed to be Simeon.Half a dozen sturdy arms made the transfer, by means of a hammock, from the canoe to the yacht, and Simeon, alive but quite unconscious, was laid on the deck. He had probably been subjected by the removal to more pain than in his enfeebled condition he could bear, and it required long and patient exertion on the part of the doctor before he was revived from his syncope.His condition was pitiable; from an injury to the spine he was a helpless cripple, while the arm which had been broken in his fall had knit in a way to render it perfectly useless. He was fearfully emaciated, probably from the lack of palatable food, and his expression was vacant.French gave up his own deck cabin, the most commodious in size, and before another hour had passed Simeon was lying in a comfortable bed, clean, warm, devotedly tended, but apparently dying.For forty-eight hours they kept the yacht within the shelter of the river, fearing the effect of motion on that feeble flame of life, but the warmth and nourishment soon began to tell, and on the third day he recognized French, and tried to murmur some words of gratitude and pleasure.That night Stephen called the doctor into his own room and shut the door. He wanted to put a very simple question, one which might have been asked anywhere out of Simeon’s hearing, andyet the effort seemed almost beyond his powers.“Can he live?”The words came in such a hoarse, unnatural voice that the doctor, a sensitive man, feared to deal the blow of truth. This was a very marvel of friendship; like the love of David and Jonathan, it passed the love of women.The doctor temporized. Mr. Ponsonby had rallied wonderfully; his constitution was much stronger than he had been given to understand; it was rather soon to give a definite opinion, but——Here Stephen interrupted him.“Great God, man! Can’t you answer a plain question. Yes or no?”The doctor drew himself up and, to quote his own language, “let him have it straight.”“If he lives to get home it will be a good deal more than I expect of him.”French nodded toward the door, and turned his back.That night he relieved the doctor’s watch by sitting up with his friend, and, having given him his broth at midnight, was almost dozing in his chair when a whisper from Simeon roused him. The sound was so faint, he held his breath to listen.“Stephen, I want to see Deena.”French’s heart began thumping like the screw of his yacht. How he thanked God that he could look his friend in the face as he answered:“So you shall, old man; just as quickly as steam can carry you to her.”A look of satisfaction came into the tired eyes.“It will be a race with death,” he said, “but perhaps—thank you, Stephen.” And he fell asleep.CHAPTERX.With Deena the spring moved drearily. Her position was strangely anomalous; she was neither wife nor widow, without the right to be glad or sad—only dumbly wretched. She could not mourn for a husband who might be living, nor could she ignore the fact that he might be dead, and all the while that parting scene with Stephen burned into her conscience like a brand.She shut herself up with Polly and the baby, and hardly went out of the house while she remained in New York. Love for the child crept deep into her heart and soothed her into patience when all else failed.In May the house in Harmouth returned to her keeping, the lease having expired, and she left the Sixty-fifth Street household with reluctance to take up her old life. In the great city she had been but a human atom. Her conduct, her unhappiness, her very existence mattered to no one there, except, perhaps, to Ben and Polly, who were as tender and sympathetic as such vigorous people could be; but in Harmouth every creature was interested in Simeon’s fate, and watched Deena with a curiosity she found maddening.She felt herself the main topic of conversation; she never approached two people talking in the street that they didn’t break off in guilty confusion, and comments upon her mode of dressing and daily occupations were continually repeated to her in the form of censure. Her own family were especially out of touch, for their assumption that she mourned her husband as Polly would have done made her feel like an impostor. They did not give her much of their company, for their newly found fortune made them even more self-centered than their misfortunes. Dicky was the exception; perhaps because he had started in life hard as nails, and so couldn’t grow any harder. At all events, Deena thought she discerned a reluctant affection in his greeting that was infinitely flattering.Stephen wrote whenever he could catch the Chilian mail boats on their way through the Straits. His letters were those of a man under the strong hand of restraint; admirable letters, that filled her with respect for him and shame at her own craving for “one word more.”On the twenty-fifth of May she had a cable that changed the face of events. It was from Montevideo.Have found Simeon. Desperately ill. On our way home.S. French.The news spread over the town like wildfire. The local paper issued an extra; a thing it had not done since the assassination of Mr. McKinley. As soon as Harmouth knew Mrs. Ponsonby’s exact status it became distinctly friendly. People are helpful by instinct, and offers of neighborly assistance poured in from all sides.Deena left nothing undone that could, by anticipation, add to Simeon’s comfort. His room was ready, a nurse engaged, and all the paraphernalia belonging to the care of the sick collected long before the time due for his arrival. She counted upon seeing him four weeks from the date of the cable. The regular trip of the mail boats between Rio and New York is twenty days; from Montevideo two days more; to that must be added another day to reach Boston, and she was warned that a yacht would go more slowly than a large steamer; she therefore concluded the third week in June would bring them.The lot of women is to wait, and they do it under a pressure of nervous strain that makes it slow torture. No turn of fortune could have surprised Deena at this crisis, for her imagination had pictured every possibility.When a summer storm blackened the sky she saw the yacht tempest-tossed and sinking, driven before a tropical cyclone; when the sun shone, she fancied it sailing gayly into port with Simeon restored to health, expecting to find her as he left her—the willing slave, the careful housewife—and she shivered and went pale at the thought; and then in a revulsion of feeling she saw him dying, and she was ready to cast herself at his feet, and tell him all—how she had tried to do right, how she had struggled against her love for Stephen. Perhaps he would have mercy upon her and let her go away, all by herself, to wrestle with her heart.She couldn’t eat; she couldn’t sleep. She grew so wan and thin she was like a ghost of her old self.Her mother said:“My dear, you must stop fretting. I am sure, under the care of that clever young doctor Mr. French took down, and with the comforts of the yacht, your husband will be quite himself by the time he gets home.”And her father added:“You must not be so impatient, Deena; it is mighty nasty sailing through West Indian waters, and a boat of that size doesn’t carry enough fuel for a prolonged voyage; they will have to stop for coal somewhere on their way up.”She was growing irritable under her dread. Like Elisha, she longed to silence them with the answer:“I know it; hold ye your peace.”The middle of June had passed, the fourth week of the voyage had begun, and now any day, any hour, might bring news. Deena’s anxiety had made such inroads into her health that her father took alarm and called in her old friend Dr. Hassan, and he, wise man, gave her a sedative and ordered her to bed, though the afternoon was still young.It was the first long sleep she had had for weeks, and the refreshment came at the time of her direst need, for at daybreak the summons roused her. She waked with a beating heart; wheels stopped in the street, her gate clicked, there were footsteps coming up her path—bold, hurried steps; they reached the veranda—the bell pealed.She sprang from her bed, huddling her dressing gown round her as she ran, and, slipping back the heavy, old-fashioned bolts of the front door, she stood face to face with Stephen.If she were pale, he was paler; his blood seemed turned to ice that summer morning.“The yacht is at Wolfshead,” he said. “How soon can you be ready? We must go by rail—I have a special waiting for you.”A glow from the first blush of day caught her as she stood in the frame of the doorway. She was like a mediæval saint, with her hair wound in a crown about her head, her blue gown fallingin stately fold, and her bare feet showing under the hem of her nightgown. In spite of her seeming calm, her eyes blazed with excitement.To French she seemed something holy and apart—as if those bare feet rested on a crescent, and the shadows of the old hall were floating clouds. He had schooled himself during his hurried journey, in order to meet her without emotion, but she was her own protection; to have touched her would have seemed sacrilege. Her lips tried to frame the question that consumed her with its terrors.“Simeon——” she began, but her voice failed.Stephen’s haggard eyes softened.“He is dying,” he said. “But there is time—perhaps to-day—perhaps to-morrow. His force of will has kept him alive to see you—he has cared more than you knew.”She gave a little sob, and turned toward the staircase. Halfway up she stopped.“I forgot to ask you to come in,” she said, “or whether you want anything I can get you? But it doesn’t matter, does it? All that matters is to do Simeon’s bidding. I shall be very quick.”In an incredibly short time she was back, fully dressed, and carrying a bag, into which she had thrust what was indispensable to her comfort for another day. She waked the servant, left a message for her father, and then she and Stephen went out into the street, so gay with early sunlight and twittering birds, so bare of human traffic. At first a strange shyness kept her dumb; she longed to ask a thousand things, but the questions that rose to her lips seemed susceptible of misunderstanding, and Stephen’s aloofness frightened her. Did he think, she wondered, that she could forget her duty to Simeon at such a moment, that he surrounded himself with this impenetrable reserve? And all the time he was regarding her with a passionate reverence that shamed him into silence.At the railway station their train was waiting—the locomotive hissing its impatience; they got into the car, for there was but one, and in a moment were flying seaward. A man—the steward of the yacht—was busy at the far end of the car with a cooking apparatus, and the aroma of coffee came intoxicatingly to her nostrils. She remembered she had eaten nothing since her early dinner the day before, and she was exhausted with excitement, and then she despised herself for thinking of her physical needs when Simeon lay dying. It was fortunate that French had taken a saner view of the situation, for the coffee was just what was needed to restore her equipoise.She began to understand the delicacy of her companion’s conduct, and the simplicity of the whole situation when stripped of morbidness. The only thing that behooved her was to soothe her husband’s last hours on earth—to give out the tenderness of a pitying heart. As her common sense asserted itself she began plying Stephen with the questions that had seemed so impossible half an hour before—would Simeon know her—could he bear conversation—was he changed in appearance—had he suffered beyond relief? She demanded the whole story of his rescue and of the voyage home. She was gentle, womanly, infinitely sweet. By the time they reached their destination all constraint was gone; they were two comrades absorbed in a common interest, for Simeon occupied their every thought.There was a narrow pier at Wolfshead, sheltered by a point of rocky shore that made a landing for small boats in good weather, and there the steam launch was waiting with its two trim sailors and its gaudy flag. The yacht was anchored about a mile from shore—her graceful outlines clearly defined against the ocean’s blue. If the purity of her white paint had suffered in the long voyage it was not apparent—red and white awnings were stretched over the deck. All looked hospitably gay. Once more Deena shrank into herself, the brilliant scene mocked the tragedy within.All too quickly they crossed the intervening water; they were on the deck—in the saloon. She was trembling soshe could hardly stand, and Stephen put her into a comfortable chair and left her, while he made her coming known. She hardly glanced at the luxurious fittings of the charming room; her eyes were fixed on the door, dreading, yet impatient, for the message.A small, sensitive-looking man came toward her and introduced himself.“I am Dr. Miles,” he said, “Mr. Ponsonby’s physician, and, if you will allow me, I will take you to him now. There is no question of saving his strength, Mrs. Ponsonby. We have been nursing what is left to him for days, in order that he could lavish it in this interview with you. Don’t try to curb him; let him have his say.”She followed him to a deck cabin almost under the bridge, and stood for a moment at the threshold, to make sure of her composure. There was a narrow brass bed, a chest of drawers, a washstand, and close to the bed a wicker chair, with silk cushions, was drawn up, as if in expectation of a guest. The head of the bed was toward her, so that she couldn’t see Simeon’s face, but he heard the rustle of skirts, and called her name, and she made a step forward and sank on her knees beside him.“Oh, Simeon,” she gasped, “how you have suffered! I am so sorry!”He moved his hand feebly and patted her shoulder, and she, in a passion of pity, carried it to her lips. For the first time she ventured to look at him. Was this Simeon! She would have passed him in a hospital ward as an utter stranger, so completely was he changed. He had discarded his spectacles, and his eyes were dull and faded; pain had robbed them of that expression of concentrated wisdom she knew so well. He wore a short, curling beard and mustache, and his clothing, supplied from Stephen’s wardrobe, was luxurious; it was silk, of a faint color between blue and gray, and the handkerchief, protruding from the pocket, was delicately fine. Extreme neatness was characteristic of Simeon, but he disliked anything florid in dress or appearance, anything opposed to the austere simplicity that marked his manner of living. She wondered whether such things mattered to him now.He noticed her start of surprise as her eyes met his, and fancied she was shocked by the ravages of illness, for he said, with a touch of his old irritation:“Didn’t they tell you I was dying? Are you afraid to be left alone with me? You used to be a courageous person, Deena.”The querulousness with which he began the sentence melted into a rallying smile.“Oh, no,” she said, “I am not afraid. I am too sorry to be frightened.”“There is a bell, in case you want to summon the doctor,” he continued, “but I should rather talk to you alone. I have been very homesick for you, and for the old house—sometimes the longing has been most acute—and then the anxiety of leaving you poorly provided for has been part of my distress. If I could have lived a few years more this would have been obviated, and possibly, even now, my book will add something to your income.” He made a visible effort to speak clearly. “Now, in regard to your future support; I have a life insurance of ten thousand dollars, and securities to about the same amount—and then, of course, the house. This is all I have been able to save, though I have cut our living down to bare necessities. You have been of great assistance to me, Deena—without you life would have had little flavor, but sometimes I fear that in the desire to provide for your future I was not considerate enough of your present. I ought to have been more mindful that young people need pleasure. You will have to forgive that and many other mistakes.” He looked at her almost wistfully.Deena’s tears came, dripping plentifully over her clasped hands.“It is I who should ask forgiveness,” she said, humbly, remembering how often she had scorned his economies. “The money is more than I shall need—don’t think of it again, Simeon. Isn’t there anything you want to tell me about your work—your book?”His face lit up eagerly—the topic was congenial.“My papers are safe,” he said. “All the initial work of classification and description that I did on theTintorettois in French’s keeping, and he and Sinclair—the man who has my place—are going to edit the book. We have had a great deal of talk about it on the way up, whenever I had a fairly quiet day. It is idle to try to put into words what I owe French.”“And he feels nothing but self-reproach for having urged you to go,” said Deena, faintly. “Not that anyone could have foreseen the miserable outcome.”“It isn’t miserable!” Simeon answered, almost fiercely. “In many respects it is all that I hoped. I have made a name for myself—there will not be a scientific library in the world without my book, when once it is issued. People have died for lesser achievements than that.” And then he added, more gently: “Not that it could be considered as an achievement without French’s aid.”His mind could not detach itself from its debt of gratitude, for he suddenly broke out in passionate eulogy.“He has sacrificed everything to me—his ambitions—his time—his comfort—his money, though that is the last thing he would begrudge, but you have no idea what it costs to run one of those large yachts! It must have made an inroad even in his large fortune. He has been a friend indeed!”Deena turned away her face; it was hard for her to praise Stephen, although her heart echoed her husband’s words.“He has high ideals in friendship as in everything else,” she answered, “but you must remember, Simeon, that the thought of your sufferings agonized us at home. Who could have abandoned you to such a fate? It makes me sick to think of it!”A sort of shiver passed over him, while he said, simply:“It was all in the day’s work. French ran the same risks, only with better luck.” Presently he added:“I feel tired, Deena—and a little oppressed. Perhaps you had better ring the bell—but stay. Will you kiss me before you ring?”She kissed him with a pity that wrung her heart, and he sighed contentedly and shut his eyes. He only spoke once more, just as the doctor came to his bedside.“I should have been glad to see the old house before I die, but it is just as well as it is.”He was dying all the afternoon, peacefully and gently, and at sunset the end came.CHAPTERXI.Master Richard Shelton sat at the foot of his sister’s table dispensing its hospitalities chiefly to himself. Through some law unknown to science, all dishes seemed to gravitate toward the main center of Dicky’s trencher, thereby leaving the rest of the table comparatively bare.For eighteen months Master Shelton had given Mrs. Ponsonby the advantage of his company; not so much through volition—albeit, he was well enough pleased with his quarters—as through submission to paternal authority.Conventional ideas are apt to wilt under the blight of poverty, and to revive under the fuller harvesting of this world’s goods, and Mr. Shelton, Sr., who had, in the days of his leanness, let Polly run wild with all the college boys of Harmouth, became suddenly particular, as his bank account fattened, in regard to the niceties of conduct in his daughters. His scruples even embraced Deena; he said she was too young a widow to live alone, and a blank sight too handsome, and that either she must return to the protection of his roof or else receive her brother under her own. With the docility of the intelligent, she accepted his fiat, but chose the evil represented by a unit rather than by the sum total of family companionship.So she and Dicky had lived together since the day when Simeon had been laid to rest beside his mother in the churchyard, and Deena had taken up life with such courage as she could muster in the old house. She had startedout with a long illness, as the result of overtaxed nerves, and the nurse who had been engaged for Simeon found ample employment with Simeon’s widow; but a good constitution and a quiet mind are excellent helps toward recovery, and by September she found herself in admirable health.Stephen’s energies had been absorbed in editing Simeon’s book. He had the assistance of the botanical department of Harmouth, and the book was produced in a manner which would have given poor Ponsonby infinite pleasure. French spared no expense, especially in the color drawings from Simeon’s photographs and specimens, which were exceptionally valuable. The printing was done in Boston, and Stephen was there much of the time. During Deena’s illness he was glad of an excuse to be near enough to get daily reports of her progress, but as she became strong and resumed the routine of living, so that intercourse became unavoidable, he found the strain of silence more than he could bear. He resigned his professorship permanently, and went abroad, making the book his excuse. He wished to see that it was properly heralded by both English and Continental scientific periodicals, and he preferred to attend to it himself. To say that Deena missed him but feebly expresses the void his going made in her life, but, knowing her own heart, and suspecting the state of his, she was glad to be spared his presence in these early days of widowhood, and could not but approve his decision.Dicky’s society was hardly calculated to stifle her longings for higher things, for his conduct called for constant repression. At first he had nearly driven her wild by his prying interest in what did not concern him, his way of unmasking her secret thoughts, his powers of seeing round corners, if not through sealed envelopes, but as time went on she grew fond of his honest boy-nature, and learned to laugh at his precocious acuteness. Perhaps with Stephen’s departure there were fewer occasions for her to resent the challenge of his intrusive eye. There were, also, alleviations coincident with the school year, for then she was free from his company from the time he slammed the front door, at five minutes to nine, till he returned at two, ravenous for dinner.On the particular morning indicated at the beginning of the chapter, the season was the late autumn—the clock was pointing ominously near nine—the lady opposite to Master Shelton looked more beautiful than ever in her widow’s weeds. Dicky conveyed half a sausage and a wedge of buttered toast to the sustenance of boyhood before he asked—with some difficulty, if the truth were confessed:“May I take a bunch of grapes to school, Deena?”She was about to give a cheerful consent, when he defeated his own ends by adding:“None of the other boys have hothouse grapes; it makes ’em think a lot of me. I guess they know where they come from, too!”“In those circumstances, certainly not,” she answered, indignantly. “You can eat all you like at home.”“Well, I call that low-down mean,” he said, stabbing another sausage, “and you gettin’ all the fruit and flowers from Mr. French’s place sent to you every day. I wish Polly and Ben were there still—they wouldn’t begrudge me a little fruit.”Polly and Ben had taken Stephen’s place for the summer, during his protracted absence, and had but recently returned to New York.“Polly and Ben would despise your snobbishness just as I do; besides, I do not approve of your taking eatables to school,” she added, disingenuously, for her objection was to furnishing food for Harmouth gossip—not to Dicky.“Oh, pshaw!” he exclaimed. “As if I didn’t know why you won’t let me take ’em! Mr. French will give me anything I ask for when he gets home—that’s one comfort. Did you know he may be here any day? The man who brought the flowers told me so yesterday.”Deena’s complexion flushed a lively pink, or else it was the reflection from the wood fire, leaping in tongues offlame behind the tall brass fender. She certainly looked singularly girlish as she sat behind the array of Ponsonby breakfast silver, her severe black frock, with the transparent bands of white at throat and wrists, only serving to mark her youthful freshness. Her beauty was of little consequence to her brother, who was busy considering the advantages that might accrue to himself from Stephen’s return.“When Mr. French went away, he said I could ride his saddle horse, and though I’ve been there half a dozen times since Ben left, that old beast of a coachman won’t let me inside the stable. Will you tell Mr. French when he comes home what an old puddin’ head he’s got to look after his horses? The man ought to be kicked out!”“I shall hardly venture to complain to Mr. French about his servants,” said Deena.“You might be good-natured,” he urged; “here’s the whole autumn gone without my getting any riding, and Mr. French would do anything you asked——”“It is time for you to go to school,” said Deena, shortly.“No, it isn’t; not for three minutes yet,” he contradicted. “‘Tenny rate, I don’t mean to be early this morning—it’s jography, and I don’t know my lesson; but I do think you might speak about the horse, Deena; I never get a bit of sport worth countin’”—this in a high, grumbling minor. “There was Ben; he had his automobile here the whole summer, and never offered it to me once! The fellows all think it was awfully mean—I had promised to take them out in it, and it made me feel deuced cheap, I can tell you. The idea of using a machine like that just to air a kid every day! I guess it pumped it full of wind, anyhow—that’s one comfort.”“If you are going to say disagreeable things about the baby, I won’t listen to you,” said Deena, crossly, and then, ashamed of her petulance, added: “Run along to school, dear; the sooner you get some knowledge into that little red head of yours, the sooner you can have automobiles and horses of your own.”“Those of my brothers-in-law will suit me just as well,” he said, favoring her with a horrid grimace, as he wiped his mouth on a rope of napkin held taut between his outstretched fists. “Perhaps I had better let Mr. French know myself what I expect in the future.”“Perhaps you’ll mind your own business!” cried Deena, driven to fury.He left the room singing in a quavering treble:I’ll pray for you when on the stormy oceanWith love’s devotion. That’s what I’ll do.It was a song with which a nursemaid of the Shelton children had been wont to rock the reigning baby to sleep, and had lurked in Dicky’s memory for many a year.Poor Deena was thoroughly ruffled. It was maddening to have a love she held as the most sacred secret of her heart vulgarized by a boy’s coarse teasing, and, in addition, she was jealous of her own dignity—anxious to pay her dead husband proper respect—distressed at the possibility of Stephen’s thoughtful kindness becoming a subject of comment in the town. And yet what difference did it make?This carefully guarded secret would be public property by her own consent before a week was over, for Dicky’s announcement of French’s return was no news to Deena—at that very moment her heart was beating against a letter which assured her he was following fast upon its tracks, and when he came he was not likely to prove a patient lover. All through that second summer his letters had been growing more tender, more urgent, till at last he had taken matters into his own hands, and decided that their separation must end. For aught she knew, his vessel might already have reached New York—he might be that blessed moment on his way to Harmouth! The thought sent little thrills of happiness bounding through her veins. She had a shrewd idea he would appear unannounced by letter or telegram, but not to-day—certainly not to-day—she reflected.There were plenty of small duties waiting for her that morning, but in woman’s parlance she “couldn’t settle to anything”; there was an excitement in her mood that demanded the freedom of fresh air. She went up to her bedroom and stood for a moment at her window before yielding to the impulse that beckoned her out into the sunshine; and, drawing Stephen’s letter from her dress, she read it once more, to make sure she had missed no precious hint as to the time of his sailing. He wrote:May I come back? You must know all I mean that to imply—to come back, my best beloved, to you—to order my life in accordance to your pleasure—to marry you the day I set foot in Harmouth—or to wait impatiently till you are pleased to give yourself to me. I trust your love too entirely to fear that you will needlessly prolong the time. You are too fair-minded to let mere conventions weigh with you as against my happiness. Between you and me there must be no shams, and yet I would not shock or hurry you for the world.On second thoughts, I shall not wait for your permission to return—that is not the best way to gain one’s desires! No, I shall come before you can stop me, and while you are saying to yourself, “Perhaps he is on the ocean,” I may be turning in at your gate.What did she mean to do? she asked herself, with a smile that was its own answer.She went into her closet, and, fetching her crape hat from the shelf, began pinning it on before the glass. Its somber ugliness accorded ill with the brightness of her hair, and somehow her hair seemed to turn mourning into a mockery.She couldn’t help recalling an incident that had happened two years before, when she had seen herself in that same glass transformed into sudden prettiness by Polly’s skillful fingers, and how her pleasure in her appearance had been turned into humiliation by Simeon’s petty tyranny, when she asked him to pay for her hat. And then she was ashamed of her own thoughts—distressed that she had let the paltry reminiscence force itself into her mind; for great happiness should put us in charity with all. Never again would she allow an unkind remembrance to lodge in her thoughts.She shut the door of her room and hurried out into the street—there was so much indoors to remind her of what she most wished to forget. When Stephen came for her they would go away from Harmouth—just for a little while, till the memories faded—and, in a future of perfect love, think kindly, gratefully, pitifully, of Simeon.You see, she was desperately in love, poor child, and at last heart and conscience were in accord.Her feet fairly danced up the street; she moved so lightly she hardly rustled the carpet of fallen leaves that overspread the pavement. It was a glorious day, the sun was touching all prosaic things with gold, and up in heaven, against the interminable blue, little white clouds sailed in dapples, such as Raphael charged with angel faces, and every face seemed to smile.Wandering across the campus, under the stately arches of the college elms, she finally reached the open country, and, realizing that even the wings of happiness are mortal, she turned homeward, choosing the avenue that led past French’s place. Perhaps she hoped for reassuring signs of his coming—doors and windows thrown open and gardeners at work upon the ground—but before she got beyond the high hedge that cut off her view, a carriage, which she recognized as Stephen’s, drove rapidly toward the gate, and in it sat a lady, stately and grand, but so closely veiled as to defy both sun and curiosity. At a sign from her the carriage stopped, and a voice exclaimed:“I have just been to see you, Mrs. Ponsonby, and was so much disappointed to find you out—and so was some one else, I fancy, who I am sure has been at your house this morning! Pray get in and drive home with me. And I will send you back to town after you have paid me a little visit.”Deena had by this time recognized Mrs. Star, and recovered sufficiently from her surprise to take the offered seat in the carriage, but she was in such a tumult of hope and fear she hardly dared trust herself to do more than greet her old friend. Mrs. Star understoodquite well, and gave her time to recover her wits by a characteristic harangue.“How am I?” she repeated, sardonically. “Lame for life! I have never got over McTorture’s treatment, and never shall. Oh, no, it was not the original accident—that was an innocent affair—it is the result of McTorture’s nonsense in keeping me chained to my sofa in one position till my leg stiffened. But never mind about doctors; they’re all alike—bad’s the best! You look handsome and healthy enough to keep out of their clutches; tell me all about yourself.”“There is never anything to tell about me,” said Deena. “I am much more concerned to know why you are here.”Mrs. Star’s eyes softened.“Because Stephen wouldn’t stop long enough in New York for me to exchange ten words with him, and so I did the next best thing—indeed, the only thing I could do to satisfy my affection—I came with him; and upon my word, I do not think he wanted me! Now, how do you account for that, Mrs. Deena?”Her expression was so insinuating that Deena might be excused a slight irritation in her tone as she answered:“I don’t account for it.”Here they reached the front door, for the approach was a short one, and Mrs. Star got out laboriously and ushered her guest into the hall.“Do you know your way to the library?” she asked. “It is on the other side of this barn of a room, and if you will make yourself comfortable there, I will join you in a minute. The truth is, we are not in order, and I must give a message before I can have the conscience to sit down and enjoy a chat.”Deena’s eyes were still blinded by the midday glare, but she managed to cross the great drawing room without stumbling over an ottoman, and, pushing aside the heavy curtain that shut off the library, she walked directly into Stephen’s arms.As Mrs. Star saw fit to leave her undisturbed, it would be sheer presumption for a humble person like the writer to disregard that compelling example. Suffice it to say that for one hour Stephen’s horses stamped and champed in the stable, and that when finally Mrs. Star did appear, the occupants of the library were under the impression she had been gone barely long enough to take off her wraps.Perhaps no mortals deserve happiness, and certainly few attain it, but if ever a man and a woman were likely to find satisfaction in each other’s companionship, it was the lovers sitting hand in hand before Stephen’s fire.Most women of twenty-four have had some experience of love as a passion; they have known its fullness or its blight, or more often still, they have frittered it away in successive flirtations, but with Deena it had come as a revelation and been consecrated to one. To be sure, she had tried to crush and repress it, but it had persisted because of its inherent force. And with Stephen the passion was at once the delight and glory of his life. His was no boy’s love made up of sentiment and vanity; he had brought a man’s courage to follow duty to the borders of despair, and all the while he held the image of her he loved unsullied in his heart. At last they were free to take all that life had before withheld of sympathy and friendship and perfect understanding. What wonder that an hour should slip away before they realized the flight of time?Mrs. Star received her nephew’s announcement with suitable effusion, and with an undercurrent of genuine feeling. After kissing Deena, she made a confidence that had a spice of kindly malice.“My dear child,” she said, “I knew so well what was about to happen, that I came all the way from New York in order to welcome you into the family, and I think I showed great self-restraint not to tell you so in the carriage when you put that very direct question as to what brought me.”

He shook his head.

“No—on land. He was hunting—it must have been the very hunt we were talking about—and wandered from his party. A fog came on, and they were unable to find him. Lopez telegraphs that they sent out search parties for a fortnight, but could find no trace.”

He longed for a word from her, but none came.

“At last they abandoned hope,” he concluded. “The expedition is now on its way home.”

She had turned her back upon him, and he waited in misery to hear her sob, to see her shoulders shake with her weeping; but, instead, the whole figure seemed to stiffen, and, wheeling round, she faced him with blazing eyes.

“The cowards!” she cried. “To abandon a man to starvation! What are they made of to do such a barbarous thing!”

“We must not judge them unheard,” Stephen ventured. “Their search may have been exhaustive—they may have risked their own lives gladly—and you know,” he added, gently, “that beyond a certain time it would have been useless from the standpoint of saving life.”

“It was inhuman to sail away and leave him,” she went on, beating her hands together in a sort of rage. “How can you defend them! You, who sent him off on this horrible journey—how can you sleep in your bed when you know Simeon in perishing by inches! I should think you would be on your way now—this moment—to search for him! Oh, do something—don’t just accept it in this awful way. Haven’t you any pity?” Unconsciously she laid her hand on his shoulder, as if she would push him from the room.

Stephen bore her reproaches with a meekness that exasperated her.

“Are there no cables to Magellan?” she asked. “There must be somebody there who for money would do your bidding. Don’t waste time,” she answered, stamping her foot.

Stephen kept his temper. Perhaps he was shrewd enough to see that it was pity rather than love that gave the fierceness to her mood. It was the frenzy of a tender-hearted woman at hearing of an act of cruelty rather than the agony of one who suffers a personal bereavement.

“Deena,” he said, not even knowing he had used her name, “do you really want me to go on this hopeless errand? Think of its utter uselessness—the time that has elapsed, the impossibility of penetrating into such a country in the advancing winter. It is the first of February, and I could not get there before March; it would be already their autumn. By this time he has either reached help or he is beyond it.”

At the beginning of his speech Deena’s pale face flushed, but as he went on setting forth the obstacles to his going she seemed to harden in her scorn.

“Oh, yes,” she sneered. “Let him die! It is cold in Patagonia for a gently nurtured person like Mr. French. Simeon is poor in friends—he only had one besides his wife, and that one is a fair-weather friend. But I’ll go—I am not afraid of privation. I’ll entreat the Argentine Government for help—I’ll make friends with the Indians—I’ll——”

“Hush,” he said, “you have said enough—I will go.”

Having gained her point, she burst into tears.

“I am cruel,” she said, “selfishly cruel to you, who have been so good to me—but whom can I turn to except to you? How can we abandon Simeon without raising a finger to save him? Say you forgive me.”

He held out his hand in mute acquiescence. Her sneers had stung him to the quick, but her appeal to his manhood for help in her distress moved him deeply.

“Perhaps,” she went on, half to herself, “perhaps if I had been a better wife—if I had loved him more, I could bear it better—but it is so pitiful. He has always been alone in life, and now he is dying alone.”

Stephen, who was pacing the floor, tried not to listen. He knew she was not thinking of him when she was confessing her shortcomings to her own conscience, but the admission that she felt herself lacking in love to Simeon filled him with a deep joy. He did not dare to linger.

“I am going,” he said, gently. “Good-by, Deena. Will you pray God to send you back the man who loves you?”

She stood staring at him dumb with misery, but as the door shut between them a cry of anguish burst from her very soul.

“Come back!” she cried. “Oh, Stephen, come back! I can’t bear it! I can’tlet you go! Don’t you know I love you?—and I have sent you off to die!”

She knew that he had gone—that her appeal was to the empty air, and she flung herself on the sofa in a frenzy of sobs. But the cry reached Stephen in the hall, where he stood battling with himself against his yearning for one more look, one more word to carry with him, and at the sound his resolution melted like wax in the flame of his passion. With a bound he was back in the room, on his knees beside her, soothing her with tenderest endearments—pouring out the fullness of his love.

“Must I go, Deena?” he pleaded. “Must I leave you when I know you love me? And for what?—a search for the dead!”

At his words her conscience woke with a stab of shame.

“Yes, go!” she said. “Go quickly. A moment ago I sent you in the name of compassion; now I send you in expiation for this one intolerable glimpse of Heaven.”

Stephen, eager to do her bidding, went straight to Mrs. Star’s house to take leave of the only person to whom he owed the obligations of family affection, and found that redoubtable lady on a sofa in her dressing room. In answer to his expressions of regret at this intimation of invalidism, she gave an angry groan.

“Oh, yes!” she said. “Our medical friend has succeeded in providing another doctor with as pretty a case of water-on-the-knee—to say nothing of other complications—as he could desire. My only comfort is, he didn’t get the charge himself.”

“But you have seen a specialist, surely?” exclaimed French, who feared her hatred of physicians might have prevented her calling in proper aid.

“Don’t distress yourself,” she answered. “McTorture has me fast in his clutches; and for how long do you suppose? Two months! He will promise nothing short of two months, and even then objects to my going abroad, and the yacht ready to start this very week! I am waiting for Bob to come into lunch, to get him to send for the sailing master and break the news to him. He’ll be a disappointed man!”

“I will take the yacht off your hands,” said Stephen, casually.

“You!” she exclaimed. “Are you running awayfromorwithanybody, that you suddenly annex an ocean steamer? You were prosing only yesterday afternoon about work and duty, as if nothing could separate you from Harmouth. Is the attraction going to bolt with you, Stevie?”

Stephen could have killed her as she lay there, allowing her tongue free play with his most intimate concerns, but the respect due to an old woman, to say nothing of an aunt, restrained his anger, and he answered, coldly:

“If you want to get rid of the yacht for the rest of the year, say so. My friend, Simeon Ponsonby, is lost in the wilderness of Patagonia, and I am organizing a party to search for him. I shall have to resign my work at Harmouth, but I feel responsible for poor Ponsonby’s fate; I sent him on the expedition.”

“Ah! did you?” she said, laughing wickedly. “Poor Uriah has been disposed of, and now the lady sends you to look for his bones. Don’t look too hard, Stevie, you might find he wasn’t lost, after all!”

“Stop!” cried French, springing to his feet. “How dare you make a jest of other people’s misfortunes? Is there so little decency among your associates that you no longer recognize it when you see it?”

She had the grace to look ashamed.

“Take the yacht, my dear,” she said, kindly, “and if the expense is too great for your income, you can draw on me for what you like. Can’t you stand a little teasing from your old aunt?”

“I will take the yacht, and pay for it,” said French. “As for the teasing, we seem to have different ideas about what is amusing.”

“Then forgive me,” she pleaded, and there were tears in her eyes, “and be careful of yourself, my dear boy, in thisdismal expedition. Take plenty of furs, and beware of the cannibals.”

She won a smile from him as he bent over her sofa to kiss her good-by, but she reserved further comments upon his errantry for Bob.

“Quixotic nonsense!” she declared. “Was there ever a man so wise that a woman couldn’t make a fool of him?”

Could there be a crueler irony of fate than to be absolutely convinced of the widowhood of her you love and to be unable, practically, to establish the fact?

Stephen French had expatriated himself, resigned the work he valued, put the seas between himself and Deena, only to be baffled at every turn. For two months he had used his utmost acumen in prosecuting the search without even finding a clew, and when finally he made his great discovery, it was by yielding to the impulse of the moment rather than the suggestions of reason.

From March to May Mrs. Star’s great ocean-going yacht had steamed along the southeastern shores of Patagonia. Sometimes within the confines of the Straits, sometimes rounding its headlands into the Atlantic, and dropping anchor wherever the line of coast gave any facility for landing an exploring party, until the hopelessness of the quest was patent to everybody except Stephen.

On his way down he had stopped at Buenos Ayres, where he provided himself with the charts and surveys made by the newly returned expedition, and secured Simeon’s personal effects left on theTintoretto, together with his diary, scientific memoranda and specimens, which had been carefully preserved, and were of rare value, from a botanist’s point of view.

French was fortunate enough to induce both Lopez and the captain of theTintorettoto accompany him as guests, and they proved invaluable allies, especially the captain, whose topographical knowledge and recent experience were always to be relied upon. From him Stephen learned all the particulars of Simeon’s disappearance, though the last home letter dispatched by the poor fellow, on the eve of the guanaco hunt, covered the first part of the story. It appeared that Ponsonby had landed with a surveying party from the ship, one morning in January, on the Patagonian side of the Straits, and set out to botanize while his companions worked. He had climbed a steep bank, in order to secure a particular shrub just in flower, when he saw on the plain beyond a party of Indians gathered by the shore of a small, fresh-water lake. Most of them were watering their horses, but half a dozen were grouped round a man lying on the ground, apparently injured. Their sharp eyes quickly marked Simeon filling his vasculum with the coveted specimens, and, waving their hands in friendly greeting, two of them advanced at a gallop. One spoke fairly good Spanish, and explained that the son of their chief had broken his leg by a fall from his horse, and he begged Simeon—whom he conceived, from his occupation of gathering simples, to be a medicine man—to come to their assistance.

Simeon’s own Spanish was too poor to undeceive them, but, thinking he might be of some use, he went back with them, and rigged out a set of splints, that made it possible to carry the young man to their encampment, about a mile away. In gratitude for his services, they accompanied him to the ship on his return, mounting him on one of their horses and forming a bodyguard round him. It was then that they proposed the guanaco hunt to the officers of the ship; their own visit to the Straits being simply in pursuit of game.

The morning of the hunt the captain described as unusually warm for that region, even in January, and not particularly clear; there was a haze that was just not a fog. The Indians met them about a mile back from the shore, bringing a dozen extra horses for their guests. The quietest beast was selected for Ponsonby, but its docility was so questionable, and the rider’s inexperience so evident, that the captain persuadedhim to give up the chase, and content himself with a ride to the encampment to inquire about his patient. The last ever seen of him he was sitting on horseback watching the departing hunt.

Guanacos in large numbers had been seen on the plains to the northwest, whereas the Indian camp lay to the northeast, and Ponsonby’s route was widely divergent to that of the hunters. All that was known is that he never reached the encampment; perhaps he mistook the trail, and, having left his compass in his cabin, had no means of ascertaining his direction—or perhaps his horse became unmanageable and bolted, carrying him far inland; at all events, his chance without a compass was poor, for a tremendous rain came on, which lasted for three days, leadening the sky to an even gray, with no mark of setting or rising sun.

At the end of four days the horse he had ridden came into camp riderless; its saddle had been removed, probably by Simeon, to make a pillow at night, and its whole appearance bespoke long travel. For a fortnight the ship’s company and the Indians scoured the country seeking him. They sent up rockets at night, and lighted fires on the hilltops by day; they wearied themselves and the tireless Indians, and at last, knowing the limits of human endurance in a case like Ponsonby’s, they gave up in despair.

All these incidents formed the main topics of conversation in the long evenings in the saloon of the yacht. In addition to Señor Lopez and the captain of theTintoretto, Stephen had secured the services of a young physician with a taste for adventure, and his own sailing master was a person of intelligence, so that the little party brought a variety of experience to the councils held on board ship or round the camp fire when their search carried them so far inland that it was impossible to return to the yacht at night. Several times, accompanied by Pecheray guides, they had been gone for ten days at a time, but never found a trace of the lost man. There was the faint possibility that he had been found and cared for by wandering Indians, but what was far more likely was that French might stumble upon the spot where he died. Even in that land of beasts and birds of prey something would be left in evidence.

The daylight hours were now so few that little could be accomplished, and the cold was becoming severe. A violent snowstorm on the fifteenth of May decided French to give up the search and go home. Accordingly, they steamed out of the Straits of Magellan and turned the vessel northward, keeping as near the Patagonian shore as was prudent, in the hope of sighting canoes.

They had been steaming in this direction for about three hours, going slowly and keeping a sharp outlook toward the land, when the captain called French’s attention to an opening in the coast line, where the Gallegos River empties into the sea. An impulse—perhaps it might more truly be called an inspiration—induced French to order the yacht brought to anchor in the bay. Although the shore seemed deserted, several canoes filled with Indians immediately put out for the yacht, as was, indeed, their invariable custom. The boats were large, capable of holding six or eight people in the two ends, while in the middle was the inevitable clay hearth, on which smoldered the fire of hemlock. As they approached the yacht, the Indians began begging for rum and tobacco, some by gestures and some in apatois, in which Spanish and Indian words were strangely blended; and French, whose policy was always to secure their good will, invited them on board and ordered the steward to bring spirits and tobacco, and also a plentiful supply of ship biscuit and sweets.

The men were of medium size, and not bad looking, and for the most part dressed in loose-fitting mantles ofguanacoskins, stained bright red. In spite of the cold, this one garment was their only protection, and even this they would offer in exchange for rum. Knowing their customs, French was astonished to find the first man who stepped on board wearing the coat of civilization under his mantle, and hisastonishment gave way to alarm when he recognized an old checked cutaway of Simeon’s, which had done service for many a winter at Harmouth, and was as unmistakable as the features of its lost owner. While Stephen stared—too agitated to find a word of Spanish—-the Indian tossed off half a tumbler of raw whisky at a gulp and, drawing from the pocket of poor Simeon’s coat a silver flask, he presented it to the steward to be filled with the same genial fluid. The flask was Stephen’s parting gift to Simeon, and marked with his name.

The excitement now became intense, for the Indians declared that the owner of the coat was alive, and the one who was wearing it, and who seemed to exercise some authority over the others, began an explanation in signs. He pointed to a cliff that overhung the stony beach at the mouth of the river, and, lifting his hand high above his head; brought it down with a violent gesture, as if to simulate a fall. He next motioned toward the canoes, talking volubly all the while, though his language was unintelligible to anyone except the captain of theTintoretto, who picked out a word here and there.

The tribes of the Straits of Magellan and the adjacent coasts vary greatly in their characteristics; some have the impassive bearing we associate with the Indian, and some are imitative, reproducing sounds and gestures with surprising exactness.

It was not difficult to guess that Simeon had fallen over the cliff and been found by the Indians, who are always skirting the shore in their canoes, and the Spanish captain made out that he was now in one of their boats higher up the river. When the Indian was asked whether he would guide them to the place, he hesitated until bribed by rum and provisions, and then he agreed to go in his own canoe and bring Simeon to the yacht, where the exchange was to be effected. Why he hesitated remained a mystery, unless Ponsonby’s knowledge of herbs had made him of value to the tribe.

French immediately ordered the various tins and boxes, containing the supply of food promised, to be placed conspicuously on the deck as an earnest of his honesty in the barter, and when a small keg of rum was added, the satisfaction was complete; four or five Indians followed their leader into his canoe and paddled up the river.

They were gone so long—over three hours—that French began to curse his folly in trusting them, and he was about to follow them up in the launch, when he saw their canoe coming round a bend in the stream. At the first glance it seemed filled with Indians only, and it was not until it was actually alongside that he detected a mummy-like form lying in the stern, which he guessed to be Simeon.

Half a dozen sturdy arms made the transfer, by means of a hammock, from the canoe to the yacht, and Simeon, alive but quite unconscious, was laid on the deck. He had probably been subjected by the removal to more pain than in his enfeebled condition he could bear, and it required long and patient exertion on the part of the doctor before he was revived from his syncope.

His condition was pitiable; from an injury to the spine he was a helpless cripple, while the arm which had been broken in his fall had knit in a way to render it perfectly useless. He was fearfully emaciated, probably from the lack of palatable food, and his expression was vacant.

French gave up his own deck cabin, the most commodious in size, and before another hour had passed Simeon was lying in a comfortable bed, clean, warm, devotedly tended, but apparently dying.

For forty-eight hours they kept the yacht within the shelter of the river, fearing the effect of motion on that feeble flame of life, but the warmth and nourishment soon began to tell, and on the third day he recognized French, and tried to murmur some words of gratitude and pleasure.

That night Stephen called the doctor into his own room and shut the door. He wanted to put a very simple question, one which might have been asked anywhere out of Simeon’s hearing, andyet the effort seemed almost beyond his powers.

“Can he live?”

The words came in such a hoarse, unnatural voice that the doctor, a sensitive man, feared to deal the blow of truth. This was a very marvel of friendship; like the love of David and Jonathan, it passed the love of women.

The doctor temporized. Mr. Ponsonby had rallied wonderfully; his constitution was much stronger than he had been given to understand; it was rather soon to give a definite opinion, but——

Here Stephen interrupted him.

“Great God, man! Can’t you answer a plain question. Yes or no?”

The doctor drew himself up and, to quote his own language, “let him have it straight.”

“If he lives to get home it will be a good deal more than I expect of him.”

French nodded toward the door, and turned his back.

That night he relieved the doctor’s watch by sitting up with his friend, and, having given him his broth at midnight, was almost dozing in his chair when a whisper from Simeon roused him. The sound was so faint, he held his breath to listen.

“Stephen, I want to see Deena.”

French’s heart began thumping like the screw of his yacht. How he thanked God that he could look his friend in the face as he answered:

“So you shall, old man; just as quickly as steam can carry you to her.”

A look of satisfaction came into the tired eyes.

“It will be a race with death,” he said, “but perhaps—thank you, Stephen.” And he fell asleep.

With Deena the spring moved drearily. Her position was strangely anomalous; she was neither wife nor widow, without the right to be glad or sad—only dumbly wretched. She could not mourn for a husband who might be living, nor could she ignore the fact that he might be dead, and all the while that parting scene with Stephen burned into her conscience like a brand.

She shut herself up with Polly and the baby, and hardly went out of the house while she remained in New York. Love for the child crept deep into her heart and soothed her into patience when all else failed.

In May the house in Harmouth returned to her keeping, the lease having expired, and she left the Sixty-fifth Street household with reluctance to take up her old life. In the great city she had been but a human atom. Her conduct, her unhappiness, her very existence mattered to no one there, except, perhaps, to Ben and Polly, who were as tender and sympathetic as such vigorous people could be; but in Harmouth every creature was interested in Simeon’s fate, and watched Deena with a curiosity she found maddening.

She felt herself the main topic of conversation; she never approached two people talking in the street that they didn’t break off in guilty confusion, and comments upon her mode of dressing and daily occupations were continually repeated to her in the form of censure. Her own family were especially out of touch, for their assumption that she mourned her husband as Polly would have done made her feel like an impostor. They did not give her much of their company, for their newly found fortune made them even more self-centered than their misfortunes. Dicky was the exception; perhaps because he had started in life hard as nails, and so couldn’t grow any harder. At all events, Deena thought she discerned a reluctant affection in his greeting that was infinitely flattering.

Stephen wrote whenever he could catch the Chilian mail boats on their way through the Straits. His letters were those of a man under the strong hand of restraint; admirable letters, that filled her with respect for him and shame at her own craving for “one word more.”

On the twenty-fifth of May she had a cable that changed the face of events. It was from Montevideo.

Have found Simeon. Desperately ill. On our way home.S. French.

Have found Simeon. Desperately ill. On our way home.

S. French.

The news spread over the town like wildfire. The local paper issued an extra; a thing it had not done since the assassination of Mr. McKinley. As soon as Harmouth knew Mrs. Ponsonby’s exact status it became distinctly friendly. People are helpful by instinct, and offers of neighborly assistance poured in from all sides.

Deena left nothing undone that could, by anticipation, add to Simeon’s comfort. His room was ready, a nurse engaged, and all the paraphernalia belonging to the care of the sick collected long before the time due for his arrival. She counted upon seeing him four weeks from the date of the cable. The regular trip of the mail boats between Rio and New York is twenty days; from Montevideo two days more; to that must be added another day to reach Boston, and she was warned that a yacht would go more slowly than a large steamer; she therefore concluded the third week in June would bring them.

The lot of women is to wait, and they do it under a pressure of nervous strain that makes it slow torture. No turn of fortune could have surprised Deena at this crisis, for her imagination had pictured every possibility.

When a summer storm blackened the sky she saw the yacht tempest-tossed and sinking, driven before a tropical cyclone; when the sun shone, she fancied it sailing gayly into port with Simeon restored to health, expecting to find her as he left her—the willing slave, the careful housewife—and she shivered and went pale at the thought; and then in a revulsion of feeling she saw him dying, and she was ready to cast herself at his feet, and tell him all—how she had tried to do right, how she had struggled against her love for Stephen. Perhaps he would have mercy upon her and let her go away, all by herself, to wrestle with her heart.

She couldn’t eat; she couldn’t sleep. She grew so wan and thin she was like a ghost of her old self.

Her mother said:

“My dear, you must stop fretting. I am sure, under the care of that clever young doctor Mr. French took down, and with the comforts of the yacht, your husband will be quite himself by the time he gets home.”

And her father added:

“You must not be so impatient, Deena; it is mighty nasty sailing through West Indian waters, and a boat of that size doesn’t carry enough fuel for a prolonged voyage; they will have to stop for coal somewhere on their way up.”

She was growing irritable under her dread. Like Elisha, she longed to silence them with the answer:

“I know it; hold ye your peace.”

The middle of June had passed, the fourth week of the voyage had begun, and now any day, any hour, might bring news. Deena’s anxiety had made such inroads into her health that her father took alarm and called in her old friend Dr. Hassan, and he, wise man, gave her a sedative and ordered her to bed, though the afternoon was still young.

It was the first long sleep she had had for weeks, and the refreshment came at the time of her direst need, for at daybreak the summons roused her. She waked with a beating heart; wheels stopped in the street, her gate clicked, there were footsteps coming up her path—bold, hurried steps; they reached the veranda—the bell pealed.

She sprang from her bed, huddling her dressing gown round her as she ran, and, slipping back the heavy, old-fashioned bolts of the front door, she stood face to face with Stephen.

If she were pale, he was paler; his blood seemed turned to ice that summer morning.

“The yacht is at Wolfshead,” he said. “How soon can you be ready? We must go by rail—I have a special waiting for you.”

A glow from the first blush of day caught her as she stood in the frame of the doorway. She was like a mediæval saint, with her hair wound in a crown about her head, her blue gown fallingin stately fold, and her bare feet showing under the hem of her nightgown. In spite of her seeming calm, her eyes blazed with excitement.

To French she seemed something holy and apart—as if those bare feet rested on a crescent, and the shadows of the old hall were floating clouds. He had schooled himself during his hurried journey, in order to meet her without emotion, but she was her own protection; to have touched her would have seemed sacrilege. Her lips tried to frame the question that consumed her with its terrors.

“Simeon——” she began, but her voice failed.

Stephen’s haggard eyes softened.

“He is dying,” he said. “But there is time—perhaps to-day—perhaps to-morrow. His force of will has kept him alive to see you—he has cared more than you knew.”

She gave a little sob, and turned toward the staircase. Halfway up she stopped.

“I forgot to ask you to come in,” she said, “or whether you want anything I can get you? But it doesn’t matter, does it? All that matters is to do Simeon’s bidding. I shall be very quick.”

In an incredibly short time she was back, fully dressed, and carrying a bag, into which she had thrust what was indispensable to her comfort for another day. She waked the servant, left a message for her father, and then she and Stephen went out into the street, so gay with early sunlight and twittering birds, so bare of human traffic. At first a strange shyness kept her dumb; she longed to ask a thousand things, but the questions that rose to her lips seemed susceptible of misunderstanding, and Stephen’s aloofness frightened her. Did he think, she wondered, that she could forget her duty to Simeon at such a moment, that he surrounded himself with this impenetrable reserve? And all the time he was regarding her with a passionate reverence that shamed him into silence.

At the railway station their train was waiting—the locomotive hissing its impatience; they got into the car, for there was but one, and in a moment were flying seaward. A man—the steward of the yacht—was busy at the far end of the car with a cooking apparatus, and the aroma of coffee came intoxicatingly to her nostrils. She remembered she had eaten nothing since her early dinner the day before, and she was exhausted with excitement, and then she despised herself for thinking of her physical needs when Simeon lay dying. It was fortunate that French had taken a saner view of the situation, for the coffee was just what was needed to restore her equipoise.

She began to understand the delicacy of her companion’s conduct, and the simplicity of the whole situation when stripped of morbidness. The only thing that behooved her was to soothe her husband’s last hours on earth—to give out the tenderness of a pitying heart. As her common sense asserted itself she began plying Stephen with the questions that had seemed so impossible half an hour before—would Simeon know her—could he bear conversation—was he changed in appearance—had he suffered beyond relief? She demanded the whole story of his rescue and of the voyage home. She was gentle, womanly, infinitely sweet. By the time they reached their destination all constraint was gone; they were two comrades absorbed in a common interest, for Simeon occupied their every thought.

There was a narrow pier at Wolfshead, sheltered by a point of rocky shore that made a landing for small boats in good weather, and there the steam launch was waiting with its two trim sailors and its gaudy flag. The yacht was anchored about a mile from shore—her graceful outlines clearly defined against the ocean’s blue. If the purity of her white paint had suffered in the long voyage it was not apparent—red and white awnings were stretched over the deck. All looked hospitably gay. Once more Deena shrank into herself, the brilliant scene mocked the tragedy within.

All too quickly they crossed the intervening water; they were on the deck—in the saloon. She was trembling soshe could hardly stand, and Stephen put her into a comfortable chair and left her, while he made her coming known. She hardly glanced at the luxurious fittings of the charming room; her eyes were fixed on the door, dreading, yet impatient, for the message.

A small, sensitive-looking man came toward her and introduced himself.

“I am Dr. Miles,” he said, “Mr. Ponsonby’s physician, and, if you will allow me, I will take you to him now. There is no question of saving his strength, Mrs. Ponsonby. We have been nursing what is left to him for days, in order that he could lavish it in this interview with you. Don’t try to curb him; let him have his say.”

She followed him to a deck cabin almost under the bridge, and stood for a moment at the threshold, to make sure of her composure. There was a narrow brass bed, a chest of drawers, a washstand, and close to the bed a wicker chair, with silk cushions, was drawn up, as if in expectation of a guest. The head of the bed was toward her, so that she couldn’t see Simeon’s face, but he heard the rustle of skirts, and called her name, and she made a step forward and sank on her knees beside him.

“Oh, Simeon,” she gasped, “how you have suffered! I am so sorry!”

He moved his hand feebly and patted her shoulder, and she, in a passion of pity, carried it to her lips. For the first time she ventured to look at him. Was this Simeon! She would have passed him in a hospital ward as an utter stranger, so completely was he changed. He had discarded his spectacles, and his eyes were dull and faded; pain had robbed them of that expression of concentrated wisdom she knew so well. He wore a short, curling beard and mustache, and his clothing, supplied from Stephen’s wardrobe, was luxurious; it was silk, of a faint color between blue and gray, and the handkerchief, protruding from the pocket, was delicately fine. Extreme neatness was characteristic of Simeon, but he disliked anything florid in dress or appearance, anything opposed to the austere simplicity that marked his manner of living. She wondered whether such things mattered to him now.

He noticed her start of surprise as her eyes met his, and fancied she was shocked by the ravages of illness, for he said, with a touch of his old irritation:

“Didn’t they tell you I was dying? Are you afraid to be left alone with me? You used to be a courageous person, Deena.”

The querulousness with which he began the sentence melted into a rallying smile.

“Oh, no,” she said, “I am not afraid. I am too sorry to be frightened.”

“There is a bell, in case you want to summon the doctor,” he continued, “but I should rather talk to you alone. I have been very homesick for you, and for the old house—sometimes the longing has been most acute—and then the anxiety of leaving you poorly provided for has been part of my distress. If I could have lived a few years more this would have been obviated, and possibly, even now, my book will add something to your income.” He made a visible effort to speak clearly. “Now, in regard to your future support; I have a life insurance of ten thousand dollars, and securities to about the same amount—and then, of course, the house. This is all I have been able to save, though I have cut our living down to bare necessities. You have been of great assistance to me, Deena—without you life would have had little flavor, but sometimes I fear that in the desire to provide for your future I was not considerate enough of your present. I ought to have been more mindful that young people need pleasure. You will have to forgive that and many other mistakes.” He looked at her almost wistfully.

Deena’s tears came, dripping plentifully over her clasped hands.

“It is I who should ask forgiveness,” she said, humbly, remembering how often she had scorned his economies. “The money is more than I shall need—don’t think of it again, Simeon. Isn’t there anything you want to tell me about your work—your book?”

His face lit up eagerly—the topic was congenial.

“My papers are safe,” he said. “All the initial work of classification and description that I did on theTintorettois in French’s keeping, and he and Sinclair—the man who has my place—are going to edit the book. We have had a great deal of talk about it on the way up, whenever I had a fairly quiet day. It is idle to try to put into words what I owe French.”

“And he feels nothing but self-reproach for having urged you to go,” said Deena, faintly. “Not that anyone could have foreseen the miserable outcome.”

“It isn’t miserable!” Simeon answered, almost fiercely. “In many respects it is all that I hoped. I have made a name for myself—there will not be a scientific library in the world without my book, when once it is issued. People have died for lesser achievements than that.” And then he added, more gently: “Not that it could be considered as an achievement without French’s aid.”

His mind could not detach itself from its debt of gratitude, for he suddenly broke out in passionate eulogy.

“He has sacrificed everything to me—his ambitions—his time—his comfort—his money, though that is the last thing he would begrudge, but you have no idea what it costs to run one of those large yachts! It must have made an inroad even in his large fortune. He has been a friend indeed!”

Deena turned away her face; it was hard for her to praise Stephen, although her heart echoed her husband’s words.

“He has high ideals in friendship as in everything else,” she answered, “but you must remember, Simeon, that the thought of your sufferings agonized us at home. Who could have abandoned you to such a fate? It makes me sick to think of it!”

A sort of shiver passed over him, while he said, simply:

“It was all in the day’s work. French ran the same risks, only with better luck.” Presently he added:

“I feel tired, Deena—and a little oppressed. Perhaps you had better ring the bell—but stay. Will you kiss me before you ring?”

She kissed him with a pity that wrung her heart, and he sighed contentedly and shut his eyes. He only spoke once more, just as the doctor came to his bedside.

“I should have been glad to see the old house before I die, but it is just as well as it is.”

He was dying all the afternoon, peacefully and gently, and at sunset the end came.

Master Richard Shelton sat at the foot of his sister’s table dispensing its hospitalities chiefly to himself. Through some law unknown to science, all dishes seemed to gravitate toward the main center of Dicky’s trencher, thereby leaving the rest of the table comparatively bare.

For eighteen months Master Shelton had given Mrs. Ponsonby the advantage of his company; not so much through volition—albeit, he was well enough pleased with his quarters—as through submission to paternal authority.

Conventional ideas are apt to wilt under the blight of poverty, and to revive under the fuller harvesting of this world’s goods, and Mr. Shelton, Sr., who had, in the days of his leanness, let Polly run wild with all the college boys of Harmouth, became suddenly particular, as his bank account fattened, in regard to the niceties of conduct in his daughters. His scruples even embraced Deena; he said she was too young a widow to live alone, and a blank sight too handsome, and that either she must return to the protection of his roof or else receive her brother under her own. With the docility of the intelligent, she accepted his fiat, but chose the evil represented by a unit rather than by the sum total of family companionship.

So she and Dicky had lived together since the day when Simeon had been laid to rest beside his mother in the churchyard, and Deena had taken up life with such courage as she could muster in the old house. She had startedout with a long illness, as the result of overtaxed nerves, and the nurse who had been engaged for Simeon found ample employment with Simeon’s widow; but a good constitution and a quiet mind are excellent helps toward recovery, and by September she found herself in admirable health.

Stephen’s energies had been absorbed in editing Simeon’s book. He had the assistance of the botanical department of Harmouth, and the book was produced in a manner which would have given poor Ponsonby infinite pleasure. French spared no expense, especially in the color drawings from Simeon’s photographs and specimens, which were exceptionally valuable. The printing was done in Boston, and Stephen was there much of the time. During Deena’s illness he was glad of an excuse to be near enough to get daily reports of her progress, but as she became strong and resumed the routine of living, so that intercourse became unavoidable, he found the strain of silence more than he could bear. He resigned his professorship permanently, and went abroad, making the book his excuse. He wished to see that it was properly heralded by both English and Continental scientific periodicals, and he preferred to attend to it himself. To say that Deena missed him but feebly expresses the void his going made in her life, but, knowing her own heart, and suspecting the state of his, she was glad to be spared his presence in these early days of widowhood, and could not but approve his decision.

Dicky’s society was hardly calculated to stifle her longings for higher things, for his conduct called for constant repression. At first he had nearly driven her wild by his prying interest in what did not concern him, his way of unmasking her secret thoughts, his powers of seeing round corners, if not through sealed envelopes, but as time went on she grew fond of his honest boy-nature, and learned to laugh at his precocious acuteness. Perhaps with Stephen’s departure there were fewer occasions for her to resent the challenge of his intrusive eye. There were, also, alleviations coincident with the school year, for then she was free from his company from the time he slammed the front door, at five minutes to nine, till he returned at two, ravenous for dinner.

On the particular morning indicated at the beginning of the chapter, the season was the late autumn—the clock was pointing ominously near nine—the lady opposite to Master Shelton looked more beautiful than ever in her widow’s weeds. Dicky conveyed half a sausage and a wedge of buttered toast to the sustenance of boyhood before he asked—with some difficulty, if the truth were confessed:

“May I take a bunch of grapes to school, Deena?”

She was about to give a cheerful consent, when he defeated his own ends by adding:

“None of the other boys have hothouse grapes; it makes ’em think a lot of me. I guess they know where they come from, too!”

“In those circumstances, certainly not,” she answered, indignantly. “You can eat all you like at home.”

“Well, I call that low-down mean,” he said, stabbing another sausage, “and you gettin’ all the fruit and flowers from Mr. French’s place sent to you every day. I wish Polly and Ben were there still—they wouldn’t begrudge me a little fruit.”

Polly and Ben had taken Stephen’s place for the summer, during his protracted absence, and had but recently returned to New York.

“Polly and Ben would despise your snobbishness just as I do; besides, I do not approve of your taking eatables to school,” she added, disingenuously, for her objection was to furnishing food for Harmouth gossip—not to Dicky.

“Oh, pshaw!” he exclaimed. “As if I didn’t know why you won’t let me take ’em! Mr. French will give me anything I ask for when he gets home—that’s one comfort. Did you know he may be here any day? The man who brought the flowers told me so yesterday.”

Deena’s complexion flushed a lively pink, or else it was the reflection from the wood fire, leaping in tongues offlame behind the tall brass fender. She certainly looked singularly girlish as she sat behind the array of Ponsonby breakfast silver, her severe black frock, with the transparent bands of white at throat and wrists, only serving to mark her youthful freshness. Her beauty was of little consequence to her brother, who was busy considering the advantages that might accrue to himself from Stephen’s return.

“When Mr. French went away, he said I could ride his saddle horse, and though I’ve been there half a dozen times since Ben left, that old beast of a coachman won’t let me inside the stable. Will you tell Mr. French when he comes home what an old puddin’ head he’s got to look after his horses? The man ought to be kicked out!”

“I shall hardly venture to complain to Mr. French about his servants,” said Deena.

“You might be good-natured,” he urged; “here’s the whole autumn gone without my getting any riding, and Mr. French would do anything you asked——”

“It is time for you to go to school,” said Deena, shortly.

“No, it isn’t; not for three minutes yet,” he contradicted. “‘Tenny rate, I don’t mean to be early this morning—it’s jography, and I don’t know my lesson; but I do think you might speak about the horse, Deena; I never get a bit of sport worth countin’”—this in a high, grumbling minor. “There was Ben; he had his automobile here the whole summer, and never offered it to me once! The fellows all think it was awfully mean—I had promised to take them out in it, and it made me feel deuced cheap, I can tell you. The idea of using a machine like that just to air a kid every day! I guess it pumped it full of wind, anyhow—that’s one comfort.”

“If you are going to say disagreeable things about the baby, I won’t listen to you,” said Deena, crossly, and then, ashamed of her petulance, added: “Run along to school, dear; the sooner you get some knowledge into that little red head of yours, the sooner you can have automobiles and horses of your own.”

“Those of my brothers-in-law will suit me just as well,” he said, favoring her with a horrid grimace, as he wiped his mouth on a rope of napkin held taut between his outstretched fists. “Perhaps I had better let Mr. French know myself what I expect in the future.”

“Perhaps you’ll mind your own business!” cried Deena, driven to fury.

He left the room singing in a quavering treble:

I’ll pray for you when on the stormy oceanWith love’s devotion. That’s what I’ll do.

I’ll pray for you when on the stormy oceanWith love’s devotion. That’s what I’ll do.

I’ll pray for you when on the stormy ocean

With love’s devotion. That’s what I’ll do.

It was a song with which a nursemaid of the Shelton children had been wont to rock the reigning baby to sleep, and had lurked in Dicky’s memory for many a year.

Poor Deena was thoroughly ruffled. It was maddening to have a love she held as the most sacred secret of her heart vulgarized by a boy’s coarse teasing, and, in addition, she was jealous of her own dignity—anxious to pay her dead husband proper respect—distressed at the possibility of Stephen’s thoughtful kindness becoming a subject of comment in the town. And yet what difference did it make?

This carefully guarded secret would be public property by her own consent before a week was over, for Dicky’s announcement of French’s return was no news to Deena—at that very moment her heart was beating against a letter which assured her he was following fast upon its tracks, and when he came he was not likely to prove a patient lover. All through that second summer his letters had been growing more tender, more urgent, till at last he had taken matters into his own hands, and decided that their separation must end. For aught she knew, his vessel might already have reached New York—he might be that blessed moment on his way to Harmouth! The thought sent little thrills of happiness bounding through her veins. She had a shrewd idea he would appear unannounced by letter or telegram, but not to-day—certainly not to-day—she reflected.

There were plenty of small duties waiting for her that morning, but in woman’s parlance she “couldn’t settle to anything”; there was an excitement in her mood that demanded the freedom of fresh air. She went up to her bedroom and stood for a moment at her window before yielding to the impulse that beckoned her out into the sunshine; and, drawing Stephen’s letter from her dress, she read it once more, to make sure she had missed no precious hint as to the time of his sailing. He wrote:

May I come back? You must know all I mean that to imply—to come back, my best beloved, to you—to order my life in accordance to your pleasure—to marry you the day I set foot in Harmouth—or to wait impatiently till you are pleased to give yourself to me. I trust your love too entirely to fear that you will needlessly prolong the time. You are too fair-minded to let mere conventions weigh with you as against my happiness. Between you and me there must be no shams, and yet I would not shock or hurry you for the world.On second thoughts, I shall not wait for your permission to return—that is not the best way to gain one’s desires! No, I shall come before you can stop me, and while you are saying to yourself, “Perhaps he is on the ocean,” I may be turning in at your gate.

May I come back? You must know all I mean that to imply—to come back, my best beloved, to you—to order my life in accordance to your pleasure—to marry you the day I set foot in Harmouth—or to wait impatiently till you are pleased to give yourself to me. I trust your love too entirely to fear that you will needlessly prolong the time. You are too fair-minded to let mere conventions weigh with you as against my happiness. Between you and me there must be no shams, and yet I would not shock or hurry you for the world.

On second thoughts, I shall not wait for your permission to return—that is not the best way to gain one’s desires! No, I shall come before you can stop me, and while you are saying to yourself, “Perhaps he is on the ocean,” I may be turning in at your gate.

What did she mean to do? she asked herself, with a smile that was its own answer.

She went into her closet, and, fetching her crape hat from the shelf, began pinning it on before the glass. Its somber ugliness accorded ill with the brightness of her hair, and somehow her hair seemed to turn mourning into a mockery.

She couldn’t help recalling an incident that had happened two years before, when she had seen herself in that same glass transformed into sudden prettiness by Polly’s skillful fingers, and how her pleasure in her appearance had been turned into humiliation by Simeon’s petty tyranny, when she asked him to pay for her hat. And then she was ashamed of her own thoughts—distressed that she had let the paltry reminiscence force itself into her mind; for great happiness should put us in charity with all. Never again would she allow an unkind remembrance to lodge in her thoughts.

She shut the door of her room and hurried out into the street—there was so much indoors to remind her of what she most wished to forget. When Stephen came for her they would go away from Harmouth—just for a little while, till the memories faded—and, in a future of perfect love, think kindly, gratefully, pitifully, of Simeon.

You see, she was desperately in love, poor child, and at last heart and conscience were in accord.

Her feet fairly danced up the street; she moved so lightly she hardly rustled the carpet of fallen leaves that overspread the pavement. It was a glorious day, the sun was touching all prosaic things with gold, and up in heaven, against the interminable blue, little white clouds sailed in dapples, such as Raphael charged with angel faces, and every face seemed to smile.

Wandering across the campus, under the stately arches of the college elms, she finally reached the open country, and, realizing that even the wings of happiness are mortal, she turned homeward, choosing the avenue that led past French’s place. Perhaps she hoped for reassuring signs of his coming—doors and windows thrown open and gardeners at work upon the ground—but before she got beyond the high hedge that cut off her view, a carriage, which she recognized as Stephen’s, drove rapidly toward the gate, and in it sat a lady, stately and grand, but so closely veiled as to defy both sun and curiosity. At a sign from her the carriage stopped, and a voice exclaimed:

“I have just been to see you, Mrs. Ponsonby, and was so much disappointed to find you out—and so was some one else, I fancy, who I am sure has been at your house this morning! Pray get in and drive home with me. And I will send you back to town after you have paid me a little visit.”

Deena had by this time recognized Mrs. Star, and recovered sufficiently from her surprise to take the offered seat in the carriage, but she was in such a tumult of hope and fear she hardly dared trust herself to do more than greet her old friend. Mrs. Star understoodquite well, and gave her time to recover her wits by a characteristic harangue.

“How am I?” she repeated, sardonically. “Lame for life! I have never got over McTorture’s treatment, and never shall. Oh, no, it was not the original accident—that was an innocent affair—it is the result of McTorture’s nonsense in keeping me chained to my sofa in one position till my leg stiffened. But never mind about doctors; they’re all alike—bad’s the best! You look handsome and healthy enough to keep out of their clutches; tell me all about yourself.”

“There is never anything to tell about me,” said Deena. “I am much more concerned to know why you are here.”

Mrs. Star’s eyes softened.

“Because Stephen wouldn’t stop long enough in New York for me to exchange ten words with him, and so I did the next best thing—indeed, the only thing I could do to satisfy my affection—I came with him; and upon my word, I do not think he wanted me! Now, how do you account for that, Mrs. Deena?”

Her expression was so insinuating that Deena might be excused a slight irritation in her tone as she answered:

“I don’t account for it.”

Here they reached the front door, for the approach was a short one, and Mrs. Star got out laboriously and ushered her guest into the hall.

“Do you know your way to the library?” she asked. “It is on the other side of this barn of a room, and if you will make yourself comfortable there, I will join you in a minute. The truth is, we are not in order, and I must give a message before I can have the conscience to sit down and enjoy a chat.”

Deena’s eyes were still blinded by the midday glare, but she managed to cross the great drawing room without stumbling over an ottoman, and, pushing aside the heavy curtain that shut off the library, she walked directly into Stephen’s arms.

As Mrs. Star saw fit to leave her undisturbed, it would be sheer presumption for a humble person like the writer to disregard that compelling example. Suffice it to say that for one hour Stephen’s horses stamped and champed in the stable, and that when finally Mrs. Star did appear, the occupants of the library were under the impression she had been gone barely long enough to take off her wraps.

Perhaps no mortals deserve happiness, and certainly few attain it, but if ever a man and a woman were likely to find satisfaction in each other’s companionship, it was the lovers sitting hand in hand before Stephen’s fire.

Most women of twenty-four have had some experience of love as a passion; they have known its fullness or its blight, or more often still, they have frittered it away in successive flirtations, but with Deena it had come as a revelation and been consecrated to one. To be sure, she had tried to crush and repress it, but it had persisted because of its inherent force. And with Stephen the passion was at once the delight and glory of his life. His was no boy’s love made up of sentiment and vanity; he had brought a man’s courage to follow duty to the borders of despair, and all the while he held the image of her he loved unsullied in his heart. At last they were free to take all that life had before withheld of sympathy and friendship and perfect understanding. What wonder that an hour should slip away before they realized the flight of time?

Mrs. Star received her nephew’s announcement with suitable effusion, and with an undercurrent of genuine feeling. After kissing Deena, she made a confidence that had a spice of kindly malice.

“My dear child,” she said, “I knew so well what was about to happen, that I came all the way from New York in order to welcome you into the family, and I think I showed great self-restraint not to tell you so in the carriage when you put that very direct question as to what brought me.”

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