On the evening of the next day, just after he had lit his lamp, Hilliard's attention was drawn by a sound as of someone tapping at the window. He stood to listen, and the sound was repeated—an unmistakable tap of fingers on the glass. In a moment he was out in the street, where he discovered Patty Ringrose.
"Why didn't you come to see me?" she asked excitedly.
"I was afraidshemight be there. Did she go to business, as usual?"
"Yes. At least I suppose so. She only got home at the usual time. I've left her there: I was bound to see you. Do you know what she told me last night when she came in?"
"I dare say I could guess."
Hilliard began to walk down the street. Patty, keeping close at his side, regarded him with glances of wonder.
"Is it true that we're going to Paris? I couldn't make out whether she meant it, and this morning I couldn't get a word from her."
"Are you willing to go with her?"
"And have all my expenses paid?"
"Of course."
"I should think I am! But I daren't let my uncle and aunt know; there'd be no end of bother. I shall have to make up some sort of tale to satisfy my aunt, and get my things sent to the station while uncle's playing billiards. How long is it for?"
"Impossible to say. Three months—half a year—I don't know. What about Mr. Daily?"
"Oh, I've done withhim!"
"And you are perfectly sure that you can get employment whenever you need it?"
"Quite sure: no need to trouble about that. I'm very good friends with aunt, and she'll take me in for as long as I want when I come back. But it's easy enough for anybody like me to get a place. I've had two or three offers the last half-year, from good shops where they were losing their young ladies. We're always getting married, in our business, and places have to be filled up."
"That settles it, then."
"But I want to know—I can't make it out—Eve won't tell me how she's managing to go. Areyougoing to pay for her?"
"We won't talk of that, Patty. She's going; that's enough."
"You persuaded her, last night?"
"Yes, I persuaded her. And I am to hear by the first post in the morning whether she will go to-morrow or Thursday. She'll arrange things with you to-night, I should think."
"It didn't look like it. She's shut herself in her room."
"I can understand that. She is ill. That's why I'm getting her away from London. Wait till we've been in Paris a few weeks, and you'll see how she changes. At present she is downright ill—ill enough to go to bed and be nursed, if that would do any good. It's your part to look after her. I don't want you to be her servant."
"Oh, I don't mind doing anything for her."
"No, because you are a very good sort of girl. You 'Ii live at a hotel, and what you have to do is to make her enjoy herself. I shouldn't wonder if you find it difficult at first, but we shall get her round before long."
"I never thought there was anything the' matter with her."
"Perhaps not, but I understand her better. Of course you won't say a word of this to her. You take it as a holiday—as good fun. No doubt I shall be able to have a few words in private with you now and then. But at other times we must talk as if nothing special had passed between us."
Patty mused. The lightness of her step told in what a spirit of gaiety she looked forward to the expedition.
"Do you think," she asked presently, "that it'll all come to an end—what I told you of?"
"Yes, I think so."
"You didn't let her know that I'd been talking——"
"Of course not. And, as I don't want her to know that you've seen me to-night, you had better stay no longer. She's sure to have something to tell you to-night or to-morrow morning. Get your packing done, and be ready at any moment. When I hear from Eve in the morning, I shall send her a telegram. Most likely we sha'n't see each other again until we meet at Charing Cross. I hope it may be tomorrow; but Thursday is the latest."
So Patty took her departure, tripping briskly homeward. As for Hilliard, he returned to his sitting-room, and was busy for some time with the pencilling of computations in English and French money. Towards midnight, he walked as far as High Street, and looked at the windows above the music-shop. All was dark.
He rose very early next morning, and as post-time drew near he walked about the street in agonies of suspense. He watched the letter-carrier from house to house, followed him up, and saw him pass the number at which he felt assured that he would deliver a letter. In frenzy of disappointment a fierce oath burst from his lips.
"That's what comes of trusting a woman!—she is going to cheat me. She has gained her end, and will put me off with excuses."
But perhaps a telegram would come. He made a pretence of breakfasting, and paced his room for an hour like a caged animal. When the monotony of circulating movement had all but stupefied him, he was awakened by a double postman's knock at the front door, the signal that announces a telegram.
Again from Patty, and again a request that he would come to the shop at mid-day.
"Just as I foresaw—excuses—postponement. What woman ever had the sense of honour!"
To get through the morning he drank—an occupation suggested by the heat of the day, which blazed cloudless. The liquor did not cheer him, but inspired a sullen courage, a reckless resolve. And in this frame of mind he presented himself before Patty Ringrose.
"She can't go to-day," said Patty, with an air of concern. "You were quite right—she is really ill."
"Has she gone out?"
"No, she's upstairs, lying on the bed. She says she has a dreadful headache, and if you saw her you'd believe it. She looks shocking. It's the second night she hasn't closed her eyes."
A savage jealousy was burning Hilliard's vitals. He had tried to make light of the connection between Eve and that unknown man, even after her extraordinary request for money, which all but confessedly she wanted on his account. He had blurred the significance of such a situation, persuading himself that neither was Eve capable of a great passion, nor the man he had seen able to inspire one. Now he rushed to the conviction that Eve had fooled him with a falsehood.
"Tell her this." He glared at Patty with eyes which made the girl shrink in alarm. "If she isn't at Charing Cross Station by a quarter to eleven to-morrow, there's an end of it. I shall be there, and shall go on without her. It's her only chance."
"But if she reallycan't——"
"Then it's her misfortune—she must suffer for it. She goes to-morrow or not at all. Can you make her understand that?"
"I'll tell her."
"Listen, Patty. If you bring her safe to the station to-morrow you shall have a ten-pound note, to buy what you like in Paris."
The girl reddened, half in delight, half in shame.
"I don't want it—she shall come——"
"Very well; good-bye till to-morrow, or for good."
"No, no; she shall come."
He was drenched in perspiration, yet walked for a mile or two at his topmost speed. Then a consuming thirst drove him into the nearest place where drink was sold. At six o'clock he remembered that he had not eaten since breakfast; he dined extravagantly, and afterwards fell asleep in the smoking-room of the restaurant. A waiter with difficulty aroused him, and persuaded him to try the effect of the evening air. An hour later he sank in exhaustion on one of the benches near the river, and there slept profoundly until stirred by a policeman.
"What's the time?" was his inquiry, as he looked up at the starry sky.
He felt for his watch, but no watch was discoverable. Together with the gold chain it had disappeared.
"Damnation! someone has robbed me."
The policeman was sympathetic, but reproachful.
"Why do you go to sleep on the Embankment at this time of night? Lost any money?"
Yes, his money too had flown; luckily, only a small sum. It was for the loss of his watch and chain that he grieved; they had been worn for years by his father, and on that account had a far higher value for him than was represented by their mere cost.
As a matter of form, he supplied the police with information concerning the theft. Of recovery there could be little hope.
Thoroughly awakened and sober, he walked across London to Gower Place arriving in the light of dawn. Too spiritless to take off his clothing, he lay upon the bed, and through the open window watched a great cloud that grew rosy above the opposite houses.
Would Eve be at the place of meeting today? It seemed to him totally indifferent whether she came or not; nay, he all but hoped that she would not. He had been guilty of prodigious folly. The girl belonged to another man; and even had it not been so, what was the use of flinging away his money at this rate? Did he look for any reward correspondent to the sacrifice? She would never love him, and it was not in his power to complete the work he had begun, by freeing her completely from harsh circumstances, setting her in a path of secure and pleasant life.
But she would not come, and so much the better. With only himself to provide for he had still money enough to travel far. He would see something of the great world, and leave his future to destiny.
He dozed for an hour or two.
Whilst he was at breakfast a letter arrived for him. He did not know the handwriting on the envelope, but it must be Eve's. Yes. She wrote a couple of lines: "I will be at the station to-morrow at a quarter to eleven.—E. M."
One travelling bag was all he carried. Some purchases that he had made in London—especially the great work on French cathedrals—were already despatched to Birmingham, to lie in the care of Robert Narramore.
He reached Charing Cross half an hour before train-time, and waited at the entrance. Several cabs that drove up stirred his expectation only to disappoint him. He was again in an anguish of fear lest Eve should not come. A cab arrived, with two boxes of modest appearance. He stepped forward and saw the girls' faces.
Between him and Eve not a word passed. They avoided each other's look. Patty, excited and confused, shook hands with him.
"Go on to the platform," he said. "I'll see after everything. This is all the luggage?"
"Yes. One box is mine, and one Eve's. I had to face it out with the people at home," she added, between laughing and crying. "They think I'm going to the seaside, to stay with Eve till she gets better. I never told so many fibs in my life. Uncle stormed at me, but I don't care."
"All right; go on to the platform."
Eve was already walking in that direction. Undeniably she looked ill; her step was languid; she did not raise her eyes. Hilliard, when he had taken tickets and booked the luggage through to Paris, approached his travelling companions. Seeing him, Eve turned away.
"I shall go in a smoking compartment," he said to Patty. "You had better take your tickets."
"But when shall we see you again?"
"Oh, at Dover, of course."
"Will it be rough, do you think? I do wish Eve would talk. I can't get a word out of her. It makes it all so miserable, when we might be enjoying ourselves."
"Don't trouble: leave her to herself. I'll get you some papers."
On returning from the bookstall, he slipped loose silver into Patty's hands.
"Use that if you want anything on the journey. And—I haven't forgot my promise."
"Nonsense!"
"Go and take your places now: there's only ten minutes to wait."
He watched them as they passed the harrier. Neither of the girls was dressed very suitably for travelling; but Eve's costume resembled that of a lady, while Patty's might suggest that she was a lady's-maid. As if to confirm this distinction, Patty had burdened herself with several small articles, whereas her friend carried only a sunshade. They disappeared among people upon the platform. In a few minutes Hilliard followed, glanced along the carriages till he saw where the girls were seated, and took his own place. He wore a suit which had been new on his first arrival in London, good enough in quality and cut to give his features the full value of their intelligence; a brown felt hat, a russet necktie, a white flannel shirt. Finding himself with a talkative neighbour in the carriage, he chatted freely. As soon as the train had started, he lit his pipe and tasted the tobacco with more relish than for a long time.
On board the steamer Eve kept below from first to last. Patty walked the deck with Hilliard, and vastly to her astonishment, achieved the voyage without serious discomfort. Hilliard himself, with the sea wind in his nostrils, recovered that temper of buoyant satisfaction which had accompanied his first escape from London. He despised the weak misgivings and sordid calculations of yesterday. Here he was, on a Channel steamer, bearing away from disgrace and wretchedness the woman whom his heart desired. Wild as the project had seemed to him when first he conceived it, he had put it into execution. The moment was worth living for. Whatever the future might keep in store for him of dreary, toilsome, colourless existence, the retrospect would always show him this patch of purple—a memory precious beyond all the possible results of prudence and narrow self-regard.
The little she-Cockney by his side entertained him with the flow of her chatter; it had the advantage of making him feel a travelled man.
"I didn't cross this way when I came before," he explained to her. "From Newhaven it's a much longer voyage."
"You like the sea, then?"
"I chose it because it was cheaper—that's all."
"Yet you're so extravagant now," remarked Patty, with eyes that confessed admiration of this quality.
"Oh, because I am rich," he answered gaily. "Money is nothing to me."
"Are you really rich? Eve said you weren't."
"Did she?"
"I don't mean she said it in a disagreeable way. It was last night. She thought you were wasting your money upon us."
"If I choose to waste it, why not? Isn't there a pleasure in doing as you like?"
"Oh, of course there is," Patty assented. "I only wish I had the chance. But it's awfully jolly, this! Who'd have thought, a week ago, that I should be going to Paris? I have a feeling all the time that I shall wake up and find I've been dreaming."
"Suppose you go down and see whether Eve wants anything? You needn't say I sent you."
From Calais to Paris he again travelled apart from the girls. Fatigue overcame him, and for the last hour or two he slept, with the result that, on alighting at the Gare du Nord, he experienced a decided failure of spirits. Happily, there was nothing before him but to carry out a plan already elaborated. With the aid of his guide-book he had selected an hotel which seemed suitable for the girls, one where English was spoken, and thither he drove with them from the station. The choice of their rooms, and the settlement of details took only a few minutes; then, for almost the first time since leaving Charing Cross, he spoke to Eve.
"Patty will do everything she can for you," he said; "I shall be not very far away, and you can always send me a message if you wish. To-morrow morning I shall come at about ten to ask how you are—nothing more than that—unless you care to go anywhere."
The only reply was "Thank you," in a weary tone. And so, having taken his leave he set forth to discover a considerably less expensive lodging for himself. In this, after his earlier acquaintance with Paris, he had no difficulty; by half-past eight his business was done, and he sat down to dinner at a cheap restaurant. A headache spoilt his enjoyment of the meal. After a brief ramble about the streets, he went home and got into a bed which was rather too short for him, but otherwise promised sufficient comfort.
The first thing that came into his mind when he awoke next morning was that he no longer possessed a watch; the loss cast a gloom upon him. But he had slept well, and a flood of sunshine that streamed over his scantily carpeted floor, together with gladly remembered sounds from the street, soon put him into an excellent humour. He sprang tip, partly dressed himself, and unhasped the window. The smell of Paris had become associated in his mind with thoughts of liberty; a grotesque dance about the bed-room expressed his joy.
As he anticipated, Patty alone received him when he called upon the girls. She reported that Eve felt unable to rise.
"What do you think about her?" he asked. "Nothing serious, is it?"
"She can't get rid of her headache."
"Let her rest as long as she likes. Are you comfortable here?"
Patty was in ecstasies with everything, and chattered on breathlessly. She wished to go out; Eve had no need of her—indeed had told her that above all she wished to be left alone.
"Get ready, then," said Hilliard, "and we'll have an hour or two."
They walked to the Madeleine and rode thence on the top of a tram-car to the Bastille. By this time Patty had come to regard her strange companion in a sort of brotherly light; no restraint whatever appeared in her conversation with him. Eve, she told him, had talked French with the chambermaid.
"And I fancy it was something she didn't wantmeto understand."
"Why should you think so?"
"Oh, something in the way the girl looked at me."
"No, no; you were mistaken. She only wanted to show that she knew some French."
But Hilliard wondered whether Patty could be right. Was it not possible that Eve had gratified her vanity by representing her friend as a servant—a lady's-maid? Yet why should he attribute such a fault to her? It was an odd thing that he constantly regarded Eve in the least favourable light, giving weight to all the ill he conjectured in her, and minimising those features of her character which, at the beginning, he had been prepared to observe with sympathy and admiration. For a man in love his reflections followed a very unwonted course. And, indeed, he had never regarded his love as of very high or pure quality; it was something that possessed him and constrained him—by no means a source of elevating emotion.
"Do you like Eve?" he asked abruptly, disregarding some trivial question Patty had put to him.
"Like her? Of course I do."
"Andwhydo you like her?"
"Why?—ah—I don't know. Because I do."
And she laughed foolishly.
"Does Eve likeyou?" Hilliard continued.
"I think she does. Else I don't see why she kept up with me."
"Has she ever done you any kindness?"
"I'm sure I don't know. Nothing particular. She never gave anything, if you mean that. But she has paid for me at theatres and so on."
Hilliard quitted the subject.
"If you like to go out alone," he told her before they parted, "there's no reason why you shouldn't—just as you do in London. Remember the way back, that's all, and don't be out late. And you'll want some French money."
"But I don't understand it, and how can I buy anything when I can't speak a word?"
"All the same, take that and keep it till you are able to make use of it. It's what I promised you."
Patty drew back her hand, but her objections were not difficult to overcome.
"I dare say," Hilliard continued, "Eve doesn't understand the money much better than you do. But she'll soon be well enough to talk, and then I shall explain everything to her. On this piece of paper is my address; please let Eve have it. I shall call to-morrow morning again."
He did so, and this time found Eve, as well as her companion, ready to go out. No remark or inquiry concerning her health passed his lips; he saw that she was recovering from the crisis she had passed through, whatever its real nature. Eve shook hands with him, and smiled, though as if discharging an obligation.
"Can you spare time to show us something of Paris?" she asked.
"I am your official guide. Make use of me whenever it pleases you."
"I don't feel able to go very far. Isn't there some place where we could sit down in the open air?"
A carriage was summoned, and they drove to the Fields Elysian. Eve benefited by the morning thus spent. She left to Patty most of the conversation, but occasionally made inquiries, and began to regard things with a healthy interest. The next day they all visited the Louvre, for a light rain was falling, and here Hilliard found an opportunity of private talk with Eve; they sat together whilst Patty, who cared little for pictures, looked out of a window at the Seine.
"Do you like the hotel I chose?" he began.
"Everything is very nice."
"And you are not sorry to be here?"
"Not in one way. In another I can't understand how I come to be here at all."
"Your physician has ordered it."
"Yes—so I suppose it's all right."
"There's one thing I'm obliged to speak of. Do you understand French money?"
Eve averted her face, and spoke after a slight delay.
"I can easily learn."
"Yes. You shall take this Paris guide home with you. You'll find all information of that sort in it. And I shall give you an envelope containing money—just for your private use. You have nothing to do with the charges at the hotel."
"I've brought it on myself; but I feel more ashamed than I can tell you."
"If you tried to tell me I shouldn't listen. What you have to do now is to get well. Very soon you and Patty will be able to find your way about together; then I shall only come with you when you choose to invite me. You have my address."
He rose and broke off the dialogue.
For a week or more Eve's behaviour in his company underwent little change. In health she decidedly improved, but Hilliard always found her reserved, coldly amicable, with an occasional suggestion of forced humility which he much disliked. From Patty he learnt that she went about a good deal and seemed to enjoy herself.
"We don't always go together," said the girl. "Yesterday and the day before Eve was away by herself all the afternoon. Of course she can get on all right with her French. She takes to Paris as if she'd lived here for years."
On the day after, Hilliard received a postcard in which Eve asked him to be in a certain room of the Louvre at twelve o'clock. He kept the appointment, and found Eve awaiting him alone.
"I wanted to ask whether you would mind if we left the hotel and went to live at another place?"
He heard her with surprise.
"You are not comfortable?"
"Quite. But I have been to see my friend Mdlle. Roche—you remember. And she has shown me how we can live very comfortably at a quarter of what it costs now, in the same house where she has a room. I should like to change, if you'll let me."
"Pooh! You're not to think of the cost——"
"Whether I am to or not, I do, and can't help myself. I know the hotel is fearfully expensive, and I shall like the other place much better. Miss Roche is a very nice girl, and she was glad to see me; and if I'm near her, I shall get all sorts of advantages—in French, and so on."
Hilliard wondered what accounts of herself Eve had rendered to the Parisienne, but he did not venture to ask.
"Will Patty like it as well?"
"Just as well. Miss Roche speaks English, you know, and they'll get on very well together."
"Where is the place?"
"Rather far off—towards the Jardin des Plantes. But I don't think that would matter, would it?"
"I leave it entirely to you."
"Thank you," she answered, with that intonation he did not like. "Of course, if you would like to meet Miss Roche, you can."
"We'll think about it. It's enough that she's an old friend of yours."
When this change had been made Eve seemed to throw off a burden. She met Hilliard with something like the ease of manner, the frank friendliness, which marked her best moods in their earlier intercourse. At a restaurant dinner, to which he persuaded her in company with Patty, she was ready in cheerful talk, and an expedition to Versailles, some days after, showed her radiant with the joy of sunshine and movement. Hilliard could not but wonder at the success of his prescription.
He did not visit the girls in their new abode, and nothing more was said of his making the acquaintance of Mdlle. Roche. Meetings were appointed by post-card—always in Patty's hand if the initiative were female; they took place three or four times a week. As it was now necessary for Eve to make payments on her own account, Hilliard despatched to her by post a remittance in paper money, and of this no word passed between them. Three weeks later he again posted the same sum. On the morrow they went by river to St. Cloud—it was always a trio, Hilliard never making any other proposal—and the steam-boat afforded Eve an opportunity of speaking with her generous friend apart.
"I don't want this money," she said, giving him an envelope. "What you sent before isn't anything like finished. There's enough for a month more."
"Keep it all the same. I won't have any pinching."
"There's nothing of the kind. If I don't have my way in this I shall go back to London."
He put the envelope in his pocket, and stood silent, with eyes fixed on the river bank.
"How long do you intend us to stay?" asked Eve.
"As long as you find pleasure here."
"And—what am I to do afterwards?"
He glanced at her.
"A holiday must come to an end," she added, trying, but without success, to meet his look.
"I haven't given any thought to that," said Hilliard, carelessly; "there's plenty of time. It will be fine weather for many weeks yet."
"But I have been thinking about it. I should be crazy if I didn't."
"Tell me your thoughts, then."
"Should you be satisfied if I got a place at Birmingham?"
There again Was the note of self-abasement. It irritated the listener.
"Why do you put it in that way? There's no question of what satisfies me, but of what is good for you."
"Then I think it had better be Birmingham."
"Very well. It's understood that when we leave Paris we go there."
A silence. Then Eve asked abruptly:
"You will go as well?"
"Yes, I shall go back."
"And what becomes of your determination to enjoy life as long as you can?"
"I'm carrying it out. I shall go back satisfied, at all events."
"And return to your old work?"
"I don't know. It depends on all sorts of things. We won't talk of it just yet."
Patty approached, and Hilliard turned to her with a bright, jesting face.
Midway in August, on his return home one afternoon, the concierge let him know that two English gentlemen had been inquiring for him; one of them had left a card. With surprise and pleasure Hilliard read the name of Robert Narramore, and beneath it, written in pencil, an invitation to dine that evening at a certain hotel in the Rue de Provence. As usual, Narramore had neglected the duties of a correspondent; this was the first announcement of his intention to be in Paris. Who the second man might be Hilliard could not conjecture.
He arrived at the hotel, and found Narramore in company with a man of about the same age, his name Birching, to Hilliard a stranger. They had reached Paris this morning, and would remain only for a day or two, as their purpose was towards the Alps.
"I couldn't stand this heat," remarked Narramore, who, in the very lightest of tourist garbs, sprawled upon a divan, and drank something iced out of a tall tumbler. "We shouldn't have stopped here at all if it hadn't been for you. The idea is that you should go on with us."
"Can't—impossible——"
"Why, what are you doing here—besides roasting?"
"Eating and drinking just what suits my digestion."
"You look pretty fit—a jolly sight better than when we met last. All the same, you will go on with us. We won't argue it now; it's dinner-time. Wait till afterwards."
At table, Narramore mentioned that his friend Birching was an architect.
"Just what this fellow ought to have been," he said, indicating Hilliard. "Architecture is his hobby. I believe he could sit down and draw to scale a front elevation of any great cathedral in Europe—couldn't you, Hilliard?"
Laughing the joke aside, Hilliard looked with interest at Mr. Birching, and began to talk with him. The three young men consumed a good deal of wine, and after dinner strolled about the streets, until Narramore's fatigue and thirst brought them to a pause at a cafe on the Boulevard des Italiens. Birching presently moved apart, to reach a newspaper, and remained out of earshot while Narramore talked with his other friend.
"What's going on?" he began. "What are you doing here? Seriously, I want you to go along with us. Birching is a very good sort of chap, but just a trifle heavy—takes things rather solemnly for such hot weather. Is it the expense? Hang it! You and I know each other well enough, and, thanks to my old uncle——"
"Never mind that, old boy," interposed Hilliard. "How long are you going for?"
"I can't very well be away for more than three weeks. The brass bedsteads, you know——"
Hilliard agreed to join in the tour.
"That's right: I've been looking forward to it," said his friend heartily. "And now, haven't you anything to tell me? Are you alone here? Then, what the deuce do you do with yourself?"
"Chiefly meditate."
"You're the rummest fellow I ever knew. I've wanted to write to you, but—hang it!—what with hot weather and brass bedsteads, and this and that——Now, whatareyou going to do? Your money won't last for ever. Haven't you any projects? It was no good talking about it before you left Dudley. I saw that. You were all but fit for a lunatic asylum, and no wonder. But you've pulled round, I see. Never saw you looking in such condition. What is to be the next move?"
"I have no idea."
"Well, now,Ihave. This fellow Birching is partner with his brother, in Brum, and they're tolerably flourishing. I've thought of you ever since I came to know him; I think it was chiefly on your account that I got thick with him—though there was another reason I'll tell you about that some time. Now, why shouldn't you go into their office? Could you manage to pay a small premium? I believe I could square it with them. I haven't said anything. I never hurry—like things to ripen naturally. Suppose you saw your way, in a year or two, to make only as much in an architect's office as you did in that——machine-shop, wouldn't it be worth while?"
Hilliard mused. Already he had a flush on his cheek, but his eyes sensibly brightened.
"Yes," he said at length with deliberation. "It would be worth while."
"So I should think. Well, wait till you've got to be a bit chummy with Birching. I think you'll suit each other. Let him see that you do really know something about architecture—there'll be plenty of chances."
Hilliard, still musing, repeated with mechanical emphasis:
"Yes, it would be worth while."
Then Narramore called to Birching, and the talk became general again.
The next morning they drove about Paris, all together. Narramore, though it was his first visit to the city, declined to see anything which demanded exertion, and the necessity for quenching his thirst recurred with great frequency. Early in the afternoon he proposed that they should leave Paris that very evening.
"I want to see a mountain with snow on it. We're bound to travel by night, and another day of this would settle me. Any objection, Birching?"
The architect agreed, and time-tables were consulted. Hilliard drove home to pack. When this was finished, he sat down and wrote a letter:
"DEAR MISS MADELEY,—My friend Narramore is here, and has persuaded me to go to Switzerland with him. I shall be away for a week or two, and will let you hear from me in the meantime. Narramore says I am looking vastly better, and it is you I have to thank for this. Without you, my attempts at 'enjoying life' would have been a poor business. We start in an hour or two,—Yours ever,"MAURICE HILLIARD."
He was absent for full three weeks, and arrived with his friends at the Gare de Lyon early one morning of September. Narramore and the architect delayed only for a meal, and pursued their journey homeward; Hilliard returned to his old quarters despatched a post-card asking Eve and Patty to dine with him that evening, and thereupon went to bed, where for some eight hours he slept the sleep of healthy fatigue.
The place he had appointed for meeting with the girls was at the foot of the Boulevard St. Michel. Eve came alone.
"And where's Patty?" he asked, grasping her hand heartily in return for the smile of unfeigned pleasure with which she welcomed him.
"Ah, where indeed? Getting near to Charing Cross by now, I think."
"She has gone back?"
"Went this very morning, before I had your card—let us get out of the way of people. She has been dreadfully home-sick. About a fortnight ago a mysterious letter came for her she hid it away from me. A few days after another came, and she shut herself up for a long time, and when she came out again I saw she had been crying. Then we talked it over. She had written to Mr. Dally and got an answer that made her miserable; that was thefirstletter. She wrote again, and had a reply that made her still more wretched; and that was thesecond. Two or three more came, and yesterday she could bear it no longer."
"Then she has gone home to make it up with him?"
"Of course. He declared that she has utterly lost her character and that no honest man could have anything more to say to her! I shouldn't wonder if they are married in a few weeks' time."
Hilliard laughed light-heartedly.
"I was to beg you on my knees to forgive her," pursued Eve. "But I can't very well do that in the middle of the street, can I? Really, she thinks she has behaved disgracefully to you. She wouldn't write a letter—she was ashamed. 'Tell him to forget all about me!' she kept saying."
"Good little girl! And what sort of a husband will this fellow Dally make her?"
"No worse than husbands in general, I dare say—but how well you look! How you must have been enjoying yourself!"
"I can say exactly the same about you!"
"Oh, but you are sunburnt, and look quite a different man!"
"And you have an exquisite colour in your cheeks, and eyes twice as bright as they used to be; and one would think you had never known a care."
"I feel almost like that," said Eve, laughing.
He tried to meet her eyes; she eluded him.
"I have an Alpine hunger; where shall we dine?"
The point called for no long discussion, and presently they were seated in the cool restaurant. Whilst he nibbled an olive, Hilliard ran over the story of his Swiss tour.
"If onlyyouhad been there! It was the one thing lacking."
"You wouldn't have enjoyed yourself half so much. You amused me by your description of Mr. Narramore, in the letter from Geneva."
"The laziest rascal born! But the best-tempered, the easiest to live with. A thoroughly good fellow; I like him better than ever. Of course he is improved by coming in for money—who wouldn't be, that has any good in him at all? But it amazes me that he can be content to go back to Birmingham and his brass bedsteads. Sheer lack of energy, I suppose. He'll grow dreadfully fat, I fear, and by when he becomes really a rich man—it's awful to think of."
Eve asked many questions about Narramore; his image gave mirthful occupation to her fancy. The dinner went merrily on, and when the black coffee was set before them:
"Why not have it outside?" said Eve. "You would like to smoke, I know."
Hilliard assented, and they seated themselves under the awning. The boulevard glowed in a golden light of sunset; the sound of its traffic was subdued to a lulling rhythm.
"There's a month yet before the leaves will begin to fall," murmured the young man, when he had smoked awhile in silence.
"Yes," was the answer. "I shall be glad to have a little summer still in Birmingham."
"Do you wish to go?"
"I shall go to-morrow, or the day after," Eve replied quietly.
Then again there came silence.
"Something has been proposed to me," said Hilliard, at length, leaning forward with his elbows upon the table. "I mentioned that our friend Birching is an architect. He's in partnership with his brother, a much older man. Well, they nave offered to take me into their office if I pay a premium of fifty guineas. As soon as I can qualify myself to be of use to them, they'll give me a salary. And I shall have the chance of eventually doing much better than I ever could at the old grind, where, in fact, I had no prospect whatever."
"That's very good news," Eve remarked, gazing across the street.
"You think I ought to accept?"
"I suppose you can pay the fifty guineas, and still leave yourself enough to live upon?"
"Enough till I earn something," Hilliard answered with a smile.
"Then I should think there's no doubt."
"The question is this—are you perfectly willing to go back to Birmingham?"
"I'manxiousto go."
"You feel quite restored to health?"
"I was never so well in my life."
Hilliard looked into her face, and could easily believe that she spoke the truth. His memory would no longer recall the photograph in Mrs. Brewer's album; the living Eve, with her progressive changes of countenance, had obliterated that pale image of her bygone self. He saw her now as a beautiful woman, mysterious to him still in many respects, yet familiar as though they had been friends for years.
"Then, whatever life is before me," he said. "I shall have doneonething that is worth doing."
"Perhaps—if everyone's life is worth saving," Eve answered in a voice just audible.
"Everyone's is not; but yours was."
Two men who had been sitting not far from them rose and walked away. As if more at her ease for this secession, Eve looked at her companion, and said in a tone of intimacy:
"How I must have puzzled you when you first saw me in London!"
He answered softly:
"To be sure you did. And the thought of it puzzles me still."
"Oh, but can't you understand? No; of course you can't—I have told you so little. Just give me an idea of what sort of person you expected to find."
"Yes, I will. Judging from your portrait, and from what I was told of you, I looked for a sad, solitary, hard-working girl—rather poorly dressed—taking no pleasure—going much to chapel—shrinking from the ordinary world."
"And you felt disappointed?"
"At first, yes; or, rather, bewildered—utterly unable to understand you."
"You are disappointed still?" she asked.
"I wouldn't have you anything but what you are."
"Still, that other girl was the one youwishedto meet."
"Yes, before I had seen you. It was the sort of resemblance between her life and my own. I thought of sympathy between us. And the face of the portrait—but I see better things in the face that is looking at me now."
"Don't be quite sure of that—yes, perhaps. It's better to be healthy, and enjoy life, than broken-spirited and hopeless. The strange thing is that you were right—you fancied me just the kind of a girl I was: sad and solitary, and shrinking from people—true enough. And I went to chapel, and got comfort from it—as I hope to do again. Don't think that I have no religion. But I was so unhealthy, and suffered so in every way. Work and anxiety without cease, from when I was twelve years old. You know all about my father? If I hadn't been clever at figures, what would have become of me? I should have drudged at some wretched occupation until the work and the misery of everything killed me."
Hilliard listened intently, his eyes never stirring from her face.
"The change in me began when father came back to us, and I began to feel my freedom. Then I wanted to get away, and to live by myself. I thought of London—I've told you how much I always thought of London—but I hadn't the courage to go there. In Birmingham I began to change my old habits; but more in what I thought than what I did. I wished to enjoy myself like other girls, but I couldn't. For one thing, I thought it wicked; and then I was so afraid of spending a penny—I had so often known what it was to be in want of a copper to buy food. So I lived quite alone; sat in my room every evening and read books. You could hardly believe what a number of books I read in that year. Sometimes I didn't go to bed till two or three o'clock."
"What sort of books?"
"I got them from the Free Library—books of all kinds; not only novels. I've never been particularly fond of novels; they always made me feel my own lot all the harder. I never could understand what people mean when they say that reading novels takes them 'out of themselves.' It was never so with me. I liked travels and lives of people, and books about the stars. Why do you laugh?"
"You escaped from yourselfthere, at all events."
"At last I saw an advertisement in a newspaper—a London paper in the reading-room—which I was tempted to answer; and I got an engagement in London. When the time came for starting I was so afraid and low-spirited that I all but gave it up. I should have done, if I could have known what was before me. The first year in London was all loneliness and ill-health. I didn't make a friend, and I starved myself, all to save money. Out of my pound a week I saved several shillings—just because it was the habit of my whole life to pinch and pare and deny myself. I was obliged to dress decently, and that came out of my food. It's certain I must have a very good constitution to have gone through all that and be as well as I am to-day."
"It will never come again," said Hilliard.
"How can I be sure of that? I told you once before that I'm often in dread of the future. It would be ever so much worse, after knowing what it means to enjoy one's life. How do people feel who are quite sure they can never want as long as they live? I have tried to imagine it, but I can't; it would be too wonderful."
"You may know it some day."
Eve reflected.
"It was Patty Ringrose," she continued, "who taught me to take life more easily. I was astonished to find how much enjoyment she could get out of an hour or two of liberty, with sixpence to spend. She did me good by laughing at me, and in the end I astonishedher. Wasn't it natural that I should be reckless as soon as I got the chance?"
"I begin to understand."
"The chance came in this way. One Sunday morning I went by myself to Hampstead, and as I was wandering about on the Heath I kicked against something. It was a cash-box, which I saw couldn't have been lying there very long. I found it had been broken open, and inside it were a lot of letters—old letters in envelopes; nothing else. The addresses on the envelopes were all the same—to a gentleman living at Hampstead. I thought the best I could do was to go and inquire for this address; and I found it, and rang the door-bell. When I told the servant what I wanted—it was a large house—she asked me to come in, and after I had waited a little she took me into a library, where a gentleman was sitting. I had to answer a good many questions, and the man talked rather gruffly to me. When he had made a note of my name and where I lived, he said that I should hear from him, and so I went away. Of course I hoped to have a reward, but for two or three days I heard nothing; then, when I was at business, someone asked to see me—a man I didn't know. He said he had come from Mr. So and So, the gentleman at Hampstead, and had brought something for me—four five-pound notes. The cash-box had been stolen by someone, with other things, the night before I found it, and the letters in it, which disappointed the thief, had a great value for their owner. All sorts of inquiries had been made about me and no doubt I very nearly got into the hands of the police, but it was all right, and I had twenty pounds reward. Think! twenty pounds!"
Hilliard nodded.
"I told no one about it—not even Patty. And I put the money into the Post Office savings bank. I meant it to stay there till I might be in need; but I thought of it day and night. And only a fortnight after, my employers shut up their place of business, and I had nothing to do. All one night I lay awake, and when I got up in the morning I felt as if I was no longer my old self. I saw everything in a different way—felt altogether changed. I had made up my mind not to look for a new place, but to take my money out of the Post Office—I had more than twenty-five pounds there altogether—and spend it for my pleasure. It was just as if something had enraged me, and I was bent on avenging myself. All that day I walked about the town, looking at shops, and thinking what I should like to buy: but I only spent a shilling or two, for meals. The next day I bought some new clothing. The day after that I took Patty to the theatre, and astonished her by my extravagance; but I gave her no explanation, and to this day she doesn't understand how I got my money. In a sort of way, Ididenjoy myself. For one thing, I took a subscription at Mudie's, and began to read once more. You can't think how it pleased me to get my books—new books—where rich people do. I changed a volume about every other day—I had so many hours I didn't know what to do with. Patty was the only friend I had made, so I took her about with me whenever she could get away in the evening."
"Yet never once dined at a restaurant," remarked Hilliard, laughing. "There's the difference between man and woman."
"My ideas of extravagance were very modest, after all."
Hilliard, fingering his coffee-cup, said in a lower voice:
"Yet you haven't told me everything."
Eve looked away, and kept silence.
"By the time I met you"—he spoke in his ordinary tone—"you had begun to grow tired of it."
"Yes—and——" She rose. "We won't sit here any longer."
When they had walked for a few minutes:
"How long shall you stay in Paris?" she asked.
"Won't you let me travel with you?"
"I do whatever you wish," Eve answered simply.