CHAPTER XVII
The morning broke with abounding good cheer. It was impossible not to respond to the revivifying matutinal influences. The vast solemnity of the austere mountain ranges filling the universe seemed more impersonal. Some stupendous, resplendent work of art might thus affect the senses. Only a keenly receptive temperament, the impressionable, plastic mood, might embrace its insistent meaning, its eloquent message, its redundant appeal to every vibrant, sensitive pulse. One saw the reality, yet put it aside, postponed it, like the great facts of life and death, and the momentousness of eternity, turning instead to the cheerful trifle of the hour. And perhaps it was enough to breathe such fresh balsamic air, to hear the sonorous periods of the lordly wind sounding over cliff and torrent, while all the poly-tinted leafy forests bent in obeisance; to see with the shallow outward eye the variant tints of blue, from the dark blurred efflorescence on the nearest slopes to the translucent sapphire of further ranges and thence to a hard, clear, turquoise blue, and so to a faint, vague azure that one could hardly discriminate from the sky line; and above still, the silent great, white domes, where, although so early, the snow had fallen. Even the shadows were but simulacra of winged joys, as the white dazzling clouds sped through the sky, while their similitudes followed swiftly below over the mountain side and the valley, racing for some unimagined aërial goal. The air was full of woodsy fragrance—the odour of sere leaves, the pungent aroma of mint and of water-side weeds, the balsamic breath of fir and pine. Keen, too, withal; the group gathering around the hearth in the office comprised all the adult guests in the house, save a few loiterers, still lingering at the breakfast tables nearest the fire in the great dining-room. Now and then juvenile parties came thundering down the stairs with golf clubs or tennis rackets, rushed through the office, and were gone, banging the glass doors to imminent fracture, or the hearth-side was recruited by the laggards from the breakfast table bringing a whiff of cold air from the transit through the hall. Ruth and Lucia were rubbing their pink hands, and shivering in their boleros of dark red and light blue cloth respectively, worn over their sheer lawn morning dresses, to the wonderment of Jardine, who could not comprehend why, if they were cold, they should not wear warm cheviot gowns, unmindful of the unwritten law of truly orthodox Southern women, who would fain cling to their white lawn attire till the snow falls. Lloyd's theatric discrimination had already appraised the effect of their Dresden belt ribbons, and high stocks, the one in red and brown, the other blue and pink. He bowed to them with distant gravity, but his face had a suggestion of happiness which had not heretofore characterised its quiet composure. His peculiar appeal to popular favour had been all the more effective because of the romantic history of good fortune detailed in his absence last night, and there had been some very hearty hand-shaking in the casual introductions around the fireside this morning. All the house looked with a joyous prepossession upon the newly found legatee and a sort of vicarious pleasure. They were even prepared to find a certain quaint zest in his "outrageous profession," as one irreconcilable old prig called it.
"Did you have a fine bout with the gloves?" asked a clean-shaven gentleman, taking his cigar from his smiling lips. His expression just now was as benignant as a bishop's, but he was broker at home.
Lloyd was a trifle embarrassed; he did not know how much of the lawn had been in view from his interlocutor's point of observation.
"Oh, Mr. Laniston will get so he can stand up, after a little."
There was a laugh around the circle, and Frank's pink cheeks grew very red.
"Why, Francis," exclaimed his mother in genuine amazement, "I thought you were a champion boxer!"
"Oh, I've got it in for him, good and hot," Frank sputtered, over his cigarette.
"Did he down you?" asked the broker. "Really?"
"I fell over somehow, every time he crooked his little finger."
"I'll get him so that he can stand up," said Lloyd patronisingly.
"There's all the difference in the world between a pastime and a profession," said the broker. "We see that in the market—a little flier once in a while—and a plunger."
"But will you continue this profession, Mr. Lloyd?" the prig fixed him with such a scandalised expression in his prominent, lashless eyes, that it amounted to an intentional reproach and affront.
Mr. Dalton seemed to resent it.
"He has something better to do." He laughed prosperously, and stroked his moustache.
"He was signing cheques for half an hour this morning," continued the lawyer. This boast was not in the best taste, but Lloyd had so far won upon him that he was both sensitive and belligerent in his client's behalf.
The showman was pained, and winced visibly.
"Just some little things I wanted before the fairy gold melts away," he said, laughing but disconcerted. He had begun to entertain great confidence in Mr. Dalton, but bruiser though he was, he could not appreciate the lawyer's faculty for putting people down.
Mr. Dalton took from his pocket a great sheaf of letters, ready stamped for the mail.
"And I had better post these while I think of it;" he began to sift them apart, and one by one slipped them into a slit in the counter where a box lurked for their reception.
"The first expresses filial piety, and endows a bed in a hospital in his mother's name. The second orders a monument to the memory of his parents."
Mr. Dalton looked around with a triumphant eye, evidently bent on "rubbing it in."
"Then comes the discharge of just debts. James Tunstan."
"That's Wick-Zoo," said Lloyd, suddenly forgetful of the public display of his affairs. He looked with a laugh of extreme relish at Frank, who cried hilariously, "Oh, hi! the wild man!"
"And John Haxon."
"Captain Ollory," Lloyd interpreted, still smiling, half regretfully; the street fair seemed now some tender reminiscence of many a year agone.
"I can't persuade my young friend to sever his connection with the greatest show on earth," Mr. Dalton laid the letters on one knee and glanced around the circle with an expression of disapproval and exasperation. "That is, he doesn't propose to manage it personally or to perform, but he still remains a partner, and intends to finance it. With all its faults, he loves it still!—and Haxon succeeds to the managerial—er—er—er—ermine."
"Why, they'd go to pieces without me—to everlasting smithereens!" exclaimed Lloyd excitedly. "And it's hard to get a place in a company to break your neck in!"
"But I understand they went off and leftyou," said Dalton.
"Somebody had to stay, and I was the captain of the ship."
"But, Mr. Lloyd, think of the unpleasant personal publicity," said the priggish gentleman. "They will advertise your name in this connection and make money out of it. That's what they'll do—make money out of it. They will use your accession to fortune as a sensation, a card to draw people to the show."
"Exactly what I wrote to Haxon—work it for all it's worth, and quit sousin' in that old tank of yours that will break your back and drown you some day! I'll keep that show going—straight goods; it kept me going many a day."
Mr. Dalton mournfully shook his head, and the priggish gentleman, too inquisitive for good form—but he was justified in some degree by the uncommon circumstances—demanded:
"Then you contemplate a different occupation for your own life, I suppose?"
"Yes; I'm fed up with knocking about the world. I want to be quiet for a change. I'll go to my own house," he paused, and shook his head a trifle sadly. "Sounds funny to me! I don't understand farming, but I'll see if I can catch on. I like animals, but they're wild generally; the lions and panthers and such fellows always get to know me almost before I notice them. Maybe cows and muleswould seemtame." He laughed a little.
"Professor Gordon B. Lancaster," read Mr. Dalton from another stamped and addressed envelope, "—thought I'd mislaid his letter; desiring if possible to secure his company and services."
"Ah, to read with Mr. Lloyd," said the priggish gentleman, a look like a benediction in the lashless orbs, such satisfaction beamed from them. "Yes—yes; you are still young enough to prepare for a collegiate course."
"But I don't contemplate that," said Lloyd, very calmly; "I'd fizzle out at that. This gentleman, if he accepts, will seem to the world to be my secretary, but in private life he will be my tutor, and live with me in my house."
Mrs. Laniston looked bewildered.
"But I should think that would be more expensive than a regular university course."
Mr. Dalton smiled and beamed, and tapped the letter against the sheaf he was sorting.
"A good bit of money goes with the real estate. Mr. Lloyd thinks he can afford to put himself on a level in culture with his station."
"Very praiseworthy," said the prig.
"I haven't the proper foundation for the classics," explained Lloyd. "I propose that this gent shall read with me. Hist'ry is the racket I care most for. When I performed with a circus company I travelled with through Europe, I saw enough to excite my wonder, and I jus' wondered, an' wondered. Now I want toknow. And the poets and general literachure! My father used to read a great deal of such stuff when his health had disabled him, and I am going to travel right along the road he took, and read the words he read, and dream the dreams he dreamed. I never had the time before. I'm strong on the common rudiments—readin' and writin' and arithmetic."
"A very fair accountant," Mr. Dalton commended the meritorious attainment.
"Oh, yes; kept the books of the company."
"'Greatest show——'" suggested Mr. Dalton, dimpling.
And the impresario had the grace to laugh good-humouredly, though he flushed, too.
"Now here are two letters to the department stores," said Mr. Dalton, who for some reason seemed bent on exploiting his client, who in his inexperience and his absorption in the strange developments of his affairs, apparently saw nothing unusual in the trend of the conversation.
"They've not got stamps," he exclaimed excitedly, "That'll never do. They must get off! Can you accommodate me?" to the affable clerk. "Thanks, much."
"They are both orders for dry goods?" said Mr. Dalton.
"Oh, no; this is for the hydrostatic bed for the Living Skeleton. That poor man's bones, that he lives by, torture him. The feather beds, and the flock beds, and the mattresses are simply fierce. And he is stingy, yet he is tolerably warm in this world's goods. And he is an educated man. But he always stuck at the expense. Now he has got it."
Lloyd chucked the letter into the slit with extreme satisfaction.
"Stop—hadn't you better ask some lady about the number of yards for that gown, Mrs. Laniston, for instance, before you mail that letter?"
"If you will be so very kind." Theci-devantshowman turned toward Mrs. Laniston with that distinguished manner which she had first observed in him. "It depends, of course, on the size of the person. It is a gown for the fat lydy. She is sensitive, and suffers dreadfully from the public. But she is a very nice lydy! I think she would like to be beautiful, and as she has so few pleasures I thought a surprise might tickle her. So I ordered sixty yards of silk—the heaviest and best quality."
"Oh, oh, I should think that would be ample," said Mrs. Laniston, decorously able to preserve her gravity.
But Ruth's dimples could not be hid; she was all pink now, and smiled alluringly.
"What tint—Mr. Lloyd?" she asked.
"Alice blue," he replied, quite solemnly, and Ruth's suppressed laughter burst out uncontrollably at the idea.
His eyes had a suggestion of reproach, as he looked at her, but Lucia's face was grave, deeply flushed, pondering, pained.
"Hard life, to be a freak," Lloyd said; then as if for tabulation of correspondence by Mr. Dalton—"One dozen pink sandals for flying lydy. She has so much trouble presenting fresh soles to the public, and dingy ones show so."
"And now, your grand relative, Thomas Lloyd, Esquire."
"Do you visit him in Glaston?" the habitué of Glaston asked with an added infusion of respect.
"No, sir!" said the ex-showman, with his first touch of stiffness. "Hevisits me at my house."
"Mr. Thomas Lloyd wrote to request the honour of a visit, and I brought the letter," said Mr. Dalton; he still had the air of exploiting a case and marshalling his points, one by one, before a judge or a jury. "It seemed an agreeable arrangement to me, but Mr. Lloyd saw the matter in a different light. He is a man equipped fortours de force, and he seemed to think it best to make the mountain come to Mahomet. So we telegraphed his refusal and his counter invitation last night, and received a long distance telephone of acceptance this morning. Now Mr. Lloyd writes to name the day. It seems he is not leaving New Helvetia immediately."
"I hope you don't inconvenience yourself on my account—our little contract," said Frank, with solicitude.
Lloyd showed sudden embarrassment.
"No—no——," he said, his fine face flushing, his candid eyes faltering. "Not on your account. I know you'd release me. I'm tired of hustling round; and—I like the place, and I've a little leisure now."
Mr. Jardine hearkened to this in prophetic displeasure. His pride, his self-respect, had been cut down by the part he had played in the esclandre of the previous evening, and yet he could not reproach himself with precipitancy. He had vainly sought to evade, to shake off this dangerous, this derogatory association, since the incident of the Ferris Wheel. The crisis was forced when he had seen the woman he loved and admired and respected unsuspiciously promenading the moon-lit verandah in this showman's company. The fact that he proved to be the scion of a family of standing, and that he had been lifted from vagabondage to competence by the provisions of a will did not in any small degree annul the objections to his career and the suspicion, which Jardine felt was justified, of recent complicity with the moonshiners in their unlawful traffic. Jardine's inherent caution, however, was rendered more conservative by the circumstance that the fellow-traveller had proved to be a lawyer, rather than a Federal emissary, and was charged with a mission of honour and service to the object of his suspicion instead of espionage and arrest, as he had fancied, and he was devoutly thankful that this ludicrous mistake of identity was not definitely elicited in his impetuous and uncharacteristic outburst last night, when he had demanded an explanation. The sensational outcome with its elements of romance, so alluring to the average mind, had served to obliterate at the time Jardine's own extraordinary conduct, and although it had recurred to the memory of more than one of the group, since the excitements had subsided, they had hesitated to mention it. Jardine was not a drinking man, but intoxication only might serve to account with simplicity for the demonstration. His was a nature of almost austere reserve and his presence had always a certain distinction and dignity difficult to disregard. Most of those present after the breaking up of the party last night, lingering to finish out their cigars, had reconciled themselves to the ravages of their curiosity, and there was a sentiment of gratitude as to a public benefactor when the broker suddenly accosted Jardine.
"By the way, Mr. Jardine, you treated us to a fine sensation to-night. Were you acquainted with this lawyer and his lucky client, or whom did you suppose them to be?"
"A case of mistaken identity," said Jardine easily, but with the certain aloof composure that became him so well. "I beg you won't refer to it. I could not discuss it—very embarrassing. Good-night." And he turned away.
In the days that ensued Mr. Jardine's gloomy expectations seemed hardly likely to be justified. Mrs. Laniston had taken the helm with a strong hand, and the sway that she could maintain when she would was amply manifest. The two girls were continually under her wing, and the old routine of their occupations was re-established as before the outing to Colbury. Jardine once more found himself her partner at bridge against Lucia and Ruth, whiling away long hours of rainy weather, while Lloyd was smoking and chatting or playing billiards with some of the other gentlemen, with whom he had swiftly become cordial friends, or deep with his lawyer in business correspondence, or out exercising with the stalwart Frank. Mrs. Laniston was not so radical in her management of the situation as to attract attention, not even indeed from the persons most concerned. Now and again Lloyd, all unsuspicious of her effort at avoidance, entered into conversation with the two young ladies in the group by the office fire, and their chaperon had not a word or glance to check them. She even smilingly surveyed the scene when more than once he joined them in the procession of young people who, in wraps and rubbers, essayed a constitutional tramp, trudging up and down the wet and windy piazzas while the persistent rain steadily fell without and the rest of the world had vanished utterly in the clouds. But these occasional incidents occupied inconsiderable fractions of time, and counted but scantily against the long hours that Jardine spent in their society, at cards, or driving in the woods, or reading aloud to them, while they sat at their crochet-work in the bay-window, an improving book, of which Mrs. Laniston had expressed her desire that he should give them his views, in marginalia, so to speak, which were somewhat in contravention of the conclusions of the author. Mr. Jardine entertained a conviction not only that he read well, but that his thoughts did not suffer disparagement in contrast with the expositions of the text.
It was not altogether with a good grace, however, that Jardine fell into line under these tactics. Mentally he revolted at every concession, even slight and apparently obligatory, to evade an awkward discrimination against Lloyd. Jardine could tolerate no half measures, and the errors of this policy he deemed amply demonstrated one morning of brilliant sunshine when all the guests were assembled in the hotel office awaiting the arrival of the stage from Colbury.
When the stage came in with the mail, but with not a single passenger, there was a general diversion of the attention of the group around the fire. Letters were opened and read, the recipients now frowning over unwelcome information, now with hard-set teeth and firm jaw, as the eyes scanned the lines, in prophetic refusal of a proposition as yet hardly presented. Only once or twice was there a gleam of pleasure, so awry does the world go with most of us, so do anxiety and disillusionment, and actual disaster predominate. The composite expression of countenance of the group after opening the mail was a reluctant and grudging thanksgiving that matters were no worse. The columns of market prices and stock quotations in the newspapers came in for serious and silent study, and the politician, who had congressional aspirations, pondered long and deeply over the reports of the returns from certain local elections, of moment to a possible canvass.
Mr. Dalton and his young friend had retired to the bridge table in the bay-window, where the man of law explained and expatiated upon certain business interests of which his correspondence treated. Now and again Lloyd's eyes wandered to the verandah outside where Lucia and Ruth were rapidly walking to and fro in the sunshine, their sheer, crisp, white skirts waving in the speed of their motion and their chilly hands tucked under their elbows in the sleeves of their blue and red boleros. Jardine noticed that they smiled graciously upon the two gentlemen in the bay-window as they passed. They came in presently, all aglow, announcing their intention to make up a party for the bowling alley.
"Mamma says the ground is too damp for tennis," pouted Ruth, glancing at Jardine, expectant of partisanship and counsel.
He had been saying to himself bitterly that it was not his capacity for self-sacrifice in Lucia Laniston's interests that was limited, but the possibilities. Her aunt had been present throughout the scene of the disclosure of identity and otherwise knew as much of the man as he did, for his suspicions could not have been safely suggested, and he had no means of proving their truth. He was amazed to find that his anger against Lucia Laniston, his disapproval of her headstrong folly, had not diminished the strength of his attachment, for the qualities she had displayed throughout the Street Fair episode were precisely the traits with which he had least sympathy—unconventionality, girlish impetuosity, a lack of solid judgment, a flighty fun that no sane man could enjoy, a wild relish of fantastic novelty, and the evening of their return a flout at a friendly monition and a defiant persistence in her own course. He loved her, it was clear, and he had an infinite patience where she was concerned.
He merely bowed with silent acquiescence in the proposition to wile away the time with tenpins, but Mrs. Laniston broke out with inexorable negation.
"No—no bowling alley to-day. The roof leaks like a riddle and the building is sopping with dampness and as chilly as a vault. Whatareyou two thinking of?"
Lucia's countenance clouded with disappointment.
"We can't sit moping by the fire all this magnificent day, Aunt Dora," she plained.
For his life Jardine could not refrain from coming to the rescue.
"What do you say to a brisk gallop in the sunshine? The horses are in fine fettle."
"The very thing!" cried Ruth.
"I justlivefor the saddle!" declared Lucia, beaming with pleased anticipation.
"What a help he'll be to Mrs. Jardine (when he finds her) in making up her mind!" said Ruth, in explanatory wise to Lucia.
"How astonished Mrs. Jardine will be (when he finds her) at the way he can hit it off when he does let himself go!" said Lucia, in an affected aside to Ruth.
Jardine laughed with genuine good humour. It had been so long since he had encountered this fiction of "Mrs. Jardine" that he was heartily glad to hear of her again, and was disposed to think them and their ingenuity in manufacturing her views very fetching.
"Shall I have your saddle put on Admiration?" he asked of Lucia, for two of the horses were his; the affection of the liver which he had, or fancied he had, was presumed to be benefited by horseback exercise, and as Mr. Jardine had no affinity for martyrdom he had brought his own excellent mounts with him. On occasions like this he sacrificed his own pleasure and rode an animal from the livery stable which, however, kept very passable stock, especially since the hard driving and riding of the season were over and the horses had had time to recuperate.
"Oh, do, Lucia," cried Ruth. "I'm afraid of Admiration. He's dear, but he dances so on his hind legs."
"He's perfectly safe," said Jardine, "only a little spirited."
"And so fast! I lo-o-ve him!" declared Lucia.
"And will you have the mare, Rosabel?" he asked Ruth, respectfully.
"Oh—won't I, though!" she said, dimpling.
"And the rest of us will have to put up with the livery stable nags," said Frank, oblivious of the fact that Mr. Jardine had not invited him to join the party; indeed Jardine had contemplated taking the two girls on a decorous morning canter, riding a livery stable nag between the two, and had by no means proposed an equestrian party. Still, the suggestion had grown out of the taboo of tenpins and tennis, and it was natural, with his cubbish facility for blundering, that Frank should not think the project at all exclusive. Indeed, the idea that it was to be a general outing of the youth of the place was shared by others as well, and one of the elderly gentlemen, the broker from New Orleans, turned with a sudden inspiration to Lloyd, who had completed his business with Dalton and now waited to pass through the group.
"Let me warn you against the livery nag. I have an extra good saddle horse here, and shall be much complimented to put you up."
He had been greatly attracted by the young fellow's face and manner; besides Lloyd might be soon seeking investment for his money, and there was no telling when he would want to buy or sell stocks. Fair words go as far in the brokerage business as any other.
Jardine was amazed and incensed at Lloyd's ready acceptance, and the broker, turning to the telephone, was the first to cry "Hello" to the livery stable.
It seemed a fate, the most mischievous of complications, that Jardine's effort to save his lady-love the ennui of a dull day should presently place her beside the man of all others whom he wished her to avoid—handsomer than ever in correct equestrian costume—"possibly his gear as a ringmaster," Jardine thought, with a sneer—and riding like a centaur. The broker's horse was a stylish, well-bred brute, and his very proximity seemed to stimulate Admiration to sudden bursts of competitive speed. Both mounts were hard to hold, and Lucia had never seemed half so beautiful, so spirited. Her dark-green riding-habit enhanced her fairness. She wore the regulation high stiff silk hat on her fluffy brown hair, with a shimmering white silken veil twisted half about it, and half about her throat. Her high white collar and shirt front in their mannish effect and a dark-red four-in-hand tie were her special pride. Her airy poise on the side-saddle seemed to Lloyd infinite temerity and a great sacrifice to feminine bondage in convention, for he was accustomed to see "lydies" ride cross-saddle, but she appeared to have much confidence, and maintained a secure seat. Erect and fearless she now and again looked over her shoulder to invite Ruth's bright-eyed sympathy from the distance. For Rosabel could not canter in the same class; sleek and gentle and fleet enough, she was ideal for a lady's use, and Jardine jogged on his hired nag beside her. Jardine had jockeyed, as one may say, to throw Lloyd with Ruth Laniston, and himself join the two ahead. But Lloyd had taken his place beside Lucia's rein, and persistently kept it. Frank was soon losing ground. He could not maintain the pace, and Jardine presently to his immeasurable chagrin found the brother and sister beside him while the fleeter steeds carried the couple ahead on and on—out of sight.
For a time neither drew rein; the sandy road, beaten hard by the late storm, was ideal. The foliage of the forest trees all along the vast slopes was freshly washed and resplendent. The illuminated yellow of the maples and hickories might have dispensed with the sun in its wonderful clarity of tone; it seemed to glow with inherent light. The red of the sourwood and the sumach and the scarlet oak contrasted richly. Down in the valleys, glimpsed whenever the road skirted the mountain's verge, one could see that the deciduous trees were still green, but on these lofty levels no foliage showed verdant save the fir and the pine. The wind itself seemed hardly more swift than the racing steeds; the clouds, dazzlingly white above the endless blue ranges, challenged their speed, scudding before the high aërial currents above even the bare domes, the "balds" of the mountains.
Now and then as the riders skirted a precipice they caught sight of a swift torrent, leaping down the mountain side, in cataract after cataract. Once Lloyd checked his horse to mark how the great vine that climbed from among the roots of a giant poplar on the slope below to its topmost branch, was laden with grapes; on a level with the road sat the cub of a bear in their midst, feeding on the fruit, pausing to gaze at them with a quaint ursine stare.
The horses snorted and sprang aside, and he laid his hand on her bridle as they passed along the narrow precipitous way. It was somewhat too narrow, too precipitous for this breakneck speed, and perhaps but for his peculiar insensibility to danger in equine matters he might earlier have checked it.
"We had best go slow along here," he said. "The earth is soft with the rain, and it might cave. Step lightly, my friend," he addressed the animal. But when they came on good rock-ribbed footing he did not mend their pace.
"Yes, we will go slow," she said, "and wait for the others."
"I don't care for them to overtake us," he said. "I have something in mind I want to say to you."
She looked confused, agitated. Her flush rose to the roots of her hair. She turned upon him her beautiful eyes—was it appeal or was it a gentle compassion that looked out at him inscrutably. Then she turned them hastily away.
"Don't say it," she exclaimed. "Don't say it!"
"You know already what it is—and why should I not speak? You want to spare me?"
She made a gesture of assent.
"I am not very easy hurt; that's one value of the hard knocks I've had; I'm equal to taking my punishment. I hardly hoped—how could I? But from the moment I saw you there on the piazza of the hotel in Colbury I knew the difference 'twixt prose and poetry. The world's been set to music since; sometimes it's sad, and sometimes it's sweet, but it's all singing rhymes. I loved you from the minute I heard your voice—but I did not begin to say my prayers to you till that night in the wheel; oh, you seemed so kind, so good, made in a special creation, unlike all in heaven or earth—not an angel—'cause you are a woman; not a woman—'cause you are a blessed saint! Oh, I lived to see you, and in all my troubles I'd only have to think of you, and though I never expected you to speak to me again my heart would be light—light!"
He broke off suddenly.
"Oh, I distress you;" for her head was bent low and he saw the tears falling from her eyes on her little trembling riding gloves. "And you are so kind; you wanted to spare me."
"No," she said, suddenly, brokenly; "I wanted to spare myself, for, oh—oh, I care as much as you—and more;more!"
She could not look at him, but she knew that his face was irradiated.
"Then—why—whycan't we be happy together? Say it again! I can't believe it!"
"No—no——" She was calming herself, sorry and dismayed that she had said aught. She had lost her self-control, and was struggling hard for composure.
"You mean that your friends would object? I would not have spoken a word, but for this change. I told you that if I had a chance for life on a better scale I'd take it. I have the means to make your life comfortable; I could not, I would not have asked you to make any sacrifice. Ought you to let your friends prevent our marriage if you care—if you really care?"
"It is impossible—the sorrow of my life, but impossible!" He gave a sigh of perplexity.
"You think I am—or rather my life has made me—so unacceptable?"
"I am so artificial," she sobbed. "I should not be easily contented."
She thought of the little six-room house just across the swamp and beyond the bayou, near her aunt's handsome country place in Louisiana, and tried to see herself there—in a rocking-chair on the porch, or planting seeds in the turfed, star-shaped flower beds.
"You are no more artificial than a lydy of culchure should be," he asseverated. Then ensued a long pause during which she glanced at him as, with a frown of doubt and perplexity, he looked far away at the horizon line, and she winced to note his grace and perfect pose in riding, realising the tawdry life which this apotheosis of equestrianism comprehended and represented.
"If you care," he said, "and God bless you for the word, will we be happy apart?"
"Oh, no! no!" she said, with a gush of tears. "A great joy has knocked at my door, and I can't open to it, but must bar up, and draw the bolts, and—how can I be happy?"
He turned in the saddle and looked sternly at her.
"Are you promised—to—another? That Mr. Jardine, perhaps?"
She rejoiced to see the fires of jealousy fiercely kindling in his eyes. She burst into a peal of laughter.
"Oh, poor Mr. Jardine," she cried. "To be jealous of poor Mr. Jardine!"
"Then, why—why—?" he asked impatiently.
"Can't you see that there would be no happiness for us together? We are of different worlds. I couldn't endure to see you give up your standards—and yet I could not abide them. The distance between us would widen, not close. I have no instincts for the simple life, and you would have no interest in the artificial."
Once more the dark and dreary little farmhouse came within her mental range of vision.
"You would not know what I relinquished, nor I what you sigh for. You keep up your connection with your roving company fortheirbenefit, and I honour you for your generosity—but I would prefer a more selfish man, with more regard for the sneer of the world."
"And you care for that—the sneer of the world?"
"The world would think I had quite thrown myself away."
"H-a-rdly—ha-a-rdly. The world noses out a little money mighty quick!"
"All your training, won with such pain and toil, is something I can't appreciate; tawdry and odious with a personal application, a stumbling-block and an offence to me; and all I have been taught and have striven for is beyond your ken."
"All I know is I love you; and all I care for is that you have said you love me!" he declared resolutely.
"And I should never have said it, but I have a confidence in you beyond my faith in any other mortal. I wanted you to know it, and keep it hidden in your heart, though we part forever."
"For my life I can't see why."
"It will be bitter, but that knowledge will help us to live through it."
"Oh, we will live through it—like the survivors live through death. The sun shines on graves all over the world, but the mourners go about the streets."
She burst into sobbing again, holding up her handkerchief to her eyes. Suddenly she lifted her head.
"They are coming—they are coming! Do I look as if I had been crying? Oh, I don't want them to know—it's like a sacrilege for them to know! There! there is a man coming along that path. What is that in his hand? Let us ride forward and stop him, as if we had been questioning him."
She drew the white gauze veil over her tearful eyes, and her cheeks all pallid from weeping, and together they rode forward to hail the mountaineer who had stopped stock still on beholding them. And from the long reaches of the road, like the footsteps of approaching doom, they heard the iterative tramp of hoofbeats, every moment growing louder.