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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Aurora the Magnificent, by Gertrude Hall
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Aurora the Magnificent
+
+Author: Gertrude Hall
+
+Release Date: December 10, 2009 [EBook #30642]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AURORA THE MAGNIFICENT ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: Alone in her room later ... she looked at the other
+portrait]
+
+
+
+
+AURORA THE MAGNIFICENT
+
+BY
+
+GERTRUDE HALL
+
+AUTHOR OF "THE TRUTH ABOUT CAMILLA," "THE UNKNOWN QUANTITY," ETC.
+
+ILLUSTRATED BY GERALD LEAKE
+
+
+NEW YORK
+
+THE CENTURY CO.
+
+1917
+
+
+
+
+Copyright, 1916, 1917, by
+
+The Century Co.
+
+Published, March, 1917
+
+
+
+
+TO
+
+MY SISTER GRACE
+
+WITHOUT WHOM THIS BOOK
+
+WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN.
+
+AND TO
+
+MY DEAR HELEN R----,
+
+WITHOUT WHOM IT WOULD
+
+HAVE BEEN
+
+DIFFERENT
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+Alone in her room later ... she looked at the
+other portrait                                             Frontispiece
+
+                                                            FACING PAGE
+
+After it she still stood a moment, looking toward the sanctuary      20
+
+"I thought," said Mrs. Hawthorne, "that you were going to
+come and take us sight-seeing"                                       82
+
+Aurora, clasping her hands in a delight that could find no
+words to express it, made a sound like the coo of a dove            200
+
+Gerald turned, and beheld that lady                                 272
+
+Aurora's eyes, fixed and starry, rested upon the little flame       290
+
+Aurora, with a comedy of pride, threw up her chin, lifted
+her arms, and turned as if on a pivot                               316
+
+"Come, let us reason together, Aurora"                              384
+
+
+
+
+AURORA THE MAGNIFICENT
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+
+Near sunset, one day in early October, not too long ago for some of us
+to remember with distinctness, Mr. Foss, United States consul at
+Florence, Italy, took a cab, as on other days, to the Porta Romana.
+Here, where the out-of-town tariff comes into effect, he paid his man,
+and set out to walk the rest of the way, thus meeting the various needs
+he felt: that for economy,--he was a family man with daughters to
+clothe,--that for exercise,--his wife told him he was growing fat,--and
+the need in general for an opportunity to think. He had found that
+walking aided reflection, that walking in beautiful places started the
+spring of apt and generous ideas. Though in his modest way a scholar, he
+was not as yet an author, but Florence had inspired him with the desire
+to write a book.
+
+Just beyond the Roman Gate begins the long Viale dei Colli,--Avenue of
+the Hills,--which climbs and winds, broad, shady, quiet, between lines
+of gardens and villas, occupied largely by foreigners, to the Piazzale,
+whence Michelangelo's boyish colossus gazes with a slight frown across
+Florence, outspread at his feet. Mr. Foss, as he mounted the easy grade,
+and noted with a liking unabated after years the pleasantness of each
+habitation glimpsed through iron railings and embowering green, thought
+how privileged a person should feel, after all, whose affairs involved
+residence in Italy.
+
+This recognized good fortune had not been properly tasted before another
+aspect of the thing presented itself for consideration....
+
+The consul felt a sigh trying to escape him, and turning from the images
+whose obtrusion had called it up from the depths, directed his attention
+to a different set of subjects, unwilling at the moment to be troubled.
+
+The glories and iniquities of that great family whose cannon-balls--or
+pills?--adorn so many of the 'scutcheons on Florentine street-corners
+and palace-fronts are what he selected as the theme for his meditations,
+a choice which seems less odd when we know that his book, the labor and
+pleasure of his spare hours, was a study of the Medici.
+
+He had not been busy many minutes with their supplanted policies and
+extinct ambitions before these dropped back into the past whence he had
+drawn them, and his mind gave itself over to an exercise more curious
+than reconstructing a dead epoch. A shortish, stoutish man, with a
+beginning of baldness on his crown and gray in his mustache, was trying
+by the whole force of a sympathetic imagination to fit himself into the
+shoes, occupy the very skin, of a delicate young girl, to look at the
+world through her eyes and feel life with her pulses.
+
+Thus absorbed, he hardly saw the posts of his own carriage gate; he
+passed unnoticing between his flower-beds, up his stone steps and came
+to himself only when, rubbing the hands he had just washed, he entered
+the dining-room and saw his wife.
+
+"Where are the girls?" he asked even before kissing her, for the most
+casual eye must be informed by the blank look of the table that instead
+of being laid for half a dozen as usual, it was prepared for a meagre
+two.
+
+Mrs. Foss was fond of sitting in the dining-room, which had a glass door
+into the garden on the side farthest from the road. There she read her
+book while waiting for dinnertime and her husband. The good gentleman
+did not always come directly home from his office. He had the love of
+dropping into dim churches, of loitering on bridges, of fingering the
+junk in old shops, but he was considerately never late for dinner.
+
+Mrs. Foss rose to receive her husband's salutation, and while answering
+his question settled herself at the table; for she had caught sight of a
+domestic peeping in at the door to see if the masters were there to be
+served.
+
+"Leslie and Brenda went to call on the Hunts," she gave her account,
+"and presently the Hunts' man came with a note from Mrs. Hunt, asking if
+the girls could stay to dine and go to the theater. A box had just been
+sent them. I was very glad to give my consent. Charlie will probably be
+one of the party and bring them home. Or perhaps Gerald. Or they will be
+put in a cab. I was delighted of the diversion for Brenda."
+
+"And where's Lily?"
+
+"She, too, is off having a good time. Fräulein was invited by some
+German friends who were giving a _Kinder-sinfonie_. Awful things,
+if you want my opinion. She asked if she might go and take Lily, and the
+poor child was so eager about it I thought I would just for once let her
+sit up late. She has so few pleasures of the kind."
+
+Mrs. Foss had helped the soup, with a ladle, out of a tureen.
+
+It was after her husband and she had emptied their soup-plates in
+companionable silence that, leaning back to wait for the next course,
+she asked her regular daily question.
+
+"Well, anything new? Anything interesting at the consulate?"
+
+Mr. Foss seemed in good faith to be searching his mind. Then he answered
+vaguely:
+
+"No; nothing in particular." All at once he smiled a smile of
+remembrance. "Yes, I saw some Americans to-day." He nodded, after an
+interval, with an appearance of relish. "The real thing."
+
+"In what way, Jerome? But, first of all, who were they?"
+
+"Wait a moment. I stuck their cards in my pocket to show you. They came
+to see me at the consulate. No, they are in my other coat. One of them
+was Mrs. Something Hawthorne, the other Miss Estelle Something."
+
+"What did they want?"
+
+"Everything--quite frankly everything. They have grown tired of their
+hotel; they speak nothing but English and don't know a soul. They came
+to find out from me how to go about getting a house and servants, horses
+and carriage."
+
+"Did they think that was part of a consul's duty?"
+
+"They didn't think. They cast themselves on the breast of a
+fellow-countryman. They caught at a plank."
+
+"A house, horses. They are rich, then."
+
+"So one would judge. Oh, yes, they're rich in a jolly, shameless,
+old-fashioned American way."
+
+"Well, it's a nice way." Mrs. Foss added limitingly: "When they're also
+generous. One has noticed, however, hasn't one,"--she seemed on second
+thought to be taking back something of her approval,--"a certain
+reticence, as a rule, with regard to the display of wealth in people of
+any real culture?"
+
+"These aren't, my dear. It's as plain as that they're rich. And, for a
+change, let me whisper to you, I found it pleasant. Not one tiresome
+word about art did they utter in connection with this, their first,
+visit to Italy."
+
+"I can see you liked them, but what you have so far said doesn't
+entirely help me to see why. Rich and ignorant Americans,
+unfortunately--A light breaks upon me! They were pretty!"
+
+A twinkle came into the consul's eyes, looking over at his wife, as one
+is amused sometimes by a joke old and obvious.
+
+His pause before answering seemed filled with an effort to visualize the
+persons in question.
+
+"Upon my word, Etta, I couldn't tell you." He laughed at his inability.
+
+"By that token they were not beauties," said the wife.
+
+"It seems likely you are right. At the same time"--he was still mentally
+regarding his visitors--"one would never think of wishing them other
+than they are."
+
+"Describe them if you can. What age women?"
+
+"My dear, there again you have me. Let us say that they are in the
+flower of life. One of them, so much I did remark, was rather more
+blooming than the other. Perhaps she was younger."
+
+"The miss?"
+
+"The married one. But perhaps it was only the difference between a rose
+and--" he searched--"let us say a bunch of mignonette. The rose--here I
+believe I tread safely on the road of description--had of that flower
+the roundness and solidity, if nothing else."
+
+"Stout?"
+
+"We will call it well developed, nobly planned. But what would be the
+good of telling you the color of these ladies' hair and eyes had I
+noticed it? It will help you much more effectively to pick them out in a
+crowd to be told they are very American."
+
+"Voices, too, I suppose."
+
+"Of course. You don't strictly mean high and nasal, do you? All I can
+say with any positiveness is that one of them had what I will call a
+warm voice--a voice, to make my meaning quite clear, like the crimson
+heart on a valentine."
+
+"I am enlightened. Was it the mignonette one?"
+
+"No; the hardy-garden rose."
+
+"And what did she say to you in her warm crimson voice?"
+
+"I have told you. She called for help."
+
+"You said, I hope, that your wife and daughters would be very happy to
+call on them and be of use if they could."
+
+"I did."
+
+The time-tried, well-mated friends were looking over at each other
+across the table, not expressing any more than at all times the quiet,
+daily desire of each to further the interests and comforts of the other.
+
+"Where are they staying?" the lady continued to question.
+
+"Hôtel de la Paix."
+
+"And they haven't any letters, introductions, addresses, anything?"
+
+"Apparently not."
+
+"Where are they from?"
+
+"Let me see. Did they mention it? My dear, if they did, I don't recall
+it."
+
+"New York?"
+
+"No. If I am to guess, I shouldn't guess that."
+
+"Out West?"
+
+"H-m, they might be. No, I guess they're Yankees."
+
+"Boston?"
+
+"If so, not aggressively. Where do most people come from? There's
+nothing very distinctive about most."
+
+"Perhaps it will be on their cards."
+
+Then the Fosses talked of other things. But when Mrs. Foss, after
+dinner, went upstairs for her scarf,--it was too cool now to sit out of
+doors in the evening without a wrap,--she remembered the cards, and took
+them out of her husband's pocket.
+
+"Miss Estelle Madison," she read. "Mrs. Aurora Hawthorne." There was
+nothing else. She continued a little longer to look at the bits of
+pasteboard in her hand. "Well-sounding names, both of them--like names
+in a play. Mrs. Aurora. She's a widow, then." Mrs. Foss considered. "Or
+else divorced."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jerome Foss sat out in the garden on fine evenings with his cigar, and
+watched the serene oncoming of the night, because he loved to do this.
+His wife stayed with him to be company, when, without an old-fashioned
+ideal of married life, her natural bent would have urged her indoors,
+where the lamps were, to read or sew or even play patience. But she
+lingered contentedly and all seemed to her as it should be, with the two
+of them sitting near each other in their garden chairs before the family
+door-stone, he smoking, she getting the benefit of it by now and then
+fanning his smoke toward her face. She liked the odor.
+
+They only spoke to each other, as is common with married people, when
+they had something to say, and so were often silent for long spaces.
+That they had talked a great deal lately in the seclusion of their
+bedroom, away from the ears of the children, was a reason why they
+should not be very communicative to-night. They had threshed out the
+matter foremost in their minds so thoroughly that there could be little
+to add. Now and then, however, when they were alone, scraps of
+conversation would occur, part of the long discussion continued from day
+to day; which fragments, isolated from their context, might have sounded
+odd enough to any one overhearing.
+
+Thus it was to-night. After half an hour without a syllable, Mrs. Foss's
+voice came out of the dark.
+
+"When I was a young girl, there was a music-master, Jerome," she opened,
+with no more preface than a shooting-star. "I don't know that he was
+particularly fascinating, but he seemed so to me. I suppose he was
+thirty, I was seventeen or eighteen. It was during my year at Miss
+Meiggs's. Whether he really did anything to win my young affections I
+can't tell at this distance, but at the time I imagined all sorts of
+things, that he looked at me differently from the other girls, that his
+voice was different when he addressed me, that an extreme delicacy was
+all that kept him from declaring his love. Oh, I used to wish on the
+first star, and I used to pull daisies to pieces, and I practiced, how I
+practiced! Well, there was a rich girl in the school, older than I and
+not nearly so good looking. The moment she graduated he proposed to her.
+How did I feel? Jerome, the sun went out for good and all the day I
+heard of their engagement. It was as serious as anything could ever be
+in this world.--I'm sure I have told you about that music-master before,
+Jerome.--Well, and what happened? At the age of twenty-two I cheerfully
+married you. And I was not a scarred and burnt-out crater either, was
+I?... In the interval, let me not neglect to mention, there had been
+other flirtations and minor affairs. Thank Heaven, those things pass,"
+the words came out devoutly. "It seems at the time as if only death
+could end it, but two or three years will do a lot. And it's God's mercy
+makes it so. How else could life be carried on?"
+
+"In my case, Etta," the consul followed her story, after an interval,
+"it was a landlady's daughter. I don't believe I have ever spoken of her
+to you. I was in college, but I boarded outside the buildings. I wrote
+to my father and begged him to let me go into business so that I could
+earlier support a wife and family. The wise man let me go down to a
+fruit-farm in Florida. You have noticed that I know something about
+orange-growing. It was not quite a year before the dear divinity whose
+name was Lottie found it too long to wait. I posted home. The room I had
+once rented from her mother was let to a handsomer man. I took up my
+studies where I had dropped them, and to all appearance there was little
+harm done. But for a long time I thought I should die a bachelor."
+
+"I know. Your cousin Fannie told me about it in the early days, before
+we were engaged. It all goes to show.... And there again was Selina
+Blackstone, one of my girlhood friends. She had a cough and they thought
+her lungs affected and sent her South. There she met an unhappy boy in
+the same case, only he, as it proved, really was in a bad way with his
+lungs. The poor things fell desperately in love with each other, but her
+parents wouldn't hear of their marrying, in which course they were
+right. Now you would have thought from her face that the separation was
+going to kill her. It didn't, that's all. He died, and she married. And
+it can't be said of her that she was either shallow, or fickle, or
+heartless. I knew her very well. Merely, time did the work that time was
+set to do."
+
+There was in the lady's tone an effect of protest against any view,
+determination against any theory, but her own.
+
+"There are the cases like Miss Seymour's, however," Mr. Foss brought in
+softly, as one calls to another's attention a lapse of memory or a slip
+in logic.
+
+"Miss Seymour? Blanche? What about her?"
+
+"That she is Miss Seymour, my dear, and to my mind a melancholy lesson.
+Because Nature so plainly had not planned her for an old maid. Her
+mother--who told me? I think it was Miss Brown--interfered with her
+marrying the man she wished to, and she has accepted nothing in his
+place. It has been an empty life. And so it goes. One can't be sure,
+Etta."
+
+"Jerome," Mrs. Foss's voice rose to a sharper protest and firmer
+rejection, "those are the cases we simply must not allow ourselves to
+think about. If we begin to think of cases like that...."
+
+She did not finish and he said no more, but in the darkness through
+which the fiery point of his cigar continued for some time to glow, it
+is to be feared the faces of both went on to reflect for nobody to see
+the working of those thoughts precisely which Mrs. Foss had said with so
+much emphasis they must guard against.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+
+Upon a day not much later in the month--a goodly day which thousands
+without a doubt were thinking all too short for the useful or merely
+delectable things they wanted to do--a certain young man in Florence
+would, if he could, have treated this mellow golden masterpiece of
+autumn's like a bad sketch, torn it across and dropped it into the
+waste-basket. What is one to do with a day when nothing that has been
+invented seems enough fun to pay for the bother? He did not wish to
+paint, he did not wish to read, or to play on the piano, as he sometimes
+did in solitude, with one hand, to solace himself by re-framing a
+remembered melody. He did not wish to go out, but was restless from
+staying in. He did not want to see the face of friend or foe, but could
+no longer endure to be alone.
+
+He stood for a moment in the middle of the floor, with his hands over
+his face, the ends of his fingers pressing back his eyeballs, and got in
+his throat a taste of the bitter waters which he felt as a perpetual
+pool in the center of his heart. Next minute he sneered at himself, like
+a schoolmaster at a boy who blubbers, and without further paltering put
+on his hat, took up a very slender cane with a slender grasp of yellow
+ivory, and ran down the long stairs of his house to the street.
+
+"Air and exercise, air and exercise!" This prescription he repeated to
+himself, and, surely enough, in a quarter of an hour felt better.
+
+He was on Via Tornabuoni. Passing Giacosa's, he glanced in to see if it
+were any one he knew taking tea so early behind the great plate glass
+window. No, they were chance English. He halted before a shop farther on
+to look at a display of jewelry, wondering that there should be fools
+enough in the whole world to support one such dealer in turquoise
+trinkets that at once drop out their stones; crude, big mosaics, and
+everlasting little composition-silver copies of the Strozzi lantern.
+
+He crossed the street and entered the bank, where he found the usual
+table strewn with weeklies and monthlies for the advantage of those
+clients who must be asked to wait. He seated himself with his face so
+directed that if an acquaintance should enter, he need not bow, and
+turned over the magazines one after the other. It hurt him like a direct
+personal injury to find these authors all alike so shallow, dishonest,
+giving the public not their thought or their experience, but something,
+anything, it would buy.
+
+"A little more air and exercise is what I evidently need," said the
+young man, and again went out into the streets.
+
+He turned toward the river, and had not followed the Lungarno for more
+than ten yards before it was with him as when, looking out of the window
+in despair at the weather, we see a break in the clouds. His step took
+on alertness; his face lighted in the very nicest way.
+
+The young lady on whom his eyes were fastened from afar did not see him.
+She came at her usual step, a happy mean between quick and slow,
+accompanied by a hatless serving-woman carrying a music-roll. She looked
+straight before her, but her glance was absent. The passers could not
+but notice her,--she had beauty enough for that, and was besides
+conspicuous in wearing a costume entirely white,--but she was not
+noticing them or the eyes that turned to keep her a moment longer in
+sight. She looked rather shut in herself, rather silent; not really
+proud and cold, but proud and cold as the feeling and modest and young
+have to look if they are to keep their sacred precincts from the
+intrusions of curiosity.
+
+The young man approaching questioned her face to see if it were sad. No,
+as far as he could tell, she was not in any way troubled. At the same
+time he knew that it was neither a face nor a nature to be easily read.
+Still, not to find her visibly sad comforted him.
+
+She did not recognize the young man till he was almost near enough to
+touch her, and she had heard her name called, "Brenda!"
+
+Then her face showed a genuine, if moderate, pleasure.
+
+"Gerald!"
+
+"What are you doing?" he asked, with the freedom of a familiarity
+reaching back over long years. He shortened his step to keep time with
+hers, which she at the same moment lengthened.
+
+"I have been for my singing-lesson."
+
+"And where are you going?"
+
+"Home."
+
+"I haven't seen you for ages."
+
+"You haven't come. One never sees you, one never meets you anywhere any
+more."
+
+Her English was different from the ordinary in having occasional Italian
+turns and intonations. His partook of the same defect, but in a lesser
+degree.
+
+"But I have come," he stood up for himself, "and you were all out except
+Lily. Didn't she tell you I was there? We had a long talk. She told me
+her plans for the future. She is going to keep a school for poor
+children. We discussed their diet and their flannels and every point of
+their bringing-up. We invented things to do on holidays to give them a
+good time. There is only one thing I can see leaving a doubt of this
+school coming into being. It is that Lily has moments, she confessed to
+me, of thinking almost equally well of a castle with a moat and
+drawbridge and a page to walk before her carrying her prayer-book on a
+cushion. She's a funny young one."
+
+"It's partly Fräulein."
+
+"How are they all?"
+
+"Well, thank you. At least, I suppose they are well." She gave a slight
+laugh at the humor of this. "You could hardly imagine how little I see
+of them."
+
+"What has happened?"
+
+"They have been going around with some new people, some Americans. They
+have been helping them to shop, and showing them the way one does things
+over here. Mother, you know, is always so ready."
+
+"Your mother is a dear."
+
+"Leslie is just like her. But I am sure they both enjoy it, too. They
+have not been home to lunch for a week."
+
+"And you?"
+
+"Oh, I am not needed where there are already two who do the thing so
+much better than I could. I have not even seen the people. My day is
+very full, you know. Piano and singing-lessons, and I am painting again
+this winter, with Galletti, and I am going to a course of
+_conferenze_ on Italian literature. That involves a lot of reading.
+There are, besides, the other, the usual things, the--" Her voice stuck;
+then, as she went on, deepened with the depth of a suppressed
+impatience. "I wish one might be allowed not to do what is meant for
+pleasure unless one takes pleasure in it. But going to teas and parties
+is apparently as much a duty as school or church. Mother and Leslie at
+least seem to think it so for me."
+
+"I see their point, Brenda dear, don't you?" He was not looking at her
+as with a gentle brotherliness he spoke this.
+
+"You don't go to many parties yourself, Gerald."
+
+"I am afraid nothing I do is fit to be an example to anybody. But it
+doesn't matter about me. About you it does. I can't say to you all I
+think. It would sound fulsome, and from such an old chum might make you
+laugh. But, being as you are, Brenda, surely your mother is right in
+thinking of _le monde_ as the proper setting for you. You know I'm
+not fond of _le monde_, but it's because it hasn't enough such
+ornaments as yourself. With the life that lies before you--"
+
+"Who can possibly know what my life will be?" the girl asked quickly,
+almost roughly.
+
+"True, Brenda. I dare say I am talking like a fool." He left off,
+wondering that for a moment he should actually have been speaking on the
+side of convention.
+
+They walked a few rods in silence. They had crossed the bridge, and were
+headed for Porta Romana, the handmaiden trotting in their tracks, when
+at a corner Gerald stopped, and, as if to change the subject, or to
+regain favor by a felicitous suggestion, said:
+
+"Do you remember my telling you of a painting I came upon in a little
+old church on this street? _Scuola di Giotto_, they call it, but
+the thing is undoubtedly Sienese. Have you the time? Shall we take a
+moment to see it?"
+
+"I should be glad. If you will walk home with me afterward, Gerald, I
+might tell Gemma she can go."
+
+There was an exchange of Italian between the young lady and the maid,
+after which the latter turned, and with a busy, delighted effect about
+the rear view of her walked back across the bridge to spend her gift of
+an hour in what divertisements we shall never know.
+
+The church was closed. Gerald pulled the bell-handle of the next door. A
+priest opened to them, and, seeing at a glance what was wanted, guided
+them through a white-washed corridor to a living-room where a crucifix
+hung on the wall and the table had a red cloth; by this into a dim and
+stony sacristy, whence they emerged into the back of a darkling little
+church, with shadowy candlesticks and kneeling-benches, the whole full
+of a cold, complex odor of old incense and old humanity and, one could
+fancy, old prayers.
+
+The priest brought a lighted taper and, crossing to one of the side
+altars, held it near the painting, which was all that well-dressed
+people ever came for outside of hours.
+
+The reddish light trembled over the figure of a majestic virgin, in the
+diadem and mantle of a princess, bearing the palm of martyrs in her
+hand. It was a very simple and noble face, beautiful in a separate way,
+which not every one would perceive, so little in common had it with the
+present-day fair ladies whose photographs are sold.
+
+Gerald had taken the light from the priest's hands and was lifting,
+lowering, shading it, experimenting, to bring out all that might still
+be seen of the withdrawn image on its faintly glinting field of gold.
+His face was keen with interest; the love of beautiful things in this
+moment of satisfaction smoothed away from it every line of dejection and
+irritability.
+
+Brenda was examining the picture with an attention equal to his, but, if
+one might so describe it, of a different color. Her admiration got its
+life largely from Gerald's, whose tastes in art she was in the habit of
+adopting blindfold. Of this, however, she was not aware, and gazed doing
+good to her soul by the conscious and deliberate contemplation of a
+masterpiece.
+
+"Do you remember a great calm, white figure in the communal palace at
+Siena?" Gerald asked, "with other figures of Virtues on the same wall?
+Doesn't this remind you of them?"
+
+Brenda answered abstractedly:
+
+"Yes," and continued to look. "How amazing they are!" she fervently
+exclaimed. He supposed she meant the saint's hands or eyes, but she
+explained, "The Italians."
+
+He did not take up the idea either to agree or to dispute; his mind was
+busy with one Italian only, the painter of the picture before him.
+
+The young girl's interest flagged sooner than his own; he felt her melt
+from his side while he continued seeking proof in this detail and that
+of the painter's identity.
+
+When he turned to find her and to follow, she was kneeling on one of the
+wooden forms, her gloved hands joined, her face toward the high altar.
+
+He approved the courtesy of it, done, as he knew, in order that the
+priest, who stood aside, waiting for them to finish, should not think
+these barbarians who came into his church to see a work of art had no
+respect for his shrines and holies. Having returned the light to the
+priest Gerald himself, while waiting for Brenda, took a melancholy
+religious attitude, his hat and cane held against his breast, and sent
+his thoughts gropingly upward, where the solitary thing they encountered
+was his poor mother in heaven. Heaven and the changes undergone by those
+who enter there he could never make very real to himself. He thought of
+her as she used to be, affectionate and ill.
+
+At the stir of Brenda rising from her knees he, too, stirred, ready to
+depart. She was bowing to the altar, making an obeisance so deep, so
+beautifully reverent, that the priest could never have guessed she was
+not a Catholic. After it she still stood a moment, looking toward the
+sanctuary, like one with last fond words to say after the farewell; and
+this excess of either regard for the priest's feelings or else a
+devoutness he had not suspected in her quickened Gerald's attention. And
+there in the dimness he saw what he had not seen in the broad light of
+day, that his friend's little face, which had presented the effect of a
+house with all the blinds drawn down, was lighted up behind the
+blinds--oh, lighted as if for a feast!
+
+He felt himself at sea. He had thought he knew the circumstances. Some
+part, of course, nobody could know unless Brenda chose to tell them. But
+what reason there should be for positive joy--
+
+A suspicion flashed across his mind. He looked at her more closely, and
+put it away.
+
+She might have been the wisest of the virgins, the one who before any
+other heard the music of the bridegroom and was first to light her lamp.
+She stood as if listening to his footsteps.
+
+[Illustration: After it she still stood a moment, looking toward the
+sanctuary]
+
+That such a simile should have been possible to Gerald shows how much
+the expression of Brenda's face centered attention on itself, for her
+white serge dress was in the fashion of that year, and it was not a
+fashion to be remembered with any artistic joy. Gerald was never
+reconciled to it.
+
+He had the power to detach himself and at will see persons as if he
+looked at them for the first time. So for a moment he saw Brenda as a
+thing solely of form and color, a white shape against a ground of gloom,
+and took new account of the fact that the little girl who had had
+pigtails when he first knew her, and gone to the _Diaconesse_ with
+lunch-basket and satchel of books, had from one season to the next,
+stealthily, as it were, and while his back was turned, become beautiful.
+
+More than that. He was looking at Brenda--he recognized it with a pulse
+of exquisite interest--in her exact and particular hour. He had
+surprised a rose at its moment of transition from bud to bloom, that
+delicate and perfect moment when the natural beauty which women and
+fruits and flowers have in common, reaching its height, hangs
+poised--for such a pitifully short time, alas!--before it changes, if
+not declines, to something less dewily fresh, less heart-movingly
+untouched, less complete.
+
+The artist could not long in this case be regarding the girl as part of
+a picture; his human relation to the owner of that lifted profile
+brought him back to wondering in what the quiet ecstasy it breathed
+could have its source. He was touched by it, by the whole character, at
+the moment, of her face, with its strength so nullified by gentleness.
+
+When the will is strong and nature sensitive, what arms has youth with
+which to prevail? What but the power to keep still and hold on? Nothing
+was in Brenda's face so marked as that power, except, in this moment of
+undisguise, while she thought herself unwatched, its singular happiness,
+a mingling of tenderness, dedication, hope.
+
+The genuine sympathy he felt for her made Gerald deserving of the
+intuition that blessed him while he stood there trying to divine. An
+interpretation of her secret offered itself, worthier of him as of her
+than the suspicion of erewhile; one so beautiful, indeed, that he felt
+uplifted by standing in its presence. All he had most cared for in his
+life, the things that had touched and inspired him,--visions of
+painters, dreams of poets, scenes of beauty, sweet of human
+intercourse,--all the influences that make life dignified and fair,
+seemed in their essence to be in the air around him, like scents of
+flowers in the dark....
+
+The wish to pray came over him again, yet he wanted to weep, too,
+because as soon as his heart expanded a little the rusty splinter of a
+knife corroding there reminded him that lofty sentiments, sincerities,
+idealisms, have as their fruit in this life--dust, derision! He wondered
+that without being any older one could feel as old as he did while
+watching Brenda transfigured by her poor young dream.
+
+Now for the second time she curtseyed to the altar. The priest moved,
+Gerald moved, all three passed up the aisle, to a faint chink of coins
+in Gerald's pocket where he groped for a fee. At the main altar the
+priest dipped a rapid genuflexion.
+
+As soon as they were outside Brenda began to talk about the picture, to
+ask questions, as if the art of the Italians had been of all things
+nearest to her heart, and Gerald was drawn into holding in the street
+while they walked a sort of lecture on the primitives.
+
+All the while, in an independent corner of his brain he was reflecting
+upon the absurdity of supposing that because he was an old familiar of
+the Fosses, and so fond of them all, he knew anything of their affairs
+these days, when he saw them so seldom. Ever so many things could have
+happened without his knowledge. The girls might have new friends and
+admirers just as they had hats and dresses that he had never seen.
+
+They were making their way while talking toward Porta Romana, and were
+often obliged to step off the narrow sidewalk to make room for other
+passers, the street being busy at that time of day.
+
+Brenda was in the midst of an entirely pertinent remark when her voice
+softly died, like the flame of a candle sucked out by a draft or like a
+music-box run down. Gerald, looking round for the end of her sentence,
+saw that she had sighted an acquaintance on the other side of the
+street.
+
+She nodded, without a smile, slowly. Just so must Beatrice have bowed in
+these same streets of Florence when she passed the dreamy passionate
+youth through whom we are acquainted with her name.
+
+Gerald's eyes traveled across the way to see who might be the recipient
+of the lady's most sweet salute, and hurriedly uncovered to an officer
+of the Italian army who, holding his hand to his cap, stood at attention
+till the two had passed.
+
+Was the man pale or was it that one had never before noticed, meeting
+him indoors and at evening, how strongly the black of his mustache and
+brows contrasted with his skin? The suspicion that had for a moment
+troubled Gerald in church returned as a stronger infection. Had Brenda
+expected this? Did they concert such meetings?
+
+He might have said to himself that a tryst which consisted in crossing
+glances from opposite sides of the street was very innocent. In a moment
+he did see that as the villas _fuori la porta_ must be reached
+through the _porta_, a lover whose lady lived on Vial dei Colli
+might without previous arrangement hope for a glimpse of her by walking
+in its neighborhood.
+
+As we have seen him doing more than once this afternoon, Gerald here
+tried to get his clue from Brenda herself, her face, her atmosphere. Yet
+he knew, as has already been said, that it was Brenda Foss's way to keep
+these as much as she could from telling anything to the world. This
+wariness notwithstanding a tinge of unaccustomed rose had spread through
+the clear white of her cheek; her eyes had in them noticeably more life.
+Emotion or mere self-consciousness?
+
+On one point only he was satisfied: Brenda had done nothing that
+involved deceit. Into the very structure of her face, which had almost
+nothing left of the American look, was built a certain Puritan
+truthfulness. She could conceal if she must, but hated to shuffle, to
+prevaricate. She concealed exactly because of that.
+
+"Go on with the Sienese masters, Gerald," she bade him, collectedly. "I
+am listening, and learning a lot."
+
+As they passed under the great arch of the Roman Gate, Gerald was saying
+modestly:
+
+"I don't know anything about them, really. I've just been impressed by a
+thing or two. This Lorenzetti, for instance--" And so on up the
+_viale_ to the house.
+
+In the drawing-room they found Mrs. Foss and Leslie, who, just home from
+town, tired and thirsty, had had tea brought to them, and were
+strengthening themselves before even taking off their hats.
+
+Their welcome to Gerald was mingled with reproaches of the sort that
+flatters more than it hurts.
+
+"It's perfect ages since we saw you. We thought you had forgotten us.
+What have you been doing this long, long time?"
+
+"It is you, who are never at home, my dear friends," Gerald took his
+turn. "I was here a fortnight or so ago. Didn't Lily tell you? Of course
+she told you, and you have forgotten, so it's I, properly, who should be
+calling names."
+
+"Have you been quite well, Gerald?" Mrs. Foss asked in her maternal
+voice, after a more careful look at him.
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"I am glad you have come. I have been on the point more than once of
+sending for you, but the days fly so! We have been busy, too."
+
+She had poured cups of tea for Gerald and Brenda. All four were seated
+and refreshing themselves.
+
+It was a very large room, but a corner had been so arranged as to look
+shut in and cozy. There stood the tea-table convenient to the sofa and,
+surrounding it, a few chosen chairs in which one could sink and lean
+back and be comfortable.
+
+"Have you had a tiring day?" Brenda asked her mother, somewhat as if she
+were tired herself at the mere thought of such a day as she supposed her
+mother to have had.
+
+"No," Mrs. Foss answered briskly; "it's rather fun. I don't mean that
+one doesn't get tired after a fashion. Has Brenda told you, Gerald, how
+we have lately been occupied?"
+
+"Some new people, I think she said."
+
+"Yes, some nice, funny Americans."
+
+"Funny, you say?"
+
+"I say it fondly, Gerald. Let me tell you a little about them, and you
+will see what I mean. They are going to spend the winter here and wanted
+a house. What house do you think they selected?"
+
+"You really mustn't set me riddles, Mrs. Foss."
+
+"For years we have seen it every time we drive to the Cascine, and seen
+it with a certain curiosity--always deserted, always with closed blinds,
+in its way the most beautiful house in Florence."
+
+"The most--I can't think what house you mean."
+
+"Of course not, with your tastes. But imagine some nice, rich Americans,
+without either art education or the smallest affectation of such a
+thing, and ask yourself what they would like. Why, a big, square,
+clean-looking, new-looking, wealthy-looking house, of course, set in a
+nice garden, with, at the end of the garden, a nice stable. I was
+thankful to find the place had been kept up."
+
+"But is there--on the Lungarno, did you say?"
+
+"It is that house we have called the Haughty Hermitage, Gerald," Brenda
+helped him.
+
+"Oh, that! But surely one doesn't live in a house like that!"
+
+"Your excellent reason?" inquired Leslie.
+
+"I don't know,"--he hesitated,--"but surely one doesn't live in a house
+like that!"
+
+They had to laugh at the expression brought into his face by his sense
+of a mysterious incongruity.
+
+"No," he went on with knitted brows to reject the idea; "a house like
+that--one doesn't come all the way from America to live in a house which
+has no more atmosphere than that!"
+
+"Ah, but that's the point, Gerald," said Mrs. Foss. "What you call
+atmosphere these people avoid as they would an unsanitary odor.
+Atmosphere! What would you say if you saw the things Leslie and I have
+been helping them to buy and put into it! I love to buy, you know, even
+when not for myself. I thought with joy, 'Now I shall at least go
+through the form of acquiring certain objects I have lusted after for
+years.' Delightful old things Jerome has discovered in antiquarians'
+places, and that we shall never be able to afford. Do you think I could
+persuade them to take one of these? I represented that the worm-holes
+could be stopped up and varnished over, that the missing bits of inlay,
+precious crumbs of pearl and ivory, could be replaced, the tapestries
+renovated. In vain. They want everything new--hygienically new, fresh,
+and shining. And, Gerald, prejudice apart, the idea is not without its
+good side. The result is not so bad as you may think. Why, after all,
+should my taste, your taste, prevail in their house, will you tell me?"
+
+"For no reason in the world. This liberal view comes the easier to me
+that I do not expect ever to see the interesting treasures you may have
+collected from Peyron's and Janetti's."
+
+"If it were no worse than that!" put in Leslie, and laughed a covered
+laugh.
+
+Mrs. Foss explained, after a like little laugh of her own.
+
+"You see, things that we have seen till we have utterly ceased to see
+them, the things that nobody who really lives in Florence ever dreams of
+buying, are new to these people. They _love_ them. As a result, you
+can guess. There will be in their apartments alabaster plates with
+profiles of Dante and Michelangelo on a black center. There will be
+mosaic tables with magnolias and irises. There will be Pliny's doves.
+Think of it! There will be green bronze lamps and lizards--"
+
+"And the fruit--tell about that, Mother!" Leslie prompted.
+
+"There will be on the sideboard in the dining-room a perpetual dish of
+magnificent fruit, marble, realistic to a degree. You know the kind."
+
+"And you could stand by and let them--you and Leslie!" spoke Brenda, in
+an astonishment almost seriously reproachful.
+
+"My dear," Leslie took up their common defense, "one's feeling in this
+case is: What does it matter? A little more, a little less.... It all
+goes together. When they have those curtains, they might as well have
+that fruit."
+
+"At the same time, my dear children, let me tell you that the effect is
+not displeasing," insisted Mrs. Foss. "Such at least is my humble
+opinion. In its way it's all right. They are people of a certain kind,
+and they have bought what they like, not what they thought they ought to
+like. Thousands of people, if it were not for you artists perverting
+them, would be thinking a marble lemon that you can't tell from a real
+one a rare and dear possession. These people haven't known any artists.
+They are innocent."
+
+"They're awfully good fun," Leslie started loyally in to make up for
+anything she had said which might seem to savor of mockery or dispraise.
+"One enjoys being with them, if they aren't our usual sort. They are in
+good spirits, really good--good spirits with roots to them. And that's
+such a treat these days!"
+
+From which it was supposable that Leslie had been living in circles
+where the gaiety was hollow. The suggestion did not escape Gerald. But,
+then, Leslie, just turned twenty-four, was rather given to judging
+_these days_ as if she remembered something less modern, an
+affectation found piquant by her friends in a particularly
+young-looking, blond girl with a short nose. Gerald might have hoped
+that her sigh meant nothing had not Leslie, awake to the implication of
+her remark as soon as she had made it, gone hurriedly on to call
+attention away from it.
+
+"Yes, it's pleasant to be with them. It's a change. The world seems
+simple and life easy. Life _is_ easy, with all that money. Besides,
+Mrs. Hawthorne really is something of a dear. After all, if people make
+much of one, one is pretty sure to like them. Haven't you found it so,
+Gerald?"
+
+"I don't know. I am trying to remember if there is anybody who has made
+much of me."
+
+"_We_ have made much of you."
+
+"And don't think I temperately like you. I adore you all, as you well
+know. You're the only people I do. By that sign there has been nobody
+else kind enough to make much of me."
+
+"You're so bad lately, Gerald; that's why," Mrs. Foss affectionately
+chide him. "You never go anywhere. You neglect your friends. What have
+you been doing with yourself? Is it work?"
+
+"No; not more than usual. I work, but I'm not exactly absorbed--obsessed
+by it. I don't know--" He seemed to search, and after a moment summed up
+his vague difficulties: "It seems a case for quoting 'Hamlet.'" He was
+bending forward, his elbows resting on his knees, as they could do
+easily, his chair being low and his thin legs long. His thin, long hands
+played with that slender cane of his, which he had set down and taken up
+again, while he tried to recall the passage, and mumbled snatches of it:
+"'This goodly firmament--congregation of vapors--Man delights not
+me--no, nor'--the rest of it."
+
+"But it won't do, Gerald dear; it won't do at all," Mrs. Foss addressed
+him anxiously, between scolding and coaxing. "Shake yourself, boy! Force
+yourself a little; it will be good for you. _Make_ yourself go to
+places till this mood is past. What is it? Bad humor, spleen,
+hypochondria? It doesn't belong with one of your age. We miss you
+terribly, dear. Here we have had two of our Fridays, and you have not
+been. And we have always counted on you. Charming men are scarce at
+parties the world over. The Hunts have begun their little dances, too.
+One used to see you there. And at Madame Bentivoglio's. She was asking
+what had become of you. Promise, Gerald, that we shall see you at our
+next Friday! We want to make it a nice, gay season. Will you promise?
+Oh, here's Lily. Why didn't you tell us, Lily, that Gerald had come to
+see us when we were out?"
+
+A long-legged, limp-looking little girl with spectacles had come in. A
+minute before she had been passing the door on her way to walk, and
+catching the sound of a male voice in the drawing-room, insisted upon
+listening till she had made sure whose it was. At the name Gerald she
+had pulled away from her governess and burst into the drawing-room.
+
+She stood still a moment after this impulsive entrance, and the
+governess turned toward Mrs. Foss a face that, benign and enlightened
+though it was, called up the memory of faces seen in good-humored German
+comic papers. The expression of her smile said to the company that she
+was guiltless in the matter of this invasion. Could one use severity
+toward a little girl who suffered from asthma and weak eyes?
+
+Lily, after her pause, went half shyly, half boldly to Gerald. He did
+not kiss her,--she was ten years old,--but placed an arm loosely around
+her as she stood near his knee.
+
+"Did you forget it, Lily?"
+
+"No, Mother, I didn't forget, but I never thought to speak of it. You
+didn't tell me to, did you, Gerald?"
+
+"No, we had so much else to talk about. Well, Lily, have you decided
+what color the uniform must be for our orphanage? The thing is
+important. It makes a great difference in an orphan's disposition
+whether she goes dressed in a dirty gray or a fine, bright apricot
+yellow."
+
+"Gerald,"--Lily lowered her voice to make their conversation more
+private,--"will you be the cuckoo?" As he gazed, she went earnestly on:
+"We can't find anybody to do the cuckoo. I am going to be the
+nightingale. Fräulein is going to be the drum. Leslie is going to be the
+_Wachtel_. Mother is going to be the triangle. Brenda will play the
+piano. Papa says that if he is to take part he must be the one who sings
+on the comb and tissue-paper. But I am afraid to let him. You know he
+hasn't a good ear. That leaves the cuckoo, the comb, and the rattle
+still to find before we can have our _Kinder-sinfonie_. Which
+should you like to be, Gerald?"
+
+"What an opening for musical talent! But, my dear little lady, I'm not a
+bit of good. I can't follow music by note any more than a cuckoo. I am
+so sorry."
+
+"But, Gerald, all you have to do is--"
+
+"I have told you, Lili," said the governess in German, "that we would
+take the gardener's boy and drill him for the cuckoo. Come now quickly,
+dear child; we must go for our walk."
+
+The casual, unimportant talk of ordinary occasions went on after the
+interruption.
+
+"And what do you hear from that charming friend of yours, the abbé,
+Gerald?" And, "I hope you have good news from your son, Mrs. Foss." And,
+"Do you know whether the Seymours have come back from the country?"
+
+Gerald left the Fosses, warmed by his renewed sense of their friendship,
+and believing that he would go very soon again to see them. But he did
+not, and his feeling of shame was more definite than his gratitude when
+he in time received a note from Mrs. Foss, kind as ever, asking him to
+dine.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+
+There was dancing at the Fosses' on two Fridays in the month. It was
+their contribution toward the gaiety of the winter. They did not often
+give a formal dinner, and when such an entertainment appeared to be
+called for from them, planned it with forethought to make it serve as
+many ends as it would. Every careful housewife will understand.
+
+It was with Leslie that Mrs. Foss talked such matters over. The eldest
+daughter was so sufficient as adjutant that one did not inquire whether
+Brenda would have been useful if needed. The latter took no part in the
+domestic councils which had for object to decide who should be asked to
+dinner and of what the dinner should consist.
+
+The question whom to invite to meet Professor Longstreet had taken Mrs.
+Foss and Leslie time and reflection. The Fosses' only son had a great
+regard for this man, one of the faculty during his period at Harvard,
+and now that the travels of the professor's sabbatical year brought him
+to Florence, the family was anxious to entertain him as dear John,
+studying medicine in far-off Boston, would have wished.
+
+The professor was engaged upon a new translation of the "Divine Comedy."
+The guests had therefore better be chosen among their literary
+acquaintance, thought Mrs. Foss. But Leslie was of the opinion that they
+would do better to make the requisite just any gift or grace, and keep
+an eye on having the company compose well and the table look beautiful.
+
+When she reminded her mother that a dinner was owing the Balm de Brézés,
+and that this would be a chance to pay the debt, Mrs. Foss objected:
+
+"But I want to ask Gerald. I felt sorry for him last time he came. We
+must look after him a little bit, you know."
+
+Leslie did not show herself in any wise disposed to set aside Gerald's
+claim, but expressed the idea that Gerald probably would not mind
+meeting the De Brézés now. After all, the memories sweet and sour
+associated with them had had time to lose their edge. And they could be
+seated at the opposite end of the table.
+
+It was finally decided to ask the Balm de Brézés, Gerald, the Felixsons,
+Miss Cecilia Brown, and Gideon Hart, all intelligent, all people who
+could talk. It was further frugally resolved to have the dinner on a
+Friday and let it be followed by the usual evening party, thus making
+the same embellishment of the house do for two occasions, as well as
+augmenting their visitor's opportunity to make acquaintance with the
+Anglo-American colony in Florence.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+All had been going so well, the guests were in such happy and talkative
+form, that the minor matter of taking food had dragged, and the diners
+were not ready to rise when a servant whispered to Mrs. Foss that the
+first evening guest had arrived.
+
+Mrs. Foss's eyes found those of Leslie, who understood the words
+soundlessly framed, and excused herself from the table.
+
+In the garnished and waiting drawing-room, lighted with candles, like a
+shrine, and looking vast, with the furniture taken out of the way, she
+found the Reverend Arthur Spottiswood, of whom it was not easy to think
+that eagerness to dance had driven him to come so sharply on time. He
+looked serious-minded, almost somber, and Leslie, though prepared to be
+vivacious with peer or pauper, found it all duty and little fun to make
+conversation with him until the next arrival should come to her relief.
+The gentleman was Brenda's adorer, but Brenda would never, if she could
+help it, let him have one moment with her. His love-charged eye inspired
+in her the simple desire to flee. Singularly, this was, with one notable
+exception, beautiful Brenda's only conquest, while Leslie, who was just
+ordinarily pretty and wore a pince-nez, received tribute and proposals
+from almost every unattached young fellow who drifted inside the circle
+of her wide invisible net. Boys in particular had to pass through her
+hands, receive good advice from her, be encouraged in their work,
+cheered in their distance from home, and refused, and consoled for the
+refusal, and sent away finally rather improved than otherwise. With very
+little sentiment, she had a kind and cozy quality, like her mother.
+
+The Satterlees were next to arrive, mother with son and daughter, and
+Leslie was warm as never before in her welcome to them. The Reverend
+Arthur was gently shed from her and with pleasure picked up by Isabel
+Satterlee, who was charmed to have any kind of man to talk with.
+
+Then arrived a group of unrelated people living for the moment at the
+same pension in town and coming in the same conveyance. Among them was
+Percy Lavin, who had the extraordinary tenor voice, and along with it an
+exuberance of confidence in his future that made him as destructive of
+coherence in company as a large frisking pup. Leslie had at the very
+first meeting felt that it would be her sacred mission to attend to that
+young man.
+
+The hired pianist had come, he was unrolling his sheets of dance-music
+and rolling them the contrary way. Mr. Hunt, the English banker, with
+his wife and daughters, had come; and Maestro Vannuccini with his
+signora on his arm; and a glittering young officer or two; and Landini,
+Hunt's partner; and Charlie Hunt, the banker's nephew.
+
+Charlie, bold through long acquaintance, asked, "Where are the others?"
+
+Leslie told him, whereupon the young man said "Oh!" and his "Oh" sounded
+blank, whether because it was apparent to him through her answer that
+there had been indiscretion in his question, or because he wondered at
+there being a dinner-party in this house and he not asked to it. Leslie
+paid no attention, for at that moment the diners were beginning to
+appear.
+
+The drawing-room had two doors in the same wall: people coming from the
+dining-room would enter by one of these, while those who came from the
+street entered by the other, after passing through the small
+reception-room where they left their things, and the larger
+reception-room intervening between this and the drawing-room. Charlie
+Hunt, talking with Mrs. Satterlee, let a casual eye roll away from her
+middle-aged agreeableness to see who was entering by that different door
+from the one which had given him passage. Curiosity, pure and simple.
+
+Ah, so. Madame Balm de Brézé, spare, sharp, high-nosed, beaked and
+clawed like a bird--a picked bird. Very elegant. It was clear to Charlie
+Hunt why with a dinner to give one should care to secure her and her
+husband. They looked so fiendishly aristocratic.
+
+The Felixsons. Naturally. Felixson had to be asked when the guest of
+honor was a scholar. Mrs. Felixson's warm brilliancy to-night bore
+testimony to a good dinner. Abundance of meats and wines always turned
+her a burning pink. It looked to Charlie like a new frock she was
+wearing; he did not remember seeing her in it before.
+
+Gideon Hart, the old sculptor. It was his picturesque white hair and
+beard that people liked to see at their tables, for the old fellow,
+thought Hunt, was phenomenally a bore. In this case patriotism explained
+his presence. America quaintly loved his name.
+
+And Cecilia Brown. But was it really Cecilia?... What had she been doing
+to herself?... Oh. Her hair. Her hair was cropped and curled all over
+her head like wicked Caracalla's. That was the fashion in England, he
+had heard, where she had been spending the summer.
+
+But who was this, at the end of the procession, after Mrs. Foss and
+Brenda and the consul?
+
+Hunt had a genuine surprise. Gerald Fane.
+
+Now, wherefore Gerald Fane rather than Charlie Hunt?
+
+Mrs. Foss, coming into the drawing-room, felt a glow of pleasure at the
+scene meeting her eyes. The occasion, the success of it, had lifted life
+for her above its usual plane. She could feel how blessed she was in
+ways she did not sufficiently consider on common days when common cares
+blinded her. It was a beautiful home, this of hers; here was a beautiful
+room, with its mirrors and flowers and candle-light and happy guests.
+She smiled at everybody and everything with a brooding sweetness.
+
+Her sense of herself was satisfactory too at the moment. She felt her
+dress--an old one, rejuvenated--to be becoming. She was young to have
+grown children. Her blond hair did not show the silver threads among it.
+She was as handsome in her older way as she had been when young, and she
+was sure she was nicer. She had family and friends, all full of regard
+for her. Her smile reflected the state of her mind and did one good to
+see.
+
+Her eyes resting upon Brenda--whom the reverend Arthur had tried to
+capture the moment she appeared, and been baffled--Mrs. Foss in the
+optimism of her mood said to herself that all would very likely go well
+in that quarter; they ought not to worry as they did.
+
+The pianist had struck up a polka. One still danced the polka in those
+days, and the schottische and the dear old lancers, though the waltz was
+already the favorite.
+
+The floor was at first sparsely, then ever more thickly, sown with
+hopping and revolving couples. Hunt, one arm curled around a young waist
+in pink muslin, had enough of his mind to spare from the amount of talk
+one has breath for while dancing to continue in a line of thought
+started by an annoying little smart where a shred of skin had been
+rubbed off his vanity when he saw Gerald come from the dining-room. He
+mentally looked at himself and looked at Gerald, and after comparing the
+pictures felt his astonishment increase. He could admit, as an excuse
+for inviting Gerald instead of himself, that Gerald was an artist, and
+this dinner had presumably been planned with the idea of having it
+literary-artistic. But then--an artist! Gerald was so little of one. One
+never heard of his selling a painting. In the darkest corners of his
+friends' rooms you sometimes discovered one of his queer things--a gift,
+hung there as a compliment. One might, furthermore, grant that it did
+not matter that a man should be agreeable in appearance. But Gerald was
+not even agreeable in disposition; he did not try to make himself
+agreeable. What did the Fosses see in him?
+
+The music had worked through a mighty flourish to a banging final chord.
+Hunt escorted his lady to a chair, took the fan from her hand to fan her
+with,--himself a little, too,--and while talking let his dark eye stray
+from her and go roving, as was the habit of his eye.
+
+It plunged through an open door into the quietly lighted library, where
+the consul and his distinguished guest and a few more of the older or
+staider people had withdrawn from the tumult and were having smokes and
+conversation. They were considering a marble fragment, passing it from
+hand to hand.
+
+Hunt knew that fragment, and at sight of it looked cynical. The consul,
+who had discovered it immured in an ancient garden-wall, believed it to
+have been carved by Orcagna.
+
+Old Hart had it in his hand. What he said could hardly be heard at that
+distance; he passed it to Gerald with a look that seemed to ask for
+corroboration. Gerald held it long and gazed seriously, with that
+conceit in his own judgment which made him sometimes dispute the
+attributions in no less a gallery than the Uffizi--say that a Verocchio
+was not a Verocchio, a Giorgione not a Giorgione.
+
+Charlie strained to catch some syllable of what he said. Vainly. The
+pianist was preluding. Bertie Bentivoglio came to ask the girl in pink
+to dance with him. From the chair she left empty Charlie moved nearer to
+the library door, of half a mind to join the group in there. But Gerald,
+upon whom Leslie had impressed it that he must do his duty and let there
+be no wall-flowers, when the prelude had developed into a waltz returned
+the marble into Hart's hand and came to the door. Whereupon Charlie
+changed his mind and after saying "Hello, Gerald!" turned again, and the
+young men stood looking over the scene side by side, two figures
+contrasting in reality nearly as much as they did in Charlie's mental
+image of them for purposes of comparison.
+
+Any Rosina who sold buttonhole bouquets at the theater door could have
+seen that Charlie was handsome, with his pale brown smoothness and
+regularity of feature; the pretty mustache accentuating and not
+concealing the neat and agreeable mold of his lip; the fine whiteness of
+his teeth, his civilized and silken look altogether. The defects of his
+face, if one could call them that, did not appear at first glance or
+even at second. His forehead had begun to gain on his hair,--it ran up
+at the sides in two points,--and his slightly prominent eyes were brown
+in the same sense as a horn button or a bit of chestnut-shell is
+brown,--while some eyes that we remember were brown like woodland pools
+with autumn leaves at the bottom! He did not look English, yet did not
+look quite Italian either. He was in fact both, and the thing evenly
+balanced. The banker Hunt's brother had married an Italian; Charlie had
+been born in Italy and hardly ever stirred out of it; on the other hand
+he had found his society largely among the English and Americans in
+Florence.
+
+As he stood there, conforming gracefully to a recognized canon of manly
+beauty, his neighbor Gerald, who would not have been noticed one way or
+the other for his looks, yet from being beside him took on an
+indescribable effect of eccentricity. The bone showed plainly around his
+eye-sockets and at the bridge of his nose. One eyebrow became different
+from the other the moment he regarded a thing analytically; and when he
+smiled those who noticed such things could detect that nature had marked
+him for recognition: there showed beneath his mustache three of the
+broad front middle teeth whereof two are the common portion. For the
+remainder, a slight beard veiled the character of his chin and jaw and a
+little disguised the thinness of his throat. Above a large forehead his
+dark hair rose on end in a bristling bank, like that of most Italian men
+at the time. He looked solitary, unsociable, critical, but not
+altogether ungentle. His forehead was full of the suggestion of
+thoughts, his gray-blue eyes were full of the reflection of feelings,
+that you could be comfortably sure he would not trouble you with.
+
+"Well, Gerald, what are you doing with yourself these days?" asked
+Charlie as they stood looking on, delaying to seek partners for the
+dance. "Immortal masterpieces?"
+
+This innocuous playfulness somehow jarred. Gerald looked down at Charlie
+from the side of his eye,--he was by a couple of inches or so the
+taller,--then asked in his turn, a little crustily:
+
+"Do you really want to know?"
+
+"Why, no, my dear fellow, I don't, if that's your reply. It was not
+curiosity. I was only showing an amiable interest." His tone conveyed
+that he had intended no offense and refused to take any; the
+disagreeableness should be all on the same side.
+
+"Thank you for the interest. I am doing much as usual," Gerald answered,
+placated.
+
+"Who is this professor from America whom the very select are invited to
+meet?" Charlie asked after an interval, as if they had been on the best
+of terms again.
+
+The playfulness again was innocent, again might have been regarded as
+almost an attempt to flatter; nevertheless it again jarred upon Gerald.
+It was by an effort that he answered soberly and literally, without
+betraying that the point of irony had irritated him, as, he did not
+doubt, it was meant to irritate.
+
+"Another translation of Dante?" Charlie made merry, when Gerald had
+finished telling as much as he knew about the professor. "I tell you
+what--I will set myself to translating the 'Divine Comedy'! It will give
+me distinction, and then--it 's very simple,--I will never show my
+translation!"
+
+There was surely no harm in this. It was just stupid. Charlie's
+_esprit_ was never of any fineness. He and Gerald had known each
+other from the days when both went to M. Demonget's school, whence,
+without having been friends, they had emerged intimates. It would have
+been ridiculous for either to try to impress the other by the profundity
+of his thoughts. Charlie was right in thinking of himself as standing in
+a relation to Gerald that made him free to expose ideas in their
+undress. And yet it was on this evening and this occasion that Gerald
+said to himself for the first time definitely that he did not like
+Charlie Hunt. An antipathy existing perhaps from the beginning had risen
+to the point where it crossed the threshold of consciousness. No, he
+neither liked nor thought well of him.
+
+Luckily, it did not much matter, their relations were superficial.
+Belonging in the same circles they must meet from time to time; but if
+Gerald avoided him whenever it was decently feasible, he need not often
+suffer as at this moment from the repressed nervous need to repudiate in
+explicit terms his person, his society, his manners, his morals,
+everything that was his. By way of beginning this avoidance, Gerald cast
+his eyes more particularly about him in search of a partner. Charlie's
+eyes too were wandering over the small and scattered number of ladies
+still available to late comers.
+
+Both of them knew every one present. Charlie had picked out with his eye
+a still youthful mama, who would not, he believed, refuse to dance, but
+would jest and appear flattered and, when after some hesitation she
+consented, lean in his arms only a little more heavily than her
+daughter. Gerald had singled a slender, faded woman in garments of ivory
+lace, who, seated near Mme. Vannuccini in the far corner of the room,
+was devoting herself to conversation as if she really had not cared to
+dance. Gerald was moved to go and give her the chance of refusing, if
+she were in total earnest. He remembered Blanche Seymour as a passionate
+dancer still when he began to go to grownup parties.
+
+Now her hair was gray, her face had lines, but she did not look
+accustomed to them; there was plaintiveness in her expression, as if she
+had been a young girl, really, made up for an elderly part in
+theatricals, and did not like her part. It was some sense of this which
+was attracting Gerald to her across the room. Leslie had ordered him to
+dance, so dance he must. But the glare of festivity all around him did
+something to his inner self comparable to a light too bright making the
+eyes ache. Leslie would have told him that he picked up his party by the
+wrong end. The general gaiety instead of infecting him, reinforced his
+feeling that everybody, beneath the surface, was perplexed, bleeding,
+afraid of the future, and had good cause to be.
+
+The dinner had been interesting,--he had not been much affected, he was
+glad to find, by the presence of the De Brézés,--but he had risen from
+it haunted by the conviction that the Fosses were not happy. Nobody, if
+one examined into it, was happy; all this pretense was pathetic to the
+point of dreariness. Gerald knew everybody's affairs to some extent,
+after spending most of his life in the same community, and a little city
+where gossip is an elegant occupation. This person had made bad
+investments; that one was crippled by the necessity to pay a son's
+debts; this couple did not live in harmony, the husband was said to be
+infatuated with a dancer. The fact that so much of their own fault
+entered into people's misfortunes, while rousing rage, forced him to
+pity, because the limitation of their intelligence had so much to do
+with people's faults. He was in fact oppressed by the sense of the
+limits set to all the lives around him in this beautiful little
+Florence, his home, his love, sometimes his despair: the narrow actual
+opportunities after the boundless illusions and hopes of youth; the
+limited outlook, the limited breathing-room, the limited fortunes. Bars
+at the windows, closed doors on every hand.
+
+It was with the feeling that Miss Seymour was no more truly in holiday
+spirits than was he that he turned toward her, as toward a spot of
+shadow amid too fervid sunshine. It would be more congenial, drifting
+with her to the languid measure of this very modern, morbidly emotional
+waltz, knowing that, whatever their light talk, they alike felt life to
+be a sad affair, than going through livelier evolutions with a young
+person who would secretly desire him to flatter and flirt. An instinct
+founded less upon male conceit than knowledge of his world drove the
+young bachelor determined to remain unattached to seek in preference
+women who would found no smallest hope upon his notice of them.
+
+So, keeping at the edge of the room in order to be out of the way of the
+dancers, he started on his way to Miss Seymour, while Charlie, whose
+mood was as different from Gerald's as was his eye,--that brown eye
+which looked upon the world as a barrel of very passable oysters, of
+which he would open as many as he could get hold of,--started after.
+
+The approach of a stormily whirling couple, waltzing _all'_
+_italiana_, and then another and still another following, forced
+them to suspend their journey. While they prudently waited, "Who is
+that?" came from Charlie in a voice of acute curiosity.
+
+Gerald, after half a glance at him, mechanically looked in the same
+direction.
+
+There stood at the door opening from the reception-room an unknown.
+
+When it was said that our young men knew everybody at the Fosses'
+soirée, it was not strictly meant that there might not be a person or
+two whom they had not seen before: a plain little visiting cousin whom
+the Bentivoglios had begged permission to bring; a new face of a young
+Italian introduced by a fellow officer. But at the door now, displacing
+a good deal of air, stood a real and striking unknown, in a Paris dress
+and diamonds and a smile.
+
+Gerald did not take the trouble to answer Charlie; to himself he said
+that this was perhaps Mrs. Hawthorne, the Fosses' new friend.
+
+Mrs. Foss had hastened to meet her. Leslie, disengaging herself from a
+partner, left him standing in the middle of the room while she hastened
+likewise. It must be Mrs. Hawthorne.
+
+Gerald took back his eyes, and continued on his way to Miss Seymour. But
+Charlie, always alive to the possibilities of a new acquaintance, always
+eager to be first in the field, dropped his quest of the mama. With an
+air of nonchalant abstraction he went to stand in the neighborhood of
+the new arrival, conveniently at hand for an introduction. He saw then
+that there were two fine new birds; the light and size of the one had at
+first obscured the other, though she, too, had on a Paris dress and
+diamonds and a smile. But the dress--though there could be little
+difference in the women's age, both were young, without being unripe
+girls,--was of soberer tones: a sage green moire with pale
+coffee-colored lace; and the jewels were more modest, and the smile was
+smaller, its beam did not carry so far, nor was perched on so
+considerable an eminence.
+
+As he had known she would do, Mrs. Foss after a moment looked about her
+for men to introduce. And there he was.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne. Miss Madison.
+
+Leslie had at the same moment brought up Captain Viviani, who spoke a
+little English, and liked very much to practise it with the charming
+American ladies, as he told them.
+
+Mrs. Foss lingered awhile, helping the progress of the acquaintance by
+bits of elucidation and compliment, then, when the thing was under way,
+withdrew so adroitly that she was not missed. A young man, coming up to
+importune Leslie for a promised dance, was allowed to carry her off;
+Miss Madison, assured by the _capitano_ that he could dance the
+American waltz, trusted herself, though a little doubtfully, to his
+arms; and Charlie was left with Mrs. Hawthorne.
+
+"Shall we take a turn?" he offered.
+
+"Me?" The lady gave him a look sidewise from dewy blue eyes, as if to
+see whether he were serious. He perceived that she with effort kept her
+dimples from denting in. He could not be sure what the joke was. But she
+went on, as if there had been no joke: "I was brought up a Baptist. My
+pa and ma considered it wicked to dance, so would never let me learn. It
+doesn't look very wicked to me."
+
+She watched the dancers with an earnestly following eye, preoccupied, he
+supposed, with the moral aspect of their embraces and gyrations.
+
+"It looks easy enough," she said, with suppressed excitement, immensely
+fascinated. "I should think anybody could do that. You hop on this foot,
+you slide, you hop on that foot, you slide. I believe I could do it. No,
+no, I mustn't let myself be tempted. I don't want to be a sight." Her
+voice had wavered; it suddenly came out bold. "My land!" she exclaimed
+full-bloodedly, "there goes a woman who's not a bit slimmer than me!
+Look here, let's try. Not right before everybody. I see a side room
+where it's nice and dark. Come on in there." As, hardly muffling a gleam
+of peculiar and novel amusement, he escorted her toward the room
+indicated, she reassured him, "I'm big, but I'm light on my feet."
+
+Charlie was afterward fond of telling that he had taught Mrs. Hawthorne
+to dance. But the single lesson he gave her did not of a truth take her
+beyond the point where, holding hands with him, like children, and
+counting one-two-three, she tried hopping on this foot, then on the
+other. For Mrs. Foss, who seemed to have specially at heart that the new
+people should enjoy themselves, in her idea of securing this end,
+brought one person after the other to be introduced.
+
+How carefully selected these were, or how diplomatically prepared, the
+good hostess alone could know.
+
+"Oh, I'm having such a good time!" Mrs. Hawthorne sighed from a full and
+happy heart, later in the evening, having gone to sit beside her hostess
+on the little corner sofa which that tired woman had selected for a
+moment's rest. The dancing was passing before them. "It's the loveliest
+party I ever was to. What delightful friends you have, Mrs. Foss, and
+what a lot of them! I've made ever so many friends, too, this evening.
+Mrs. Satterlee has told me about the Home she's interested in, and Miss
+Seymour about the church-fair, and I've had a good talk with the
+minister. Those are three nice girls of the banker's, aren't they?
+Florence, Francesca, and Beatrice, commonly known as Flick, Fran, and
+Trix, they told me. Mr. Hunt, the nephew, is nice, too; we get on like
+sliding down-hill. They're all going to come and see me.--Mrs.
+Foss,"--her attention had veered,--"do look at that little fellow
+playing the piano! Isn't he _great_! But isn't he comical, too!
+I've been noticing him all the evening. He fascinates me. I never heard
+such splendid playing. The bouncing parts make my feet twitch to dance,
+but the sighful, wind-in-the-willow parts make me want to just lean back
+and close my eyes. I could listen till the cows come home. I call it a
+wonderful gift."
+
+Mrs. Foss looked over at the little Italian, the unpretentious musical
+hack whom one sent for when there was to be dancing, and paid--it was
+all he asked--so very little. Her eyebrows went up a point as she
+smiled. It was true, she remarked it for the first time, that his hands
+flew over the keys with an air of breezy virtuosity. He raised them from
+the keyboard and brought them down again with the action of a snorting
+high-stepping horse. When the passage was loud he nearly lifted himself
+off the stool with pounding; when it was soft he tickled the ivories
+with the delicacy of raindrops, at the same time diminishing his person
+till he seemed the size of a fairy. Now and then he tossed his head, as
+if champing a bit, and the bunch of black frizz over his left temple
+trembled. A decidedly comic figure he appeared to Mrs. Foss.
+
+"I will tell Signor Ceccherelli what you say," she amiably promised. "I
+am sure it will please him."
+
+Leslie, whose responsibilities kept her from dancing her young fill at
+her own parties, sought Mrs. Hawthorne still later in the evening, when
+she thought that lady might have had enough of Mr. Hunt senior sitting
+beside her. The heavy old banker was not considered very entertaining,
+and everybody in Florence knew his way of sticking at the side of a
+good-looking woman. Lest this one, so evidently making herself pleasant,
+should be unduly taxed, Leslie stepped in to free her, tactfully
+interested the banker in a game of cards going on upstairs, and took the
+place he vacated--took it for just a minute, as a bird perches.
+
+"No, you don't!" Mrs. Hawthorne laid a hand on her arm when she seemed
+near dashing off to bring somebody else to present. "You've done the
+social act till you ought to be tired, if you aren't. Sit here by me a
+moment and take it easy. This party doesn't need any nursing. It's the
+loveliest party I ever was to."
+
+Leslie looked off in front of her to verify the statement, and
+unreluctantly settled down on the little sofa to rest awhile. She liked
+Mrs. Hawthorne. One could not help liking her, as she had had occasion
+to assert and reassert in defense against a vague body of reasons for
+not adopting the new-comer into the sacred circle of friends, or
+launching her on the waters of their little world. Now, as they chatted,
+she said to herself again that if Mrs. Hawthorne's homeliness of phrase
+were not a simple thing of playfulness, a disclaimer of the affectation
+of elegance in talk as stilted, bumptious, unsuited to a proper modesty,
+it could very well pass for that. Mrs. Hawthorne seldom expressed
+herself quite seriously. As she seldom looked serious either, one could
+hardly hear her say it was the loveliest party she ever was to without
+suspecting her of a humorous intention. By the sly gleam of her eye one
+should know she was doing it to amuse you, imitating a child, a
+country-woman, a shop-girl, for the sake of promoting an easy
+pleasantness. With her bearing of entire dignity, her honest
+handsomeness, her air of secure and generous wealth, she was truly not
+one whom the ordinary public would feel disposed to seek reasons for
+excluding. Leslie and her mother had refrained from presenting to her
+particular persons in the company. All remarks heard from those who had
+been presented led to an almost certainty that the new Americans were a
+success.
+
+"Do look at Estelle!" exclaimed Mrs. Hawthorne. "She's been dancing one
+dance after the other, and sits there now looking cool as a cucumber. I
+would have her life if it could make me into a bone like her. Miss
+Foss,"--she was diverted from the envious contemplation of
+Estelle,--"who is that lovely girl over there?"
+
+"Which one? There are so many to-night!"
+
+"The white one with the knob of dark hair down in her neck. An Italian,
+I guess. Rather small. See who I mean? There. She's going to speak to
+the little fellow at the piano."
+
+Leslie looked, but did not at once answer. The girl in white was indeed
+strangely, at this moment poignantly, lovely. Some intensity of
+repressed feeling made her cheek of a white-rose pallor, and her dark
+eyes, those spots of velvet shadow, mysteriously deep. She had gone
+where the piano stood in a bower of palm and bamboo, with Signor
+Ceccherelli seated before it, busy wiping the sweat of his brow. More
+than one had gone to him that evening to ask for some favorite piece.
+She was perhaps just requesting him to play The Blue Danube, or La
+Manola or Bavardage, and it was merely the romantic way of her beauty to
+express a sense of doom. She spoke quietly to the pianist, who looked at
+her while she spoke and when she ceased made with his head a motion of
+assent. She turned and went from the room.
+
+"It is my sister Brenda," said Leslie. "How singular you should not
+recognize her!"
+
+"I've never met her, my dear. You don't remember. The time I came to tea
+she was in town taking a music lesson. The time I came to dinner she was
+in bed with a headache. Well, well, she's not a bit like the rest of
+you, is she? I took her for an Italian."
+
+"She was only twelve when we came over here, it has somehow molded her.
+I was seventeen; too old, I fancy, to change. Brenda is going back to
+America before long, to be with our aunt, father's sister, for whom
+Brenda was named. It was only decided a day or two ago, when we heard
+from some friends who are going and will take her under their wing. And
+if she goes there's no telling when she will come back, you see, because
+with every change of administration father may be recalled. And Italy
+has been her home so long, all her friends are here. It's no wonder she
+doesn't look exactly light of heart."
+
+"No, poor child!"
+
+There was a sympathetic silence, after which, "Who is that?" Mrs.
+Hawthorne asked, to take their minds off the intrusive sadnesses of
+life. With her gaze across the room she counted, "One, two, three, four,
+to the left of the piano, with his hands behind him and a round glass in
+his eye."
+
+Leslie looked over at a figure of whom it was natural to ask who that
+was, it so surely looked like Somebody--though Mrs. Hawthorne had very
+likely asked because, merely, in her eyes he was queer. It was an oldish
+man, dressed with marked elegance, white tie, white waistcoat, white
+flower at his lapel. The whole of worldly wisdom dwelt in his weary eye.
+He had yellow and withered cheeks, black hair with a dash of white above
+the ears, and a mustache whose thickest part curved over his mouth like
+a black lacquer box-lid, while its long ends, stiff as thorns of a
+thorn-tree, projected on either side far beyond his face.
+
+"His name is Balm de Brézé, vicomte. He is by birth a Belgian, I think;
+the title, however, is French. He has lived mostly in Paris, but now
+spends about half of his time here. He married a friend of ours, an
+American. There is Amabel, in ruby velvet, just inside the library door.
+A good deal younger than he, yet they seem appropriately matched,
+somehow."
+
+"She looks about as foreign as he does. Who's the one she's talking to,
+handsome, dark as night? Never saw such a dark skin before except on a
+cullud puss'n."
+
+"I know. He might be an Arab, only he's very good Tuscan. It's Mr.
+Landini,--Hunt and Landini."
+
+"Ah, the bankers. They do my business, but I've never seen the heads
+before to-night."
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne's eyes wandered, as if she said, "Whom else do I want to
+know about?" and Leslie made internal comment upon the fact that Mrs.
+Hawthorne's interest was quickened by those individuals precisely whom
+they had withheld, for reasons, from presenting to her.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne suddenly pressed closer, and with a little chuckle
+grasped Leslie's knee, by this affectionate touch to make herself
+forgiven for the disrespect about to be shown.
+
+"And who's Stickly-prickly?"
+
+Leslie had to laugh, too. Impossible not to know which one was meant of
+all the people in the direction of Mrs. Hawthorne's glance. He was
+leaning against the wall between two chairs deserted by the fair,
+looking off with a slightly mournful indifference at everything and at
+nothing. His mustache ended in upturned points, his beard was pointed,
+his hair stood up in little points. He gave the impression besides of
+one whose nervous temper put out porcupine shafts to keep you off.
+
+"It's one of our very best friends, Mrs. Hawthorne. Dear old Gerald! Mr.
+Fane. Shall I go get him and bring him over?"
+
+"No, don't. I should be scared of him."
+
+"Let me! His prickles are harmless. He has heard us speak of you so
+much! See, he is looking over at us wistfully, in a way that plainly
+suggests our course. Here comes Charlie Hunt, who will keep you amused
+while I fetch Gerald; then we will go in together and have an ice."
+
+Charlie Hunt, modern moth without fear or shyness, but with a great deal
+of caution, was indeed returning for the third or fourth time to Mrs.
+Hawthorne's side, drawn by the sparkle of eyes and tresses and smiles
+and diamonds. Francesca had already described him that evening to
+another young lady as dancing attendance on the new American. He dropped
+into the seat vacated by Leslie, addressed Mrs. Hawthorne as if they had
+been friends for at least weeks, and made conversation joyfully easy by
+getting at once on to a playful footing.
+
+Leslie meanwhile steered her course toward Gerald. The music had started
+up again, men were presenting themselves to maidens with their request
+for the favor.... Leslie threaded her way between the first on the
+floor. Her eyes were naturally turned toward the object of her search;
+some intention toward him was probably apparent in her look. As if he
+had not seen it, or as if, having seen it, he scented in her approach
+some conspiracy against his peace, Gerald in a moment during which her
+eye was not on him quietly vanished.
+
+Missing him, Leslie looked about in some surprise, then entered the door
+by which inevitably he must have passed. She gave a glance around the
+library; Gerald did not seem to be there. Mystified, she looked more
+carefully at the faces to be seen through the thin tobacco smoke. No,
+Gerald's was not among them. Gerald, acquainted with the house, knew the
+door, of course, of the kind frequent in Italian houses, the little door
+indistinguishable from the wall, by which one could leave the library,
+and after crossing the landing of the kitchen stairs, reach the
+dining-room. From the dining-room, then, one could come into the
+entrance hall, whence go upstairs, or out into the garden, or, as one
+pleased, back into the drawing-room. Leslie did not think the matter of
+sufficient importance to pursue the chase farther.
+
+The dancing was suspended while the musician had sandwiches and glasses
+of a fragrant and delicious-looking but weak punch. The Fosses' waiter
+knew him well and fraternally attended to his wants.
+
+The dining-room, though large, would not permit all the couples to enter
+at once, so ices and cakes were borne from the table by cavaliers to
+expectant ladies in the antechamber, on the stairs, and in the farther
+rooms.
+
+The musician after eating to his satisfaction took the time for a
+cigarette, which he enjoyed, not in the library, but in cool and
+peaceful isolation on the top step of the kitchen stairs. Refreshed, he
+briskly went back to his piano, persuaded that the young people were
+sighing to see him there. With new vigor he struck up a march. The crowd
+in the dining-room thinned.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne and Miss Madison, with Charlie Hunt and Doctor Chandler,
+one of the Americans from the pension, lingered on in the corner where,
+with the migration of so many to the ball-room, all four had been able
+to find chairs. Mrs. Hawthorne, of the fair moon-face, was as a matter
+of course eating sweet stuff; Miss Madison, contrariwise, sipped a small
+cup of black coffee. Miss Madison, no need to say, had a neat jaw-bone
+to show--collarbones, too. She was not pretty, her features were hardly
+worth describing, but yet it was an attractive face, as merry as it was
+fundamentally shrewd, as sensible as it was sprightly. The frank, almost
+business-like manner of her setting out to have a good time at the party
+ensured her having at least a lively one, and her partners not finding
+it slow. She at once and impartially interested herself in the men
+brought up to her, and sought to interest them. Her flirtatiousness was,
+however, sedate--in its way, moral--not intended to have any result
+beyond the enlivenment of the hour.
+
+Miss Madison had been finding exhilaration and delight this evening in
+dancing, and when presently the alluring strains of a waltz came
+floating to their ears, she looked at Chandler, and he in the same
+manner looked at her; whereupon she rose, as if words had been
+exchanged, took his arm, and they deserted for the ball-room. Charlie
+Hunt was left ensconced in an intimate nook alone with Mrs. Hawthorne.
+
+But he had hardly a moment in which to enjoy the feeling of advantage
+this gave him before his cousin Francesca came looking for him. They
+were going, she said. Father was sleepy, and mother said they must go.
+If he wanted a lift home, he must hurry up. Charlie had come with them,
+on the box near the driver, there being five already inside the landau.
+Gallantry should perhaps have made him answer that rather than be
+dragged away at this moment he would walk. But gallantry was dumb.
+Charlie was not fond of walking. It was a great convenience, an economy
+as well, being permitted to make use of his aunt's carriage.
+
+Having delivered her message, Francesca had gone to put on her things,
+and Charlie, after expressions of regret over the inevitable, asked Mrs.
+Hawthorne whither she would wish to be taken before he left.
+
+Let him not bother, she answered; she could find her friends without
+help.
+
+They separated. Walking slowly, she looked for faces of acquaintances.
+She glanced in at the ball-room door. They were dancing still, but not
+nearly so many. She turned into the reception-room, whence she could
+reënter the ball-room at the other end without danger of collision, and
+reach that comfortable blue satin sofa, now standing empty. There she
+would sit looking on till Estelle joined her, when they would set about
+making their adieux. The carriage must have been waiting for them ever
+so long.
+
+She had sat a minute, unconsciously smiling to herself, because the
+sensations and impressions of the evening were all so pleasant, when
+something occurred to her as desirable to be done. She rose to carry out
+her idea.
+
+The dancing had stopped; the floor was clear except in the neighborhood
+of the walls, where couples stood or sat recovering breath and coolness.
+She started to cross the long room. She did not skirt it because the
+direct line to her destination was by the middle; she did not go fast
+because there was no occasion, and it was not her way. She advanced like
+a goodly galleon pushing along the sea with finely curved bows, all
+sails set to catch the breeze. Her mind was entirely on her idea, and
+she did not at first feel herself to be conspicuous. But all the eyes in
+the room, before she had gone half her way, were fastened upon her, a
+natural and legitimate mark. One might now without impertinence have the
+satisfaction of a good look at the newly come American who had taken the
+big house on the Lungarno; the women might study the fashion of her hair
+and dress.
+
+She was smiling faintly, but fixedly; she smiled, indeed, all the time,
+as if smiles had been an indispensable article of wear at a party. The
+least of her smiles brought dimples into view, and her dimples seemed
+multitudinous, though there were really only three in her face and one
+of those irregular things called apple-seeds. Her agreeably blunted
+features and peachy roundness of cheek belonged to a good-humored,
+unimposing type, which took on a certain nobility in her case from being
+carried high on a strong, round neck over a splendid broad breast,
+partly bare this evening, and seen to be white as milk, as swans'-down,
+as pearl.
+
+If one had tried to define the look which left one so little doubt as to
+her nationality, one would perhaps have said it was a combination of
+fearlessness and accessibility. She feared not you, nor should you fear
+her; she counted on your friendliness, you might count on hers.
+
+She was a person simple in the main. The colors she had selected to wear
+accorded with the rest, showing little intricacy of taste. The two silks
+composing her dress were respectively the blue of a summer morning and
+the pink of a rose. From cushioned and dimpled shoulders the bodice
+tapered to as fine a waist as a Paris dressmaker had found possible to
+bring about in a woman who, despite a veritable yearning to look
+slender, cared also for freedom to breathe, and, as she said with a
+sigh, guessed she must make up her mind to be happy without looking like
+a toothpick. At the back of the waist, the dress leapt suddenly out and
+away from the dorsal column--every lady's dress did that for a season or
+two at the time we are telling of, and at every step she took the back
+of her skirt gave a bob, for the bustle was supplemented by three or
+four concealed semi-circles of thin steel, reeds we called them, which
+hit against you as you went and sprang lightly away from your heels.
+
+The arrangement of Mrs. Hawthorne's hair equalled in artificiality the
+mode of her dress: the front locks were clipped and twisted into little
+curls, the back locks drawn to the top of the head, where they were
+disposed in silken loops and rolls, at the top of which, like a flag
+planted on a hill, stood an aigrette, a sparkle and two whiffs.
+
+It may not sound pretty, it was not, but the eye of that day had become
+used to it, as eyes have since become used to fashions no prettier, and
+as Mrs. Hawthorne's hair was of a soft sunny tint it was that evening
+admired by more than one, as was her intrinsically ugly beautiful gown,
+which gave a little jerky rebound every time she placed one of those
+neat solid satin-shod feet before the other in her progress across the
+now attentive room.
+
+She had taken off her long white gloves to eat a cake--or cakes; she was
+carrying them loosely swinging from one dimpled hand.
+
+In the middle of the room self-consciousness overtook her. With the
+awakening sense of eyes upon her, she looked first to one side, then to
+the other. Her smile broadened while growing by just a tinge sheepish;
+she seemed to waver and consider turning from her course and finishing
+her journey close along the wall, like a mouse....
+
+She finally did not, nor yet hurried. She made her smile explain to
+whoever was looking on that a person was excusable for making this sort
+of mistake, that it hurt nobody, that one need not and did not care;
+that she was sure they did not like her any less for it; they would not
+if they knew how void of offense toward them all was her heart; that
+having exposed herself to being looked at, she hoped they liked her
+looks. Her dress was a very good dress, her laces were very good lace,
+and the maid who had done her hair was considered a first-rate hand at
+doing hair.
+
+So she was carrying it off, and her smile was only a little
+self-conscious, only a shade embarrassed, when from among the men
+standing near the library door, for which she was directly making, there
+stepped out one to meet her, not unlike a slender needle darting toward
+a large, rounded magnet as it comes into due range.
+
+More sensitive than she, feeling the situation much more uncomfortably
+for his country-woman than she felt it for herself, a foreign-looking
+fellow, who had not quite forgotten that he was an American, after a
+moment's hard struggle against his impulse, hastened forward to shorten
+for her that uncompanioned course across the floor under ten thousand
+search-lights.
+
+"I'm looking for somebody," said Mrs. Hawthorne, with the smile of a
+child.
+
+The voice which had made one man think of the crimson heart on a
+valentine reminded this other of rough velvet.
+
+He showed his eccentric three front teeth in a responding smile that had
+a touch of the faun, and asked whimsically:
+
+"Will I do?"
+
+"Help me to find Mr. Foss, and you'll do perfectly," she said merrily.
+"I haven't seen him more than just to shake hands this whole evening,
+and I do want to have a little talk before I go."
+
+"If I am not mistaken, we shall find him in the library." He offered his
+arm.
+
+"I may have appeared to be doing something else, Mrs. Hawthorne, but I
+have really been looking for you the last hour," said the consul when he
+had been found. "I wanted to have a little talk. How are you enjoying
+Florence?"
+
+"Oh, we're having an elegant time, thanks to that dear wife of yours and
+that dear girl, Leslie. I don't know what we should have done without
+them and you."
+
+"But the city itself, Florence, doesn't it enchant you?"
+
+"We--ell, yes. N-n-n-no. Yes and no. That's it. You want me to tell the
+truth, don't you? Some of it does, and some of it doesn't. Some of it, I
+guess, will take me a long time to get used to. It's terribly different
+from what we expected--I, in particular. You see, I came here because an
+old friend used to talk so much about it. Florence the Fair! The City of
+Lilies! He said Italy was the most beautiful country in the world, and
+Florence the most beautiful city in Italy. So my expectations were way
+up.--Oh, I don't know; it's hard to tell. I don't exactly remember now
+what I did expect. I guess my picture of it was something like the New
+Jerusalem on an Easter day. But I shall get used to this, like to the
+taste of olives. It must be all right, for the friend I was speaking of
+had the finest mind I've ever known. I'm green as turnip-tops, of
+course, but I shall get educated up to it, I suppose. Give me time."
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, hear me prophesy," said Mr. Foss. "In six months you
+will love it all. It's the fate of us who come here from new countries.
+It will steal in upon you, grow upon you, beset and besot you, till you
+like no other place in the world so well."
+
+"Will it? Well, if you say so. The Judge--the friend I was speaking
+of,--said so much of the same kind that the minute I thought of coming
+to Europe, right after I'd said, 'I'll go to Paris,' I said to myself,
+'I'll go to Florence.'"
+
+"Your friend was a judge of places."
+
+"It wasn't he alone influenced me. He was sick a long time, and I used
+to read aloud to him, and one spell, when his mind for some reason or
+other was running on Italy, every book he chose had the scene laid here.
+There were whole pages of description, and anything so lovely, so
+luscious, as the places and people described I never did dream. I didn't
+understand more than a quarter, but I swallowed it all and gloated. The
+woman who wrote those books certainly did have an imagination. O
+Antonia, let me meet you and have a good look at you so I can tell
+a--hm, the owner of an imagination when I see one again!"
+
+"Antonia, did you say?" The consul smiled.
+
+"That was the writer's name. You know the books I mean?"
+
+"I have read a work or two of Antonia's, yes. She lives near Florence,
+you know, on another of these little hills."
+
+"Oh, does she!"
+
+"Her name is Mrs. Grangeon. She is an Englishwoman, with an
+extraordinary sense of, and feeling for, Italy. She is, at her best, a
+poet; at her worst, slightly deficient, perhaps, in humor. But her
+passion for Italy is genuine, and I have no doubt she sees it as glowing
+as the pictures she makes of it."
+
+"Her books are 'grand, John'! If I never had come here, I never should
+have appreciated them or her--making up that wonderful world, all
+pomegranates and jasmin-stars, and curls like clustering blue-black
+grapes, and staturesque limbs, out of the back of her head. Yes, and the
+golden dust of centuries, and time's mellow caressing touch--oh, I wish
+I could remember it all!"
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, we must take you in hand. Be it ours to initiate you.
+Come, what have you been to see?"
+
+"Treasures of art? We haven't had time yet. We've been getting a house
+fit to live in. When you asked me how I liked Florence, I ought to have
+begun by that end. I love my house, Mr. Foss. I love my garden. I love
+the Lungarno. And the Casheeny. And Boboly. And the drive up here. And
+the stores! I positively dote on those little bits of stores on the
+jewelers' bridge."
+
+"Well, well, that's quite enough to begin with."
+
+"Now that we're going to have some time to spare, we mean to go
+sight-seeing like other folks."
+
+"How I wish, dear Mrs. Hawthorne, that I were not such a busy man!
+But"--Mr. Foss had a look of bright inspiration--"should I on that
+account be dejected? Here is Mr. Fane--"
+
+He turned to Gerald, who, after bringing up Mrs. Hawthorne, had stood
+near, a silent third, waiting to act further as her escort by and by.
+Meanwhile he had been listening with a varied assortment of feelings and
+a boundless fatigue of spirit.
+
+"Mr. Fane," said the consul, "who is not nearly so busy a man as I, and
+is the most sympathetic, well-informed cicerone you could find. When we
+wish to be sure our visiting friends shall see Florence under the best
+possible circumstances, we turn them over to Mr. Fane."
+
+Gerald's face struggled into a sourish smile, and he bowed ironical
+thanks for the compliment. Lifting his head, he shot a glance of
+reproachful interrogation at the consul. Was his friend doing this
+humorously, to tease him, or was the man simply not thinking?
+
+The consul looked innocent of any sly intention; he was all of a jocund
+smile; the consul, who should have known better, wore the air of doing
+him a pleasure and her a pleasure and a pleasure to himself; the air of
+thinking that any normally constituted young man would be grateful for
+such a chance.
+
+"I shall be most happy," said Gerald, with irreproachable and misleading
+politeness.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne turned to him readily.
+
+"Any time you say. Let me tell you where we live."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+
+The room in which Mrs. Hawthorne went to bed an hour or two after taking
+leave of the dwindling company at Villa Foss was large and luxurious.
+Its windows were enormous, arched at the top and reaching the floor. A
+wrought-iron railing outside made them safe. In the angle of the wall
+between two of them--it was a corner room--stood a mirror nearly the
+size of the windows, in a broad frame of carved and gilt wood, resting
+on a marble shelf that supported besides two alabaster vases holding
+bunches of roses.
+
+In the corner opposite to the mirror and placed "catty-corner," as the
+occupier worded it, stood the stateliest of beds, upholstered and draped
+in heavy watered silk of a dull, even dingy, yellow. Its hangings were
+gathered at the top into the hollow of a great gold coronet, whence they
+spread and fell in folds that were looped back with silk cords. The
+walls were covered by that same texture of dull gold, held in place by
+tarnished gilt moldings.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne had wanted all this dusty and faded splendor removed,--it
+seemed to her the possible lurking-place of mice or worse,--but the
+agent would not hear of it. The noble landlord was not really eager to
+let.
+
+So Mrs. Hawthorne, to brighten the room in spite of it, for she wished
+to keep it for her own, having taken a fancy to the fresco
+overhead,--that fascinating chariot driven among clouds by a radiant
+youth surrounded by smiling, flower-scattering maidens,--Mrs. Hawthorne
+to "gay up" the room, as she said, had hung windows and doors with
+draperies of her favorite cornflower blue, and covered the chairs with
+the same. On the floor she had stretched a pearl-gray carpet all aglow
+with wreaths of roses tied with ribbons of blue; and over the carpet--at
+the bedside, before the dressing-table, in front of the fireplace--laid
+down white bear-skins.
+
+To cover further the yellow silk, she had hung in one panel of it a
+painting of the "Madonna della Seggiola," in another, Carlo Dolci's
+"Angel of the Annunciation," and in another, Carlo Dolci's Magdalen
+clasping the box of ointment--all works of art bought in Via dei Fossi,
+framed in great gilt-wood frames, like the mirror.
+
+The lace curtains under the cornflower blue brocade were like Brussels
+wedding veils seen through a magnifying glass.
+
+Yes, the room had been made to look bright. It had lamps of
+cream-colored biscuit, painted with roses and crowned with pink shades;
+it had polished brass fire-irons. But the point of supreme brightness
+was the dressing-table, where glittered in orderly display Mrs.
+Hawthorne's American toilet silver, mirror, trays, brushes, boxes,
+bottles--solid, shining, richly embossed.
+
+There was just one thing in all the room that looked poor, workaday. It
+was on the small table at the head of the bed, beside the candle-stick
+and match-safe, a black book, the commonest kind of Bible, such a Bible
+as is dispensed by those who have to furnish the sacred writings in
+large numbers--Sunday schools, for instance.
+
+It was in fact a Sunday-school prize that now lay on the night-stand, in
+what the sober volume presented to a pious little girl must have thought
+strange company. Cover to cover with it, cheek by jowl, lay a book on
+etiquette.
+
+It was for the Bible, however, that Mrs. Hawthorne reached after she had
+got into bed. She found her place. She read in it every night before
+sleeping, to keep a promise made long ago, and avoid the reproaches of a
+person gone from this earth, but who still, she never questioned, could
+be pleased or displeased with her actions.
+
+She did not always try to understand or follow; when she was sleepy she
+read merely with her eyes. To-night her mind was too full of personal
+things to permit of strict attention to the text. As she enumerated the
+wonders of the House that Solomon built for the Lord, there formed no
+picture of it in her mind.
+
+"I wonder what knops are," she said to herself drowsily. "I must
+remember to ask Hattie."
+
+There was a stir. Both doors of her room were open; the little
+unobtrusive one into the dressing-room for air,--the window there stood
+wide open through the night,--the large one into the sitting-room so as
+to leave a free road to Miss Madison's room beyond. Through this now
+slipped a slender form in a soft, fur-bordered wrapper, and with front
+locks done up in curling-kids.
+
+"You in bed?"
+
+"Yes; I'm just reading my chapter."
+
+"Livvy gone?"
+
+Livvy, or Miss Deliverance Jones, was the maid they had brought from
+America, a New York negress of the most faintly colored complexion, with
+hair mysteriously blond. Her head was egg-shaped, her nose slightly
+flat, her lip voluptuous, her brown-black eye sad as a homesick
+monkey's; but she could wind a chocolate veil about her face and stylish
+hat, and walk forth happy in the fancy that she passed for white. She
+was an accomplished dressmaker and hair-dresser; she moreover had spent
+some time in the service of a beauty-doctor. The ladies had secured her
+just before sailing, and liked her, but did not talk freely when she was
+present.
+
+"Yes, she's gone."
+
+"I'm not a bit sleepy, are you? I'm too excited. Let's talk."
+
+She climbed on to her friend's bed, gathered her knees to her chin, and
+hugged them, with the effect of hugging to herself a great happiness.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne closed her Bible and put it aside. The single candle by
+which she had been reading showed the shining mirthfulness of the eyes
+with which the two regarded each other.
+
+"Wasn't it fun?"
+
+"Oh, wasn't it!"
+
+They spoke softly, whether because the suggestion of the late hour was
+upon them, or they thought, without thinking, that Livvy might still be
+near. They whispered like school-girls who have come together in
+forbidden fun.
+
+"I never did have such a good time."
+
+"Nor I, neither. Oh, Hat, _isn't it_ fun!"
+
+"_Isn't it_, just!"
+
+"See here, Hat, you've got to teach me to dance. I was almost crazy this
+evening, I wanted so to be dancing with the rest. Where d'you learn?"
+
+"I went to dancing-school, my dear."
+
+"No! Did you?"
+
+"Yes, I did; all one winter. What are you thinking about? I've been to
+parties in my life. Not many, but I've been. There was the Home Club
+party----"
+
+"Yes, of course. I remember how I teased once to go to the Home Club
+party; but ma wouldn't let me. I hadn't anything to put on, anyhow. But
+I'd have gone in my shirt if they'd let me. The nearest to a real party
+I'd been to before to-night was a clam-bake. I don't count church
+sociables. Out West there used to be celebrations in a sort of bar-room
+place, but even I couldn't stand those. To think I've always yearned so
+to have a good time, and now I'm having it! Oh, Hat, wasn't it lovely!
+That's a mighty nice house of the Fosses. How good it looked, all fixed
+up! The flowers and candles, one room opening into the other, everything
+just right. Hat, Mrs. Foss is the finest woman I ever knew, and in my
+opinion makes the most elegant appearance. She's the one I'd choose to
+be like if I could. Just watch me copy-cat her. You'll see. 'My dear
+Mrs. Hawthorne, pray don't speak of the trouble! It's been nothing but a
+pleasure. Be sure you call upon us whenever we can be of the smallest
+service.'"
+
+"You've caught her, Nell, you silly thing! Down to the ground."
+
+"I'm going to pattern after her till it comes natural. How sweet they
+all are! How kind they've been!" Mrs. Hawthorne grew dreamy.
+
+"Your dress, Nell, was a perfect success," the other ran on--"perfect.
+How did you think mine looked? I'll tell you a compliment I got for you,
+if you'll tell me one you got for me. If not, I'll save it up in my
+secret breast till you're ready to make a trade."
+
+"To think," said Mrs. Hawthorne, still engrossed by her dream of absent
+and bygone things, "that we're the same little girls--and one of them
+barefoot!--who used to play house together on a sand-heap of old Cape
+Cod and pin on any old rag that would tail along the ground and play
+ladies! 'My dear Mrs. Madison, how do you do?'"
+
+"'My dear Mrs. Hawthorne, my toes are just as sore as they can be!'"
+
+"'That comes, my dear Mrs. Madison, of you dancing like a crazy woman
+from ten o'clock till one, in tight shoes!'--Mrs. Hawthorne! Mrs.
+Madison! Aurora! Estelle! To think, after all these years, we should be
+playing our old play that we played at Wellfleet and East Boston, only
+playing it with real things, in Paris and Florence!"
+
+"Nell, I'm so afraid of forgetting and calling you Nell that every time
+I catch myself near doing it I can feel the cold sweat break out on my
+brow."
+
+"What would it matter? We aren't impostors, Hat. We're just having fun,
+and don't want our real names to queer it. If they should slip out when
+we aren't thinking, they'd simply sound like nicknames we've got for
+each other. But they won't slip out. I'm too fond of calling you
+Estelle. Don't you _love_ to call me Aurora? Hat, how did I behave,
+far as you could see?"
+
+"Nell, if I hadn't known you, and had just been seeing you for the first
+time, I should have said to myself: 'What a fine, good-looking,
+beautifully dressed, refined, and ladylike woman that is! Wish t' I
+might make her acquaintance.' And what would you have said, if you'd
+seen me, never having met me before?"
+
+"I should have said: 'What a bright, smart, intelligent, and rarely
+beautiful girl! So well dressed, too, and slender as a worm! A queen of
+society. I do like her looks! She's the spittin' image of my little
+friend Hattie Carver, the schoolmarm in East Boston, that I used to
+know!' Oh, Hat, the _queerest_ thing! What do you suppose I saw
+this evening at that lovely house full of lovely people? I was in the
+library learning to dance. And I looked up and there was what I took to
+be a young man smoking a cigarette. Next thing, I saw that his dress was
+low-necked almost down to the waist. Hat, it was a _woman_ smoking!
+a woman with her hair cut short. I never saw anything like it, except an
+old Irishwoman once, with her pipe."
+
+"Seems to me I've heard of ladies in Europe doing it, and it being
+considered all right. I _have_ heard that some do it in New York,
+but I guess they're careful not to be seen."
+
+"Well, it does seem a queer thing to do!--Go ahead, Hat; what was the
+compliment?"
+
+"Sure, now, you've got one for me?"
+
+"Sure."
+
+"It was What's-his-name, the English fellow we see every time we go in
+to Cook's--Mr. Dysart. Leslie says he comes of a very good family. He
+said to me, 'How very charming Mrs. Hawthorne is looking this evening!'"
+
+"Hattie, that man's a humbug, that man's leading a double life. He said
+to me, 'How very charming Miss Madison is looking this evening!' He
+did."
+
+"Go 'way! You're making it up to save trouble."
+
+"No, I ain't! Stop, Hattie! I know! I _am not_. Confusion upon it!
+You've made me so nervous when I talk that I can't say ain't without
+jumping as if I'd sat on a pin!"
+
+"Nell Goodwin, look me square in the eye. How many times did you say
+ain't at the party this evening?"
+
+"Not once; I swear it. I was looking out every minute. 'I am not,' I
+said; 'We are not,' I said; 'He doesn't,' I said; 'He isn't,' I said.
+There! Between you'n' I, Hat, it's a dreadful nuisance, keeping my mind
+on the way I talk. I hope I shall come in time to talking lofty without
+thinking about it. Why do I have to, Hat, after all? I've lived among
+educated people. Wasn't the Judge highly educated? And nobody ever found
+fault with my way of talking. My folks all had been to school and read
+books. And didn't I go to school till I was fourteen? And didn't I
+graduate from the grammar school with the rest? What's the matter with
+my natural way of talking?"
+
+"It's all right at home, Nell, but it's different over here. They're a
+different kind of people we're thrown with."
+
+"This pernickety way of talking never sounds cozy or friendly one bit.
+We're as good as anybody, of course, but when I say 'I am not, he does
+not,' I always feel as if I were setting up to be better than the
+rest!--Oh, it isn't, is it? Oh, do you say so? 'Between you and I' isn't
+correct? But I thought you told me.... To Jericho, Hattie! How's a
+feller ever going to get to know?"
+
+"Listen, Nell, while I go over it again. When you say----"
+
+"Ah, no! Not at this time of night, Estelle! Let me live in ignorance
+till morning! You know all those sorts of things, my dear Estelle,
+because you're paid by the government to know them. I don't; but I know
+lots and lots of things that are a sight funnier."
+
+She grabbed one of the pillows and flung it at her friend, who flung it
+back at her; and the simple creatures laughed.
+
+Aurora re-tied in a bow the blue ribbon that closed the collar of her
+nightgown, and settled back again, with her arms out on the white satin
+quilt, flowered with roses and lined with blue. The two braids of her
+fair hair lay, one on each side, down her big, frank, undisguised bosom.
+
+"You heaping dish of vanilla ice-cream!" said Hattie.
+
+"You stick of rhubarb!" said Nell. "Stop, Hat! Behave! Do you suppose
+all the people we've invited to come and see us will come?"
+
+"Doctor Chandler will come. And the Hunt girls will come. And Madame
+Bentivoglio I guess will come."
+
+"Yes, and the Satterlees I'm sure will come. And Mrs. Seymour and her
+daughter that I said I'd help with the church fair. And the minister;
+what was it? Spottiswood."
+
+"And won't the Mr. Hunt come that you seemed to be having such a good
+time with?"
+
+"Yes, he'll come. He'll come to-morrow, I shouldn't wonder. Then that
+thinnish fellow with the hair like a hearth-brush--did you meet him? Mr.
+Fane, a great friend of the Fosses. He's coming to take us
+sight-seeing." She yawned a wide, audible yawn. "I only hope there'll be
+some fun in it. Confound you, Hat, go to bed!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+
+After the Fosses had helped the lessees of the Haughty Hermitage to make
+it habitable; found for them a coachman who had a little French and,
+when told what they desired to buy, would take them to the proper shops;
+provided them with a butler to the same extent a linguist, through whom
+Estelle, who in Paris had ambitiously studied a manual of conversation,
+could give her orders, they not unnaturally became less generous of
+their company.
+
+But they were not permitted to make the intervals long between visits.
+The coachman wise in French was perpetually driving his spanking pair to
+their gates, delivering a message, and waiting to take them down for
+lunch or dinner with their joyfully welcoming and grateful friends. It
+was not at all unpleasant. It was not prized preciously,--there was too
+much of it and too urgently lavished,--but the lavishers were loved for
+it by two women neither dry-hearted nor world-hardened. Leslie fell into
+the way, when she was in town and had time, of running in to Aurora's,
+where it would be cheerful and she looked for a laugh.
+
+Leslie, having reached, as she considered, years of discretion, thought
+fit to disregard the Florentine rule that young unmarried women must not
+walk in the streets unattended. She had balanced the two inconveniences:
+that of staying at home unless some one could go out with her, and that
+of being spoken to in the street, and decided that it was less
+unpleasant to hear a strange young man murmur as she passed, "Angel of
+paradise!" or "Beautiful eyes!"--no grosser insult had ever been offered
+her,--than to be bothered by a servant at her heels. The fact that she
+looked American and was understood to be following the custom of her own
+country secured her against any real misinterpretation.
+
+It was chilly, Novemberish, and within the doors of Florentine domiciles
+rather colder, for some reason, than in the open air. The Fosses kept
+their house at a more human temperature than most people, but yet after
+years of Italy did not heat very thoroughly: one drops into the way of
+doing as others do, and grows accustomed to putting up with cold in
+winter. Leslie often expressed the opinion that in America people really
+exaggerate in the matter of heating their houses. Nevertheless, just for
+the joy of the eyes and, through the eyes, of the depressed spirit, she
+was glad to-day of the big fire dancing and crackling in Aurora's
+chimney-place.
+
+The upstairs sitting-room, where the ladies generally sat, might look
+rather like a day nursery; yet after one had accepted it, with its
+chintz of big red flowers and green foliage, its rich strawberry rug and
+new gold picture-frames, it did seem to brighten one's mood. How think
+grayly amid that dazzle and glow any more than feel cold before that
+fire?
+
+Leslie held her hands to the blaze, and with an amiable display of
+interest inquired of their affairs, the progress made in "getting
+settled." There was still a good deal to do of a minor sort.
+
+Accounts were given her in a merry duet; purchases were shown; she was
+told all that had happened since they last saw her, who had called, whom
+they had been to see.
+
+Casting about in her mind for further things to communicate, Aurora was
+reminded of a small grievance.
+
+"I thought your friend Mr. Fane was going to come and take us
+sight-seeing," she said.
+
+"Was it so arranged?"
+
+"So I supposed."
+
+"And he hasn't been?"
+
+"Hide nor hair of him have we seen."
+
+"I meant, hasn't he perhaps called while you were out?"
+
+"He hasn't."
+
+"Strange. It's not like him to be rude. But, then, he's not like himself
+these days. You must excuse him."
+
+"What's the matter with him? Isn't he well?"
+
+"He's not ill in the usual sense. If he were, we should make him have a
+doctor and hope to see him cured. It's worse than an illness. He is
+blue--chronically blue."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Oh, he has reasons. But the same reasons, of course, would not have
+made a person of a different temperament change as he has changed."
+
+"I don't suppose you want to tell us what the reasons are?" Very
+tentatively this was said.
+
+"Why ... ordinarily one would not feel free to do so, but you are sure
+to hear about it before you have been here long. In Florence, you know,
+everybody knows everything about everybody else. Not always the truth,
+but in any case an interesting version. Oh, it behooves one to be
+careful in Florence if one doesn't wish one's affairs known and talked
+about. But in the case of Gerald there was nothing secret. Everybody
+knows him, everybody knew when he was engaged to Violet Van Zandt,
+everybody knows that she married some one else."
+
+"Oh, the poor boy!"
+
+"It's very simple, you see, commonplace as possible. But it's like the
+old story of the poem: an old story, yet forever new. And the one to
+whom it happens has his heart broken, one way or the other."
+
+"And she married some one else?"
+
+Both Aurora and Estelle were craning toward the speaker in a curiosity
+full of sympathy.
+
+Leslie was used to seeing them hang on her lips. "I do love to hear you
+talk!" Aurora candidly said. "It doesn't make any difference whether I
+know what you're talking about, it fascinates me, the way you say
+things!" And the compliment disposed Leslie to talk to them no otherwise
+than she talked with Lady Linbrook or Countess Costetti, leaving them to
+grasp or not her allusions and fine shades. She was by a number of years
+the youngest of the three drawn up to the fire; yet some advantage of
+fluency, collectedness, habit of good society--a neat effect altogether
+of authority, made her seem in a way the oldest.
+
+"Violet," she began, like a grown person willing to indulge children
+with a story, "is Madame Balm de Brézé's sister. You saw Madame de Brézé
+that Friday evening at our house. Violet is very like her, only much
+younger and a blonde. Amabel is--let us call things by their names in
+the seclusion of this snug fireside--Amabel is scrawny; Violet was
+ethereal. Amabel is sharp-featured; Violet's face was delicate and
+clear-cut. I say _was_, because she has grown much stouter. We have
+known them since they first came to Florence, and have been friends
+without being passionately attached. They are Americans, but had lived
+in Paris since Violet was a baby. They came here, orphans, because it is
+cheaper. They used to live on the top floor of a stony old palace in Via
+de' Servi, where they painted fans on silk, sending them to a firm in
+Paris. Amabel did them exquisitely: shepherds and shepherdesses, corners
+of old gardens, Cupids--Watteau effects, veritable miniature work. The
+little sister was beginning to do them well, too; she painted only
+flowers. Amabel had no objection to Violet marrying Gerald. He was as
+far as possible from being a good match, but in those days both Amabel
+and Violet seemed to live in an atmosphere that excluded the
+consideration of things from a vulgar material point of view. Violet and
+Gerald were alike in that, and so very much alike in their superfine
+tastes and ways of thinking. _Nous autres_ who live upon this earth
+wondered how they would keep the pot boiling in case of 'that not remote
+contingent, _la famille_.' Gerald has an income simply tiny. You
+would hardly believe how small. We supposed that now he would paint a
+little more than he ever has done with the idea of pleasing the general
+public and securing patronage. They were so much in love, anyhow, and
+made such an interesting pair, that one's old romantic feelings were
+gratified by seeing them together. They were to wait until she was
+twenty-one, when a crumb of money in trust for her would fall due. Then
+Amabel surprises us all by marrying De Brézé. Violet of course lives
+with them, and with them goes to Paris. And in Paris she becomes Madame
+Pfaffenheim. _Tout bonnement!_"
+
+"Oh, the wretch, the bad-hearted minx!"
+
+"No," said Leslie, reflectively. She turned from the warmth of the fire
+and let her eyes rest on the gray sky seen in wide patches through the
+three great windows, arched at the top and blocked at the bottom by
+wrought-iron guards, that admitted into the red and green room such very
+floods of light--"no," Leslie repeated. "One is the sort of person one
+is. The sin is to pretend. I don't believe Violet knew the sort of
+person she was until it came to the test. She thought, very likely, that
+she was all composed of poetry and fine sentiments and eternal love. She
+wasn't; and there it is. When she had the chance actually to choose, she
+preferred money, a fine establishment, luxury, and she took them. How
+ghastly if, with that nature concealed in her behind the pearl and pale
+roses, she had married poor Gerald! It's much better as it is, don't you
+agree with me? I call him fortunate beyond words."
+
+"Well, of course; that's one way of looking at it."
+
+"It's his way. Gerald knows just how fortunate he has been, and it's
+exactly that which makes him so miserable. At first, you understand, he
+could lay the entire blame on the De Brézés; he was sure they had in
+some mysterious way constrained her, and though he was angrily,
+tragically, suicidally wretched, it was one kind of woe--a clean,
+classic woe, I will call it. He believed it shared by her in the secret
+of her uncongenial conjugal life. '_Ich grolle nicht_,' he could
+say, and all that. But a year or two ago she came to Florence with
+Pfaffenheim on a visit to her sister. I don't know how Gerald felt,
+whether he tried to avoid her or tried to see her. That he saw her,
+however, is certain. She is perfectly happy, my dears, in her marriage!
+And that she should love Pfaffenheim, or be proud of him, is
+inconceivable. So her happiness rests entirely upon the fact of her
+riches and worldly consequence."
+
+"Say what you please, I call her a nasty, mean thing!" exclaimed Aurora.
+
+Leslie shrugged her shoulders, as if saying: "Have it your way; but a
+more philosophical view is possible."
+
+"She was looking very beautiful," she went on. "Much more beautiful than
+before, but in such a different way! From diaphanous she has become
+opaque; from airy, solid. She brought a most wonderful wardrobe, and,
+kept in the background with her husband, two fat babies."
+
+"I should think she would have been ashamed to come back here."
+
+"Oh, no; not Violet. She was enchanted to show herself in her glory to
+those who remembered her in the modest plumage of her girlhood. Florence
+did not really like it, because she affected toward Florence the
+attitude of one who comes to it from places immeasurably grander. You
+would have thought Florence an amusing little hole where she long ago,
+by some accident, had spent a month or two. She found us quaint,
+provincial, old-fashioned. She was witty about us. She criticized us
+with a freedom and publicity that made her funnier to us than we were
+funny to her. It was not an endearing thing to do or a very intelligent
+one. It was, in fact, rather antipathetic."
+
+"Antip--I call it the actions of a _bug!_"
+
+"You can see how it all left Gerald. The Violet he cared for was
+obviously no more. Worse than that, she had probably never been.
+Comforting knowledge, isn't it, that for years you have treasured
+memories that had no reality to start from; that you have suffered
+agonies of love without any real object. Nauseous! Intolerable! A
+tragedy that is shown to have been all along a farce! To a man of
+imagination, to a person as sincere as Gerald, you can see what it would
+mean. You can see what it would leave behind it."
+
+"I should think he would just despise her, and shake it off, and forget
+her as she deserves."
+
+"Your simple device, dear Aurora, is the one he adopted. But to have an
+empty hollow where your beautiful hoard of pure gold was stored is a
+thing it takes time to grow used to. He is not an unhappy lover now,
+certainly; but he is a man who has been robbed, and he has fallen into
+the habit of low spirits. It is a thousand pities his poor mother and
+sister could not have been spared to make a home for him. Being too much
+alone is bad for any one. He shuts himself in with his blues, and they
+are growing more and more confirmed. Love is a curious thing." Leslie
+said the latter separately and after a pause, as if from a particular
+case she had been led to reviewing the whole subject. "It complicates
+life so," she added, and rose to go.
+
+They teased her to remain and lunch with them. But Leslie was suddenly
+more tired at the contemplation of life than she had been when she came.
+The total result of her call had not been to cheer her, for by an
+uncomfortable stirring within, as soon as she had finished, she was made
+to repent having talked to outsiders about things so personal, so
+private, regarding Gerald--Gerald, who was infinitely reserved. It
+seemed a crime against friendship. That somebody else would have been
+sure to tell his story did not excuse her.
+
+Leslie's mood to talk was over for that morning and she went home, but
+not before she had been forced to take a bottle of perfume which she had
+carelessly picked up off Aurora's toilet-table, sniffed, and praised;
+also, lifted out of their vase, a bunch of orchids for her mother; and
+for Lily the box of sweets that had stood invitingly open on the
+sitting-room table.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Next time Aurora saw Gerald--it was on Viale Principe Amedeo--she waved
+to him.
+
+He did not see it. He was just aware of a victoria coming down the
+middle of the street he was preparing to cross and of something
+fluttering, but that it concerned him he did not suspect.
+
+Then suddenly the victoria, like a huge Jack-in-the-box, shot up a
+figure, and he recognized Mrs. Hawthorne standing at full height in the
+moving carriage, and waving both hands, as he must suppose, nobody else
+being near,--to him.
+
+He lifted his hat. He saw her reach for the coachman and by touch make
+him aware that she wished to stop. The horses were pulled up. Mrs.
+Hawthorne, from the seat into which the jerk had thrown her, made
+beckoning signs to him, laughing the while, and calling, "Mr. Fane! Mr.
+Fane!"
+
+He went to stand at the carriage-step.
+
+"I thought," said Mrs. Hawthorne, "that you were going to come and take
+us sight-seeing."
+
+"I thought I was," said Gerald, with that scant smile of his; "but I was
+not so fortunate as to find you at home."
+
+It was true that he had gone to her door one afternoon, having
+previously caught a glimpse of her in the heart of the city, shopping.
+
+"You mean to say you came?"
+
+"You did not find my card?"
+
+"No; but it's all right. This is Miss Madison--Mr. Fane. We are
+together. What have you got to do?"
+
+Gerald looked as if the question had not been quite clear, and he waited
+for some amplification of it before he could answer.
+
+"Have you got anything very important to do? Aren't you lonesome? Don't
+you want to jump in and come home with us? Wish you would."
+
+Gerald smiled again in his remote way, and looked as if he knew, as any
+one would know, that this was not meant to be taken seriously.
+
+"I have just seen a beautiful spectacle," he said, after a vague
+head-shake that thanked her shadowily for an unreal invitation. "A game
+of _pallone_, which is the nearest to your football that boys have
+over here. Beautiful bronzed athletes at exercise, a delightful sight,
+statues in motion. I go to see them whenever I can.--The days are
+becoming very short, are they not?"
+
+"Yes. Jump in and come home with us. Tell you what we'll do. I'll go
+down into the kitchen and make some soda biscuits that we'll have hot
+for supper--with maple syrup. We've had a big box of sugar come."
+
+Gerald again smiled his civil, but joyless, smile, and after another
+vague head-shake that thanked, but eluded the question, he said: "They
+are very indigestible; hot bread is not good for the health. At least,
+that is what they tell us over here. We keep our bread two days before
+eating it, or longer. But I am afraid I am detaining you."
+
+The horses were jingling their bits, frisking their docked tails. The
+driver, checking their restless attempts to start, was giving them
+smothered thunder in Italian. Gerald withdrew by a step from the danger
+to his shins.
+
+[Illustration: "I thought," said Mrs. Hawthorne, "that you were going
+to come and take us sight-seeing"]
+
+"Oh, jump in!" said Mrs. Hawthorne for the third time. And because his
+choice lay between saying curtly, "Impossible!" and letting the
+impatient horses proceed, or else obeying, Gerald, who hated being rude
+to women, found himself irresolutely climbing in, just long enough, as
+he intended, to explain that he could not and must not go home with them
+to the hot biscuits and syrup.
+
+The little third seat had been let down for him; his knees were snugly
+wedged in between those of the ladies. Aurora was beaming over at him;
+Estelle was beaming, too. Aurora's smile was a blandishment; Estelle's
+was a light. The horses were flying toward the Lungarno. And he gave up;
+he helplessly gave up trying to find an excuse for asking to be set down
+again and allowed to go his lonely way.
+
+It might be entertaining, he tried to think, to see what they had done
+to the Hermitage. But no! That was very sure to be revolting. If the
+evening were to afford entertainment, it must be found in watching this
+healthy and unhampered being who, just as certain fishes color the water
+around them, seemed to affect the air in such a way that, coming near
+enough, you were forced to like her, without ceasing to think her the
+most impossible person that had ever found her way into cultivated
+society.
+
+The carriage-wheels crunched gravel; the horses' hoofs rang on the
+pavement of a columned portico; the door was opened by a man in blue
+livery.
+
+Entering the wide hall, they faced an ample double staircase, between
+the converging flights of which stood, closed, a great stately
+white-and-gold door.
+
+Gerald, as bidden, followed the ladies up the stairs to the cozier
+sitting-room, where a fire, they hoped, had been kept up. In the
+beginning dimness of an early twilight he first saw the big red flowers
+and green, green leaves. He was left a moment alone while the ladies
+took off their hats, and he sent his eyes traveling around him, prepared
+really for something worse than they found, though the pictures on the
+wall called from him the gesture of trying to sweep away an unpleasant
+dream.
+
+Aurora reappeared from her room in a business-like white apron.
+
+"Now I'm going down to make the biscuit. Oh, no trouble. No trouble at
+all. I want them myself. I'm homesick for some food that tastes like
+home. Estelle will entertain you while I'm gone. I sha'n't be but a
+minute."
+
+Estelle sat in a low arm-chair close to the fire.
+
+Gerald, to whom it did not seem cold enough for a fire, took a seat
+nearer the windows, whence he could watch the fading sunset-end beyond
+garden and street, river and hill.
+
+He would have cared less, no doubt, to make himself not too dull company
+for this stranger, had he known that there, before that fireplace, a few
+days before, she had been placed in possession of the most intimate
+facts of his humiliating destiny. Unsuspecting, in a mood rather more
+amiable than usual, he asked, by way of entering into conversation,
+whether she and her friend were not New-Englanders. It established the
+sense of a bond, however light, to find that they and he were almost
+townsmen. He had been born in Boston, or, at least, near it. His parents
+had owned a house in Charlestown, where he had lived till he was ten
+years old. They talked for a while of Boston.
+
+He had heard a singular thing, he said, she might be able to tell him
+how true: that in Boston a new medical method had arisen by which the
+sick were said to be made well without the help of drugs. Mind cure, he
+believed it was called. It seemed very extraordinary, and rather
+interesting, if it were not all a fraud or a fable, that persons of the
+most prosaic, as these had been described to him, should go about
+professing to do for a fee the same thing that saints of old are
+recorded to have done through their mysterious powers. The subject had
+come into his mind--he went on making conversation--from recently
+re-reading a book of George Sand's, _La Petite Fadette_, in which a
+cure is performed which seemed to him very similar. If she had not read
+the book, she must permit him to bring it for her perusal. He talked
+about the book.
+
+A maid brought in a lighted lamp, and, as is the pleasant custom of the
+country, wished them a happy evening.
+
+Very soon after it came Aurora, with a dab of flour on one cheek, which
+the kitchen fire had warmed to a deeper pink.
+
+"There," she said, "they're all ready for the oven. When we took the
+house, all the stove we had was a big stone block thing with little
+square holes. The cook fanned them with a turkey-wing. But now we've got
+a range. Don't you want me to show you over the house? There'll be just
+time before supper."
+
+"I'm afraid it's all dark," said Estelle. "Let me ring and have them
+light up. Think of a city house without gas!"
+
+"No, they'd be too long. I can take a lamp."
+
+She went for it to her dressing-room, and came back with one easy to
+carry, long in the stem and small in the tank, from which, to make it
+brighter, she had lifted off the shade. Gerald reached to take it from
+her, but she refused his help.
+
+"The weight's nothing. I want you to be free to look around. Coming,
+Estelle?"
+
+"I'll join you in a minute."
+
+They went down the wide stairs side by side. She led through a door, at
+the right, as you entered the house, of the main door.
+
+"Here's one of the parlors. We have four on this floor, between big and
+little. Four parlors and a dining-room. Doesn't that seem a good many
+for two lone women?"
+
+The unshaded lamplight showed a crowd of furniture, modern, muffled,
+expensive, the lack of simplicity in design of which was further
+rendered dreadful to the artist by every device to make it still less
+simple, embroidered scarfs thrown over chair-backs, varicolored textiles
+depending from the mantel-shelf, drooping over the mirror, down pillows
+of every shape and tint piled in sofa-corners. Nothing was left
+undecorated. The waste-basket even wore a fat satin bow, like a pet
+poodle. Every horizontal surface was encumbered with knick-knacks.
+
+"This is where we have people come when we don't know them very well,"
+said Mrs. Hawthorne, hardly concealing her pride. "We couldn't ask the
+minister to come right upstairs, as we did you. How do you--"
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne," came hurriedly from Gerald, "I beg you will not ask me
+how I like it! It is a peculiarity like--like not liking oysters. I
+can't bear to be asked how I like things."
+
+"How funny! But, then, you're different from other people, aren't you?
+That's what makes you so interesting."
+
+She preceded him into the next room, which was not so bad as the first
+for the reason that, as she explained, "they hadn't yet finished with
+it." He seized the occasion almost eagerly to praise the chairs.
+
+"We found them here when we came," she informed him. "There was a good
+lot of furniture of this big, bare sort; clumsy, I call it. We stored
+some of it in the top rooms, but Leslie Foss begged me so to let these
+stay that we just had the seats covered over with this new stuff and
+left them."
+
+When she opened the next door and stepped into the space beyond it
+seemed as if her lamp had dwindled to a taper, the room was so vast. It
+had nine great windows, five in an unbroken row on the front of the
+house the entire width of which it occupied. Aurora's light was faintly
+reflected in a polished floor; it twinkled in the myriad motionless
+drops of two great crystal chandeliers.
+
+"Ah," exclaimed Gerald in a long sigh. "This is superb!"
+
+"Yes," she said, "but you might as well try to furnish all outdoors. You
+see that we haven't done anything beyond putting up curtains. We never
+use it. All those chairs along the walls are going to be regilded when
+we can get them to come and fetch them. Things move awfully slowly over
+here, don't they, even if you're willing to pay."
+
+"What a ball-room!"
+
+"Yes. Wish we could give a ball; but we only know about a dozen people.
+We've got to wait till we know enough at least for two sets of a
+quadrille."
+
+She was moving across the wide floor, holding her torch-like lamp high
+the better to illumine the great pale, silent emptiness. No longer
+hearing his footsteps echoing behind hers, she looked over her shoulder;
+whereupon he hurriedly joined her, without explaining why he had lagged.
+
+"This," she said, as turning to the left they passed from the ball-room
+into a small oval room the domed ceiling of which was all tenderly
+bepainted with Cupids and garlands--"this is almost my favorite."
+
+She set down her lamp on a table of rose-tinged marble, and dropped for
+a minute on to a little rococo settee.
+
+"The things in here we found just as you see them."
+
+"So I imagined."
+
+"All but the ornaments on the mantel."
+
+"Very astute in me; I divined that, too."
+
+"We liked it, so we left it. Pretty, ain't it? Oh, beg pardon!" She
+blushed and looked at him sidelong, laughing. "That was a bad break!
+That came mighty near to being the forbidden question how you like it.
+All the same, it is pretty, _is it not_?"
+
+"Extremely. Extremely pretty."
+
+"There are going to be some tapestries presently. Oh, don't be afraid!
+Not those old worsted things full of maggots, but beautiful new ones,
+painted by hand, all in these same delicate colors. A story in four
+scenes, one for each panel. The 'Fountain of Love' is the subject. It
+sounds to me like something Biblical, Sunday-schoolish, but Mr. Hunt
+says, no, _it is not_."
+
+"Mr. Hunt--"
+
+"The nephew, Charlie. You know him, don't you? He's getting them done
+for me. He's a great friend of mine. He's helped me a lot to buy
+things."
+
+"Did he help you to buy the pictures?"
+
+"Yes. He knows the dealers, and gets them to make fair prices. I think
+it perfectly wonderful how cheap everything is over here. He helped me
+to buy these, too." She lifted the chain of pink corals, graduated from
+the size of a pea to that of a hazelnut, which with their delicate
+living color brightened her winter dress. "I can't say, though," she
+dropped, "that I found these particularly cheap. Hush!" she broke off.
+"It's Hat! Quick!" she whispered, "let's get behind the door and say
+'Boo!' as she comes in."
+
+Amazingly, incredibly to him, this grown woman appeared about to
+ensconce herself.
+
+"But won't it make her jump?" he asked, supposing it to be Miss Madison
+for whom the little surprise was intended.
+
+"Of course it'll make her jump. No matter how often I do it, she jumps.
+That's the fun."
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, please!" he begged nervously. "As a very special favor
+to me, don't! It would make me jump, too--horribly."
+
+She stood listening while the footsteps turned away and faded
+fruitlessly. With a look of disappointment, as at opportunity missed,
+she took up her lamp and moved on.
+
+"And here," she said, leaving the oval room by the door opposite to the
+one they had come through, "is the dining-room. Which takes us back to
+the hall and completes the circle."
+
+This room, of a fine new Pompeian red, was lighted. The table was set; a
+butler busied himself at the sideboard. Gerald's eye was caught by the
+brightness of a china basket piled high with sumptuous fruit, and
+similarly caught the next moment by the pattern of the curtains, in
+which the same rampant red lion was innumerably repeated on a ground of
+wide-meshed lace.
+
+"Wouldn't it be a lovely house to give a party in?" she asked him.
+"Isn't it exactly right to give a party in? There are two big spare
+chambers upstairs at the back that would do, one for gentlemen, one for
+ladies, to lay off their things in. No use; we shall have to give a
+party."
+
+Having returned upstairs, he was without any false delicacy shown her
+bedroom and her friend's bedroom and their dressing-rooms, as well as
+given a peep into the two spare rooms, as yet incompletely furnished,
+that he might get an idea how beautiful these were going to be when
+finally industry and good taste had been brought to bear on them.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+At dinner, which Mrs. Hawthorne seemed to have a fixed preference for
+calling supper, it was Gerald who did most of the talking. The ladies
+abandoned the lead to him, and listened with flattering attention while
+he called into use his not too sadly rusted social gifts. He related
+what he knew about the Indian Prince whose monument at the far end of
+the Cascine had roused their interest. He explained the Misericordia. He
+asked if they had noticed the wonderful figures of babies over the
+colonnade of the Foundling Hospital, and told them how the "infantile
+asylum," as he rendered it, was managed. He tried to amuse them by the
+episodes from which certain streets in Florence have derived their
+names, Street of the Dead Woman, Street of the Dissatisfied, Burg of the
+Blithe.
+
+Whenever he stopped there was silence, which he hastened again to break.
+
+"You talk like Leslie," suddenly remarked Mrs. Hawthorne.
+
+But now came the hot biscuits and the syrup, borne in by the mystified
+butler at the same time as the more conventional dessert prepared by the
+cook.
+
+Aurora smiled at the biscuits' beautiful brown and, having broken one to
+test its lightness, nodded in self-approval.
+
+"They're all right. Now you want to put on lots of butter," she said.
+"Here, that's not near enough," she reproved him. She reached over, took
+his biscuit, buttered it as she thought it should be buttered, and
+returned it to his plate; then, while eating, watched him eat with eyes
+that expressed her simple love of feeding up any one, man or animal, so
+lean as he.
+
+There had been shining in Aurora's eyes all this evening, when they
+rested on him, a look of great kindness, the consequence of knowing how
+badly life had treated him, and desiring that compensation should be
+made. He could not fail to feel that warm ray playing over his bleak
+surface. He could not but think what nice eyes Mrs. Hawthorne had.
+
+When he asked her if she knew how to make many other such delicious
+things it became her turn to talk. Estelle here joined in, and they
+exalted the fare of home, affecting the fiction of having found nothing
+but frogs' legs, cocks' combs, and snails to feed upon since they struck
+Italy. Blueberry-pie--did Mr. Fane remember it? Fried oysters! Buckwheat
+cakes!
+
+He said he remembered, but did not confess to any great emotion.
+
+"You wait till Thursday," said Aurora. "It's Thanksgiving. We're going
+to have chicken-pie, roast turkey, mince-pie, squash-pie, everything but
+cranberry sauce. We can't get the cranberries. Will you come?"
+
+In haste and confusion he said, alas! it would be impossible, wholly
+impossible, intimating that he was a man of a thousand engagements and
+occupations.
+
+But after an interval, and talk of other things, he inquired, with an
+effect of enormous discretion, whether he might without too great
+impertinence ask who was coming to eat that wonderful Thanksgiving
+dinner which her own hands, he must suppose, would largely have to
+prepare.
+
+"Just the Fosses. All the Fosses."
+
+"Ah, Mr. Foss will feel agreeably like the great Turk."
+
+"You mean he'll be the only man? I guess he can stand it. We thought of
+asking Charlie Hunt, too, but he's English and would seem an outsider at
+this particular gathering. Wish you'd come. You're such a friend of
+theirs. Come on, come!"
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, you are so very unusually kind. If you would leave it
+open, and then when the day arrives, if I should find I could do so
+without--without--"
+
+"Oh, yes. Come if you can. And be sure, now, you come!"
+
+They were still sitting at the table--dinner had been retarded by the
+circumstantial round of the house--when music resounding through the
+echoing rooms stopped the talk.
+
+It was the piano across the hall that had been briskly and powerfully
+attacked. The "Royal March" of Italy was played, first baldly, then with
+manifold clinging and wreathing variations.
+
+Aurora signed to the servant to open the dining-room door. All three at
+the table sat in silence till the end of the piece.
+
+Gerald wondered what the evening caller could be who made the moments of
+waiting light to himself in this fanciful manner.
+
+"It's Italo," said Mrs. Hawthorne, rising. "I call him Italo because I
+never can remember his other name. Come, let's go into the parlor."
+
+It was all rosily lighted. Candles set on the piano at each side of the
+music-rest enkindled glossy high lights on the nose-bump and forehead
+bosses of Signor Ceccherelli, who at Mrs. Hawthorne's appearance sprang
+up to salute. She reached him her hand, over which he deeply bowed.
+
+"You're to play all those lovely things I'm so fond of," she directed
+him. "'The Swallow and the Prisoner,' 'The Butterflies,' 'The Cascade of
+Pearls.' And don't forget the 'Souvenir of Saint Helena.' Then the one
+of the soldiers marching off and the soldiers coming home again. All our
+favorites. Mr. Fane-- Are you acquainted with each other? Italo--you'll
+have to tell him your name yourself. All I can think of is
+Checkerberry."
+
+"Yes, yes, we are acquainted," said Gerald, hurriedly. "We have seen
+each other many times. _Come sta?_"
+
+"Oh, he can speak English."
+
+"A leetle," Ceccherelli modestly admitted.
+
+"He understands everything I say. We have great conversations. He comes
+every evening when he isn't engaged to play somewhere else."
+
+She went to sit on the gorgeous brocade sofa, arranging herself amid the
+multitude of cushions so as to listen long and happily. Estelle
+preferring a straight-backed chair, Gerald took the other corner of
+Aurora's sofa. Immediately Ceccherelli opened with "Souvenir de
+Sainte-Hélène." Aurora, respectful to the artist, talked in a whisper.
+
+"He's so talented! You simply couldn't count the pieces he can play. We
+do enjoy it so! We haven't anything in particular to do evenings if no
+one calls. We don't often go out. We haven't been here long enough to
+know many people. And aside from his magnificent playing, the little man
+is such good company! We do have fun! There, I mustn't talk, I'm keeping
+you from listening."
+
+Gerald settled back, too, as if to listen, but to do the contrary was
+his fixed purpose, even though the pianist, at last appreciated, put
+into his playing so much feeling and force. Gerald's eyes went wandering
+among the clutter of bric-à-brac, from a green bronze lizard to a mosaic
+picture of Roman peasants, from a leaning tower of Pisa to a Sorrento
+box. Then they rose to the paintings. He closed them.
+
+The music was describing a hero's death-bed, besieged by dreams of
+battle, at moments so noisy that Gerald had to open his eyes again for a
+look of curiosity at the person who could produce so much sound. As he
+watched him and his nose, like the magnified beak of a hen,--the nose of
+a man who loves to talk,--he tried a little to imagine those merry
+evenings spoken of by Aurora. The fellow looked almost ludicrously
+solemn at this moment. He took himself and his art right seriously,
+there could be no doubt of it. His face was a map of the emotions
+expressed by the music, and wore, besides, according to his conception
+of the part, the look of a great man unacclaimed by his own generation.
+
+_Dio!_ what an ugly little man!
+
+Gerald closed his eyes again.
+
+The last cannon was fired over the hero's grave, the music stopped. The
+ladies applauded. Gerald, smiling sickly, clapped his hands, too,
+without, it might have been observed, making any noise to speak of.
+Estelle went to the piano to compliment the player more articulately,
+and loitered there, practising her French while he perfected himself in
+English, by mutual aid.
+
+"Italo," Mrs. Hawthorne interrupted them, "play that lovely thing of
+your own now--you know, the one we're so crazy about, that by and by
+turns into a waltz."
+
+Without laying upon the ladies the tiresome necessity of pressing him,
+the composer plunged into this masterpiece, and Gerald sat back again,
+wondering what the little man thought of hearing himself called Italo by
+the fair _forestiera_. He was dimly troubled, knowing that there is
+no hope of an Italian ever really understanding the ways of being and
+doing of American women, and especially an Italian of that class. But
+then it would be equally difficult to make this American woman
+understand just how the Italian might misunderstand her.
+
+He permitted himself a direct look at her, where she rested among the
+cushions, with eyes closed again and a smile diffused all over her face;
+her whole person, indeed, permeated with the essence of a smile.
+Extraordinary that, loving music so much, one could so much love such
+music.
+
+She surprised him by opening her eyes and whispering:
+
+"Don't you want to smoke?" showing that for a moment at least she had
+not been thinking of music. "You can, if you want to. Here, we've got
+some. Don't go and think, now, that Estelle and I have taken to smoking.
+Heavens above! We sent out for them the other night when Charlie Hunt
+was here."
+
+She reached across the table near her and handed him a box of
+cigarettes.
+
+He was very glad to light one. To smoke is soothing, and he felt the
+need of it. Added to his vague distress at the spectacle of such
+familiarity from these ladies to that impossible little Italian, a
+ferment of resentment was disquieting him apropos of Hunt--those works
+of art of which Hunt had facilitated the purchase.
+
+Hunt, of a truth, ever since the first mention of him that evening had
+been like a fish bone in Gerald's throat.
+
+He checked his thoughts, recognizing that it is not sane or safe to
+permit oneself to interpret the conduct of a person whom one does not
+like. The chances of being misled are too great. He uprooted a suspicion
+dishonoring to both.
+
+Let it be taken for assured, then, that Hunt had in this case no
+interest to forward beyond his love for making himself important. After
+all, if the ladies liked bad pictures!... Yet it was a shame that he
+should frequent their house, be accepted as their friend, invited by
+them, made much of in their innocent and generous way, then should make
+fun of them. Permissible, if you choose, to make fun of funny people,
+but you must not at the same time make use of their kindness. A precept
+for the perfect gentleman, in Florence or elsewhere: You can make fun of
+persons, or you can cultivate their friendship, but not both things at
+once. And Gerald, without proof, felt certain that Charlie Hunt spread
+good stories about Aurora.
+
+Mrs. Innes, his mother's old friend, meeting him at Vieusseux's
+reading-room a few days before, had detained him for a chat, and in the
+course of it asked him if he knew this Mrs. Hawthorne of whom the Fosses
+appeared so fond. An amusing type, she must be. Seeing that statue of
+the she-wolf and little Romulus and Remus at the foot of Vial de' Colli,
+it seemed she had asked what it meant, and said she didn't believe it.
+
+It indefinably hurt him, incommoded some nerve of envenomed
+sensitiveness--yes, annoyed him like sand in his salad, to think of his
+country-woman, with the good faith of a dog in her face, so quoted as to
+make her ridiculous by a fellow wanting in human vitals, like Hunt.
+
+He would have liked, had it been possible, to ask a few frank questions
+of Mrs. Hawthorne, and find out more certainly what he should think. He
+would have liked to warn her against trusting her enormous ignorance to
+one who would have so little good-humor and protectiveness toward that
+baby-eyed giant-child. Really, instinct ought to teach her better whom
+to make her confident as respected that grave affair.
+
+Singularly, when next the music stopped, Mrs. Hawthorne, after she with
+true politeness had taken the box of cigarettes to the other of her
+guests, spoke of Hunt. Perhaps her thoughts, too, had gone straying, and
+mysteriously encountered some straying thought of his.
+
+"Charlie Hunt," she said, "is coming on Sunday morning to take us to the
+picture-galleries. We're going to play hooky from church. His work,
+don't you see, keeps him at the bank on week days till everything of
+that sort is closed."
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne," cried Gerald and sat up in unaffected indignation,
+while mustache, beard, hair, everything about him appeared to bristle,
+"I thought _I_ had been engaged to take you sight-seeing! I thought
+it was to be _my_ honor and privilege. Mrs. Hawthorne, my dear
+friend, if you do not wish deeply to hurt me, deeply to hurt me, you
+will write to Mr. Hunt at once, this evening, and I will post the
+letter, that you have thought better of that immoral plan for Sunday
+morning, and are going to church like a good Christian woman. And
+to-morrow, Mrs. Hawthorne, at whatever time will be convenient for you,
+I will come and take you to the Uffizi."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+
+And so because, in his uncalled-for chivalry, he had made himself guide
+to a lady in a ball-room, Gerald, one thing leading to another, was once
+more committed to serving as a guide in Florence.
+
+He had filled the part so often, at the appeal of one good friend and
+another, that he had sworn never again to be caught, cajoled, or hired.
+He could have hated the Ghiberti doors had such a thing not been
+impossible. He did rather hate the Santissima Annunziata. And now it was
+all to do over again.
+
+It might be adduced, as a mitigation of his misfortune, that this was
+different.
+
+This was sometimes very different.
+
+A singular thing about acquaintance with Mrs. Hawthorne was that it had
+in a sense no beginning. One started fairly in the middle. No sooner did
+one meet her than one seemed to have known her long and know her well.
+Most people found this so. One therefore readily slid into speaking
+one's mind to Mrs. Hawthorne, dispensing with the formal affectation of
+a perfect respect for her every act and opinion, secure in the
+recognition that anger, sulkiness, the self-love that easily takes
+umbrage, were as far from her breezy sturdiness as the scrupulosities of
+an anxious refinement.
+
+That one could say what one pleased to Mrs. Hawthorne put more life into
+intercourse with her, naturally, than there would have been if, with her
+limitations, one had been forced to be entirely and tamely circumspect.
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne," cried Gerald, "do me the very real favor, will you,
+like a dear good woman, of not calling the most venerable of the
+primitives Simma Bewey!"
+
+It was astonishing what things Gerald Fane could say without losing his
+effect of a complete, even considerate politeness.
+
+"But that's the way it's written," said Mrs. Hawthorne.
+
+"You will pardon the liberty I take of contradicting you; it is not. It
+gives me goose-flesh. Cimabue!"
+
+"Very well. I'll try to remember. But it doesn't matter what I call him;
+his Madonna is no beauty. Do you mean to tell me there was a time when
+people admired faces like that? She gives me a pain."
+
+"That is not the point; her beauty is not the point. Besides, she is
+beautiful."
+
+"Oh, very well. If you'd like to have me look like her, I can."
+
+She tipped her head to one side, lengthened her jaw, pointed her hand,
+and by a knack she had for mimicry made herself vaguely resemble the
+large-eyed, small-mouthed, pale and serious Lady of Heaven before whose
+portrait by the old master this dialogue took place.
+
+"It is really a very poor joke, Mrs. Hawthorne," Gerald said, with mouth
+distorted by the conflict between laughter and disgust. "To travesty a
+dignified and sacred thing is a very poor pastime. Of course I laugh.
+Miss Madison laughs, and I laugh. I think very poorly of it, all the
+same. You would do much better to frame your mind to an attitude of
+respect and try to understand. I can't say, though, that I think it
+unnatural you should not at first appreciate the earliest old masters.
+We will go to look at something more obvious."
+
+"Wait a moment. These fascinate me, they're so queer and so awful. I
+tell you those old codgers of the time you say these belong to had
+strong nerves and stomachs. All these wounds and dripping blood and
+hollow ribs and criminals being boiled in caldrons, and having their
+heads cut off and arrows shot into them!... I guess you're right; we'd
+better move on to something more cheerful."
+
+Miss Madison was never guilty of the foolishness that fell from Mrs.
+Hawthorne's gross and unconcerned ignorance. Miss Madison took modesty
+and tact with her, as well as keenness of eye, when she went to
+picture-galleries and museums. But this, strange to say, did not make
+her the more acceptable companion of the two to their guide. What Miss
+Madison did never seemed so important as what her larger, weightier
+friend did. The one personality to a singular extent eclipsed the other,
+who was accustomed to this to the point of not feeling it. A laughing
+lack of conceit in both women marvelously simplified their relation.
+
+Gerald, in choosing pictures for their enjoyment, avoided with a
+conscientiousness of very special brand to halt with them before
+paintings fit to please their unpracticed eyes but which he did not
+think worthy of admiration. He likewise passed Venuses, Eves, Truths,
+all nudities, without remark or pause, acquainted of old with the
+simple-minded prudery of certain Americans, and not disrespectful to it.
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne," he said, "to be ignorant is no sin. One may have been
+doing beautiful, gracious, useful and merciful things while others were
+cultivating the arts and sciences. But ignorance on any subject is not
+in itself beautiful or desirable. One should therefore not be complacent
+in it, proud of it. With a little humility, Mrs. Hawthorne, what can one
+not hope to accomplish? Now, please, Mrs. Hawthorne, drop all
+preconception, and use your eyes. Look at that angel."
+
+"Do you mean to tell me I could live long enough to think that angel
+beautiful? With those Chinese eyes?... Give it up, my friend, why do you
+want to bother?"
+
+"Because, Mrs. Hawthorne, you have essentially a good brain. You are at
+the back of all a very intelligent woman--"
+
+"Go 'way with you! You know that if you feed me taffy enough you can
+make me see and say anything you want."
+
+"--a very intelligent woman. And I am so constituted that I simply
+cannot go on living in the same world with a really intelligent
+woman--my friend, besides--who does not see the difference between
+Raphael and Guido Reni, and likes one exactly as well as the other. I
+ache to change it!"
+
+"Go ahead. We don't want you to die. But I'm afraid it'll take surgery.
+You'll have to drill a hole in my thick head to get the things you mean
+into that good brain so full of real intelligence."
+
+"If you wouldn't be flippant!"
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"If you would bring reverence to the study of things done by great
+people, and that people of great taste and learning have collected for
+our joy and improvement!"
+
+"See here! Don't you want me to have a little fun while we do Florence?
+I don't see how I can stand it, if we're to be solemn as those old
+saints with mouldy green complexions."
+
+"We're not to be solemn. I have done these galleries solemnly times
+enough, Heaven knows. But we're to be attentive, respectful, of an open
+and receptive mind. We're not to say outrageous things in the mere
+desire to shock our guide, or tease him."
+
+"You don't mean to say you think that I--?"
+
+"It's not funny."
+
+"It mayn't be funny--but it's fun! Go on and lecture. You haven't got a
+bit of fun in you."
+
+"Yes, I have!" said Gerald, and with a creeping smile--grudging at
+first, then brighter--looked Mrs. Hawthorne in the eye, while such fun
+as lived in him traveled over the bridge of their glances, and she was
+permitted to get a glimpse of his underlying relish.
+
+"All I ask of you, Mrs. Hawthorne," he said, finally, "is that you will
+not let your innocence on these subjects appear when you are with
+others. I don't say pretend. Just keep still, be silent! It does not
+matter when you are with me. When you are with me I beg of you to be
+yourself. But with others.... You would become the talk of the town,
+and--" he shuddered, "I should most horribly hate it!"
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne," he said, with a quiver of annoyance in his voice a few
+days later, "did I not implore you not to let it be known in Florence
+how you are affected by the proudest treasures of her world-famous
+collections?"
+
+"Yes, you told me. But I didn't promise."
+
+"And now I am asked--with laughter and mockery--whether I have seen Mrs.
+Hawthorne giving an imitation of a Madonna by Simma Bewey, and heard
+Mrs. Hawthorne on the subject of G. Ottow and Others."
+
+"Didn't you say--with laughter? Well, then, it's all right. Don't you
+care. I just got to training and did it to make them a little sport.
+Didn't they tell you about my Native of Italy eating Macaroni?"
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, you are just a bad big school-girl--a bad big
+school-girl--"
+
+"'Hark, from the tomb!'" said Mrs. Hawthorne, in lieu of anything more
+scintillating.
+
+"A bad big school-girl, and I will have nothing more to do with you. If
+you delight in being the talk of the town, all you have to do is allow
+your friend Mr. Hunt in his spare hours to take you to see such things
+as I have not yet had the honor of showing you."
+
+"Blessed if I--Look here, you aren't mad in earnest? Sooner'n lose you,
+I won't say another word. There! I've been Tchee-mah-boo-eh's Madonna
+for the last time. Don't be cross with little T. T.--Talk of the Town!"
+
+"If you had any discrimination, any reticence ..."
+
+"No reticence? Does that mean can't keep anything to myself? You don't
+know me!"
+
+"You even tell your age."
+
+"You aren't going to find fault with me for _that_?"
+
+"Yes. At your age one should know better. It is part of your general and
+too great frankness."
+
+They upon occasions came near quarreling, but not seriously, her
+disposition to quarrel was so small. Yet, two could not be outspoken and
+one of them irritable, and those rocks never even be grazed.
+
+She unwarily enlarged to him one day upon her disappointment in
+Florence. By this time, she said, she was growing used to it, she didn't
+notice so much the things she didn't like. But at first, with her
+expectation high, her imagination inflamed by the Judge's and Antonia's
+eloquence, the narrow streets, in some of them no sidewalks even, the
+gloomy bars at the windows, the muddy river with the dirty old houses
+huddled on the bank, the stuffy churches with the average height of the
+Italian populace marked on the pillars by a dubious grindy brown tint,
+the dreadful beggars, the black fingernails, the smells....
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne!" came from Gerald, who with difficulty had let her go
+on thus far, "those were all you noticed, were they? In the most
+wonderful city in the whole world, those are all you find to talk about!
+The narrow streets, the beggars, the smells. Mrs. Hawthorne--" he nearly
+trembled with the effort to keep calm, "this is obviously not the place
+for you. You should have gone to ... to Switzerland! Instead of a
+sunburned hill-side, with sober silver olives and solemn black
+cypresses, and a pair of beautiful calm white oxen plowing, you would
+have seen a nice grass-green pasture, at the foot of blinding peaks, cut
+by an arsenic-green stream, on whose bank a red and white cow feeding!
+Then among the habitations all would have been well-regulated, the
+churches swept, perhaps even ventilated, the people washed, clean
+aprons, clean caps, no beggars, no disorder, no crimes. And there would
+have been no disturbing manifestations of genius, either; no troublesome
+masterpieces or other evidences of a little fire in the blood. It would
+have suited you perfectly."
+
+"I guess you mean that to be cutting, don't you?"
+
+"Let me try to tell you how much I liked New York, when I went back
+there some years ago after an absence of ten or eleven years. I had some
+idea, you know, of perhaps returning to live in America. Well, I
+shivered. I shut my eyes. I held my ears. I fled. I remained just the
+time I was forced to by the affairs of my poor mother and, as I tell
+you, I fled!"
+
+"Why, what's the matter with New York?"
+
+"I will tell you what is the matter with New York, with Boston, with all
+the places in America that I have seen again since I was grown up--"
+
+"No! Stop! Don't say anything against America. It's the one way to make
+me mad.--I didn't know you felt the same way about Florence. You aren't
+an Italian, are you? It's because we're both alike Americans that we sit
+here fighting so chummily."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+
+Lending her spacious front room for the Christmas bazaar in aid of the
+church, and beholding it full of bustle and brightness, was the thing
+that brought to the acute stage Mrs. Hawthorne's longing to see her
+whole house the scene of some huge good time: she sent out innumerable
+invitations to a ball. Mrs. Foss's card was inclosed with hers. It was a
+farewell party given for Brenda, whose day of sailing was very near. The
+frequent inquiry how Brenda should be crossing the ocean so late in the
+year met with the answer that her traveling companions had a brother
+whose wedding had been timed thus awkwardly for them.
+
+On the morning of the day before the ball Gerald came to see Mrs.
+Hawthorne. He was still intrusting the servant with his message when
+Aurora, leaning over the railing of the hallway above, called down to
+him, "Come right upstairs!"
+
+He was aware of unusual activities all around--workmen, the sound of
+hammering, housemaids plying brooms and brushes. Leslie Foss, with her
+hat on, looked from the dining-room and said, "Hello, Gerald!" too busy
+for anything more. Fräulein seemed to be with her, helping at something.
+
+The great central white-and-gold door, to-day open, permitted a glimpse,
+as he started up the stairs, of a man on a step-ladder fitting tall
+wax-candles into one of the great chandeliers. From unseen quarters
+floated Estelle's voice, saying, "_Ploo bah! Nong, ploo hoe!_"
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne met him at the head of the stairs. The slight disorder of
+her hair, usually so tidy, pointed to unusual exertions on her part,
+also. Her face was flushed with excitement and, to judge by her
+wreathing smiles, with happiness.
+
+"I saw you coming," she greeted him. "_Riverisco! Beata Lei! Mamma
+mia!_ And do you know how I saw you? Come here."
+
+She led the way to the back, where the window-door stood open on to the
+roof of the portico, which formed a terrace.
+
+"See? I've had it glassed in for to-morrow night. We couldn't say we
+hadn't plenty of rooms before, and plenty of room in them. That's just
+the trouble: there aren't any nooks in this big, square house. So I've
+made one. This is Flirtation Alcove. Here a loving couple can come to
+cool off after dancing and look up at the stars together. Oh, it's going
+to be so pretty! You can't tell anything about it as it looks now; I've
+only got these few things in it. But the gardeners are going to bring
+all sorts of tall plants and flowers in pots. Just wait till to-morrow
+night!"
+
+"You are very busy, I am afraid, Mrs. Hawthorne. I ought not to take
+your time."
+
+"Can't you sit down a minute?"
+
+"I have come to ask a favor."
+
+"I guess I can say it's granted even before you ask."
+
+"I should like to retract my refusal of your very kind invitation for
+to-morrow evening. I have explained to you my weak avoidance of crowds.
+I have determined to overcome it in this case, and I want your
+permission to bring a friend."
+
+"That? How can you ask? Bring ten! Bring twenty! Bring as many as you've
+got! As for coming yourself, I'm tickled to death that you've
+reconsidered."
+
+"It's not quite as simple as it seems, Mrs. Hawthorne. I shall have to
+tell you more."
+
+At her indication, he took the other half of the little dumpling sofa
+which had seemed to her an appropriate piece of furniture for Flirtation
+Alcove, and which, with a rug on the floor, formed so far its only
+decoration. In the clear, bare morning light of outdoors, which bathed
+them, she still looked triumphantly fresh, but he looked tired.
+
+"It is Lieutenant Giglioli for whom I have come to beg an invitation.
+You perhaps know whom I mean."
+
+"Let me see. I can't tell. Quite a few officers have been introduced,
+but I never can get their names."
+
+"Hasn't Mrs. Foss or Leslie ever spoken of him?"
+
+"Not so far as I can remember. In what way do you mean?"
+
+"They evidently have not." He seemed to be given pause by this and need
+to gather force from reflection before going on, as he did after a
+moment, overcoming his repugnance. "He is the reason for poor Brenda
+being packed off to America."
+
+"Oh, is that it?"
+
+"He came to see me last evening and spent most of the night talking of
+her. We were barely acquainted before; but he knew I am a close friend
+of the Fosses, and in that necessity to ease their hearts with talk
+which Italians seem to feel he chose me. I felt sorry for him."
+
+"She's turned him down?"
+
+"No; she loves him."
+
+Again Gerald stopped, as after making a communication of great gravity.
+Mrs. Hawthorne, listening with breathless interest, made no sound that
+urged him to go on. The fact he had announced seemed solemn to both
+alike, with the vision floating between them of Brenda's white-rose face
+and deer's eyes, the feeling they had in common that Brenda, for
+indefinable reasons, was not like ordinary mortals, and that what she
+felt was more significant, more important.
+
+"But he has nothing beside his officer's pay," Gerald went on when the
+surprise of his revelation had been allowed time to pass, "and she on
+her side has nothing but what her parents might give her, who, you
+probably know, have no great abundance. His proposals were made to them,
+as is the custom in this country, and have been formally declined."
+
+He left it to her to appreciate the situation created by this, and,
+while thinking on his side, ran the point of the slender cane which he
+had not abandoned round and round the same figure of the rug-pattern at
+their feet.
+
+"They are both too poor. I see," said Mrs. Hawthorne; but added quickly,
+as if she had not really seen: "It seems sort of funny, though, doesn't
+it, to let that keep them, if they're fond of each other?"
+
+"Oh, it's not that. However fond, they couldn't marry without her
+bringing her husband a fixed portion. It is the law in this country, in
+the case of officers of the army,--to keep up the dignity of that
+impressive body, you understand. In the case of a lieutenant the
+_dote_, or dowry, must be forty thousand francs. I learned the
+exact sum for the first time last night."
+
+"How much is that? Let me see,"--Mrs. Hawthorne did mental arithmetic,
+rather quickly for a woman,--"eight thousand dollars. And the Fosses
+can't give it."
+
+"Of their ability to give it if they wished to I am no judge. I dare say
+they could, though with their son John going before long to hang out his
+shingle, as they call it, I doubt if it could be without bleeding
+themselves. But they are not convinced that the sacrifice ought to be
+made." He frowned at the pattern on the rug, and suddenly cut at it
+impatiently with his stick. "It is a singular story, in which everybody
+is right and the result wrong, horribly wrong!"
+
+"Oh, dear me!" sighed Mrs. Hawthorne, feeling with him even before
+understanding.
+
+"I ought perhaps to say," he corrected, "everybody is good and
+well-meaning, but has been unwise. And everybody now has to pay."
+
+"I've thought right along that the Fosses had some reason for not being
+very happy," said Mrs. Hawthorne, "and I guessed it was something about
+Brenda. But they never said anything, and I didn't try to make out.
+Brenda doesn't take to me, somehow, as the others do. I'm not her kind,
+of course; but I do adore her from afar. She's so beautiful! She's like
+a person in a story-book, who at the end dies, looking at the sunset
+over the sea, or else marries the prince."
+
+"Yes, Brenda is wonderful."
+
+"I never should take her for an American."
+
+"She's not like one, and yet she is. She has grown up in this country
+and breathed in its ideas and feelings till she even looks Italian. Her
+parents are the sort of Americans that fifty years of foreign countries
+wouldn't budge; but they began later. Still, it is because Brenda is
+American, after all, that cruelties are being committed. Her family have
+taken it for granted that one of them couldn't really be in love with an
+Italian, least of all that joke, a dapper and decorative Italian officer
+that a girl buys at a fixed price for her husband. And Brenda can't say
+to them: 'But I am. I am in love with just such a man. The happiness of
+my life depends upon your finding the vulgar sum of money with which to
+buy him for me.' Because of the American-ness all round, Brenda can't
+say that to them, and because she doesn't say it, they are in doubt,
+they only half apprehend, they don't understand. The one thing they are
+sure of is that to marry a foreigner is a mistake. And the one safe
+thing they see to do, when Brenda's face, combined with her entire
+reserve toward them, has begun to torment them seriously, is to send her
+away where, if the truth be that she mysteriously is 'interested in' an
+Italian, the change of scene may help to put him out of her head."
+
+"So that's why they're sending her home!"
+
+"There are no better or dearer people in the world, kind, true, just;
+but"--Gerald held in, and showed how much he hated to make any sort of
+reservation--"in this they have been to blame. They bring growing girls
+to Italy, where, such is their confidence in I don't know what quality
+supposed to be inherent and to produce immunity from love of Italian
+men, they never dream that there might happen to them an Italian
+son-in-law."
+
+He gave her a moment to realize how rash this was; then hurried, as if
+wishing to get through as quickly as possible with the disagreeable, if
+not disgraceful, task of criticizing his friends and of gossiping:
+
+"During the progress of the affair Mrs. Foss lets all go on as the
+little affairs and flirtations of her own youth were allowed to go on at
+home. She likes her daughters to be admired. It is only proper they
+should make conquests, have beaus. Leslie has had flirtations with
+Italians as well as with others, and come out of them without impairing
+that sense of humor which permits her to see as funny that one should
+succumb to the attractions of one of those only half-understood men, who
+may either be playing a comedy of love while in truth pursuing a
+fortune, or, if in earnest, are rather alarming, with the hint of
+jealous ferocity in their eyes. With Mrs. Foss's knowledge, Brenda,
+during a whole summer at the seaside, receives Giglioli's letters,
+written at first, or partly, in English, which he is learning with her
+help. With this excuse of English, it is a correspondence and courtship
+_dans toutes les règles_. Brenda is not asked by an American mother
+to show her letters or his. Giglioli, with his traditions, could not
+have imagined such a thing if the parents were unwilling to receive him
+as a suitor. Brenda herself--one will never know about Brenda, how it
+began, what she thought or hoped. She is very young; no doubt she did
+hope. Children seldom know much about their parents' means. She very
+likely thought hers could make her the present of a dowry, as they had
+made her other presents. But when she discovered their attitude toward
+the whole matter, with dignity and delicacy she let all be as they
+desired, incapable of pressing them to tax their resources to give her a
+thing their prejudice is so strongly set against. They did what they
+thought best, and have hung in doubt ever since as to whether it was
+best; for though Brenda gives her confidence to none of them, and they
+do not press her to give it, with that respect for a child's liberty
+which is also American, they are growing more and more uneasy with the
+suspicion that it was serious on her part, too. They love her
+extraordinarily, and she has always dearly loved them. They show their
+love by protecting her youth from a step she may repent. She shows hers
+by being strong, poor love, and trying not to grieve them with the
+revelation of her heart. And they are making one another wretched."
+
+For a moment Mrs. Hawthorne had nothing to say, busy with pondering what
+she had heard. "I don't see how, if she really loves this Italian, she
+could give him up so gracefully," she finally said.
+
+"She has not given him up, Mrs. Hawthorne," said Gerald. "Believe me,
+she has not. She has some plan, some dream, for bringing about the good
+end in time without aid from her parents. I am sure of it. No, she has
+not given him up." He had before him, vivid in memory, the image of
+Brenda in the little church, and was looking at that, though his eyes
+were on Mrs. Hawthorne's friendly and attentive face. "She is at the
+wonderful hour of her love," he said, "when the world is transfigured
+and life lifted above the every-day into regions of poetry; when the
+simple fact of his existence justifies the plan of creation, when to
+wait a hundred years for him would seem no more difficult than to wait a
+day, and to perform the labors of Hercules no more than breaking off so
+many roses. She is sure of him, the immortality of his passion, as she
+is sure of herself. So they are above circumstances, and nothing that
+friend or foe can do should trouble their essential serenity."
+
+"How wonderful!" breathed Mrs. Hawthorne, after a little silence in
+which Gerald had been thinking with a very sickness of sympathy of
+Brenda and the sinister propensity of the Fates for bringing to nothing
+the most valiant dreams and hopes; and Mrs. Hawthorne had been thinking
+entirely of Gerald, whose own heart was so much more certainly revealed
+by what he said than could be anybody else's.
+
+"Unfortunately,"--he turned abruptly to another part of his
+subject,--"he is not of the same temperament. She has some project, I
+imagine, for earning the money for her dowry, poor child, by music,
+singing, painting. But he does not know her vows of fidelity, because
+her parents did use their authority so far as gently to request her not
+to write to him or see him; and she promised, and a promise with Brenda
+is binding. And he has felt his honor involved in not writing or meeting
+her. But, though separated, they have been in the same city; they could
+hope to catch a glimpse of each other now and then. Heaven only knows
+how often he has stood to see her pass, or watched her window, and lived
+on such things as unhappy lovers find to live on. After all, the faith
+that when he dreamed of her she dreamed of him, that as he kissed a
+glove she kissed a silver button, was a life, something to go on with. I
+dare say, too, he cherished the hope of some miracle,--it is so natural
+to hope!... But now they are sending her away, and it seems to him the
+black end of everything."
+
+"I see. And what you want is--"
+
+"To be driven half a world apart for indefinite periods, more than
+probably forever, without one look, one word of leave-taking, is truly
+too much. Granted that they are not to have each other, they ought not
+to be torn in two like a bleeding body. Let them have to remember a few
+last beautiful moments!"
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne had become pensive. He watched her sidewise, trying to
+divine what turn her thoughts were taking. Her prolonged silence made
+him uneasy.
+
+"It wouldn't be wrong, you think?" she asked finally. "Mrs. Foss
+wouldn't be cross with us?"
+
+"If it is wrong, my dear Mrs. Hawthorne, let it be wrong!" he cried
+impetuously. "If any one is cross, we will bow our heads meekly--after
+having done what we regarded as merciful. Let us not permit a cruelty it
+was in our power to prevent!"
+
+But Mrs. Hawthorne continued to disquiet him by hesitating, while her
+face suggested the travels of her thought all around and in and out of
+the question under consideration.
+
+"You don't think it would perhaps be cruel to Brenda?" she laid before
+him another difficulty in the way of making up her mind. "Mightn't it
+just ruin the evening for her, with the painfulness of good-bys? Or, if
+she doesn't in the least expect him, the shock of the surprise?"
+
+"If I know that beautiful girl, passionate as an Italian under her
+American self-control, it will be the blessed shock of an answered
+prayer. She prays nightly, never doubt it, that Heaven may manage for
+her just such a surprise."
+
+He was growing afraid of the calm common sense that tried to see the
+thing from every side and weight the merits of each person's point of
+view. Feeling it intolerable to be refused, he suddenly appealed to her
+pity, away from her justice.
+
+"Oh, Mrs. Hawthorne, life is so unkind, and to be always wise simply
+deadly! A few memories to treasure are all the good we finally have of
+our miserable days, and to catch at a moment of gold without care that
+it will have to be paid for is the only way to have in our hands in all
+our lives anything but copper and lead; yes, dull lead, common copper."
+He covered his face and pressed his eyes, in a way he had when the world
+seemed too hopeless and baffling; then as suddenly straightened up,
+remarking more quietly, "The Fosses are too wise."
+
+"They have my sympathy, I must say, Mr. Fane," Mrs. Hawthorne hurriedly
+defended herself against being moved. "I should be just as much afraid
+as they to have my daughter marry a foreigner."
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, you ought to be afraid to have your daughter marry
+anybody." He gathered heat again and vehemence. "As regards Italians, we
+are all one mass of superstitions. We are always comparing our best with
+their bad. As a matter of truth, our best and their best and the best
+the world over are one as good as the other, and our worst can't be
+exceeded by anything Italy can show. If you make the difficulty that we
+are different, our point of view different, I object that Brenda's is
+not so different. The international marriages that turn out well make no
+noise, but there are plenty of them. I have seen any number in the
+ordinary middle classes. No, parents are twice as old as their children;
+that is the trouble and always will be. The older people by prudence
+secure a certain thing, but it's not the thing youth wanted. The older
+see a certain thing as preferable, because they are old; but the young
+were right for themselves, for a time, at least, until they, too, grew
+old and saw a long peace and comfort as superior to a brief love and
+rapture. Brenda is not shallow or changeable; it may be her one chance
+of happiness that her parents in their anxious affection are trying to
+remove her from, and which she will cling to with every invisible fiber
+of her being until she conquers, or turns into a dismal old maid. Brenda
+is not like other girls. Love is serious to her. She never played with
+it as Leslie has always done, and as American girls do, yes, in
+Massachusetts and Virginia alike. She is an earnest, simple, sincere,
+constant nature, very much, in fact, like him."
+
+"You seem to like him. Is he such a fine man really?"
+
+"I don't know a finer, in his way."
+
+"Good looking?"
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, what a frivolous question! But he is. He is one of the
+most completely handsome men I know. Rather short, that's all."
+
+"Oh, what a pity!"
+
+"But, if you must insist on that sort of symmetry, Brenda is not tall.
+He is a kind of Italian, more common than one thinks, that doesn't get
+into literature, having nothing exciting, mysterious, wicked, or even
+conspicuously picturesque about him. After being a good son,--they are
+very often good sons,--he will be a good husband and a good father, like
+his own father before him. He is without vanity, while looking like a
+square-built, stocky, responsible Romeo. Devoted to duty, passionate for
+order, absolutely punctilious in matters of honor and courtesy, he is a
+good citizen, a good soldier. He belongs to excellent people, I
+gathered, whose fortune, once larger, is very small. They live in the
+Abruzzi, I think he said. He is the eldest son and hope of the house.
+His gratitude to them comes first of all, he made me understand. He
+would be an _indegno_, unworthy of esteem and love, if that were
+not so. He had never cared for pleasures, he told me; even in the time
+not demanded by the service he studied. He wished to be useful to his
+country; he looked for the advancement to be gained by solid capacity in
+military things. He felt older than his years, he said, from being the
+eldest of the family and always carrying responsibilities. He committed
+no follies of youth, had no quarrels, made no debts. His companions
+sometimes laughed at him for this prosaic seriousness. But he had
+friends, for he is of a manly, modest sort. One evening during Carnival
+last year certain of these friends dropped in on their way to a dance, a
+costume party at the house of Americans, and seeing him so absorbed by
+duties and studies, thought it a lark to tempt him from these and take
+him along. And he, to astonish them for once, he says, let it happen,
+they assuring him that he would be well received if presented as their
+friend. One of them had on two costumes, one on top of the other, of
+which he lent him one, a monk's frock and cowl. So they went. At the
+ball was Brenda as the Snow-queen. And the fatal thing happened at very
+first sight of her. It is a repetition of _Romeo and Juliet_, as
+you see. He had shunned women as the rivals of duty and work. He
+believes his instantaneous adoration owing to the fact that Brenda so
+far surpassed all he had ever known,--a being entirely formed of light
+and snow and fragrance.... I am using his words. Her very name is sweet
+to Italian lips. He permitted himself the dreams of other men. He
+permitted himself to hope. And then!... These things he told me with
+actual tears in the finest dark eyes I have perhaps ever seen, and
+without seeming any the less manly for them. He told me, and I believed
+him. He came to me, poor fellow, because it was the nearest he could
+come to Brenda, and he trusted, I suppose, that I would tell her he had
+been. It was a way of sending her a message. He talked more than half
+the night, walking the floor, then throwing himself into a chair and
+grasping his head. I can't tell you all he said, but it filled me with
+pity and respect. It made me his friend."
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne looked soft and sympathetic, but far away, and when he
+stopped did not speak, engrossed, it was to be hoped, by the story just
+told.
+
+He continued, though discouraged:
+
+"He wanted to know if I thought he would be guilty of an unpardonable
+breach should he ask permission to write her one letter before she left.
+This parting without farewell is the last bitter touch to his tragedy.
+Brenda, when it had been decided that she should leave, sent word to him
+by that little pianist who comes here. Again through the same channel he
+received word that the day of departure was fixed. Can you think what it
+means, Mrs. Hawthorne? Have you in your experience or imagination the
+wherewith to form any conception, dear Mrs. Hawthorne, of what it means?
+The day of departure fixed! The day of parting! Do you realize? No more
+sight or sound of each other! The end! The sea between! Silence! And it
+is to befall on Saturday of this week, and we are at Wednesday!"
+
+"All right, Mr. Fane; bring him!" she said in haste. "You've made me
+want to cry. I mustn't let myself cry; it makes my nose red. What did
+you say his name is?"
+
+"Giglioli."
+
+"Spell it. Gig--no, it's no use. What's the other part of his name?"
+
+"Manlio."
+
+"That's a little better. I guess he'll have to be Manlio to me. Bring
+him along, whatever happens, and then let's pray hard to have everything
+happen right."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Not much later on the same day Mrs. Hawthorne's brougham might have been
+seen climbing Viale dei Colli, with the lady inside, alone, engaged in
+meditation.
+
+"It would be a pity," she was thinking, as she alighted before Villa
+Foss, "that a little matter of eight thousand dollars should stand in
+the way of perfect bliss!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+
+So many forces had been enlisted, into so many hands the white card
+given, to make Mrs. Hawthorne's ball a success, that it could hardly
+fail to be somewhat splendid. On a platform raised in one corner of the
+ball-room sat the little orchestra assembled and conducted by Signor
+Ceccherelli, who, from his mien, might have been the creator of these
+musicians and originator of all music.
+
+Charlie Hunt was floor-master, and busy enough. Another might perhaps
+have done as much and not appeared so busy. The cotillion especially
+gave him a great deal to do. Everybody understood that he had planned
+all the figures and bought the favors. Some received an impression that
+the ball was entirely managed by him, who was such a very great friend
+of the hostess's. Some even carried home an idea that the hostess never
+did anything without consulting him, and more often than not besought
+him to do it for her.
+
+This sounds cruder than it actually was. Charlie was looking most
+handsome and high-bred. Animation shone from his eyes, his teeth, his
+skin, over which he now and then swept a fine white silk handkerchief.
+He danced devotedly every minute during which he was not engaged in
+making others dance. Mrs. Hawthorne, gazing after him with a benignant
+smile, was truly grateful to him for putting into her party so much
+"go." It was his atmosphere rather than his words--though he did drop
+words, but not many or really in bad taste--that made him appear the one
+indispensable person in the house.
+
+Mrs. Foss stood near the central door with Mrs. Hawthorne, receiving.
+She had not omitted from her list one acquaintance in Florence of the
+suitable class. Everybody was there; the style of invitation-card sent
+had suggested a grand occasion.
+
+All the persons she had seen at the Fosses on the first Friday evening
+at their house Mrs. Hawthorne saw again, and many more. Balm de Brézé,
+with a gallantry of old style, bent his black-lacquer mustache over her
+glove. The dark Landini pressed her hand with a pinch the warmth of
+which pricked her attention, and she found his eyes fixed on her with
+more the air of seeing her than is common at a first meeting.
+
+Suddenly her heart thumped like a school-girl's. Gerald was coming, and
+with him an officer who must surely be Manlio. She tried to keep down
+her emotion, but the pink of her face deepened, a trembling seized her
+smile.
+
+The Italian was as white as paper, his mustache and brows made spots of
+ink on it; his eyes were as deep and still as wells in the night. She
+could hardly doubt that his heart was in a tumult, but he spoke without
+disaster to his voice, thanking her in a formal phrase. She perceived,
+from a distinct advantage over him in height, how faultlessly handsome
+he was in a quiet, unmagnetic way. Never had she seen anything to equal
+the whiteness of his teeth except her pearls in their black velvet case.
+
+After having paid his duty to her, he remained for some minutes speaking
+with Mrs. Foss, who appeared as kind, while he appeared as calm and
+natural, as if time had moved back, and they were still at last spring
+and the beginning of his visits. Of all concerned Aurora was the least
+collected.
+
+"I can't help it!" she murmured to Gerald, while the other two were
+talking together. "I'm all of a tremble. I feel as if I were Brenda; and
+at the same time I feel as if I were him--or he."
+
+Mrs. Foss turned to them to say she believed everybody had arrived, and
+with Giglioli moved away from the door. Gerald asked Mrs. Hawthorne if
+they should waltz, but she refused, because she ought to be looking
+after the people who were not dancing and seeing that every one had a
+good time. She should dance only once that evening, she told him, and it
+should be with Mr. Foss, who had promised to dance at her party if she
+would promise to dance with him.
+
+Mr. Foss was seen approaching, and Mrs. Hawthorne smiled and sparkled in
+anticipation of the jokes they would exchange on her fairy weight and
+his youthful limberness.
+
+Gerald sent his eyes around the room to see if any one were free whom it
+would be a sort of duty to ask to dance. He did not look for pleasure
+from dancing, the less so that Charlie Hunt, on the perpetual jump, and
+dancing with a perfection almost unmanly, had brought the exercise into
+temporary discredit with him. Miss Madison was dancing, Miss Seymour was
+dancing, Leslie was dancing, Brenda--his eyes were unable to find. In a
+doorway, and not quite as festive in looks as the majority, which gave
+to the room the effect of an animated flower-bed, he perceived a figure
+in snuff-brown silk, just in front of which, soberly watching the
+dancers, was a little girl in a short dress of embroidered white, a blue
+hair-ribbon and blue enamel locket. At once dropping his search for a
+partner, Gerald went to join this pair, thinking, as he approached, that
+Lily without her spectacles was beginning to have a look of Brenda,--a
+Brenda with less beauty, but more originality; more--what could one call
+it?--geniality, perhaps.
+
+"Oh, Gerald!"--the little girl caught his hand without ceasing for more
+than a second to watch the ball-room floor,--"I have promised to go home
+willingly at ten o'clock!" It was spoken in a gentle wail.
+
+"My child," said Fräulein, "you must begin to prepare, for I fear it
+cannot be far from ten."
+
+"Oh, Fräulein, don't keep talking about it! _Please!_"
+
+"When you leave this pleasure, Lili, remember, there will be still that
+other pleasure of the long ride home in the night and the moonlight."
+
+"Yes." Lily, glad again, turned wholly to Gerald, the music having
+stopped. "Mrs. Hawthorne told mother that if she would let me come I
+should be taken home in her own carriage, with all the furs around us
+and a hot water-box for our feet, so that we never could catch cold.
+Wasn't it sweet of her? And we've both already had ices and cakes,
+before anybody else, because she said we must. Don't you think she's
+sweet, Gerald?"
+
+"Sweet as honey," he said.
+
+"Oh, Gerald,"--Lily's tone was fairly lamentable,--"have you seen the
+baskets of favors that are going to be given away by and by? There are
+roses of red silk, and lilies of white velvet, and chocolate cigars, and
+fans, and bonbonnières, and silver bangles! Then funny ones of little
+monkeys and ducks and things. And I have to go home willingly,
+cheerfully, promptly, at ten o'clock!"
+
+"Lily, if any lady is so good and so misguided as to honor me with a
+favor, I will bring it to you in my pocket to-morrow or soon after, I
+promise."
+
+"What hour is it, Herr Fane?" asked Fräulein over Lily's head.
+
+Gerald drew out his watch and hesitated, sincerely sorry.
+
+"To be exact, it is three minutes and three quarters to ten," he said.
+
+Lily's mouth dropped open, and out of the small dark hollow one could
+fear for a second that a cry of protest or revolt might come; but the
+very next moment it was seen that Lily had returned to be the best child
+in the world and the most honorable.
+
+"Good night, Gerald!" she said, with a wistfully willing, cheerful,
+ready face. "You won't forget?"
+
+He was left in the oval room, and as the dancers who had come in to
+occupy its seats seemed all to be in pairs, he remained aloof. He took
+the occasion to have a look at the panels, which he had not before seen,
+the tapestries, which were not tapestries, but paintings on rep. He
+remembered--the Fountain of Love, not Biblical.
+
+The fountain, surely enough, spouted from a marble dolphin squeezed in
+the chubby arms of a marble Love, and was four times repeated, at
+different hours of the day and seasons of the year. In spring, at dawn,
+a maiden filled her cup at it. At noon, in summer, the same maiden and a
+youth drank from it with cheeks close together. In autumn, at sunset,
+the maiden, sadder of countenance, stared at the fountain, visibly
+wrapped in memories. In winter the fountain stood solitary and frozen,
+Cupid had a hood of snow, the purplish twilight landscape was drowned in
+melancholy.
+
+Gerald's mind made an excursion from the things before him to the studio
+where those facile works of art had been produced. The place was
+imaginary, and the artist not altogether clear, but the features of the
+second figure which he saw, the visitor at the studio, were well-known
+to him, and the sentiments of the artist receiving the order to treat a
+subject in four large panels for a rich _forestiera_ not difficult
+to estimate.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+The ball had been raging, if one may so express it, for several hours,
+the feast was at its height, when Aurora, confused with the richness and
+multiplicity of her impressions, and aware of a happy fatigue, withdrew
+from her guests to be for a few minutes just a quiet looker-on. She
+chose as her retreat a spot at the curve of the stairs, where she felt
+herself in the midst of everything and yet isolated. Her back was toward
+the persons going up and down; she leaned on the sloping balustrade, and
+breathed and rested and hoped no one would notice her for a little
+while, all being delightfully engaged.
+
+She could see a little way into the ball-room, where certain younger
+couples, mad for dancing, were making the most of the time when the
+floor was relatively empty, the supper-room being proportionately full.
+Supper over, the cotillion would begin. She could see Leslie, in
+Nile-green crape, eating an ice out in the hall with that American boy,
+the singer, whose conceit, by his looks, had not yet been made to
+totter. She could hear the merry sound of spoons and glasses, and knew
+what good things were being consumed. All the house was involved in
+festivity, and resounding with it. In the upstairs sitting-room were
+card-tables. In the improvised conservatory opposite one large dim
+lantern glowed softly amid palms and flowers. To Aurora every goose
+present that evening was a swan. There were frumpy dresses more than a
+few,--there always are,--and there was the usual proportion of plain
+girls and uninteresting men, but she did not see those. She saw a crowd
+more brilliant and beautiful and fit to be loved than had ever before
+been assembled beneath one roof. Her heart felt very large, very soft,
+very light.
+
+All evening it had seemed to her rather as if she walked in a dream.
+More than ever now, as she stopped to take account of all the
+wonderfulness surrounding her, it felt to her like a dream; so that she
+said to herself, "This is I, Nell--is it possible? Is it possible that
+this is I--Nell?"
+
+And no doubt because she had been too excitedly happy and was tired, and
+the time had come for some degree of reaction, her joy fell, withered
+like a child's collapsing pink balloon, when, contrasting the present
+with the past for the sake of seeing the things before her as more
+rarely full of wonder and charm, she saw those other things. Memories
+she did not willingly call up rose of themselves, and forced her to give
+them her attention in the midst of that scene of flowers, light, music.
+The brightness, the flavor, went out of these as if under an unkind
+magic.
+
+"It's a wonder," she thought, "that I can ever be as happy as I am. I do
+wonder at myself how I can do it to rejoice."
+
+But the next minute she was smiling again, sweetly, heart-wholly,
+forgetfully. She had caught sight of Gerald looking at her as if about
+to approach.
+
+"Who are you going to dance the cotillion with?" she asked gaily.
+
+"You, Mrs. Hawthorne, with your kind consent."
+
+"No, I couldn't do it. I only dance a little bit, just what Estelle has
+taught me since we've been here. I don't keep step very well; I walk all
+over my partner's feet. Besides, it wouldn't do, because I've already
+refused to dance with Mr. Landini."
+
+"Sit it out with me, then, I implore you, if you positively do not wish
+to dance."
+
+"Oh, but you must dance! I want you to. I want to behold you all stuck
+over with favors."
+
+"It's true that I must have a few favors for Lily; but couldn't a good
+fairy arrange it, and then we let the others heat themselves while we
+keep cool and rest? I feared a moment ago that you were feeling tired,
+Mrs. Hawthorne."
+
+"Look!" she whispered, interrupting him.
+
+He imperceptibly turned in the direction of her stolen glance. Two
+figures were ascending the opposite flight of stairs, looking at each
+other while they inaudibly talked: Brenda, in filmy white diversified by
+a thread of silver; Manlio, carrying over his arm, and in his absorption
+letting trail a little, a white scarf beautiful with silver
+embroideries; in his hand a white pearl fan. Brenda's face was angelic,
+nothing less. When the young and rose-lipped cherubim are full of
+celestial sensations and adoring, eternal thoughts, they must look as
+Brenda did at that moment. Manlio's head was so turned that his
+night-black hair alone was presented to our friends. Slowly the pair
+mounted and was lost to sight.
+
+Neither Gerald nor Mrs. Hawthorne made any comment. Gerald, after a
+silence, spoke of Lily's increasing resemblance to her sister. Mrs.
+Hawthorne was reminded that they must go to select some favors for Lily,
+and led the way.
+
+They sat together through the cotillion, and Gerald, because he had seen
+the shadow of sadness on Mrs. Hawthorne's face, tried more than usual to
+be a sympathetic companion, easy to talk to, easy to get on with. He was
+always quick to see such things.
+
+No trace of it remained. Her dimples were in full play, but he found it
+according to his humor to continue uncritical, inexpressively tender,
+toward this big, bonny child who never curbed the expression of a
+complete kindness toward himself.
+
+More interesting to them than any other dancers were naturally Brenda
+and Manlio, partners for the cotillion. Certainly the plot for giving
+those two a few beautiful last hours together was proving a success.
+Brenda was calmly, collectedly luminous; Manlio, uplifted to the point
+of not quite knowing what he did. Radiant and desperate, he looked to
+Gerald, who found his state explained by the facts as he knew them.
+
+"Poor things! Poor dears!" he thought, with the cold to-morrow in view,
+yet retained his conviction of having done the unhappy lovers on the
+whole a good turn.
+
+He had been glad to find the Fosses sharing his point of view that to
+forbid Giglioli a sight of Brenda before the long parting would have
+been unnecessarily cruel. Mrs. Hawthorne, it seemed to him, had lost
+sight of what was to follow. She was exclusively delighted with their
+joy of the evening, she gave no thought to their misery next day. It was
+amazing to him, the extent to which she had forgotten.
+
+So he said aloud, "Poor things! Poor dears!" and discovered that it was
+not forgetfulness exactly in Mrs. Hawthorne, but that general optimism
+which insists on believing in a loophole of possibility through which
+things can slip and somehow turn out right after all.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+The party was over. The musicians had laid their instruments in
+coffin-like black boxes and were getting into their overcoats. The
+candles were burned to the end, the flowers looked tired, the place all
+at once amazingly empty. The last half dozen people were standing and
+laughing with Mrs. Hawthorne and Miss Madison around Percy Lavin while
+he told a final good story when one of the guests who had departed some
+time before returned.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne caught sight of the figure in closed coat, tall hat, and
+white silk muffler as soon as it entered the house, for the group of
+laughers stood near the ball-room door, and this was only separated from
+the inner house door by the wide hall. Without waiting for the end of
+the comic story Mrs. Hawthorne hurried to the guest, whose reason for
+returning she wished to know, though it so easily might have been only
+his forgotten cane.
+
+That it was nothing of the kind she at once perceived. He looked upset.
+
+"May I speak with you a moment?" he asked at once.
+
+They stepped into the nearest room, still brightly lighted, but
+deserted.
+
+"What's the matter?" she inquired, prepared by his face for news of
+trouble.
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, we've done it!" said Gerald. "Giglioli tells me that
+he's giving up the army, and Brenda has promised to marry him!" He was
+on the verge of laughing hysterically.
+
+"Oh!" Mrs. Hawthorne paused to watch him, and wonder why they should not
+without further to-do rejoice and triumph. "Well? What's wrong with
+that?"
+
+"Oh, Mrs. Hawthorne, it's deadly!" he exclaimed with conviction. "If it
+were a simple solution, why shouldn't it have been suggested before?"
+
+"It did suggest itself to me, in the quiet of my inside, you know."
+
+"But you, dear lady, can't be supposed to understand. Oh, it's either
+too, too beautiful, or else too, too bad! And in this dear world of ours
+the probability is that it's too bad. He was taken off his feet by his
+emotion; he offered her what he will feel later he had no right to
+offer--a good deal more than his life. But it shows, doesn't it, that he
+does immensely love her? To throw into the balance everything--his
+career, his family, his country--and offer them up! To cut his throat
+for a kiss."
+
+"You're quite right; I can't understand," she hurried in. "What makes
+you say 'cut his throat'? Couldn't he go into some other business just
+as well as the army?"
+
+"All in the world he's fitted for is the army. Do you see that beautiful
+fellow going to America, for instance, and earning a living as a teacher
+of Italian, or as the representative of some tobacco interest? There is
+no way of earning a proper living over here, you know. Oh, I'm afraid he
+will feel, when he wakes up, like a deserter toward his country and an
+ingrate toward his family and even toward Brenda like a misguider of her
+youth."
+
+"But, look here, isn't there a chance that having each other will make
+up to them for everything else?"
+
+"That of course was their sentiment at the moment of doing it. We did
+the work so well, Mrs. Hawthorne, that their passion, raised to a
+beautiful madness, would make them see anything as possible to be done
+so long as it gave them to each other, obviated the horrible necessity
+to part. Oh, it is touching, but dreadful! What were we dreaming? The
+thing I so greatly fear is that when he comes to himself he will feel
+dishonored, and Italians do not bear that easily, if at all."
+
+"Now, see here, don't you go imagining things and worry. And don't you
+let that young man worry. He isn't leaving the army to-morrow or the day
+after, is he?"
+
+"No. In the natural course of things, I suppose, it will take some
+time."
+
+"Well, I don't at all relish, myself, the idea of seeing that beautiful
+fellow, as you say, in every-day clothes--the sort they wear over
+here--after seeing him all glorious in silver braid and stars. No. I
+just can't bear to think of him giving them up. At the same time I don't
+agree with you that he had better have given up his girl than them. And
+I don't believe she will mind about his clothes one way or the other."
+
+"But there is his family, a thousand obligations--he spoke of them
+himself."
+
+"Perhaps the Fosses, now this has happened and they see how much in
+earnest the blessed creatures are, will sell some of their stock in
+California gold-mines and afford the dowry you spoke of."
+
+"But Giglioli will blush at this forcing of their hand."
+
+"Now, see here, you keep that young man cool. He hasn't done anything to
+be ashamed of. Brenda knows her own mind, and I don't believe her father
+and mother would stand in the way of her marrying a tramp if he was
+honest and her heart set on him. You tell that young man, in your own
+way, to sit tight and put his trust in the Lord."
+
+Gerald's nervous laughter for a moment got the better of him. He covered
+his face to check it, then, tearing away his hands, made the gesture of
+releasing a pack of tugging hounds too strong for him to hold. Let them
+be off and at the devil!
+
+"I didn't come here looking for comfort, dear Mrs. Hawthorne. Your
+optimism is constitutional, you know, rather than enlightened. I merely
+came to tell my accomplice the result of our meddling with destiny.
+'Accomplice' is a manner of speaking. Don't suppose I forget that I
+alone am to blame. Good night. I must go back to him where I left him,
+with his head among the stars and clouds, and his feet perhaps beginning
+to burn already with the heat of the nether fire. As you say, 'let's be
+cheerful, let's hope for the best!' Ha!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+
+Brenda, reaching home after the ball, had asked her parents to hear a
+thing she must tell them, and, very pale, informed them of the manner in
+which she had taken the direction of her life into her own hands. At the
+sight of their faces something had melted within her; she had trusted to
+them at last all that was in her heart, so that father and mother,
+greatly moved, felt as if they had found their child again rather than
+lost her. At the almost incredible spectacle of tears in her father's
+eyes Brenda had crept into his arms, against his breast, and lain there
+so still, so silent, that it seemed unnatural. They perceived that she
+had fainted.
+
+She left for America on the date that had been set, but a term was fixed
+for her visit; April was to see her back in Florence.
+
+Her engagement was not announced. Mr. Foss, talking of it with his wife,
+expressed liking and respect for their prospective son-in-law. His
+confidence in the man had been increased by an action that seemed to him
+quite in the American spirit. No doubt Giglioli would prove a good
+business man, just as he had been a good soldier, the chief requisites
+in all walks of life being a clear head, a heart in its place, and the
+will to work.
+
+Mrs. Foss was secretly unhappy during these conversations. The model
+wife had never before kept anything from her husband nor taken any step
+without his sanction, and she was ashamed now of the duplicity she was
+forced to practice. She strengthened herself by the assurance that in so
+doing she was really sparing Jerome, saving him possible moments of
+indecision, or conflict with himself. She was saving Brenda from the
+same troubles, if not worse: such perhaps as seeing her brilliant hero
+made into an unsuccessful struggle-for-lifer. She, the mother, would
+swallow by her single self all the mental discomforts that might have
+been the general portion, and, nobody being any the wiser, shoulder
+hardily for their sakes the consciousness of an obligation which might
+to the others have poisoned a gift, if not made it impossible to accept.
+No member of her family, it seemed to Mrs. Foss, knew quite as well as
+she how simple, native, and without self-conceit was Aurora Hawthorne's
+generosity; so that taking from her was hardly different, in a sense,
+from giving her something. You did not have to pay with gratitude. You
+paid, first and last and all the time, with affection.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Gerald, who had seen as beset with difficulty the rôle of friend which
+he might be called upon to play, heard with relief that Giglioli had
+obtained leave of absence and gone to see his family. With Brenda over
+the seas, and Manlio in the Abruzzi, the subject of their attachment and
+future could fall a little into the background, crowded out by the
+nearer things.
+
+The fact became of some consequence to Gerald that in his relation to
+Mrs. Hawthorne he was so largely a taker. He did not count as any return
+for her hospitalities the time he gave to sight-seeing with her and her
+friend; he was modest with regard to his own contributions.
+
+He had in truth not desired to fall into Mrs. Hawthorne's debt. He would
+have liked best to keep away from her; but fate, likewise character, set
+snares for him. After he had stayed away for a certain length of time,
+the thought would rise to trouble him, "She will feel hurt," and all
+against the voice of good sense, such a reason as that had power with
+Gerald. He would then call, and her welcome would be so kind, her
+heartiness so warming, that he would stay to dinner, and promise to go
+somewhere with them on the following day, after which he would dine with
+them again.
+
+So now the gentlemanly wish defined itself in him to show by some token
+that he did not take favors all as a matter of course.
+
+He would have liked to make her an offering a little exquisite, a little
+rare, which she might recognize as possessing these points and
+accordingly prize. To bestow anything concrete would have been folly. A
+few possessions he had which he would have thought worthy of the
+acceptance of queens: a tear phial of true Roman glass, a Japanese print
+or two, a few coins that were old already when Christ was young. And he
+would have parted with any one of these treasures to Mrs. Hawthorne,
+though not wholly without a pang: first, because he liked her, and then
+because he had eaten as it seemed to him a good deal of her bread and
+syrup. But she would not have cared for these things; while bereaving
+himself, he would have enriched her not at all.
+
+The duty of doing something for Mrs. Hawthorne's pleasure was felt even
+by Charlie Hunt, who took her to a concert. When Gerald heard of it, he
+searched more persistently and, fate aiding, found something which might
+give the lady amusement, he thought, and would certainly afford an
+opportunity that would hardly have come her way without his good
+offices.
+
+The morning mail brought him a note relating to his project; he did not
+wait for afternoon to communicate its contents.
+
+It was eleven when he rang at Mrs. Hawthorne's door. He had hardly
+finished asking the servant whether the signora were at home when he
+heard her voice upstairs, singing behind closed doors.
+
+She had said so many times, when he went through the formality of having
+himself announced and waiting for permission to present himself, "Why
+didn't you come right up?" that this morning he said to the servant, "It
+imports not to advise her. I shall mount." Did the servant look faintly
+ironical, or did Gerald mistakenly imagine it?
+
+The tune she sang sounded familiar. It must be a hymn, he decided, but
+could not remember what hymn, or even be sure it was one he had heard
+before, hymns are so much alike. He stopped at the sitting-room door and
+waited, listening to the big, free, untrained velvet voice, true
+throughout the low and medium registers, flat on the upper notes, the
+singer having carelessly pitched her hymn too high. He could hear the
+lines now, given with a swing that made them curl over at the ends, and
+with a punch on certain of the syllables, irrespective of their meaning:
+
+    "Feed me _with_--the heavenly manna
+    In this _barr_--en wilder_ness_;
+    Be my _shield_, my sword, my banner,
+    Be the Lord--my righteous_ness_!"
+
+When she came to the words,
+
+    "Death of death and hell's destruction,"
+
+a bang and rattling ensued, as if some one were taking a practical hand
+in that work. The heavenly ferryman was thereupon besought with vigor to
+land her safe on Canaan's side, and the singing ceased.
+
+Gerald stood waiting, if perchance there might be another verse, and
+wondered, while waiting, at the sounds he heard in the room, easy to
+recognize, but difficult to explain. When it seemed certain that the
+music was at an end, he, after hesitating for some minutes longer,
+gently tapped.
+
+"Oh, come in!" was shouted from inside. "_Entrez_, will you?
+_Avanti!_"
+
+He opened the door a little way, discreetly, and put in his head, ready
+to draw it back at once should he see his morning call as befalling
+inopportunely.
+
+Aurora was so far from expecting him that for a second or two she
+actually did not recognize him, and waited to understand what was wanted
+of her. Her head was tied in a white cloth, her sleeves were turned
+back, she had on an apron, and she held a broom. The furniture was
+pushed together out of the corners, some of it covered with sheets; the
+windows were open. No mistake possible. Aurora was sweeping.
+
+A burst of laughter rang; the broom-handle knocked on the floor.
+
+"Yes, I'm sweeping," she cried. "Come right in! You find me practising
+one of my accomplishments. I can't play the piano, I can't speak
+languages, I can't paint bunches of flowers on black velvet; but I can
+sweep, I can cook, I can wash dishes--or babies, one just as well as the
+other, and I can nurse the sick."
+
+"I am afraid I have come at an inconvenient moment."
+
+"Not at all. I'm glad to see you. I was most through, anyhow."
+
+She had pulled the cloth off her head, and was patting her hair before
+the glass. She turned down her cuffs, untied her apron, and came to
+shake hands, smiling as usual.
+
+"You caught me," she said. "When I feel a certain way, I've got to work
+off steam, and there's nothing that does it like sweeping."
+
+"I beg of you--I beg of you to let me close those windows for you!"
+
+"All right. I'm awfully hot, but I guess the room's cold. We can have a
+fire in a minute. Everything's there to make it."
+
+"I beg you will not trouble! I shall only remain a moment and leave you
+to finish."
+
+"No, now, no; don't go and leave me. I was only sweeping to be doing
+something. To clean the room wasn't my real object. I took their work
+from Zaira and Vitale, who are the ones to do it usually, in a way
+that's new to me, with damp sawdust. It's nearly finished, anyhow. All
+I've got to do is fold the sheets and push things back into their
+places."
+
+"Oh, Mrs. Hawthorne, please, please, allow me--"
+
+He tried to help her, waking to the fact that she was as strong as he,
+if not stronger.
+
+The room in a minute looked as usual, and she knelt in front of the
+hearth, piling up a kindling of pine-cones and little fagots, on which
+she laid a picturesque old root of olive-wood.
+
+"You seem to be alone," he remarked.
+
+"Yes; Estelle's gone out."
+
+He was not sorry to hear it. Miss Madison, whom he entirely liked,
+affected him curiously, or, to express the matter more exactly, in a
+curious degree failed to affect him at all. Her personality did not bite
+on his consciousness. Unless some chance left them on each other's
+hands, he had difficulty in remembering her presence. It was not that
+she was colorless; not by any means. She obviously had character,
+brightness, individuality, even charm; but so far as he was concerned
+she might have had none of these. Particularly when her big friend was
+by Gerald ceased to see her. He recognized the danger of her negative
+effect on him, and often made a point of devoting to her a special
+amount of attention, being toward her of an unnatural amiability, trying
+thus to keep her ignorant of the extent to which she did not exist for
+him. Now he suddenly remembered that from the choice little treat
+provided for Mrs. Hawthorne Miss Madison had been left out--forgotten.
+He was dismayed. Then a pleasant side to the affair revealed itself by a
+dim gleam. He was mortified by his forgetfulness, but the ladies were
+after all not Siamese twins.
+
+"You must wonder what brought me at this unusual time of day," he said.
+
+"Any time's good that brings you. But what in particular was it?"
+
+"I wanted to ask you to keep free next Saturday afternoon and, if you
+will be so good, spend it in part with me. I should like to take you to
+Mrs. Grangeon's."
+
+"Mrs. Grangeon's...?"
+
+"Don't you remember? Antonia! It is Antonia's real name. On the first
+evening of our acquaintance you had a good deal to say about her. If I
+remember rightly, you expressed then a desire to meet her--see her
+face."
+
+"Yes, yes. Antonia, of course."
+
+"She is a figure of importance here in Florence. She is in truth a very
+gifted woman--in her way, great, and of wide reputation. And she is
+clever, except in just some little spots. Geniuses, one has observed,
+are seldom quite free from such spots. She has kept herself very much to
+herself now for several years, so that an occasion to see her is grasped
+eagerly. This affair of hers on Saturday is the first thing of the kind
+in an age. Her villa at Bellosguardo is most interesting and full of
+interesting things. And the view from her terrace is worthy of a
+pilgrimage. You perceive, Mrs. Hawthorne, that I am doing what I can to
+_faire valoir_ the scrap of entertainment I have to offer."
+
+"I think it perfectly lovely of you! Of course I'll go, and delighted
+to. And see how it fits in--" She kindled to joyful enthusiasm. "We've
+just bought a lot of her books. We realized we'd got to have some books
+to make this room look finished off. We bought hers in paper covers and
+have had them beautifully bound. Just look here." She went to take a
+specimen from the bookcase, a white parchment volume with gold tooling,
+a crimson fleur-de-lys painted on the front cover. "Aren't they lovely?
+An idea! We'll take some of them up to her and ask her to write her name
+in them. Wouldn't that be flattering?"
+
+"Ye ... es."
+
+"I've been trying to read some of it over since these came home from the
+binder's. My! Aren't those people of hers wonderful--where you'd think
+the ladies never could have a stomache-ache nor the gentlemen a corn!"
+
+"I hope Miss Madison will not think I forgot her," he disingenuously
+said, "when in replying to Mrs. Grangeon's invitation I begged
+permission to bring you, and that she will do me the honor some day very
+soon--"
+
+"Oh, Estelle won't mind!"
+
+The mention of Estelle seemed to change the color of Mrs. Hawthorne's
+thoughts, casting a shadow over them.
+
+"Estelle and I had a spat this morning," she told him.
+
+"Oh!"
+
+"That's why I was sweeping and why she's gone for a walk by herself."
+
+"I'm so sorry!" was all he found to say.
+
+"It doesn't amount to anything," she cheered him. "We've had times of
+quarreling all our lives, and we've known each other since we were
+children. Her aunt and my grandmother had houses side by side in the
+country; there was just a fence between our yards. That's how we first
+came to be friends. All our lives we've had the way of sometimes saying
+what the other doesn't like. And do you know what's always at the bottom
+of it? That each one thinks she knows what would be most for the other's
+good to do, and we get so mad because the other won't do what we ourself
+think would be best for her! Just as some people abuse you because
+you're a pig, we as likely as not abuse the other because she isn't a
+pig. One of the biggest fights we ever had was because once late at
+night, when she was dead tired, tired as a yellow dog, I wanted her to
+sit still and let me pack for her, or, anyhow, let me help her pack. And
+she said I was as tired as she,--as if that was possible!--and if I
+didn't go to bed and get some rest myself and let her alone to get
+through her packing as she pleased if it was daylight before she
+finished she should have a fit. And from one thing to another we went on
+getting madder and madder till we said things you would have thought
+made it impossible for us ever to speak to each other again. But the
+first thing next morning, when we opened our eyes, we just looked at
+each other and began to laugh. Another time we fought like cats and dogs
+because I wanted to give her something and she refused to take it."
+
+"I don't call those quarrels, Mrs. Hawthorne."
+
+"You would if you could hear us; you would have if you could have heard
+us this morning. And it was only a little one. You see, two people
+aren't best friends for nothing. It gives you a sort of freedom; you
+aren't a bit afraid. And when you know it's only the other's good you
+have at heart, it makes you awfully firm and fast-set in your point of
+view. I don't mind telling you that I'm always the one in the wrong."
+
+"Are you?"
+
+"Of course I am. But I like to have my way, even if it's wrong. Hear me
+talk! How that does sound! And I was brought up so strict! But it's so.
+I want to do as I please. I want to have fun. It began this morning with
+Hat saying I spent too much money."
+
+"Did she say that? How unreasonable, how far-fetched!"
+
+"'What's the good of having it,' I said, 'if I can't spend it?'
+
+"'You'd buy anything,' she said, 'that anybody wanted you to buy, if it
+was a mangy stuffed monkey. It isn't generosity,' she said; 'it's just
+weakness.'
+
+"'Oh, suck an orange!' I said, 'Chew gum! It's anything you choose to
+call it. But when a thing takes my fancy, I'm going right on to buy it.
+And if it enables a greasy little Italian to buy himself and his
+children more garlic,' I said, 'that's not going to stop me,' I said. I
+don't mind showing you"--she dropped her selections from the morning's
+dialogue--"the thing I bought which started our little discussion. The
+artist who made it brought it himself to show me."
+
+She went to take the object referred to from her desk, and held it
+before him, examining it at the same time as he did.
+
+"Do you see what it is? Can you tell at once?"
+
+"H-m, I'm not sure. Is it intended for a portrait of Queen Margherita?"
+
+"Right you are! Of course that's what it is. It's a picture of the
+queen, done by hand with pen and ink; but that's not all. If you should
+take a magnifying glass, you would see that every line is a line of
+writing--fine, fine pen-writing, the very finest possible, and if you
+begin reading at this pearl of her crown, and just follow through all
+the quirligiggles and everything to the end, you will have read the
+whole history of Italy in a condensed form! Isn't it wonderful? Don't
+you think it extraordinary, a real curiosity? Don't you think I was
+right to buy it?"
+
+"My opinion on that point, dear Mrs. Hawthorne, would rather depend on
+what you paid for it."
+
+"Oh, would it?" She lost impetus, and gave a moment to reflection.
+"Well, I shall never know, then, for I'm not going to tell you. One's
+enough blaming me for extravagance."
+
+"My dear Mrs. Hawthorne, pray don't suppose me bold enough to--"
+
+"Oh, you're bold enough, my friend. But while I like my friends to speak
+their minds, I've had just enough of it for one day, d' you see? I've
+had enough, in fact, to make me sort of homesick."
+
+She looked it, and not as far as could be from tears. The small vexation
+of his failure to think her treasure worth anything she might have paid
+for it, the intimation that he might join the camp of the enemy in
+finding her extravagant, had acted apparently as a last straw.
+
+"Oh, Mrs. Hawthorne, I beg of you not to feel homesick!" he cried,
+compunctious and really eager. "It's such a poor compliment to Florence
+and to us, you know, us Florentines, who owe you so much for bringing
+among us this winter your splendid laughter and good spirits and the
+dimples which it does us so much good to see."
+
+"No," she said ruefully, "you can't rub me the right way till I'm
+contented here as I was yesterday. Florence is all right, and the
+Florentines are mighty polite; but--" She looked at the fire a moment,
+while he tried, and failed, to find something effectively soothing to
+say. "In the State of Massachusetts there's a sort of spit running into
+the sea, and on a sand hill of this there's a little shingled house that
+never had a drop of paint outside of it nor of plumbing inside; but
+there's an old well at the back, deep as they dig them, with, on the
+hottest day, ice-water at the bottom. The yard is pretty well scratched
+up by the hens, but there are a few things in it you can't kill
+out--some lilacs and some tiger-lilies and a darling, ragged, straggling
+old strawberry-bush. Outside the fence, hosts of Bouncing Bets--you know
+what they are, don't you? The front door has some nice neat blinds,
+always closed, like those of the best room, except for weddings and
+funerals; but the back door is open, and when you sit on the step you
+can look off down an old slope of apple-orchard and over across it at
+the neighbors' roofs and chimneys. And there, Geraldino, is where
+Auroretta would like to be."
+
+He had the impulse to reach out and touch the ends of his fingers to her
+hand, fondly, as one might do to a child, but he prudently refrained.
+His eyes, however, dwelled on her with a smile that conveyed sympathy.
+He said, after her, amusedly:
+
+"Auroretta!"
+
+She brightened.
+
+"After I've been bad," she said, "I always am blue."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+But within the hour he had come near quarreling with her, he also, and
+on more than one score.
+
+It began with his making a pleasant remark upon her voice, which seemed
+to him worth cultivating. She brushed aside the idea of devoting study
+to the art of singing.
+
+"But," she said, "Italo has brought me some songs. He plays them over
+and shows me how to sing them. We have lots of fun." To give him an
+example, she broke forth, adapting her peculiarly American pronunciation
+to Ceccherelli's peculiarly Italian intonations, "'_Non so resistere,
+sei troppo bella!_'"
+
+Gerald winced and darkened.
+
+"Then there's this one," she went on, "'_Mia piccirella, deh, vieni
+allo mare!_' Do you want to hear me sing it like Miss Felixson,
+together with her dog, which always bursts out howling before she's
+done? I've heard them three times, and can do the couple of them to a
+T."
+
+"Please don't!" he hurriedly requested. "I hope," he added doubtfully,
+"that you won't do it to amuse any of your other friends, either." As
+she did not quickly assure him that she neither had done, nor ever would
+dream of doing, such a low thing, he went on, with the liberty of speech
+that amazingly prevailed between them: "Extraordinary as it seems, you
+would be perfectly capable of it. And it would be a grave mistake."
+
+"I've done it for Italo when he was playing my accompaniment. For nobody
+else."
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, if that little man has become your singing-master, will
+you not intrust me with the honorable charge of likewise teaching you
+something? No, not painting. I should like to drill you in the
+pronunciation of that little man's name. It is Ceccherelli.
+Cec-che-rel-li. _Cec-che-rel-li._"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"No use. I've got accustomed to the other now."
+
+He felt a spark dropped among the recesses where his inflammable temper
+was kept.
+
+"Before you know it the fellow will be calling you Aurora!" he said,
+repressing the outburst of his wrath at this possibility.
+
+"He does, my friend," she answered him quietly. "He can't say Hawthorne.
+Do you hear him saying Hawthorne? He calls me Signora Aurora."
+
+"Then why not call him Signor Italo?"
+
+"At this time of day? It would be too formal. He would wonder what he'd
+done to offend me."
+
+Gerald was reminded that since Christmas Ceccherelli had been wearing,
+instead of his silver turnip, a fine gold watch, her overt gift and his
+frank boast, which he conspicuously extracted from its chamois-skin case
+every time he needed to know the hour.
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne," said Gerald, "you have repeatedly said that you have
+what you call lots of fun with Ceccherelli. Would you mind giving me an
+idea of what the fun consists in? I wish to have light--that I may do
+the man justice. Left to myself, I should judge him to be the dullest,
+commonest, cheapest of inexpressibly vulgar, insignificant, pretentious,
+ugly, and probably dishonest, little men." The adjectives came rolling
+out irrepressibly.
+
+"Perhaps he is," Aurora said serenely; "but haven't you noticed,
+Stickly-prickly, that about some things you and I don't feel alike?
+Italo plays the piano in a way that perfectly delights me, he's
+good-hearted, and he makes me laugh. Isn't that enough?"
+
+"In short, you like him. You like so many people, Mrs. Hawthorne, and of
+such various kinds, that though one is bound to be glad to be among your
+friends, one needn't--need one?--feel exactly flattered."
+
+She seemed to consider this, but instead of taking it up, went on with
+the subject of Italo.
+
+"He entertains me. He knows all about everybody in Florence and tells
+me."
+
+"He gossips, you mean."
+
+Again she considered a moment before going on.
+
+"Funny, when I don't know the people, or just know them by sight, and
+they and the life are all so foreign and apart from me, gossip about
+them doesn't seem the same as gossip at home. It's more like Antonia's
+novels, condensed and told in the queerest English! It was some time
+before I could make out what he meant when he said two gentlemen had
+fought a duel because one of them had found the other nasconding in his
+garden-house. The one thus found obstinated himself, says Italo, to
+maintain that he had come to make a copy of the architectural design
+over the door. But as he didn't seem to have any pencil--"
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, how can you be amused by such disgusting stuff?"
+
+She gazed at him inquiringly, with very blue eyes and a look of
+innocence, real or put on, then laughed.
+
+"I am, just. I can't tell you the how of it. Do you know Italo's sister
+Clotilde?"
+
+"I have not that advantage, no."
+
+"You soon will have, if you care for it, for she's coming to live with
+us."
+
+He stared.
+
+"Yes, she's coming to keep house. She speaks English quite well, because
+she's had so much to do with English and Americans, being a teacher of
+Italian and French. It began with Italo wanting us to take lessons of
+her. But, bless you, I don't want to study! I can pick up all I need
+without. We said, however, 'Bring her to see us.' And he did. She's real
+nice."
+
+"Does she resemble her brother?"
+
+"In some ways. I've an idea, though, that you'd like her better than you
+seem to do him. I believe we shall be very well satisfied with her, and
+shall save money. Since we seem to have got on to the subject of money
+to-day: Luigi, the butler, who has everything under him now, Estelle
+says is a caution to snakes, the way he robs us. Now, we're easy-going
+and, I dare say, fools; but not darn, darn fools. It's a mistake to
+think we wouldn't see a thing big's a mountain, and that you could cheat
+us the way that handsome, fine-mannered, dignified villain Loo-ee-gy
+thinks he can. So we're going to put in his place a nice woman who is,
+in part, our friend, and will care to see that we're dealt fairly with.
+Clotilde doesn't seem to mind giving up her lessons to come and be a
+sort of elegant housekeeper for us."
+
+"I understand."
+
+"Charlie Hunt is disgusted about it, because when we complained of Luigi
+before him, he said he would find us exactly the right person to take
+his place. But, you see, we didn't wait. I don't see that we were bound
+to. What do you think?"
+
+"It is a case, dear Mrs. Hawthorne, where I must not allow myself to say
+what I think."
+
+"Personally, I must say I was rather glad to have Clotilde step in as
+she did, because I don't mind telling you--you won't tell anybody
+else?--I find just the least little bit of a disposition in that young
+man Charlie to run things in this house. D'you know what I mean? I
+suppose it's the way he's made. He has been awfully kind, and helped a
+lot in all sorts of ways, and I like him ever so much; but I was glad to
+check him just a little, and put who I pleased over my own servants, and
+then go on just as good friends with him as ever."
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, why don't you make Mrs. Foss your adviser in all such
+matters? She is so kind always and of such good counsel. It would be so
+much the safest thing."
+
+"Of course; but it was she who found Luigi for us, you see. She can't
+always know. As far as Charlie Hunt is concerned, I don't want you to
+think that we think any less of him than before. He's good and kind as
+can be, and does ever so many nice things for us. We were at his
+apartment the other day, where he had a tea-party expressly for us, with
+his cousins there, and Mr. Landini and two or three others. And then
+when he heard me say I like dogs he promised to give me a dog, one of
+those lovely clown dogs,--poodles,--with their hair cut in a fancy
+pattern, when he can lay his hand on a real beauty."
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne"--Gerald almost lifted himself off his seat with the
+emphasis of his cry,--"Don't let him give you a dog!"
+
+She looked at him in amazement.
+
+"Why, what's wrong?"
+
+"Don't! don't! Can't you see that you must not let him give you a dog?"
+
+"No, I can't. Why on earth?"
+
+"After what you said a few minutes ago," he stammered, feeling blindly
+for reasons, "which shows that you have something to complain of in his
+conduct toward you, you ought not to allow him to give you a dog. A
+dog--you don't understand, and I can't make you. It will be too awful!"
+
+"You surely are the queerest man I have ever known," she said sincerely.
+
+To which he did not reply.
+
+He restrained himself from blurting out that Charlie Hunt, for such and
+such reasons, could never deserve the extreme privilege of giving her a
+dog. Leslie had once casually spoken the true word about Charlie.
+"Charlie has no real inside," she had said, and continued, nevertheless,
+to like him well enough. He was young, handsome, in his way attractive.
+Most people liked him to just that extent--well enough; few went beyond,
+unless early in the acquaintance. He so systematically did what would be
+most useful to himself that it was difficult to preserve illusions about
+his powers of devotion or unselfishness. He had lived as one of the
+family with his aunt and cousins till he found himself desiring an
+increase of personal liberty; then an occasion presenting itself to make
+a really good arrangement with an Italian family of decent middle class
+with their best rooms to let, he had set up bachelor quarters, and
+ceasing to be an inmate of his aunt's house, retained unusually little
+sense of tie with it.
+
+"Charlie might be nicer about going to places with us," Francesca openly
+grumbled, "seeing he's the nearest we've got to a brother."
+
+All this was formlessly in Gerald's mind--this and much more--when his
+spirit groaned that Charlie should be giving Aurora a dog.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne was looking at him, trying to make him out. She could
+not. One thing, however, was plain, and it being so plain simplified
+all. He felt actual pain because Charlie Hunt was going to give her a
+dog. The wherefore it was vain to seek. But she had no desire to give
+pain of any kind, even by way of teasing him, to this funnily sensitive
+fellow whose shoulders looked so sharp under his coat.
+
+"All right," she said. "If he says anything more about it, I'll tell him
+I've changed my mind and don't want a dog. Are you satisfied? And then
+if you won't tell me what the objection is to my having one, I shall
+have to sit down and try to guess."
+
+Gerald, upon obtaining so easily what he had wanted apparently to the
+point of tragedy, looked sheepish, ashamed of himself. His thanks were
+given in a slowly returning smile.
+
+"I shouldn't think it would be so difficult," he said.
+
+Antonia had been very friendly to Gerald at the period of their first
+acquaintance. She had cared for his painting, specimens of which had
+come to her notice through Amabel Van Zandt, and distinguished the at
+that time very young artist to the extent of inviting him to her villa,
+showing interest in his talent and future, making him talk. From one
+year to the next, other things had taken up her mind to his exclusion.
+He had continued, however, to pay his respects, if she were at home, at
+least once in the season, and retained gratitude toward her, along with
+the presumption that he could never be to her the same exactly as the
+first-come outsider. He remembered At Homes of hers attended in the old
+days, and saw every reason why Mrs. Hawthorne should enjoy one of these,
+none why it should not enjoy her. On the contrary. Making full allowance
+for the fact that he had grown accustomed to her manner and mode, Mrs.
+Hawthorne had yet seemed to him lately of a circumspection not to be
+surpassed. When alone with him and Estelle, she was one person; when in
+company, she was another, not a little like Mrs. Foss, retaining enough
+of her own irrepressible self to seem just acceptably original. Antonia,
+the novelist, declared a fondness for people out of the ordinary, the
+conventional. Gerald thought the American might interest her. But if she
+did not, little depends, at a reception, upon the hostess being charmed
+with individual guests; he still believed that Aurora would have a good
+time--he meant to ensure her doing this.
+
+Aurora had, as she described it, dressed herself to kill, and was
+looking, Estelle told her, perfectly stunning. She had on velvets and
+furs, pearls and plumes. She had wished at one and the same time to make
+Gerald Fane proud of her and do honor to Antonia's party. Concealed in
+her muff was a white parchment volume--muffs were small in those days. A
+similar volume had been stuffed into each of Gerald's overcoat pockets.
+
+Gerald, as has been said, remembered At Homes of Antonia's, and had in
+mind an image of what he might expect to see.
+
+He perceived at once that to-day all was different. This was immensely
+choice, the most so afforded by Florence. That he had been invited
+showed Antonia's estimate of him still as a person of artistic
+significance; also, he modestly decided, the difficulty one had to make
+up an assemblage solely of notabilities. Her permission to bring a
+friend showed flattering faith in his taste.
+
+Persons were there whom one but seldom saw anywhere; the persons whom
+one saw everywhere were conspicuously absent. Among a majority of
+English, there was a sprinkling of Italian nobility, mostly older
+people. Antonia had lived for many years in Florence. There was a very
+able historian, allied to the English through his wife; there was an old
+General of the wars of liberation; there was a Church dignitary of
+infinite elegance and high rank: all serious people who did not go to
+teas, and whose coming to this one was a compliment to Antonia. The
+exceptional woman's right to the like homage was established; her
+celebration of Italy was by Italy, in the persons of such sons of hers
+as got an inkling of their debt, gracefully acknowledged.
+
+Gerald, entering the large drawing-room with Aurora, at first wondered,
+then understood. The interesting Princess Rostopchine, on a visit to
+Florence, was present--woman of accomplishments in every
+branch--painter, sculptress, musician, author; a beauty into the
+bargain, and lady-in-waiting for many years to a queen.
+
+She was no longer in the freshness of youth; her beauty had been left a
+little bony, a little fatigued and bloodless; her eyelids drooped over
+the brilliant intelligence of her eyes. The poetry of her looks was
+increased by her costume. In wise disdain of the fashion, she went robed
+rather than dressed; her things clung and trailed and undulated; they
+were gray as cobwebs, dim as pressed orchids. She was as fascinating as
+at any time in her life--perhaps more so, because she cared to be.
+
+Antonia, who had made her acquaintance at Aix-les-bains, was under her
+spell. The reception was given to honor her, rather than to enable
+Antonia, as Gerald had at first supposed, to see her friends again after
+several years of absence and neglect.
+
+A niece of Antonia's received, and invited guests to be refreshed with
+tea, while Antonia and the Princess sat side by side, and now talked
+together, now with others, who of themselves approached, or whom Antonia
+invited to join them. The conversation was part of the time in French,
+which Antonia spoke fluently, but for the greater part in English, which
+the princess spoke well, as Russians speak every language.
+
+Gerald was watching for the favorable moment to present Aurora; they
+therefore stood within earshot. While he talked to keep her diverted, he
+was aware that his companion less than half listened to him, absorbed in
+Antonia and the princess.
+
+A princess and a famous writer! Aurora had never set eyes on a princess
+before, nor, to her knowledge, on an author. They hypnotized her, those
+two. Their conversation was far beyond Leslie's, she did not understand
+any of it, though every syllable reached her ear. The marked Englishness
+of Antonia's speech caused an almost necessity in Aurora to say the
+words after her, echoing their peculiarity. Her lips unconsciously
+moved.
+
+Aurora's eyes were busy as well as her ears. Antonia was clad in a
+tea-gown--Aurora thought it was a wrapper. The tea-gown had long lain in
+a chest, while Antonia was on her travels, and the great woman's eyes,
+fixed on more important things, had not perceived when it was taken out
+for her wear to-day that it was crushed and rumpled. Aurora believed it
+had been recovered from the ash-can, and her breast was filled with awe.
+It was with unqualified and childlike admiration that she gazed at the
+two women whose soaring superiority she unenviously felt.
+
+As it seemed unbefitting as yet to interrupt their conversation, Gerald
+looked around him in search of acquaintances whom to present to Aurora
+while waiting.
+
+Balm de Brézé first met his eye--the vicomte was Antonia's landlord--but
+Gerald discriminated against him. He next spied Hamilton Spencer and
+Carlo Guerra, both genial fellows, left Aurora's side for an instant and
+brought them up.
+
+Aurora called back her attention and gave it to them. A certain success
+of smiles and bright eyes she was almost sure to have, with men. Gerald
+went off to get her some tea, took it to her, and finding her in the
+midst of a sufficiently lively time with her new acquaintances, returned
+to Antonia's niece at the tea-table for a chat and cup of tea. While
+hearing the news from this unassuming elderly girl, he could keep an eye
+on Mrs. Hawthorne at a distance, and catch any facial signal for help.
+
+Aurora was drinking her tea, holding her cup like a real lady, with her
+little finger delicately curled back. Aurora's figure stood out from
+among those surrounding her like a thing of a different make, an earthen
+jar among glass vases, a Swede among Japanese.
+
+Aurora was out of place, it could not be blinked; and that she was so
+visible, in her able-bodied comeliness, her supremacy of dimples, her
+extremely good corset, increased the offense. So did also the native
+assurance of her eye--which had something at all times of a jovial
+sea-captain, with his foot on his own deck.
+
+Gerald looked from her to Antonia, slightly uneasy. Antonia's face had
+characteristics of a man's, but along with them indications above all
+feminine. Power and caprice in the great woman went linked. He saw her
+while listening to the princess turn her head toward the quarter of the
+room tinctured by Aurora's unmodified presence, as if taking account of
+the voice and accent of the stranger in her house.
+
+This seemed to him his opportunity, and excusing himself from Miss
+Grangeon, he started toward Aurora.
+
+"There are more ways than one of skinning a cat!" came floating to him
+in Aurora's deep-piled voice, borne on her frank laugh, as he
+approached.
+
+He found her having a very good time, but ready to call an end to it and
+go to be presented.
+
+"I'm awfully nervous!" she whispered to Gerald, but that was a manner of
+speech. Aurora's nerves were author-proof. She meant that she was
+impressed by the greatness of the moment. She picked up her three books
+from the table near by, held them with her left arm so that her right
+hand might be free to clasp Antonia's, and, smiling as a basket of
+chips--thus did she later describe herself--advanced toward the crowning
+honor of the day.
+
+Antonia saw her coming and narrowed her eyes the better to see.
+Antonia's face, at no time in her life soft, was as much like granite at
+this moment as it had the moment before been like old white soap; her
+eyes, fixed on the approaching pair, turned stonily unseeing.
+
+Gerald bravely went through with the introduction, and tried to warm the
+atmosphere with winged words. Aurora's hand was all ready to shake.
+
+Antonia's hand did not go forth to meet it, but Aurora, elate and
+overflowing, was not put off by this.
+
+"I can never tell you"--she gushed, "how pleased I am to meet you--how
+honored I feel. Nor can I ever tell you how perfectly wonderful I think
+your books. Perfectly wonderful.... Perfectly wond ... Perf ... See what
+I've brought. These three that I'm going to leave for you to write in,
+if you'll be so very kind. It would increase their value for me I never
+can tell you how much."
+
+"My dear Madam," said Antonia, "I never inscribe a book that I have not
+myself presented. I am not acquainted with the phrase in which it is
+done. The value of my autograph will be enormously increased hereafter
+for collectors by the fact that when I receive requests for it I drop
+them into the waste-basket. Yes, I merely keep the stamps."
+
+"Oh!"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Oh!" more faintly.
+
+"Yes!" more firmly.
+
+Turning her back to Aurora, Antonia once more addressed Princess
+Rostopchine. "Vera Sergeievna, you were saying...."
+
+The only sign Aurora gave of being flabbergasted was forgetting the
+books she held. They slid with noise to the floor. As Gerald picked them
+up, "Did I ever tell you"--she asked him chattily, and leisurely moved
+on,--"about the time I stood on the sidewalk to see the procession go
+by, in Boston, when we commemorated Bunker Hill?" And she went on with a
+favorite reminiscence: how she had held on to her inch of standing-room,
+in spite of a fat and puffing man, a gimlet-elbowed woman, and a
+policeman.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+When they were in her coupé, smartly bowling toward town, silence fell.
+Gerald's brow was black, his eyes were steely.
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne," he jerked out, "I am not going to express myself on
+the experiences of this afternoon. Words could not do them justice, and
+I am not cool enough to trust myself. But I wish to apologize to you
+most humbly for my egregious, my imbecile mistake."
+
+"Don't you care, Geraldino! Don't you care one bit! Bless your dear
+heart, I'm not touchy!" Aurora said cheerily, and, not resisting as he
+had recently done the impulse to comfort his friend by a caressing
+touch, gave his hand as tight a squeeze as her snug new glove permitted.
+"Nasty old thing! What does it matter? But"--her eyes rounded at the
+amazed recollection,--"that I should have lived, I--me--my size--to feel
+like a fly-speck on the wall! It did beat everything! Yours truly, F. S.
+W.! Fly Speck on the Wall!"
+
+She was lost for a moment in the consideration of herself reduced to a
+negligible dot, and Gerald, too angry to talk, thought hydrophobia
+thoughts in silence. In these he was disturbed by the sound of her
+trying in a murmur to speak like Antonia, and hitting off the
+Englishwoman's pronunciation rather successfully.
+
+"Deah Madam! I nevah, nevah inscrrribe a book.... I drap them into the
+baaahsket. Yesss. I marely keep the stamps."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+
+The house where Gerald lived was the same one he had lived in since the
+days of Boston and Charlestown. His mother, coming to Florence with her
+two children, a boy of ten, a girl of seven, had needed to look for a
+modest corner in which to build their nest. The income of which she
+found herself possessed after settling up her husband's affairs, even
+when supplemented by the allowance made her by his family, so little
+permitted of extravagance that she chose the topmost story of the house
+in Borgo Pinti, with those long, long stairs that perhaps had
+contributed to keep Gerald's legs thin.
+
+Its street door was narrow, its entrance-hall dark; the stone stairs
+climbed from darkness into semi-darkness, reaching the daylight when
+they likewise reached the Fanes' landing. But the old house was not
+without dignity; all three loved it.
+
+As you entered the Fanes', there was another dark hall, very long,
+running to right and left. One small window opposite, on an inner court,
+was all that lighted it. This hall grew darker still, as well as
+narrower, after turning a corner to the left; then it turned to the
+right, and was lighter. At the end of it was a window from which, if you
+bent out, you saw far below you a garden.
+
+The rooms, without being lofty and vaulted, like those on the ground and
+first floors, were pleasantly high, and paved with brick tiles. From the
+one large interior room a window-door opened on to a terrace in the
+court--a deep brick terrace with a broad ledge on which stood a row of
+flower-pots. When water was wanted, you opened a little door in the
+kitchen wall and let your copper urn down, down, down into
+mossy-smelling blackness; you heard a splash and gurgle, and after
+proper exertions got it back brimming.
+
+The Italian-ness of it all captivated the mother, who had been drawn to
+this dot on the map, where she was told one could live well at less
+expense than in the United States, by the lure of the idea of Italy. She
+was very humbly an artist. She had given drawing lessons to young ladies
+in an elegant seminary, and, when approaching middle age, married the
+father of one of these, a troubled, conscientious man whom the cares of
+an entangled and disintegrating business kept awake at night. When his
+need for feminine sympathy ceased, and administrators settled in their
+summary way the questions that had furrowed his brow, his widow's wish
+to start life anew far from the scene of her worries had led to the
+balmy thought of Italy--Italy, where were all the wonders which had most
+glamour for her fancy.
+
+She had loved it in an undiminished way to the end, had never really
+desired to go home, though she spoke of it sometimes when the chill of
+the stone floors and walls shook her fortitude, and the remembrance of
+furnace heat, gas-light, hot water on tap, glowed rosy as a promise of
+eternal summer. The children, however, were taught in their respective
+schools that artificial heat is insalubrious; they had Italian ideas and
+chilblains; not on account of any creature comfort that they missed
+would Florence have been changed back for Charlestown.
+
+In her picturing of days far ahead Mrs. Fane certainly saw Lucile, an
+accomplished young lady, receiving tributes of attention in the
+drawing-rooms of home; and Gerald, a young man of parts, finding
+recognition and fortune among his countrymen. To go home eventually was
+among her cloudy plans.
+
+But Lucile died at sixteen, without adequate cause, one almost would
+have said. She merely had not the ruggedness, the resistance, needed to
+go on living among the rough winds of this world. The mother, a creature
+of old-fashioned gentleness and profound affections, survived her by
+only a few years.
+
+A business matter then obliged Gerald to go to America, and had he liked
+the place, he might have taken up his abode there. It affected him like
+vinegar dropped in a wound, like street din heard from a hospital bed.
+He turned back, and the long stairs to his empty dwelling were dear and
+sweet to him on the day of his return.
+
+This, then, had remained his home. His needs were simple, and he could
+live without applying himself to uncongenial work, though the allowance
+had been stopped, and the income, as Leslie had said, was incredibly
+small. The good Giovanna, who had been his mother's servant, stayed on
+with her _signorino_, and economized for him; the wages of an
+Italian servant were in those days no extravagance. He had no pleasures
+that cost money; he neither traveled nor went to fine restaurants. He
+wore neat, old well-brushed clothes, went afoot, gave to the poor single
+coppers. But he had liberty, worked when he pleased and as he pleased;
+he was content to be poor, so long as his poverty did not reach the
+point where it involves cutting a poor figure. Giovanna, prouder than
+her master, disliked the thought of _far cattiva figura_ even more
+than did he, and was careful in her household management to keep up a
+certain style, never forgetting the sprig of parsley on the platter
+beside the single _braciolina_.
+
+At one period he had contemplated a change in his mode of living, had
+dreamed of entering the contest for laurels and gold, so as to afford a
+more appropriate setting for the beauty of his charmer. The Charmer had
+attained without need of him the setting she craved, and Gerald went on
+climbing his long stairs, painting in his so personal and unpopular way,
+and at night reading by light of a solitary lamp the choice and subtle
+masterpieces of many literatures.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+"My land! shall we _ever_ get to the top?" whispered Aurora to
+Estelle as, one behind the other, sliding their hands along the wall,
+they felt with their feet for the steps that led to Gerald's door. "He
+told us they were long, and he warned us they were dark, but this!... I
+wonder why they don't have a lamp going, or something."
+
+"Because there isn't any image of the Virgin," said Estelle, lightly.
+"It's our just having come in from the sunshine makes it seem dark. It's
+getting lighter. Cheer up! It's good for you."
+
+"It'll make me lose three pounds, I shouldn't wonder."
+
+They spoke in whispers, because when they had pulled the bell-knob and
+the door had swung open, a voice from incalculable altitudes had shouted,
+"_Chi è?_" They had answered, as instructed, "_Amici_," and now they
+pictured somebody listening to their shuffling ascent.
+
+At the top, in fact, stood Giovanna, who regarded them with an eye the
+color of strong black coffee and said, "_Riverisco_!"
+
+The small old woman had a thin, bronze Dantesque face, molded by a
+thousand indignations--all directed against proper objects of
+indignation--to a settled severity; a face of narrow concentrated
+passions and perfect fidelity and a preference for few words. The
+friendly smiles of Aurora and Estelle produced in her a relenting.
+Courtesy here demanded a pleasant look, and Giovanna was always
+courteous. She stood aside for Gerald, who came to the very door to
+welcome these ladies.
+
+The guests were now assembled. One of them was staying with Gerald--Abbé
+Johns, who had come for a few days from Leghorn, where he lived. The
+others were Mrs. Foss and Miss Seymour.
+
+What had been in Mrs. Fane's time the drawing-room had since become also
+a studio. The landlord had permitted his tenant to increase the light by
+extending the windows across the street-side wall. Beyond that, there
+were as few signs about of the art-trade as Gerald had affectations of
+the artist. The model-stand supporting books and things appeared like a
+low table; easel, canvases, portfolios, all the littering properties of
+a painter, had been shoved for the occasion into the next room, a
+spacious glory-hole which Giovanna did not permit to become dusty beyond
+the decent.
+
+The result of removing, first, many of the things that made the room a
+drawing-room, then, most of the things that made it a studio, left the
+place rather bare. It was according to Gerald's taste: few things in it,
+each having the merit of either beauty or interest, else the excuse of
+utility.
+
+Mrs. Foss had waited for Aurora's arrival to make the tea. The feast was
+very simple. Gerald offered what his mother had used to offer. Giovanna
+cut the bread-and-butter as that genteel lady had taught her, and
+continued to buy the plum-cake at the same confectioner's.
+
+Aurora had come in from the sunshine and cold with January roses in her
+cheeks and exhilaration in her blood. At sight of her beloved Mrs. Foss
+she laughed for joy. She rejoiced also to see Miss Seymour, who was one
+of her "likes," and she was immensely interested to meet the abbé, whom
+she knew to be Gerald's best friend, even as Estelle was hers. She loved
+Gerald for having just these people to meet them at tea, the ones he
+himself thought most of. She felt sweetly flattered at being made one of
+a company so choicely wise and good.
+
+But the result was not exactly fortunate for the gaiety of the little
+party, if Aurora's laugh had been counted upon to enliven it. Far from
+shy though she was, she developed a disinclination to-day to speak. She
+was impressed by the abbé, for whom her conversation did not seem to her
+good enough.
+
+The young priest, a convert to Catholicism, was Gerald's age, and had it
+not been for his collar, the cut of his coat, would have looked like a
+not at all unusual Englishman with blue eyes, curly black hair, a touch
+of warm color in his shaven cheeks. Unless you sat across the tea-table
+from him and now and then, while he quietly and unassumingly talked, met
+his eyes.
+
+Some persons said that he looked ascetic, some austere, some angelic.
+Mrs. Foss, not finding the right adjective for his mixture of poise and
+humanity, was content to call him charming. Gerald, who had known him
+when they were Vin and Raldi to each other and equally far from entering
+the Church, regarded him as simply the nicest fellow he knew. Aurora had
+no definition for him, but did not feel disposed to ripple on as usual
+in his hearing. Yet she would have liked to make friends with him, too.
+She would have said to him some such thing as, "What are the thoughts
+you have, which make you so calm, deep inside? But I know. We learned
+them at our mother's knee, but in the fury of living, having fun,
+getting on, we never revisit the chamber where they are kept. You live
+in it."
+
+He was talking with Estelle like any other man whose conversation should
+not contain the faintest element of gallantry, and Estelle was talking
+to him with an ease that Aurora marveled at. Aurora marveled how Estelle
+could know, or seem to know, a lot of things which she had never before
+given sign of caring about. If the two of them were not conversing upon
+the symbolism of religious art! Having finished his tea, the abbé went
+to fetch a book from Gerald's shelves, which he knew as well as his own,
+and Estelle was shown reproductions of carvings on old cathedrals.
+
+Mrs. Foss, who had been talking of the Carnival now beginning, telling
+Aurora about corsi and coriandoli of the past as compared with the poor
+remnants of these customs, and describing the still undiminished glories
+of a veglione, perceiving finally that the usually merry lady was on her
+best behavior to the point of almost complete taciturnity, from
+necessity addressed herself more directly to Miss Seymour, who shared
+the sofa with her; and from talking of _veglioni_ the two slid into
+talking of Florentine affairs more personal.
+
+The task of entertaining Mrs. Hawthorne thus devolving upon Gerald, he
+took it up in a way that flatteringly presupposed in her an interest in
+general questions. His manner seemed to her very formal. She forgot
+that, innocent as their relations were, he yet could not before people
+speak to her with the lack of ceremony that in private made her feel
+they were such good friends. But even aside from this cool and correct
+manner, Gerald seemed to her different to-day--calmer, more serene, less
+needing sympathy, as if something of his friend the abbé had rubbed off
+on to him.
+
+As he was going on, in language that reminded her of a book, she
+interrupted him.
+
+"Don't you want to show me your house?"
+
+"I was going to suggest it," he said at once. "There are several things
+I should like to show you. Will you come?"
+
+She rose to follow, losing some of her constraint.
+
+"It's what we always do on the Cape. Any one comes for the first time,
+we show them all over our house."
+
+When they were outside the drawing-room door, she felt more like
+herself.
+
+"Oh, I'm so glad I can't tell you to see the place where you live!" she
+expanded.
+
+They went down the long corridor, past a closed door which he
+disappointingly did not open.
+
+"It's a dark room we use to store things," he explained. Neither did he
+open the door at the end of the hall. "It's Vincent's room," he said.
+
+They turned into the darker, narrower corridor, bent again, and went
+toward the little window high over somebody else's garden. He ushered
+Mrs. Hawthorne into the kitchen, for here, near the ceiling, was the
+door-bell, and on it the well-known coat of arms, crown and
+cannon-balls, which testified to the age and aristocracy of the house.
+
+While he sought to interest her in this curiosity, Aurora was looking at
+everything besides; for Giovanna was making preparations for dinner, and
+Aurora's thoughts were busy with the fowl she saw run on a long spit and
+waiting to be roasted before a bundle of sticks at the back of the sort
+of masonry counter that served as kitchen stove.
+
+"They do have the queerest ways of doing things!" she murmured.
+
+He took her across the passage and into the dining-room. He wished to
+show her an old china tea-set, quaintly embellished with noble palaces
+and parks, that had been his great-grandmother's. There again she looked
+but casually at the thing he accounted fit for her examination, and
+carefully, if surreptitiously, at all the rest.
+
+Last he showed her into the great square interior room with the glass
+door on to the terrace over the court, the room which had been his
+mother's and was now his own, and where hung a portrait of his mother.
+On this Aurora fixed attentive and serious eyes, and had no need to
+feign feeling, for appropriate feelings welled in her heart.
+
+"How gentle she looks!" she said softly. "And how much you must miss
+her!"
+
+She stood for some time really trying to make acquaintance with the
+vanished woman through that faded pastel likeness of her in youth which
+Gerald kept where it had hung in her day, the portrait of herself which
+she womanishly preferred because, as she did not conceal, it flattered
+her.
+
+"She looks like one of those people you would have just loved to lift
+the burdens off and make everything smooth for," Aurora said; "and yet
+she looks like one of those people who spend their whole lives trying to
+make things smooth for others."
+
+"Yes," said Gerald to that artless description of the feminine woman his
+mother had been, and stood beside his guest, looking pensively up at the
+portrait.
+
+All at once, Aurora felt like crying. It had been increasing, the
+oppression to her spirits, ever since she entered this house to which
+she had come filled with gay anticipation and innocent curiosity. It had
+struck her from the first moment as gloomy, and it was undoubtedly cold,
+with its three sticks of wood ceremoniously smoking in the unaccustomed
+chimney-place. Its esthetic bareness had affected her like the
+meagerness of poverty. And now it seemed to her sad, horribly so,
+haunted by the gentle ghosts of that mother and sister who had known and
+touched all these things, sat in the chairs, looked through the windows,
+and who conceivably came back in the twilight to flit over the
+uncarpeted floor and peer in the dim mirrors to see how much the grave
+had changed them. She shivered. Yes, cold and bare and sad seemed
+Gerald's dwelling. And Gerald, whose very bearing was a dignified denial
+that anything about himself or his circumstances could call for
+compassion--Gerald, thin and without color, looked to her cold-pinched
+and under-nourished. She had a sense of his long evenings alone,
+drearily without fire, his solitary meals in that dining-room so
+unsuggestive of good cheer; she thought of that single candle on the
+night-table burning in this cold, large room where he went to bed in
+that bed of iron, laying his head on that small hair pillow, to dream
+bitter dreams of a fair girl's treachery.
+
+She wanted to turn to him protesting:
+
+"Oh, I can't stand it! What makes you do it?"
+
+His next words changed the current of her thoughts.
+
+"I have another portrait of my mother," he said; "one I painted, which I
+will show you if you care to see it."
+
+She cheered up.
+
+"Do! do!" she urged heartily. "I'm crazy to see something you've
+painted."
+
+"You won't care for my painting," he pronounced without hesitation; "but
+the portrait gives a good idea of my mother, I think, when she was older
+than this."
+
+They returned to the drawing-room, where their friends were in the same
+way engaged as when they left them. One pair was looking at a large
+illustrated book; the other two sat leaning toward each other talking in
+undertones.
+
+"The bird which you see," the abbé was saying, "with the smaller birds
+crowding around him, is a pelican. The pelican, you know, who opens his
+breast to feed his young, is a symbol of the Church."
+
+"It's not true, though, that the pelican does that," Estelle was on the
+point of saying with American freedom, "any more than that a scorpion
+surrounded by fire commits suicide. I read it in a Sunday paper where a
+lot of old superstitions were exploded." But she tactfully did nothing
+of the sort. She appeared instructed and impressed.
+
+What Miss Seymour was saying to Mrs. Foss would have sounded a little
+singular to any one overhearing. The two women had been friends for
+years, but never come so near to each other as, it chanced, they did
+that afternoon, when all fell so favorably for a heart to heart talk.
+
+"I feel as if I had lost a key!" said Miss Seymour, and looked like a
+bewildered princess turned old by a wicked fairy's spell. "When I
+possessed it I thought nothing of it. It opened all the doors, but I
+didn't know what it was made them so easy to open. Only now, when it's
+gone, I know the value of that little golden key."
+
+"I know," said Mrs. Foss, sympathetically. "There's no use in us women
+pretending we don't mind! Those who really and truly don't must be great
+philosophers or great fools, or else selfless to a degree that is rarer
+even than philosophy...."
+
+Gerald and Aurora crossed the room unhailed and entered the room beyond,
+where dusty canvases, many deep, stood face to the wall.
+
+He found the unframed painting of his mother and placed it on the easel.
+The short winter day was waning, but near the window where the easel
+stood there was still light enough to see by.
+
+Aurora looked a long time without saying anything; Gerald did not speak
+either. After the length of time one allows for the examination of a
+picture, he took away that one and put another in its place; and so on
+until he had shown her a dozen.
+
+"I don't know what to say," she finally got out, as if from under a
+crushing burden of difficulty to express herself.
+
+"Please don't try!" he begged quickly. "And please not to care a bit if
+you don't like them."
+
+She let out her breath as at the easing of a strain. He heard it.
+
+"I won't be so offensive," he went on, "as to say that in not liking
+them you merely add yourself to the majority, nor yet that my feelings
+are in no wise hurt by your failure to like them. But I do wish you to
+know that I think it a sin and a shame to get a person like you, who
+can't pretend a bit, before a lot of beastly canvases inevitably
+repugnant to your mood and temperament, and make you uncomfortable with
+the feeling that compliments are expected."
+
+"All right, then; I won't tell any lies." She added in a sigh, "I did
+want so much to like them!"
+
+And he would never know what shining bubble burst there. She had wanted
+so much, as she said, to like them, and, as she did not say, to buy some
+of them, a great many of them, and make him rich with her gold.
+
+He replied to her sigh:
+
+"You are very kind."
+
+After a moment spent gazing at the last painting placed on the easel, as
+if she hoped tardily to discover some merit in it, she said:
+
+"I don't know a thing about painting, so nothing I could say about your
+way of doing it could matter one way or the other. But I have eyes to
+see the way things and people look. Tell me, now, honest Injun, do they
+look that way to you--the way you paint them?"
+
+He laughed.
+
+"Mrs. Hawthorne, no! Emphatically, no. And emphatically yes. When I look
+at them as you do, in the street, across the table, they look to me
+probably just as they do to you; but when I sit down to paint them--yes,
+they look to me as I have shown them looking in these portraits."
+
+"But they're so sad! So sad it's cruel!" she objected.
+
+"Oh, no," he objected to her objection; "it's not quite as bad as that."
+
+"They make me perfectly miserable."
+
+He whipped the canvas off the easel, saying dryly:
+
+"Don't think of them again!"
+
+It looked like impatience. With hands thrust in his pockets he took a
+purposeless half-turn in the room, then came back to her side.
+
+"If you totally detest them, I am sorry," he said mildly. "I had wanted
+to offer you one, a little, unobtrusive one to stick in some corner, a
+token of the artist's regard."
+
+"Oh, do! do!" she grasped at his friendly tender. "Find a little
+cheerful one, if you can. I shall love to have it."
+
+He selected a small panel of a single tall, palely expanding garden
+poppy, more gray than violet, against a background of shade. Flower
+though it was, it still affected one like the portrait of a lady wronged
+and suffering.
+
+In the drawing-room to which they returned Giovanna had lighted a lamp.
+The fire had properly caught and was burning more brightly; the place
+looked rosy and warm, after the winter twilight filling the other room
+and the chill that reigned there.
+
+Aurora returned to the tea-table; with a disengaged air she reached for
+plum-cake. She ascertained with comfort that Mrs. Foss did not look sad
+or Estelle ill used; that the abbé was as serene as ever and Miss
+Seymour, after her talk with Mrs. Foss, rather serener than usual.
+Gerald was far jollier than any of his portraits. To make sure that she
+was no depressing object herself, she smiled the warmest, sunniest smile
+she was capable of.
+
+"Do come and talk a little bit with me, before I have to go home!" she
+unexpectedly called out to the abbé.
+
+When at the end of the long evening spent together smoking and talking
+the two friends separated for the night, Gerald went to his room as did
+Vincent to his. But Gerald had no more than pulled off his necktie when
+he changed his mind, went back to the drawing-room, crossed the
+tobacco-scented space where something seemed to linger of the warmth of
+goodfellowship, and entered the farther room.
+
+A doubt had risen in his mind. He could not wait till morning to see his
+work with a fresh eye, an eye as fresh as Mrs. Hawthorne's, and satisfy
+himself as to whether he, so careful of truth, had unconsciously come to
+exaggerating, falsifying his impressions, grown guilty of hollow
+mannerisms.
+
+Whatever he had said, he had been stung by Mrs. Hawthorne's liking his
+paintings so little. It was easy to console oneself remembering the poor
+lady's ignorance of art. The truth might be that something was wrong
+with the pictures, which suspicion had driven the artist to go and have
+a dispassionate look at them in the frigid hour between twelve and one
+of the night. If a person is on the way to becoming a morbid ass he
+cannot find it out too soon.
+
+Gerald's dogma was that the first duty of a picture is to be beautiful.
+His critics did not give sufficient attention to that aspect of his
+work, he privately thought; they were put off by what they mistakenly
+called its queerness, its mere difference from the academic, the
+conventional. This was bitter, because he had always so loved beautiful
+lines, beautiful tints, had insisted that the very texture, of his
+painting should have the beauty of fine-grained skin.
+
+He was no conspicuous colorist, of course, he did not by temperament
+revel in the glow of rich, bold, endlessly varied tints. It was a
+limitation, which his work naturally reflected. This was marked in fact
+by modesty and melancholy of color-scheme. But that did not interfere
+with beauty, he maintained. He had been thrilled by the discovery in the
+Siena gallery of an old master with the same predilections as he, an
+antipathy apparently to the vivid, crying, self-assertive colors, which
+he accordingly with admirable simplicity left out, and interpreted the
+world all in blues and greens, grays and violets, whites of many degrees
+and tones and meanings.
+
+"They're so sad that it's cruel!" Mrs. Hawthorne had voiced the
+instinctive objection of her earth-loving, life-praising disposition to
+the view he took of people and things. But what was there to do about
+it? When he looked at a sitter to render his personality sincerely, that
+was the way he saw him. If he had been limited to rendering a human
+being in the single aspect he wore while walking from the drawing-room
+to the dinner-table with a lady on his arm and a rich meal in prospect,
+he would have given up painting, it interested him so little. Most of
+the portrait-painters in vogue did thus paint the surface and nothing
+besides. Gerald had no envy of their large fees at the price of such
+boredom as he would have suffered in their place.
+
+He held a canvas to the light of his candle. It was an old one of
+Amabel. She had not been sitting for him, he had made this sketch from a
+distance while she worked on her side. It was easy to see that the room
+was cold, that the woman with the pinched aristocratic nose, the little
+shawl over her shoulders, was poor, determined and anxious. If Mrs. Foss
+had said, "But Amabel never was as hollow-cheeked as that, nor ever
+looked pathetic in the least," Gerald could only have answered, "I swear
+to you this is how she looked to me on that day."
+
+He studied the portrait of his mother, one of his earliest, bad in a
+way, but excellent in the matter of likeness. His mother no more than
+Amabel had been a pathetic person, Mrs. Foss would certainly have said.
+To which Gerald might have answered that she was not so during an
+afternoon call; but that the most characteristic thing about that gentle
+and delicate woman had been the fact of her living so much in the life
+of others and being open to endless sorrows through them. The dim
+affectionate eyes, the deprecating half-smile of his mother, engaged
+sympathy for the unfair plight.
+
+Last, he took up a portrait of Violet. She had been in the perfection of
+young beauty; she had had no capacity for deep feeling, really,--why did
+an aroma of sadness escape from that dainty colored shadow of her? Why,
+but because of the artist's yearning sense that beauty is transitory,
+and the loveliest girl subject to destiny, and the future full of
+pitfalls for the fragility of all flesh!
+
+"Imagine a barnyard fowl, a common white hen pecking among the gravel,"
+Gerald once illustrated his view-point, "and imagine hovering over it a
+hawk, which it hasn't seen. Does it make no difference in your sense of
+the hen that _you_ see the hawk?"
+
+"It comes to this," Leslie on a certain occasion summed up Gerald's
+case: "Gerald isn't satisfied to paint the thing that's before him. All
+he cares to paint is the soul of things, and what you finally see
+expressed on the canvas is his pity for everything that has the
+misfortune to be born into an unsatisfactory world. Gerald can't see a
+thing as being common: the moment he narrows his eyes to look for
+purposes of art, it becomes to him exceptional, unique. I asked him
+once, as a joke, to paint me a simple, large, bright orange squash, in a
+field. And he did. A masterpiece. One can't say that the squash isn't
+large, orange, and true to life. But what a squash! It has an amount of
+personal distinction, an air of rarity and remoteness, that would make
+you think twice, nay, three times, before making such a precious product
+of the sacred earth into pies!"
+
+When he was chilled through and his hands were numb, Gerald remembered
+to pick up his candle and go to bed. No change of opinion, it is
+needless to say, had resulted from his midnight inquiry.
+
+A point of natural spite made him say that he did not ask people to like
+his pictures. All he asked was permission to go on painting as he
+pleased, obscure and independent, the sincere apostle of a peculiar
+creed, working out his problems with conscience and fidelity. If fate
+might send him critics whose opinion he valued he would be properly
+grateful. He felt the need of criticism and companionship, in his work,
+but had no regard for his fellow artists in Florence. His thoughts
+turned sometimes with envy toward Paris, where modern art had some
+vitality, and artist life the advantage of stimulating associations.
+There was a good deal of talk at the time, and some derision, of a new
+phase called impressionism, whose chief seat was Paris.
+
+As for the opinion of such a person as Mrs. Hawthorne, it obviously had
+no value. But while the artist could brush her aside in the character of
+critic, it remained a little galling to the man to know he figured in
+her mind as a painter who did not know how to paint.
+
+"Can't paint for sour apples!" he seemed to hear her reporting to
+Estelle, and got in his mouth the taste of the apples.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+
+When Gerald asked Mrs. Hawthorne to sit for him, she stared in his face
+without a word.
+
+"Don't be afraid," he hastened to reassure her; "I engage to paint a
+portrait you will like."
+
+She felt herself blush for the dismay she had not been able to conceal,
+and to hide this embarrassment she lifted to her face--not the
+handkerchief or the bouquet with which beauty is wont to cover the
+telltale signal in the cheek, but a wee dog, as white as a handkerchief
+and no less sweet than a bouquet. She rubbed her nose fondlingly in the
+soft silk of his breast, while, tickled, he tried, with baby growls and
+an exposure of sharp pin teeth, to get a bite at it.
+
+Gerald looked on with simple pleasure. Because he had given Aurora that
+dog. On the day of making a scene because she was to receive a dog from
+Hunt he had set to work to find one for her himself, the prior
+possession of which would make it natural to decline Charlie's, if, as
+Gerald doubted, Charlie's offer had been anything more than facile
+compliment. And now, instead of the torment to his nerves of seeing her
+fondle and kiss a brute of Charlie's, he had the not disagreeable
+spectacle of her pressing to her warm and rosy face an animal that
+related her caresses, even if loosely and distantly, to a less unworthy
+object. Sour and sad, dried up and done with women, a man still has
+feelings.
+
+It would be unfair not to add that something better than primeval
+jealousy actuated Gerald, at the same time as, no doubt, some tincture
+of that. A sort of impersonal delicacy made the idea disagreeable to him
+of a dear, nice woman cherishing with the foolish fondness such persons
+bestow on their pets the gift of a friend whom she, in taking his
+loyalty for granted, overrated, as he thought.
+
+The dog he had selected to present to her belonged to a breed for which
+he had respect as well as affection, crediting to Maltese terriers,
+besides all the sterling dog virtues, a discretion, a fineness of
+feeling, rare enough among humans. That Gerald kept no dog was due to
+the fact that he was still under the impression of the illness and death
+of his last, Lucile's pet and his mother's, who had been his companion
+until a year or two before, a senile, self-controlled little personage
+of the Maltese variety.
+
+Having decided to give Mrs. Hawthorne a dog, Gerald had spent some hours
+watching the several components of one litter as they disported
+themselves in the flagged court of a peasant house, and had fixed upon
+one dusty ball of fluff rather than another upon solid indications of
+character.
+
+Snowy after strenuous purifications at the hands of Giovanna,
+sweet-smelling from the pinch of orris powder rubbed in his fur, and
+brave with a cherry ribbon, he was taken from the breast of Gerald's
+overcoat and deposited in the hands of Aurora, whose delight expressed
+itself in sounds suggestive of an ogreish craving to eat the little
+beast, interspersed with endearments of dim import, such as, "Diddums!
+Wasums! Tiddledewinkums!" Estelle's did the same. There was no
+difference in the affection the two instantly bestowed on this dog.
+Aurora remarked later on that Busteretto couldn't be blamed for not
+knowing which was his mother.
+
+Sensitively timid, yet bold in his half dozen inches with curiosity of
+life and the exuberant gladness of youth, Busteretto could frisk and he
+could tremble. He was cowed by the sight of fearful things, beetles and
+big dogs, but next moment, with budding valor, would dash to investigate
+them. He twinkled when he ran, his bark lifted him off his four feet.
+Withal something exquisite marked him even among Maltese puppies, which
+Aurora felt without art to define it. She said he reminded her of the
+new moon when it is no bigger than a fingernail. If with the tip of his
+rose-petal tongue he laid the lick of fondness and approval on the end
+of your nose, you felt two things: that the salute had come directed by
+the purest heart-guidance, and that the nose had something about it
+subtly right. You were flattered.
+
+When Gerald encouraged Mrs. Hawthorne to decide for herself how she
+should like to be painted, with what habiliments, appurtenances and
+surroundings, she decided first of all to have Busteretto on her
+lap,--but that was afterward given up: he wiggled. Then her white
+ostrich fan in her hand, her pearls around her neck, her diamond stars
+in her hair, a cluster of roses at her corsage, her best dress on, and
+an opera-cloak thrown over the back of her chair.
+
+Catching, as she thought, a look of irony on Gerald's face, she had a
+return of suspicion.
+
+"See here," she said, observing him narrowly, "there's no trick about
+this, is there?"
+
+"Not the shadow of one. Please trust me, Mrs. Hawthorne. This is to be a
+portrait entirely satisfactory as well as entirely resembling. It is
+like you to desire to be painted with your plumes and pearls and roses,
+and they are very becoming. I shall put them in with pleasure. I know
+you do not believe I can paint a portrait to suit you. Very well. Grant
+me the favor of a chance to try. We shall see."
+
+It was true that she did not believe it, but she was so willing to hope.
+One of the upstairs rooms at the back was chosen for the sittings
+because the light through its windows was the least variable. The
+necessary artist's baggage was brought over from Gerald's, and the work
+began.
+
+Charcoal in hand, he regarded Mrs. Hawthorne quietly and lengthily
+through half-closed eyes.
+
+"You have not one good feature," he said, as if thinking aloud.
+
+"Oh!"--she started out of the pose they had after much experimenting
+decided upon--"oh! is that the way you're going to pay me for keeping
+still on a chair by the hour?"
+
+"You have no eyebrows to speak of."
+
+"What do you mean? Yes, I have, too; lots of them; lovely ones. Only
+they don't show up. They're fair, to match my hair."
+
+"You are undershot."
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"Your lower jaw closes outside of your upper."
+
+"Oh, but so little! Just enough to take the curse off an otherwise too
+perfect beauty."
+
+As she curled up the corners of her mouth in an affected smirk, he
+quickly shifted his glance, with a horrible suspicion that she was
+crossing her eyes. As she had pronounced the word perfect
+"_parfect_," he presumed that she was making herself look, for the
+remainder, like Antonia. It was her latest vaudeville turn, imitating
+Antonia. He was careful not to look again in her direction until she had
+stopped doing what annoyed him furiously. He could not hope to make her
+understand to what point the debasing of beauty to brutal comic uses
+wounded him.
+
+"Faultless features," he went on after a time, in commentary on his
+earlier remark, "do not by any means always make a beautiful face,"
+politely leading her to suppose he meant that to be without them was no
+great misfortune.
+
+Estelle came into the room for company. She brought her sewing, one of
+those elegant pieces of handiwork that give to idleness a good
+conscience. Gerald felt her delicately try to get acquainted with him.
+She was not as altogether void of intellectual curiosity as her friend.
+She would seem to care about discovering further what sort of man he was
+mentally, what his ideas were on a variety of subjects. Also, but even
+more delicately, to interest him, just a little bit, in her own self and
+ideas.
+
+He was grateful to her, and did what he could to show himself
+responsive. With the portrait began the period of a less perfunctory
+relation between them. They had talks sometimes that Aurora declared,
+without trace of envy, were 'way above her head.
+
+Estelle was waking to an interest in the art and history of the Old
+World. She was "reading up" on these things. She was also "working at"
+her French, and would in a little systematic way she had excuse herself
+at the same hour daily, saying she must go and get her lessons. Not
+feeling quite the enterprise to study two languages at one time, she had
+given the preference to French, as being the more generally useful in
+Europe.
+
+Gerald now made the acquaintance of a new member of the household. She
+came into the room bearing a small tray with a hot-water pot and a cup.
+She took this to Aurora, who helped herself to plain hot water,
+explaining:
+
+"I am trying to 'redooce.' This is good for what ails me, they say. But
+I could never in the world think of it. Clotilde thinks of it for me,
+and she's that punctual! Clotilde, you're too punctual with this stuff.
+You don't suppose I like it?"
+
+"But think, Madame, of the sylph's form that it will give you!" replied
+Clotilde, in respectably good English.
+
+"I do think of it. Give me another cup. Mr. Fane, this is Miss--no, I
+won't launch on that name. It's Italo's sister, who has saved our lives
+and become our greatest blessing."
+
+Clotilde exposed in smiling a fine array of white teeth. She was not at
+all like her brother, but well-grown, white and pink beneath her neat
+head-dress of crisp black hair. She impressed Gerald as belonging to a
+different and better class. If she were vulgar, it was at least not in
+the same way. She appeared like that paradox, a lady of the
+working-class, with a distinguishing air of capability, good humor, and
+openness. The latter Gerald was not disposed absolutely to trust, but he
+was glad to trust all the rest.
+
+No sooner had she left the room than Aurora and Estelle in one voice
+started telling him about her. He learned that she and Italo were not
+what they called "own" brother and sister, but only half. Their father,
+being left by the death of his wife with a young family on his hands,
+had in feeble despair married the cook, become the father of one more
+child, and died. Italo was that latest born. The children of the first
+wife had then been taken by her folks, while their step-mother retained
+her own chick, assisted from a distance by the prouder portion of the
+family to educate and give him a trade. He had chosen an art instead,
+and by it was rising in the world. There had been published a waltz of
+his composing, dedicated by permission to a name with a coronet over it.
+He lived with and supported his good soul of a mother, and saw something
+of his half-brethren, all of them through lack of fortune condemned to
+small ways of life, like himself.
+
+Clotilde, the best-hearted, was his favorite and he hers. She recognized
+his gifts, she further regarded him as a man of spirit, or wit.
+
+"It must be," reflected Gerald, "that the fellow can stir up a laugh."
+
+He knew him only as a fixture at the piano, but could well accommodate
+the idea of a species of buffoonery to that boldly jutting nose of his.
+He fancied that _maldicenza_, gossip further spiced with
+backbiting, would form the chief baggage of his wit. If he possessed
+sharp ears, his opportunities for picking up knowledge of other people's
+affairs were certainly unusual. He passed from house to house, playing
+accompaniments, drumming for dancing, so insignificant on his
+screw-stool that many no doubt talked before him as if nobody had been
+there.
+
+Gerald did not dislike Ceccherelli, really, only had him on his nerves
+in relation to Aurora. He felt him, indeed, rather likeable at a
+distance, as part of a story; he had the good point of being an
+individual. Gerald was in general touched to benevolence at sight of a
+poor devil elated by his little draught of success. To Ceccherelli
+without a doubt the patronage of the wealthy American represented
+success. Ceccherelli pulling out his gold watch was a disarming vision.
+
+Gerald cherished a hope, born of curiosity, that he might witness some
+exhibition of Ceccherelli's _spirito_, or wit, and upon an evening
+when the pianist dropped in after dinner was on the alert for
+manifestations....
+
+It may here be inserted that upon being asked to remain for dinner
+Gerald had artfully delayed answering until he had made sure that
+Clotilde did not dine with the ladies. Their familiarity had made him
+fear it. Highly as he was prepared to esteem Clotilde, the meal would,
+with her making the fourth, have lost for him those points on account of
+which he prized it. But he gathered that she found it more convenient to
+take her meals in private. In rejoicing for himself, he rejoiced also
+for her, eating in holy peace, as he pictured her doing, the dishes of
+her country, cooked with oil and onion; pouring the wine of her country
+from a good fat flask such as never found its place on the table of the
+strangers.
+
+To go back: Gerald when after dinner the pianist came to make music for
+the ladies, was hoping for some example of that brightness for which he
+had a reputation with three persons, possibly more. But Ceccherelli
+remained on the piano-stool and never once raised his voice. Estelle and
+Aurora went in turns to chat with him there, but not one witty word
+reached Gerald. Then he had the sense to see that it was he, Gerald, who
+acted as a spoil-feast, a dampener. He got an outside view of himself,
+stiff, dry, critical, ungenial-looking. It was not to be wondered at
+that the flow of spirits was dried up in the man of temperament by his
+vicinity. He suspected, catching a side-look from the pianist's small
+brown eye, that the little man who did not care to speak aloud in his
+hearing yet had plenty to say on the subject of him in a different
+entourage.
+
+This notwithstanding, it was only when Gerald got whiffs and echoes of
+Ceccherelli through Aurora that he called him a pest.
+
+"Italo says," she began, after a silence such as often fell while she
+posed and he painted, "that Mr. Landini has the evil eye."
+
+"What rubbish!"
+
+"Glad to hear you say so. I don't believe there's any such thing,
+myself. But Italo swears there is, and has told me story upon story to
+prove it. He wants me to wear a coral horn and poke it at Mr. Landini
+whenever he comes near me."
+
+"Wherefore a coral horn? You can more cheaply, and quite as effectually,
+make horns of your fingers, like this. I should strongly advise you not
+to let the object of this precaution catch you doing it.... I should
+think, Mrs. Hawthorne, you would be ashamed to let that inferior little
+individual corrupt your mind."
+
+Fancying it teased him, she pursued, "What do you think he says besides?
+That Mr. Landini's color isn't natural, but a juice, he says, a dye,
+that he stains himself with."
+
+"For the love of Heaven, why?"
+
+"That's what I wanted to know. Why go to all that trouble for the sake
+of looking like a darkey? But Italo says, says Italo, that it gives him
+more success with the ladies. His difference from other men obliges them
+to look at him, then his eyes do the rest."
+
+"I only hope your laugh is sincere, Mrs. Hawthorne, and that you do not
+allow this poisonous nonsense to affect your feelings towards--"
+
+"Don't be afraid. If I did, I shouldn't be having him to dinner, should
+I? And he's coming to-night."
+
+"Oh."
+
+"Yes. Quite a party. You weren't asked, because we know you now. You
+would have managed by sly questions to find out who else was coming and
+then you wouldn't have come."
+
+"Well, who is coming? There is nothing sly about that."
+
+"I sha'n't tell you. This much I will tell you, though--" she added with
+the frankness usual to her, "I don't look forward to it much."
+
+It was on the end of his tongue to ask next morning how her dinner had
+gone off, but on second thoughts he left it for her to speak of when she
+was ready.
+
+She at first appeared much as on other days, but when she had lapsed
+into silence and fallen into thought her expression became a shade
+gloomy. He had noticed that when her eyes were rather more grey than
+blue it was the sign of a cloud in her sky.
+
+"Might one ask the lady sitting for her picture to look pleasant?" he
+said.
+
+"Yes, yes," she remembered herself; "I will try to look pleasant. But I
+feel cross."
+
+"Well?... What went wrong with your dinner?"
+
+"Oh, I made a fool of myself."
+
+"That sounds serious. Was it?"
+
+"Yes. No. Oh, I don't know. I don't suppose it was really serious....
+But the whole thing has made me cross."
+
+She labored under an urgent necessity to tell somebody all about it,
+that was evident.
+
+"You see," she plunged without preamble into her confidence, "from the
+beginning, I didn't want that party! I love to have folks to dinner, any
+number, all the time. You know I just love a jollification. But this was
+different, as I knew it was going to be. It began with Charlie Hunt
+telling me--or, not exactly telling, I forget how it came out--that
+yesterday was his birthday. I said, 'Come and celebrate with us!' I was
+thinking of making a big cake and sticking it full of pink candles. And
+from that simple beginning, blessed if I know how it happened, except my
+always wanting to say yes to anything anybody proposes, it came to be a
+regular dinner-party, the kind they give over here, with courses and
+wines and finger-bowls, all the frills, and twelve people, not friends
+of mine at all, barely acquaintances, but people Charlie Hunt thought it
+would be nice to ask. Well, it was my fault, every bit of it, and nobody
+else's. I've no business to say all those joyful yeses if I don't mean
+them. Good enough for me if I have to swallow my pill afterwards without
+so much as making a face. It wasn't so bad, after all, everything went
+all right, thanks to Clotilde and Charlie. Only I wasn't having much
+fun. Charlie had planned how people should sit, and Mr. Landini was on
+one side of me, and he was making himself terribly agreeable. He means
+all right, but his talk, as I guess you know, isn't a bit my kind. And
+last night, I don't mind telling you--" her voice dropped to a note
+confidentially low, "with his compliments and incinerations, you'd
+almost have thought he was sweet on me. Only I know better. And so, as I
+say, I wasn't having much fun. Then I don't know what got into me. They
+were passing the fruit. I got up and went to the sideboard and took one
+of those fine hot-house looking peaches out of our permanent assortment
+that needs dusting every few days, and I came back to my seat and
+offered that marble fruit with a fetching smile to Mr. Landini. He
+looked as if he felt I was bestowing a very particular favor. He took
+it--and it dropped out of his hand on to the plate with a crash that
+laid it in smithereens.... You can see why I am cross."
+
+"I shouldn't be surprised, dear woman, if he were cross, too."
+
+"He was perfect! I respected him! Liked him better than I ever had
+before! I never saw anything so well done as the way he carried it off!
+I was never so uncomfortable in all my life, though we united in
+laughing, ha, ha.... Charlie would have taken my head off, if he had
+dared, afterwards in a corner of the parlor. But the first word he said,
+I cut in, short as pie-crust, 'Young man,' I said, 'if you aren't
+careful I shall sit on you. Do you know how much I weigh?' And I meant
+it."
+
+Gerald prudently placed a paint-brush across his mouth, and shut his
+teeth on it as on a bridle-bit, to excuse his saying nothing in the way
+of comment on what he had heard.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne told him next day at the first opportunity, like one
+eager to make reparation for an injustice, "It's all right now! A
+beautiful plate came yesterday afternoon from Ginori's where my
+dinner-set was bought--a plate, you know, to match the one that got
+broken. As if I cared anything about the old plate! And along with it
+Mr. Landini's card, with such a nice message written on it. Don't you
+think it white in him? When it was all my fault. And in the evening
+Charlie Hunt came and was sweet as pie. We're just as good friends as
+ever. I'm ashamed of myself for having felt so put out. Forget anything
+I said that didn't seem quite kind. He's all right. It's me that's
+crochety.... Isn't that picture far enough along for you to let me see
+it?"
+
+"No, Mrs. Hawthorne."
+
+"Will you let me see it when it's far enough along?"
+
+"No."
+
+"I think you're real mean. How much longer will it take to finish it?"
+
+"Does sitting bore you so much?"
+
+"Land, no! Bore me? I perfectly love it! It's like taking a sea-voyage
+with some one. You see more of them in a week or two than you would in
+the same number of years on land. I'm getting to feel I know you quite
+well."
+
+"Wasn't it clever of me to think of the portrait?"
+
+"Go 'way! D'you see anything green in my eye? As I was saying, I'm
+getting to know you pretty well. You get mad awful' easy, don't you? But
+you don't hate people, really, nearly as much as I do, that it takes a
+lot to make mad. There are people in this world that I hate--oh, how I
+hate 'em! I hate 'em so I could almost put their eyes out. But you,
+Stickly-prickly, when it comes right down to it, I notice you make a lot
+of allowance for people. Do you know, when it comes right down to it,
+you're one of the patientest persons I know. I'd take my chances with
+you for a judge a lot sooner than I'd like to with loads of people who
+aren't half so ready to call you a blame' fool."
+
+"While you have been making these valuable discoveries in character,
+what do you suppose I have been doing, Mrs. Hawthorne?" asked Gerald,
+after the time it would take to bow ceremoniously in acknowledgement of
+a compliment.
+
+"Oh, finding out things about me, I suppose."
+
+"Not things. One thing. I had known you for some length of time before
+my felicitous invention of the portrait, you remember, and as you are
+barely more elusive than the primary colors, or more intricate than the
+three virtues, I did not suppose I had anything more to learn. But I
+had. It can't be said I didn't suspect it. I had seen signs of it. I
+smelled it, as it were. But I had no idea of its extent, its magnitude,
+its importance. It is simply amazing, bewildering, funny."
+
+"For goodness' sake, what?" she cried, breathless with interest.
+
+"I can't tell you. It would ill become me to say. The least mention of
+it on my part would be the height of impertinence. The thing is none of
+my business. Be so kind as to resume the pose, Mrs. Hawthorne, and to
+keep very, very still, like a good girl. Do not speak, please, for some
+time; I am working on your mouth."
+
+Gerald had indeed been astonished, amused, appalled. He had in a general
+way known that Mrs. Hawthorne was prodigal, the impression one received
+of her at first sight prepared one to find her generous; but he had
+formed no idea of the ease and magnificence with which she got rid of
+money.
+
+In the time so far devoted to painting her he had grown quite accustomed
+to a little scene that almost daily repeated itself--a scene which he,
+busy at his side of the room, was presumably not supposed to see, or, if
+he saw it, to think anything about.
+
+Clotilde would come in with a look of great discretion, a smile of great
+modesty, and stand hesitating, like a person with a communication to
+make, but not sufficient boldness to interrupt. Aurora, always glad to
+drop the pose, would excuse herself to Gerald and ask what Clotilde
+wanted. Clotilde would then approach and speak low,--not so low,
+however, but that in spite of him messages and meanings were telegraphed
+to Gerald's brain. The look itself of the unsealed envelopes in
+Clotilde's hand was to Gerald's eye full of information. She would
+sometimes extract and unfold a document for Aurora to look at; but
+Aurora would wave it aside with a careless, "You know I couldn't read it
+if I wanted to." At the end of the murmured conference Aurora would say,
+"Will you go and get my porte-monnaie? It's in my top drawer," and when
+this had been brought, her dimpled hand would take from it and give to
+Clotilde bills of twenty, of fifty, of a hundred francs, hardly
+appearing to count. Sometimes she would say: "I'm afraid I haven't
+enough. I shall have to make out a check."
+
+Gerald's _flair_, and knowledge of his Florence, enabled him
+perfectly to divine what was in question. He was only puzzled as to why
+these transactions should not have taken place at a more private hour,
+and acutely observed that they took place when they could, this being
+when Estelle was out of the way. Clotilde also had _flair_.
+
+After Clotilde had retired, Aurora one morning, having imperfectly
+understood what her money was wanted for, puckered her brows over the
+letters that, through an oversight, had remained in her hands. She held
+one out to Gerald to translate. It was from the united chorus-singers of
+Florence, a simple, direct, and ingenuous appeal for a gratuity. Another
+letter was from a poor young girl who wished for money to buy her
+wedding outfit. Another from a poor man out of work.
+
+Gerald could have laughed. But he did not; nor made any remark. He did
+not dislike seeing those voracious maws stuffed with a fat morsel. He
+knew as much of the real poverty in Florence as of the innocent
+impudence of many poor, with their lingering medieval outlook upon the
+relations of the poor and the rich. He sided with those against these.
+Singularly, perhaps, he regarded himself as belonging among the latter,
+the rich. He was glad the chorus-singers and the _sposina_ and the
+worried _padre di famiglia_ were going to be made glad by rich
+crumbs from Aurora's board. But he could not help uneasiness for the
+future, when the famished locusts, still approaching single scout,
+should precipitate themselves in battalions, when the whole of Florence
+should have got the glad tidings and gathered impetus....
+
+Well, Clotilde was there. Clotilde would know pertinent discourses to
+hold to the brazen beggars when their shamelessness passed bounds.
+Meanwhile Gerald could see that she enjoyed this distributing of good
+things among her fellow-citizens. Not that she was strongly disposed to
+charity. He did not believe she gave away anything of her own, but she
+loved to see Aurora give. After a life spent in a home where the lumps
+of sugar were counted and the coffee-beans kept under lock and key, it
+attracted her like wild, incredible romance.
+
+It would have hurt her to behold this unproductive output, no doubt, had
+it not been a mere foreigner who lost what her own people
+gained,--money, besides, that could never have benefited her, and that
+came nearer to benefiting her when spent in that manner than in another.
+Clotilde, loyal in service, giving more than good measure, offering all
+the pleasant fruits of a visible devotion, could yet not be expected to
+have--or, to state it more fairly, was not supposed by Gerald to
+have--any real bowels for this outsider, who might for one thing be
+drawing from bottomless gold-mines, or, if she were not, would suffer a
+ruin she had richly deserved. And might it not in aftertimes profit her,
+Clotilde, to have been instrumental to this person and that in obtaining
+money from the millionaire? The shops recognized such a title to reward,
+and offered it regularly to such private middlemen as herself for a
+careful guiding of the dispensing hand, and this without the feeling on
+any side that it was the payment of the unjust steward.
+
+Gerald did not in the least despise Clotilde, poor Clotilde, with her
+nose like a little white trumpet between her downy pink and white
+cheeks, for this business-like outlook and use of her position. It would
+have been different if she had been a friend and gentleman.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+The portrait did not progress rapidly. Gerald was not hurrying. On
+Gerald's lips as he painted there played an ambiguous smile, privately
+derisive of his work and the fun he was having.
+
+No problems, no effort, none of those searching doubts of oneself that
+produce heart-sickness; nor yet any of those exaltations that cause one
+to forget the hour of meals. Curious that it should have been fun all
+the same!... His reply to which was that only a very poor observer could
+think it curious that the lower man within a man should feel it fun to
+be indulged. Fortunately, a natural limit was set to this Capuan period.
+
+He would come from the winter world into the room which the American
+kept enervatingly warm, a pernicious practice. One could not deny,
+however, that the body relaxed in it with a sense of well-being, after
+steeling itself to resist the insidious Italian cold, exuding from damp
+pavements and blown on the sharp tramontana; that cold which is never,
+if measured by the thermometer, severe, but against which clothing seems
+ineffectual. The blood does not react against it; the blood shrinks
+away, and stagnates around the heart.
+
+He would change his coat for a velveteen jacket, not in order to be
+picturesque, but to keep his coat-cuffs clean. He was as particular as
+an old maid, Aurora told him, before he had been caught absentmindedly
+wiping paint off on his hair.
+
+The fair model would get her chair-legs into correspondence with certain
+chalk-marks on the carpet, be helped to find her pose, and having made
+herself comfortable, turn on him blue eyes, with a faint brown shadow
+under them--blue eyes that wore a sheepish look until she presently
+forgot she was sitting for her picture. She was pressed to keep her
+opera-cloak over her shoulders, lest she take cold in her décolleté; the
+high fur collar made an effective background for her face. Then he would
+fall to painting, and the hours of the forenoon would fly.
+
+An amiable woman would now and then make a remark, easily jocular.
+Another amiable woman--soothing presences, both--would answer. Or he
+would answer; there would be an interlude of familiar talk, rest, and
+laughing, and throwing a ball for a scampering puppy. At noon an end to
+labor. He would remain for lunch, that meal of cheery luxury, immorally
+abundant. After it he would still linger in this house, bright and warm
+with fires, smoking cigarettes in a chair as luxuriously soft as those
+curling clouds on which are seen throning the gods in ceiling frescos,
+and grow further day by day into the intimacy of the amiable women. In
+full afternoon they would ask him if he would go out with them in their
+carriage, take an airing, and return for dinner; or, if he obstinately
+declined, might they set him down somewhere. He would make a point of
+not accepting, and hurry off afoot with his damp umbrella.
+
+Although Gerald had enlightened contempt for the sensuous comfort he was
+taking in the fleshpots of the Hermitage, there was in it one element
+which he did not analyze merely to despise.
+
+He was aware of it most often after Estelle had left the room. He
+settled down then for a time of heightened well-being. It was observable
+that the sitter also took on a faintly different air. Often at that
+moment she would vaguely, purposelessly, smile over to him, and he would
+smile in absolute reciprocity. They would not seize the opportunity for
+more personal exchange of talk. All would go on as before. He had
+nothing to say to Aurora or she to him that could not have been said
+before an army of witnesses. Yet it was to him as if a touch of magic
+had removed an impediment, and the mysterious effluvium which made the
+vicinity of Mrs. Hawthorne calming, healing to him, had a chance to flow
+and steep his nerves in a blessed quiet, a quiet which--one hardly knows
+how to describe such a thing--was at the same time excitement.
+
+Gerald did not really care for talking. He could, it was true, sit up
+all night with Vincent Johns, discussing this subject and that; he could
+split hairs and wander into every intricacy of argument with men and
+artists; with women too he could sometimes be litigious. The bottom
+truth was nevertheless that he did not care for talking. It had happened
+to him to sigh for a world where nobody talked forever and ever.
+
+What he cared for was faces. They were what discoursed to you, told the
+veracious story of lives and emotions--not lamely, as words do, mingling
+the trivial with the significant, but altogether perfectly. It rested
+with you to understand.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne in talk was cheap as echoes of a traveling-circus tent:
+you had the simple fooling of the clown, the plain good sense of the
+farmer's wife, the children's ebullient joy in the show. But Mrs.
+Hawthorne in silence and abstraction was allied to things august and
+mysterious, things far removed from her own thoughts. These, while she
+sat in her foolish jewels, unsuitable by day, were very likely busy with
+her house, her dressmaker, the doings of her little set, gossip, the
+personal affairs--who knows?--of the painter painting her. But,
+profounder than words or thoughts, Mrs. Hawthorne's essential manner of
+being related her to those forces of the world which the ancient mind
+figured in the shapes of women. There was something present in her of
+the basic kindness of old Earth, who wants to feed everybody, is ready
+to give her breast to all the children. Her robust joyousness reposed,
+one felt, on a reality, some great fact that made angers and anxieties
+irrational.
+
+The student of faces could not have maintained that he got these
+impressions of his sitter through his eyes. It was more, after all, like
+a reflection received on the sensitive plate of his heart.
+
+One day Gerald began to hurry. He had had enough of it. The portrait was
+finished in a few hours. The ladies were not permitted to see it. They
+were made to wait until it was varnished and framed in one of the great,
+bright Florentine frames of which they were so fond.
+
+Gerald, while they took their first long, rapt look, stood at one side,
+with a smile like a faun's when a faun is Mephistophelian.
+
+Aurora, clasping her hands in a delight that could find no words to
+express it, made a sound like the coo of a dove.
+
+Estelle echoed this exclamation, but her charmed surprise did not ring
+so true, if any one had been watchful enough to seize the shade of
+difference. Because, not having been made to give a promise, she had
+from time to time taken a look privately at the painting during its
+progress. Aurora had known of this and been sorely tempted to do the
+same, but had resisted the temptation, afraid of Gerald's bad opinion.
+
+"My soul!" she murmured, really much moved.
+
+Of course she knew that the portrait flattered her; but she felt as
+Lauras and Leonoras and Lucastas no doubt felt when their poets
+celebrated them under ideal forms in which their friends and families
+may have had trouble to recognize them. The pride of having inspired an
+immortal masterpiece must have stirred their hearts to gratitude toward
+the gifted beings able to see them disencumbered from their faults, and
+fix them for the contemplation of their own eyes and their neighbors' as
+they had been at the best moment of their brightest hour.
+
+[Illustration: Aurora, clasping her hands in a delight that could find
+no words to express it, made a sound like the coo of a dove]
+
+In the days when La Grande Mademoiselle was painted as Minerva, Aurora's
+portrait might have been called "Mrs. Hawthorne as Venus." The
+expression of her face was as void of history as the fair goddess's. The
+tender beam of pleasure lighting it suggested that she might that moment
+have been awarded the apple. The portrait was, nevertheless, in a way,
+"Aurora all over," as Estelle pronounced it; but an Aurora whose
+imperfections had been smoothed out of existence, and with them her
+humor; an Aurora whose good working complexion, as she called it, had
+been turned to lilies and roses, her hair of mortal gold to immortal
+sunshine, and those sagacious orbs of blue, which made friends for her
+by their twinkle, into melting azure stars.
+
+The painter had, besides, glorified every detail of the setting: the
+rich fabric of the dress, the creamy feathers of the fan, even the roses
+of the breast-knot. The pearls and diamonds he had amused himself with
+making larger than they were, and filled these with a winking fire,
+those with a lambent luster. But Gerald had no mind when he indulged in
+satire to be gross. The whole was dainty, as shimmering as a
+soap-bubble, and of a fineness that rightly commended it to lovers of
+beautiful surfaces.
+
+"I don't care," burst from Aurora, as if in reply to an inaudible
+criticism, "I just love it! I don't care if it is flattered. I could hug
+you for it, Gerald Fane. I think it's perfectly lovely. It's going to be
+a solid satisfaction. By and by, when my double chin has caught up with
+me, and I'm a homely old thing, and nobody knows what I did look like in
+my prime, I'll have this to show them. By that time, with my brain
+weakening, I hope I shall have come to thinking it was as like me as two
+peas. There's some reason for living now."
+
+Every caller was taken to see the portrait, and heard Mrs. Hawthorne's
+opinion of the talented artist. The majority of visitors candidly shared
+her admiration, though not one woman among them can have failed to say
+to herself that the portrait was flattered. But with a portrait of
+oneself to have executed, who would not prefer the brush that makes
+beautiful?
+
+Interest spread in the painter, whose work few even of the Florentines
+knew except from hearsay. No one who saw Mrs. Hawthorne's portrait was
+very clearly aware--such is fame!--that it was for Fane a departure.
+Until it came to Leslie. She stood a long time before the painting, then
+exclaimed:
+
+"What a joke!"
+
+But she was inclined to take the same view as Mrs. Hawthorne, that when
+he could paint like that it was a pity Gerald should not do it oftener,
+to build up a reputation and fill his purse. She only would have advised
+him not to go quite so far another time in the same direction.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+As Gerald, the portrait finished, came no more to the house, fairly as
+if modesty could not have endured the compliments showered upon him,
+Aurora with a communication to make had to square herself before her
+desk in the room of the red flowers and painstakingly pen a note.
+
+Aurora, when taking pains, wrote the cleanest, clearest, most
+characterless hand that was ever seen outside of a school copy-book, and
+took pride in it. Aurora's language, when she applied herself to
+composition, lost the last vestige of color and life. She wrote:
+
+    "My dear Mr. Fane:
+
+    "You have not been to see us for a long time, and so I am
+    obliged to write what I have to say. It is that our friends
+    _cannot say enough_ in praise of your portrait of me, and
+    Mrs. Bixby, an American who is staying at the pension Trollope,
+    wants to have one just like it--one, of course, I mean, as much
+    like her as that is like me, but not a bit more. But before she
+    decides she wants to know what it will cost. And that brings me
+    to the question, What is the price of my picture? Please, let me
+    beg you to make it _a figure I shall not blush to pay_ for
+    such a _fine piece of work_. Make it a price that agrees
+    with my estimate of the picture rather than your _very
+    modest_ one. I shall be glad, you ought to know, to pay
+    anything you say. You couldn't, if you tried, make it seem too
+    much for me to pay for _such a fine piece of work_. I have
+    got up in the middle of the night and gone down to look at it
+    with a candle, and stood till I began to sneeze, I like it so
+    much, though I know it's too good-looking. So please set a good
+    price on it and not _make me feel mean_ taking it. Then
+    I'll tell Mrs. Bixby what I paid. She's got plenty of money, and
+    even if she beats you down, it will be better if she knows I
+    paid a big price. You have such a wonderful talent it ought to
+    make your fortune, and so it will by and by. Don't forget that
+    we are always glad to see you and that you haven't been for
+    quite a while.
+
+                                        "Yours sincerely,
+                                            "Aurora Hawthorne.
+
+    "P.S. What do you think Busteretto did? He saw me pouring some
+    water into a bowl and imagined I was going to give him a bath.
+    So he went to hide under the grate. Then of course he had to
+    have a bath, which he wouldn't have had to otherwise. He sends
+    much love.
+
+    "Another P.S. I meant to tell you we have got a box for the
+    veglione (I hope that is the way to spell it) on the last night
+    of the Carnival. We have only asked the Fosses so far, and we
+    want you to be sure to save that night to come with us."
+
+Gerald, having read, sat down and wrote, with a disregard to the
+delicacy of his hair-lines and the shading of his down-strokes that
+would have furnished a poor example to anybody:
+
+    "The portrait, my dear Mrs. Hawthorne, is a gift, for which I
+    will not even accept thanks, as it is, your kind opinion
+    notwithstanding, absolutely without value. One sole point of
+    interest it has, that of a future curiosity--the only thing of
+    the kind that will have been painted in his whole lifetime by
+
+                                        "Your devoted friend,
+                                                         "G. F.
+
+    "Shall I find you at home this evening?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+
+No festivity has quite the vast and varied glitter of a _veglione_.
+It takes a whole city to make a party so big and bright. And the last
+_veglione_ of the season is rather brighter than the rest, as if
+the spirit of revelry, inexhausted at the end of Carnival, made haste to
+use itself up in fireworks before the cold dawn of Ash Wednesday.
+
+The opera-house is cleared of its rows of seats, the stage united to the
+parquet by a sloping floor. Every one of the boxes, rising tier above
+tier in a jeweled horseshoe, offers the sight of a merry supper-party,
+with spread table, twinkling candelabra, flowers, gala display.
+
+Crowding floor and stage and lobbies, swarm the maskers. In the center
+of the great floor the _corps de ballet_, regiment of sylphs in
+tulle petticoats and pale-pink tights, performs its characteristic
+evolutions to the pulsating strains of the opera orchestra. The public
+dances in the remaining space--dances, promenades, and plays pranks, the
+special diversion of the evening being to "intrigue" some one. They are
+heard speaking in high squeaks, in bass rumbles, in any way that may
+disguise the voice. Many are in costume,--Mephistos, Pierrots, Figaros,
+Harlequins, but the most are in simple domino.
+
+When a lady wishes to descend among the crowd she, in the darkness at
+the back of the box, slips a domino over her ball-dress, a mask over her
+features, and goes forth unknown to all save the cavalier on whose arm
+she leans.
+
+The only uncovered faces belong to gentlemen. These look often a little
+foolish, a little bored, because the uncovered faces are the natural
+objects of the maskers' impertinences, their part the rather barren
+amusement of trying to divine who it is endeavoring to intrigue, or
+puzzle, them, and wittily to parry personalities often more pointed than
+the drawing-room permits.
+
+The party in Aurora's box was large for the size of the box. She had
+gone on inviting people, then brought hampers and hampers of good things
+with which to feed them. There were the Fosses, Charlie with all the
+Hunt girls, Landini, Lavin, the American doctor, the American dentist,
+and Gerald.
+
+Also Manlio. The Fosses had brought him. He had returned from furlough
+some time before. It was known now to everybody that he was the
+_fidanzato_ of Brenda Foss. There was no talk of his leaving the
+army; on the contrary, he was rumored to have prospects of early
+advancement to the grade of captain; wherefore the general public took
+it for granted that the bride's parents were providing the indispensable
+marriage portion.
+
+Aurora's eyes, at a moment when Manlio's attention was elsewhere, rested
+on him with a brooding, shining look. The symptoms of a great happiness,
+though modestly muffled, were plain in his face. The Beautiful One was
+coming back in the spring, already near, to marry him.
+
+Aurora's affectionate look was just tinged with regret. She had suffered
+a disappointment in connection with Manlio. An obstinate and
+uncompromising woman beyond the ocean, when invited to join in a
+harmless conspiracy, had preferred to do actually, to the tune of eight
+thousand dollars, what the grasping creature should have been satisfied
+with merely appearing to do. The happiness that pierced through Manlio's
+calm, like a strong light through pale marble, came to him from the
+bride elect's aunt, and Aurora felt robbed.
+
+But Mrs. Foss's hand found hers under the table and gave it a warm
+squeeze, whereupon Aurora's heart swelled in a way it had of doing. When
+such a dilation took place, something simultaneously happened to her
+eyes: the surrounding world was revealed to them as "too lovely for
+anything." Dimples declared her joy.
+
+"Won't somebody have something more?" she asked, with the spoon in her
+hand poised over a bowl still half full of chicken mayonnaise.
+
+But every one was done with eating; all were in haste to go down on to
+the floor and find amusement, perhaps adventure, amid the fluctuating,
+fascinating crowd.
+
+The box was fairly deserted when the door opened again, and the eyes of
+those left in it, turning to see who entered, were met by two unknown
+maskers.
+
+One wore the costume of a _bravo_ of old times, picturesque,
+disreputable, an operatic _Sparafucile_ in tattered mantle and
+ragged plume. The other was in a black satin domino, and had the face of
+a crow, a great black beak projecting from a black mask.
+
+They stood a little way inside of the door as if waiting to be
+addressed. There was silence for a moment, while the others waited
+likewise. Within the eye-holes of their masks the eyes of the intruders
+glittered in the glassy, baffling way of eyes behind masks.
+
+Aurora, unused to the mode of procedure at a _veglione_, asked
+helplessly in a whisper of Landini:
+
+"What shall I say to them?"
+
+He spoke for her then, in Italian, because he thought it probable that
+these were Florentines who had come into a strange box for a lark.
+
+"Good evening," he said. "Will you speak, or sing, and let us know what
+we can do for your service?"
+
+The bravo, lifting two long hands in loose and torn black gloves,
+rapidly made signs, like the deaf and dumb.
+
+"You speak too loud," said Gerald. "We are deafened. Let the lady
+speak."
+
+The black domino, with a shrug of the shoulders and a gesture of
+black-gloved hands excusing the limitations of a bird, answered by a
+simple caw.
+
+Aurora now found her tongue and her cue:
+
+"And is it yourselves?" she burst in rollickingly. "Proud to meet you!
+Will you partake?"
+
+With a hospitable sweep of the arm, intelligible to speakers of any
+language, she made them free of her supper-table, where the candles
+still twinkled over an appetizing abundance.
+
+Gerald watched sharply, saying to himself: "If they accept, we shall at
+least see their chins."
+
+But upon the invitation _Sparafucile_, with farcical demonstrations
+of greed, reached forth his long fingers in the flapping gloves, seized
+cakes, white grapes, mandarins, nuts, and stuffed them into his wide
+pockets; while the black domino grasped the neck of a bottle of
+champagne and possessed herself of a glass. A caw of thanks issued from
+the black beak, and from the bravo, as with their booty the two
+retreated to the door, there proceeded, as unexpected as upsetting, a
+whoop of rejoicing so loud that those near him fell back as if from the
+danger of an explosion. In the midst of this consternation the maskers
+were gone.
+
+"My land! did you hear that?" cried Aurora, who had clapped both hands
+over the pit of her stomach. "Goodness! he's scared the liver-pin out of
+me! Who d'you suppose they were?"
+
+Landini lost not another minute before asking Mrs. Hawthorne if they
+should go down together for a turn.
+
+Gerald had been on the point of asking the same thing. He had almost
+uttered the first word when Landini anticipated him. He felt a sharp
+prick of annoyance with himself for not having been quicker as much as
+with Landini for having been so quick. A little jealousy was quite in
+order with regard to Mrs. Hawthorne now, on the simple ground of that
+more intimate footing of friendship established between them by the
+portrait. With the expression of courteous mournfulness proper in an
+outrivaled cavalier, he made the gesture silently of having been at the
+lady's service. Manlio did the same.
+
+The singular blonde, with Nubian lip and Parisian hair, Miss Deliverance
+Jones, or, more commonly, Livvy, who spent this evening at the farther
+end of the box making her own reflections on the European doings of
+which she got glimpses, held up a white satin domino for her mistress's
+arms. Gerald precipitated himself, took it from the maid and held it in
+her place. He tried to meet his friend's glance, hoping for some
+faintest sign of participation in his regret at not having been
+"spryer." For the space of a second, just before she fastened on her
+mask, he caught her eye. Brief and bright as the illumination of summer
+lightning, a look of fun flashed over her face. She winked at him.
+
+Landini ceremoniously held his arm for her and Gerald saw them leave
+together with a lessened objection.
+
+Gerald had for some time past suspected that Landini was paying court to
+Mrs. Hawthorne. Whether the lady were aware of it he could not tell.
+Gerald had not believed the man had a chance, although, women being
+incalculable, one can never feel quite easy. But now he could almost
+have found it in himself to pity the somewhat singular man--Italian in
+fact, English in manner, Oriental in looks,--if so were he had built up
+any little practical dream on the fair widow's acceptance of him. To the
+possibility of a sentimental dream Gerald did not accord one single
+thought.
+
+He seated himself, to wait for their return. Only Manlio was left in the
+box besides himself. Manlio, consecrated to the worship of one afar,
+cared little to mix with the profane and noisy multitude. As Gerald
+leaned forth to see the couple that had just left them reappear
+down-stairs, Manlio, whose eyes followed his, remarked very sincerely,
+when the large easily-recognized white domino came into sight "_È
+buona_!" which can be translated either, "She is kind," or "She is
+good."
+
+Gerald felt the warmth of an increased liking for him, because of the
+perspicacity he showed. They lighted cigarettes, and together looked
+over the marvelous scene, so rich in color and life, while they talked
+of things that bore no relation to it, serious things and
+manly--politics.
+
+Charlie came in with Francesca, who at the door doffed her domino and
+mask. Both, heated from dancing, were ready for a rest and a little more
+of the Champagne-cup.
+
+"By the way, Gerald," said Charlie, "that's a jolly good painting, old
+chap, you made of our charming hostess."
+
+"Glad you like it!" answered Gerald carelessly, without irony.
+
+He did not at the moment dislike Charlie.
+
+He was genially inclined to-night toward all the world. While he had
+been tying on his white cravat before the glass in preparation for the
+_veglione_, it had dawned on him, to his surprise and glimmering
+relief, that he felt something resembling pleasure in the prospect of
+the confused and promiscuous affair he was enlisted for. He had
+constated that something like normal responsiveness to the common
+exterior solicitations to enjoyment was returning to his spirit, his
+nerves. The tang of life was pleasant to his palate.
+
+A dim gladness moved him, as at coming across a precious thing one had
+supposed lost, in remembering that he was young....
+
+He laid all this to the mere passage of time, and thanked the gods that
+unless one dies of one's hurts one finally recovers.
+
+Under these circumstances it is conceivable that he should not
+momentarily feel hate or impatience toward any fellow-passenger on the
+amusing old Ship of the World.
+
+Scraps of poetry stirred in the wells of memory where they are dropped
+and lost sight of. "I feel peaceful as old age," he quoted.
+
+But his eye falling on the white carnation which Giovanna, knowing her
+signorino was going _in serata_, had provided for his buttonhole,
+lines less grey came to his lips: "_Neque tu choreas_...." He
+fished for the half-forgotten words. "_Donec virenti canities
+abest...._"
+
+Because a positive sense of health pervaded him, he, with a philosophy
+founded upon observation, remarked that by this sign no doubt he was on
+the verge of an illness. But he absentmindedly neglected the practices
+preventive of misfortune, believed in not solely by the _popolino_
+of Italy, but recommended to him in boyhood by the excellent physician
+who after curing his mumps had taught him to make horns with his fingers
+against calamity of any sort that might threaten.
+
+So, being in a good humor, and made further contented by the uplifting
+privilege of a broad unmistakable wink from a lady, he did not dislike
+Charlie as usual; he even, as he looked at him, lustrous-eyed,
+clear-skinned, smooth, lighting his cigarette at a candle, wondered why
+one should not like him. He had his good qualities. Mere vitality is
+one. Those points of conduct that called upon him the disdain of persons
+more fastidious with regard to their actions, secret or revealed, than
+he, were not productive, after all, of much harm....
+
+With eyes narrowed, as when he was examining a face to paint it, Gerald
+watched the handsome fellow in an animated cousinly dispute with
+Francesca--with the result, really against his hope, of finding himself,
+instead of aided by his effort of good-will to discover new virtues,
+confirmed in his previous disesteem. He could make himself almost love
+Charlie by picturing him afflicted, humiliated, sorrowful. But he could
+not picture him sorrowful except for narrowly personal misfortunes, such
+as poverty, sickness. One could not even be sure, with a face of so
+little generosity or moral consciousness as Charlie's, that he would
+under all circumstances be incapable of active malignity....
+
+The latter thought Gerald had the justice to sweep aside with an
+unspoken apology.
+
+"Of course, you, Charlie, never could admit that a cousin and a female
+might know better than you!" Francesca was contending noisily. "It
+happens that I have lately looked up, with some care, the costumes of
+the _trecento_...."
+
+"My dear girl!" interrupted Charlie. "You will be insisting next that an
+_incroyable_ is a Greek, or that creature, that sort of Italian
+bandit who gave the disgusting roar, is a French marquis.... Lend me
+your glass, will you? I think I see some one I know."
+
+"It's Trix," he said after a moment, "making signs to us from the
+Sartorio's box. They want us to come over. Come on, let's go."
+
+Manlio and Gerald were again left alone in the silent company of the
+pale coffee-with-milk-colored maid, who unnoticed crept nearer and
+nearer the front of the box to peep at the brilliant house.
+
+Gerald was beginning to think that Landini kept Mrs. Hawthorne rather
+longer than was fair when the door opened to let them in, with Estelle
+and Leslie and Percy and Doctor Baldwin, all laughing together.
+
+"Well, have you intrigued any one?" Gerald asked Aurora.
+
+"Me? Oh, _I_ wouldn't be up to any such pranks," she said. "Has any
+one been intriguing you?"
+
+"I haven't been down, Mrs. Hawthorne. I have stayed quietly here, hoping
+to go down with you, if you will be so good, merely intriguing myself
+meanwhile--" he dropped his voice so as to be heard of her only,--"with
+wondering what kept you so awfully long."
+
+"Interesting company, funny sights."
+
+"Are you too tired to come down again and give me a dance?"
+
+"Bless your soul, I'm not tired, but I'm going home."
+
+"_Going home?_"
+
+"Man, do you know what time it is?"
+
+"I know, of course. But you can't mean you are going home. You only came
+at midnight, and it's less than half-past two. Hosts of people stay
+until the big chandelier goes out."
+
+"Ah, don't try to talk me over! It's time I sought my downy, if I want
+to get up in the morning. We're going to begin Lent like good girls,
+Estelle and I, by going to church."
+
+Gerald was certain these excuses were hollow. It was obvious, at the
+same time, that Mrs. Hawthorne was bent on leaving. He was vexed. He
+wondered what her real reason was, as men so often do, after women have
+taken pains to give them in detail their reasons, and tried, ignoring
+what she said, to get some light from her face.
+
+It looked to him excited in a smothered way. He at once connected this
+repressed excitement with Landini; but then, the face was mirthful, too,
+in the same lurking manner, and the proposals of a serious man could
+hardly affect even the most frivolous quite like a comic valentine.
+
+He finally preferred the simplest interpretation: she had seen as much
+as she wanted to; she was prosaically sleepy and going home to bed.
+
+"Good night," she said. "Come soon to see us! Adieu; no,
+_ory-vwaw_."
+
+"Am I not permitted to take you to your carriage?"
+
+After seeing them tucked in their snug coupé and hearing this wheel off,
+Gerald returned to the great hall. He without question would remain
+until the big light was extinguished. Colors, forms, sparkle, golden
+haze--a painter must be dead or a duffer to leave before the gay glory
+of it faded and was dispersed in the gray dawn.
+
+The scene viewed from near had its cheapness, its crudity, like those
+poor painted faces of the dancers pirouetting in the midst of a public
+they can more surely enchant from the distance of the stage. The
+costumes, so many of them, came from humble costumers who let them from
+year to year without renewal of the tinsel or freshening of the ribbons.
+But those very things gave to this page of life its depth of interest,
+gave reality to this romance.
+
+The ball was taking a slightly rougher, noisier character as it
+approached the end. Some of the boxes were darkened, but the floor was
+full, even after the tired _ballerine_ had been permitted by the
+management to go home.
+
+Gerald himself now became one of the slightly bored-looking men he had
+observed earlier, strolling about, _claque_ under arm, in the rigid
+black and white which took on an effect of austerity amid the
+blossom-colors of the costumes. He sincerely hoped no one would approach
+him to intrigue him, and the hope found expression, more than he knew,
+in his countenance. He felt unable to meet such an adventure in a manner
+that would satisfy his taste. It marked a fundamental difference between
+him, at bottom a New-Englander, and his friends of Latin blood, he
+thought, that he had not the limberness, the laisser-aller, the lack of
+self-consciousness and stupid shame, which enables them so
+good-humoredly to take the chance of appearing fools. And so before this
+romance he was only a reader; they were it--the romance.
+
+He could deplore his own gray rôle, but not change it; he therefore
+wished anew, every time a merry masker looked as though she might intend
+accosting him that she would think better of it and leave him in
+deserved neglect. He had his wish; he was in the whole evening teased by
+nobody whatever.
+
+His eyes, straying over the crowd, sought for known faces. All Florence
+had turned out for the occasion, but some of it had by this time gone
+home. Most of the men he knew had women on their arms, and from their
+silence or talkativeness one might without undue cynicism determine
+whether these were their own wives and daughters or wives and daughters
+of others.
+
+A tall, gray-whiskered old gentleman in uniform passed him--none other
+than Antonia's friend, General Costanzi--who was trying to retain all
+his dignity while beset by two frolicsome little creatures looking like
+the chorus in "Faust," who, suspended one on each of his arms, were
+trying to win from him a promise to take them to supper. He sent toward
+Gerald a look of comical long-suffering, to which Gerald replied by a
+nod vaguely congratulatory, and a smile that courteously wished him luck
+in that lottery.
+
+The painter Castagnola, broad-blown, debonair, passed him, in a costume
+of sterling and royal magnificence, copied from a portrait of Francis
+First whom he in feature resembled. At his side, with gold cymbals in
+her hands, went a figure in floating robes of daffodil gauze, a dancer
+from one of the frescoes of Pompeii, wearing a mask--four inches of
+black velvet--only for the form. Her bare shoulders and arms, of an
+insolent beauty, forbade any mistake as to her identity. Gerald knew,
+like the rest, that it was Castagnola's model.
+
+Charlie passed him, at a little distance, with a laughing lady hitched
+to his elbow. Her mask swung from her hand--the ball was wearing to its
+end, and masks are hot. The hood of her rose-colored domino had been
+pushed back from a mass of ruffled black hair; her eyes and teeth
+gleamed with equal brightness and directness of purpose. It was
+suggested to Gerald by her air and manner that she had forgotten the
+spectators. Her freedom from constraint was shared by Charlie. Seeing
+them together reminded Gerald that Charlie was after all Italian,--one
+forgot it sometimes. He tried to remember which of the bits of scandal
+tossed on to the dust-heap at the back of his memory was the one fitting
+this Signora Sartorio.
+
+They passed out of sight, and he forgot them in the interest of the next
+thing.
+
+Carlo Guerra, like him alone, stopped to chat with him. Guerra, a
+pleasant figure in Anglo-American as well as Florentine circles, with
+his fine head of a monk whom circumstances have rendered worldly, had,
+before inheriting his comfortable income, been a journalist. He still
+enjoyed above all things the exercise of the critical faculty, and had
+much to say this evening about a recent exhibition of paintings.
+
+Gerald was hearing it with proper interest when some part of his
+attention was drawn away by a sound across the house. It was, softened
+by distance, that species of lion's roar, incredibly large as issuing
+from a human throat, and comical from such a disproportion, which had
+startled the audience several times already that evening. Gerald turned,
+without much thinking, to look off in the direction whence it came and
+single out the figure with which it was associated, when he was
+surprised to find the figure he sought almost under his nose. Not more
+than six feet from him were to be seen the tattered mantle and ragged
+plume of _Sparafucile_; likewise the thick crow's-beak of the black
+domino.
+
+The two were looking at him and, his impression was, laughing. He
+fancied they were on the point of speaking to him,--he had thought
+earlier in the evening when they came into the box that they might be
+acquaintances,--but the crow suddenly pressed tittering against the
+bandit, pushing and pulling him away. In a moment they were lost among
+the crowd.
+
+Who, then, had been accountable for the roar at the other end of the
+house? An imitator? A double? Gerald suspected a masked-ball device
+intended to intrigue. He gave it no more thought, but proceeded, started
+on that line by the episode, to reflect on the singularity, yes, the
+crassness, of Mrs. Hawthorne's determination to leave the ball early.
+The secret of it was, of course, that she had no imagination, no
+education of the imagination. A _veglione_ was caviar to her. This
+wonderful scene, beheld for the first time, perhaps the only time in
+life, and she had had to go to bed just as if they had been in Boston or
+Charlestown! If one must go to church in such a case, it was Gerald's
+opinion, one does not go to bed at all. But she belonged to the class of
+people who would miss the last act of an opera rather than miss a train
+or allow the beans to burn. A bread-and-butter person, a sluggish,
+fat-brained person, elementary, not awakened and sharpened to
+appreciation and wonder. If he had not been in such a good humor he
+might have been cross, scornful of her; as it was, he indulgently
+thought her merely too flatly healthy in every taste for anything but
+the wilds of Cape Cod to which she sometimes playfully referred.
+
+He here perceived that he had entirely lost the thread of Guerra's talk,
+and that Guerra, probably aware of it, had moved to another subject. It
+was hearing the name Hawthorne that had startled him to attention.
+
+"I saw you earlier in the evening in a box with Mrs. Hawthorne," Guerra
+said, "whom, you remember, I had the pleasure of meeting at Mrs.
+Grangeon's."
+
+After considering a moment with a half-smile, he nodded and pronounced
+in the tone of an impartial critic, "_Simpatica_!" Then, after
+considering another moment, nodded again. "_Ha gli occhi di donna
+buona._" Which means, or nearly, "She has good eyes." And Gerald's
+esteem for Guerra was immensely raised, for while thinking very well of
+him, he would yet not have expected a man like Guerra to discern so much
+at a first meeting. A worldling like Guerra might so naturally have said
+"_È bella_!" for Aurora that evening in her best frock, had been
+_bella_--beautiful; or he might have said, "_Begli occhi_!"
+for her shining blue eyes admitted of that description. That Guerra had
+said what he said indicated finer feeling than Gerald had given him
+credit for.
+
+Still lingering in desultory talk, the former journalist now asked:
+
+"Have you seen the Grangeon?"
+
+"No," said Gerald. "Is she here?"
+
+"Yes; she is with the Rostopchine, in a box of the third order." He
+looked up and around to find the box with his eyes, and after a moment
+indicated it to Gerald. "There! Do you see them? The Rostopchine in pale
+purple, and the Grangeon in an Indian thing all incrusted with green
+beetle-wings, a thing for a museum. They are talking with a uniform whom
+I do not know. She was speaking of you this evening--Antonia, asking me
+what you are doing. She has great faith in your talent."
+
+Gerald's lip curled a little sourly, and he stood looking upward without
+reply.
+
+Turning to look down through her jeweled lorgnette and running her eyes
+over the crowd, Antonia now saw him. Recognition lighted her face to
+unexpected liveliness. She fluttered her hand to him demonstratively.
+
+After bowing and smiling, he stood quietly, with face upturned,
+receiving her showered greetings.
+
+He had a certain knowledge of Antonia. She was capable of entirely
+dropping the remembrance of her bad treatment of him; perhaps forgetting
+it really, but likelier choosing merely that he should forget it. She
+permitted herself the caprices of a spoiled beauty.
+
+A classic golden fillet this evening bound her gray locks; a jewel
+depending from it sparkled upon the deeply lined forehead of a
+brain-worker. Her irreparably withered neck was clasped by an Indian
+necklace, showy as a piece of stage jewelry. Light-minded smiles
+wreathed her heavy face. Where her sleeves stopped there began the soft
+and serried wrinkles of those long, long buttonless gloves which Sarah
+Bernhardt had brought into fashion.
+
+It was not difficult to see in what illusion Antonia chose to live
+to-night. Her readers might even, perhaps, have determined which of her
+own heroines she personated.
+
+For all these things Gerald liked his old friend the more.
+
+Her lips framed the words, "Come up! Come up!" while her hand made the
+equivalent signs.
+
+He nodded assent, and with Guerra walking beside him started on his way.
+Guerra under the central box excused himself and turned back, having
+already paid his respects. Gerald, once out in the lobby, advanced more
+uncertainly, finally hesitated and stopped.
+
+He was not sure he wished to see Antonia in circumstances which would
+not allow him to express his resentment of her behavior toward the
+friend whom with her formal permission he had brought to her house. It
+was owed to Mrs. Hawthorne not to let the incident pass. He had ceased
+to be furious at Antonia; he had not written in cold blood the wrathful,
+finishing letter planned in heat of brain. That, after all, was Antonia
+as he had always known her and been her friend: Antonia, capable of
+heroisms and generosities, fineness and insight, density and petulance.
+One could not drop the great woman into the waste-basket because on one
+occasion more she had been perverse and the sufferer happened to be
+oneself. But the great woman, thought Gerald, needed a sober word spoken
+to her. In conclusion, he would not go to see her, no, until he could
+have it out with her.
+
+And so instead of seeking Antonia in her box, Gerald cut short his
+difficulty by going home. It was high time; it had been Lent for hours.
+If Antonia were _intrigata_ at his failure to appear, it would only
+be in keeping with the fanciful circumstances of the hour and place.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+
+Early in Lent the weather treated Florence to what Aurora and Estelle
+called a cold snap. Their surprise and indignation were extreme. That
+Italy, sunny Italy, should feel herself free to have these alpine or
+polar fancies!
+
+Estelle showed what she thought of it by taking cold. Aurora affected
+wearing her furs in the house. To increase their sense of ill usage,
+they would now and then turn their faces away from the fire and sigh,
+admiring how the air was dimmed by a puff of silver smoke. These
+pilgrims from a Northern climate, who knew so well the sensation of
+breath freezing in the nostrils and numbness seizing the nose when on
+certain winter days they stepped from their houses into the snow-piled
+streets at home, could not admit that in the City of Flowers one should
+catch sight of one's breath,--indoors, too.
+
+The little monthly roses, shivering but brave, blooming still, or
+blooming already, out in the garden, bore witness, after all, to the
+clemency of the winter, and upheld the city's title to its name. The
+garden altogether was nearly as green as ever. Against alaternus, ivy,
+myrtle, laurestine the season could not prevail. Aurora decided that the
+blame for their discomfort rested with the house; she planned drastic
+and fundamental improvements which it was quite certain the noble
+landlord would not permit her to carry out.
+
+What with Estelle being half sick and herself, as she claimed, half
+frozen, Aurora at the end of a day during which the sun had not lighted
+the world by one feeblest ray, and the night had closed down thick and
+damp, was just a little disposed to low spirits. She had not been out,
+and nobody had come to see her. She felt the weariness that follows for
+certain sociable natures upon a long stretch of hours without renewal
+from outside.
+
+She sensibly reacted against it by making the sitting-room as cozy as
+she could, drawing close the crushed-strawberry curtains, piling wood on
+the fire, placing a screen so that it shielded her chair and table from
+the draft; and, seated in her chimney-corner, took up a piece of
+knitting.
+
+She was not very fond of reading, and she was fond of knitting large
+soft woolly afghans, of which she made presents to her friends. Reading
+seemed to her, anyhow, a rather idle thing to be doing. Knitting came
+under the head of work. How often had her story-paper been snatched from
+her when she was a girl, and a sock to knit thrust in her hand, with the
+bidding to be about something useful. How she had hated it. But now that
+she was free she still had a better conscience when she knit.
+
+To the click of her long wooden needles she thought, with more pleasure
+than was afforded by any other vision at the moment, of a hot water
+bottle gently warming the bed into which she meant to creep at exactly
+nine o'clock. This hour she had set when at eight already the temptation
+to go to bed and forget the unsatisfactory day in sound warm slumbers
+had been so strong as to make yielding to it appear wrong.
+
+These vestiges of Puritanism Aurora did not recognize as such, but yet
+her mind as she was practicing self-discipline turned, without seeking
+for the reason, toward the person who had done most to inculcate in her
+the doctrine that if you like to do a thing that itself is almost surely
+a sign of the thing being wicked, and that if you dislike it it is very
+probably your duty.
+
+While she continued to appear the signora to whom the servants' eyes
+were accustomed, albeit a trifle more absent and unsmiling, she was to
+herself a young girl in a far country, living and moving in scenes of
+difficulty and misunderstanding with a sharp-chinned, narrow-chested,
+timidly-beloved just woman--her mother, long since laid to rest....
+
+There was nothing from outside to dispel the faint heartache
+accompanying this retrospection; wind and rain against the windows were
+more proper to increase the melancholy, and Aurora, suddenly sick of
+staying up to be blue, wound her yarn to start for bed. But first, for
+just a moment, she would go down-stairs, she thought, and have a look at
+her portrait, for that was the most comforting thing to do that she
+could think of. She loved her portrait as a child loves its favorite
+toy.
+
+This she was intending when the sound of the door-bell at once stopped
+and cheered her by the possibility it held out of some diversion. Vitale
+entered with a package.
+
+Catching in what he said the name Gaetano, Aurora took it to mean that
+Gaetano had brought the package. He was waiting below, she did not
+doubt. Gaetano was Giovanna's nephew, and had more than once come on
+errands from Gerald. Saying, "_Aspettare_!" she hastened into her
+room for the porte-monnaie which resided in her top drawer. From this
+she drew a reward that should make the journey through night and rain
+from Gerald's house to hers seem no hardship. Her blues had vanished.
+
+Before removing the rain-splashed newspaper, she gazed for a moment at
+the package, trying to guess what it could be. It was square, flat,
+about a foot and a half one way by a foot the other. What was Gerald
+Fane sending her like that without any enlightening missive? A note
+might be inside. She cut the string, took off the newspaper, to find a
+second wrapper of clean white drawing-paper. After touching and
+pinching, she guessed the object to be a picture-frame and picture.
+Filled with curiosity, she pulled off the last wrapping, and with a face
+at first very blank stared before her....
+
+It was a painting, one of the kind she had seen at Gerald's studio and
+not liked.
+
+Different though it was from the portrait down-stairs,--as different as
+poverty from riches, as twilight from day,--she could yet see that this
+also was meant for a portrait of herself. She remembered tying that blue
+neckerchief over her head and under her chin one evening, trying to look
+like an Italian in her _pezzola_, to make the others laugh.
+
+She stood the picture on the chair which she had pulled up before her so
+as to rest her feet on the rung, off the stone floor, still to be felt,
+she imagined, through the rug. Of course it was herself, but how
+disappointing--disappointing enough to shed tears over--to have this
+held up to her after that lovely being down-stairs! How unkind of her
+friend Gerald!
+
+Unfair, too, for although this, in not being a beauty, was obviously
+more like her than the other, she could not admit that it was any truer.
+She could not believe that she ever really looked like this, though she
+knew that it was the way she sometimes felt. How had Gerald known she
+ever felt like this?
+
+That she was a person who ate well, slept well, felt well, loved fun,
+was giving and gay--that was all most people knew, or were entitled to
+know, of her; all she knew of herself a good deal of the time. Such
+things could never be the whole of any person, of course. Every one has
+had something to overcome. Some persons have had to overcome and
+overcome and overcome, one thing after another, one thing after another,
+that has tried to drag and keep them down. She had had--probably
+because, as her mother often told her, she was born with such a lot of
+the devil in her--a great many trials sent to her, for her discipline,
+no doubt, her cleansing; but she had come out of them still unreduced,
+still eager for a good time.
+
+All persons are made up, in a way, of these experiences of the past, but
+they don't expose them in their faces, they forget them as much as they
+can.
+
+Yes, as much as they can. How much is that? The only true sorrows being
+involved with one's affections, and the objects of one's love never far
+from one's thoughts, how much could a person be said to forget her
+sorrows, really?
+
+Aurora reflected upon this for some time, staring the while at her
+portrait. The face looking back from the canvas was very like her, had
+she but known it, at this exact moment, while the thoughts produced, the
+memories wakened, by it substituted for her ordinary hardiness the
+delicate look of a capacity for pain.
+
+As she gazed at the portrait longer she liked it better; from minute to
+minute she became more reconciled, and found herself finally almost
+attracted. Something from it penetrated her for which she had no
+definition. It was perhaps the dignity of humanity confronting her in
+that strong and simple face framed by the kerchief, like a woman of the
+people's,--her own face, but not certainly as she saw it in the mirror;
+a humanity that out of the common materials offered to it day by day had
+rejected all that was mean and contrived to build up nobleness.
+
+Half perceiving that this portrait in its different way flattered her as
+much if not more than the portrait down-stairs, she, while modestly
+refusing to be fooled by the compliment, yet felt a motion of
+affectionate gratitude toward Gerald for the sympathy which had enabled
+him to pierce beneath the surface and see that Bouncing Betsy had her
+feelings, too, her history; yes, her bitter tragedy.
+
+While continuing with her eyes on the picture, she from time to time
+wiped them, and when the door-bell rang again, aware of being "a sight,"
+took the precaution of retiring to her bedroom, so that if Vitale should
+come to announce a visit,--it was not yet nine o'clock,--she could the
+better make him understand that he must excuse her to the visitor; she
+was going to bed.
+
+But learning from the servant that Signor Fane was below, she changed
+her mind, and chose unhesitatingly from her stock of useful infinitives
+the appropriate two: "_Dire venire_."
+
+Gerald found her by the fire, her fur-cloak over her shoulders, her
+woolly afghan in her hands, and the picture on the chair before her.
+
+"Well?" he asked expectantly, looking at it, too, after they had shaken
+hands.
+
+"You've made me feel sorry for myself. What's the use?" she answered in
+a little sigh, keeping her reddened eyes turned away from him. "Hush!
+Wait a moment! I was forgetting," she added, in comedy anticlimax, like
+a housewife who in the midst of a scene of sentiment should smell the
+dinner scorching. She jumped up, and went without the least noise to
+close the door to Estelle's room, returning from which she illogically
+fell to talking in a whisper.
+
+"Estelle's gone to bed. She's got a snow-balling old cold. I've rubbed
+her chest with liniment, and tied up her throat in a compress, and given
+her hot lemonade, and she lies there with a hot water bottle at her feet
+and grease on her nose, and let's hope she'll feel better in the
+morning."
+
+"Let's hope, indeed. I'm very sorry to hear she's ill. But she's sure to
+be better by to-morrow, isn't she, with all that care and those
+remedies. I hope you haven't a cold, too, Mrs. Hawthorne. You almost
+look," he said innocently, "as if you had. This weather is dreadful. You
+haven't, have you, dear friend?"
+
+"No; I guess what you see is just that I've been crying. Don't say
+anything about it. Don't notice it. Never mind. Come and sit down by the
+fire and get warm. Your hand was like ice."
+
+"It's very bad out, and not much better in, except here by your generous
+fireside. I haven't been warm all day."
+
+"Why didn't you come before? It isn't what I call balmy here, but I
+expect it's balmier than at your place."
+
+With her kindly unconstraint she reached for one of his hands to test
+its temperature. With a little cry of "Mercy me!" she closed his numb
+fingers between her palms to warm them, as if the blaze could not have
+accomplished this end so well as they.
+
+He let it be, not with the same unconsciousness in the matter as she,
+but hoping that the soft, warm infolding would somehow do him good. He
+had come in the rather desperate hope of being done good to. As he had
+been about to start out, having intended, when he sent the portrait, to
+follow close upon it, he had found himself feeling so ill--feeling, at
+the end of the dismal day, so indescribably burdened and ill and
+apprehensive of worse things--that he had been on the point of giving it
+up. But then the wish itself to escape from his bad feelings had
+impelled him forth toward the spot glowing warmer and cheerier in his
+thoughts than any other, where, if he could forget how ill he felt, he
+would naturally feel better. Aurora's house during the days of painting
+the first portrait had come to feel remarkably like home to him.
+
+So when Aurora released his hand, saying, "Let's have the other," he
+docilely gave it to her, though the fire had already partly thawed it.
+Gratefully, with the hand set free, he covered both her kind hands,
+which loved so much to warm things and feed things and pet things and
+give away money.
+
+Overcoming his ordinary stiffness, he pressed them right manfully, to
+signify that he would not speak of her tears if she wished him not to,
+but here was his sympathy, and with it his penitence, if so were that,
+as she intimated, he had had a share in making them flow.
+
+"So you are all alone this evening?" he asked in the voice that makes
+whatever is said seem affectionate and comforting.
+
+"Yes. I haven't even Busteretto. I let Estelle keep him on the foot of
+her bed. She's perfectly devoted to him. And Clotilde is busy in her own
+corner of the house, going over the bills. It takes lots of time."
+
+"And where is the musician in ordinary, the gifted Italo?" he inquired,
+with a smile meant to draw from her a smile.
+
+She was caught without difficulty. "The gifted Checkerberry hasn't been
+round lately," she smiled. "He won't expose himself to the night air for
+some time. He's got laryngitis so he can't talk above a whisper." Her
+eye twinkled and she laughed, though what she communicated was not on
+the face of it very funny.
+
+He was perhaps calling attention to this when he said, "Poor devil!"
+
+"Yes," she agreed, achieving sobriety, "it's bad weather for
+laryngitis," and went on with the weather, dropping Italo. "It's been a
+mean sort of day, hasn't it? I haven't set foot outside. I was already
+feeling kind of blue and making up my mind to go to bed when Gaetano
+came with your present."
+
+There was an intimation in her glance that this event had not made the
+world appear any rosier.
+
+Both turned to look at the picture. Their hands loosened naturally; they
+sat apart.
+
+"Can't you see why I had to paint it, Mrs. Hawthorne?" he asked,
+speaking eagerly, and as if pressing his defense.
+
+"How could I endure to have that thing down-stairs stand as my idea, my
+sole idea, of you? And how could I bear to make you a gift, a sole gift,
+of a piece of work I do not respect? This may be worth no more,--I think
+differently,--but it is at least the best I can produce. It has my
+sanction. You, too, believe me, will prefer it to the other after a
+while."
+
+She shook her head a little disconsolately.
+
+"The other you can, if you must, keep in your drawing-room to make an
+agreeable spot of color," he went on, reversing their parts and trying
+to induce in her a lighter humor; "it has that perfectly legitimate use.
+In your drawing-room, you know, Auroretta, among the pictures of your
+choosing, it does not, in our Italian idiom, altogether disappear. This
+one you will keep out of sight, but will look at now and then, if you
+please; and I quite trust you, with time, to recognize that it was
+painted by some one who understood and honored you more than there was
+any evidence of his doing when he perpetrated, for a joke, that
+bonbon-box subject down-stairs."
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne, with soft and saddened eyes fixed on the portrait, again
+shook her head, sighing, "Poor thing!"
+
+"Not at all!" he protested almost peevishly. "Please not to suggest by
+pitying her that I have not represented there a fine, big, strong thing,
+built to stand up under anything! I could slay, with pleasure, at any
+time"--he diverged, carried away by a long-standing disgust,--"the
+pestiferous asses who call my things morbid. I am too careful to keep
+true to what I see. The difference between them--I mean the critics who
+call me morbid--and myself, is in the degree of sight."
+
+"Don't get excited, Geraldino!" she checked fumings which she did not
+entirely understand. "What I meant was that looking at her has made me
+think of all the things that have gone wrong with me in my whole life.
+Don't you call that a tribute? You couldn't have painted this picture if
+you hadn't suspected those things, and, honest, I don't see how you
+could suspect them. Ever since I came over here I've been so jolly.
+Seems to me I've been nothing but jolly. I've been having such a good
+time! How you could see under it, I don't know. As a matter of fact,
+I've always been jolly between-times. Give me half a chance, let me get
+out of the frying-pan, I'd be ready in a minute to go on a picnic. But
+I've not been spared my troubles, Geraldino; you were right there."
+
+At this reference to many sorrows, he found a thing to do more
+expressive than words. Sitting near each other as they were, he could
+reach her without rising; he bent forward and touched his lips
+commiseratingly to her hand.
+
+He might have known that it would bring her story, but he had not
+schemed for this, and, unwilling, yet eager, to hear, was a prey to
+compunctions on more than one ground when, after a little gulp and
+sniff, she burst forth:
+
+"I've seen perfectly dreadful times, Geraldino. Some of them were the
+sort of thing you can get over, but some of them--upon my word, I wonder
+at myself how I've got over them as I have. The queer thing is--I
+haven't, in a way. It will come over me sometimes, in the queerest
+places, at the oddest moments, that I am still that woman to whom such
+awful things happened, that I, playing my silly monkey-shines, am that
+heart-broken woman."
+
+"I know," murmured Gerald, and took her plump hands steadyingly between
+his hard, thin ones.
+
+"I've never had any sense," she let herself go. "Anybody can see that;
+and when I was younger I had even less, naturally, than I have now.
+Always, always, I wanted so to be happy! I wanted to have a good time. I
+was born wanting to have a good time. And everything was against it. But
+I managed somehow. One way or another, I got to the circus 'most every
+time. My mother used to wonder what my finish would be, and try to lick
+the Old Boy out of me. But it couldn't be done. I'm just like my father,
+my dear old pa, who was a sinner. He let ma have her way in everything,
+as he thought it right to do. Not, I guess, because he always liked her
+way, but because after my sister, who was a beautiful child, died in
+such a terrible way that I can't even bear to mention it,--she caught
+fire,"--Aurora hurriedly interjected, "ma came so near going out of her
+senses that pa humored her in everything. He thought the world of her;
+so did we all, but it couldn't be called a happy home. There were three
+boys, besides me,--I was the last,--and we were all such everlastingly
+lively young ones, and ma was so strict! Pa was away most of the time
+getting a living. My pa, you know, was a pilot. It wasn't a fat living
+for so many of us, but that wouldn't have mattered long as we had enough
+to eat. But ma, poor soul, because of that twist her mind had taken
+through sorrow, was always seeing something wrong in everything we did;
+she never could be quiet or contented. The boys didn't get so much of
+it: they were off out of doors and later at their trades; but me, I was
+kept in to help with the housework, and kept in for company, and kept in
+for no other reason, I guess, than because my wicked heart longed so to
+go out and play with the girls and boys. I dare say it was good for me.
+Ma meant all right, that I know, but ma was all along a sick woman. We
+realized later that though she was round and about, busy every minute,
+she was sick for years with the trouble that finally took her away. I
+don't want you to think I didn't have a real good mother, for I did--a
+first-rate mother who did her honest best to make a good woman of me."
+
+"I know, I know." By a reminding pressure of her hands he begged she
+would trust him not to misunderstand.
+
+"But my pa--you should have known my pa!" Aurora's face brightened
+immensely, and Gerald suspected that it was like him she looked when she
+screwed her lips to one side in a manner humorously suggesting a pipe at
+the corner of her mouth, and said in a voice not her own, "Golly, Nell,
+can't you whistle for a snifter?" He could almost see a sailor's
+chin-whiskers.
+
+"He took me with him once in a while. Golly, those were good times, if
+you please! Free as air, all the peanuts I could eat, out in the boat
+with my pa, and catch fish, and catch a steamer if we could. We had an 8
+big as a house on our sail. He was as good a seaman, my pa was, as any
+in East Boston, but he wasn't a hustler. But there, if he'd been a
+hustler, he wouldn't have been my pa. Wouldn't for a house with a
+brownstone front have had my pa any different from what he was. Grandma
+was just the same sort, God bless her! easy-going, jolly, come a day, go
+a day, do as she please and let you do as you please. I used to have
+such lovely times at her house, summers, down on the Cape, before my
+sister died!
+
+"It was there I first knew Hattie--Estelle. Her aunt's house was next to
+my grandma's. I used to think her the luckiest child that ever was born.
+Seemed to me she had just about everything--a gold locket and chain,
+bronze boots, and paper dolls by the dozen. We used to play together,
+day in day out, one of those plays that last all the time, where you
+pretend you're some one else and act it out in all you do. We kept it up
+for years. I don't see that we've changed much with growing up. Seems to
+me we were pretty near the same then as we are now, having our spats,
+but having lots of fun, and wanting to share everything. Estelle lived
+in East Boston, too, and was going to be a school-teacher. It seemed to
+me that to be a school-teacher was just about the finest thing anybody
+could do. That would have been my ambition, to be a school-teacher. But
+I never got beyond the grammar school, I was needed at home to help
+mother. Then my poor pa died--an accident down in the docks,"--Aurora,
+lowering her voice, began to hurry and condense,--"then Ben, then Joe,
+then--will you believe it?--Charlie, that I loved best. They all had the
+same delicate constitution as ma, it turned out, and a predisposition to
+the same trouble. Then finally, after going through with so much, my
+poor mother went, too, and for that I could only be thankful. And I had
+taken care of them all. I wasn't twenty-three when I was the last left.
+Doesn't it seem strange! I sometimes can't believe it even now."
+
+This rapid enumeration of calamities so great robbed them of terror and
+pathos, yet Gerald had somewhat the startled, shocked feeling of a man
+who knows he has been struck by a bullet, though his nerves have not yet
+announced it by suffering.
+
+Aurora, who after the passing of years could think of these things
+without tears, yet in speaking of them to a sympathetic hearer had
+obvious difficulty in keeping a stiff upper lip. Gerald turned away his
+eyes while with her hand she covered and tried to stop her mouth's
+trembling.
+
+"Poor child!" he said, with a sincerity which saved the words from
+insignificance.
+
+"Yes," she half laughed. "Wouldn't one think it enough to sort of subdue
+anybody, take the starch out of them for some time? When I came out of
+that house of sickness I couldn't think of anything else but sickness
+and death. It stuck to me like the smell of disinfectants after you've
+been in a hospital. I couldn't think of anything but that it would take
+me next. I supposed I must be affected, too. But the doctor examined me,
+and do you know what he said? 'Sound as a trout,' he said. 'You're so
+sound,' he said, 'you're so healthy, that we'll have to shoot you to get
+you to the resurrection.' Then I felt better. He was a new doctor that
+we'd called in toward the end. He knew how I was situated, and as he
+seemed to think I'd make a good nurse, he got me a chance in the City
+Hospital, where I could get my training. And Hattie, dear Hattie, what a
+friend she's been! She and her ma and pa made me come and make my home
+with them. It's since then that we've been like sisters."
+
+At the sound, appositely occurring, of a cough in the neighboring room,
+Aurora stopped and listened.
+
+"Dear me!" she whispered. "D'you suppose she's lying awake?"
+
+"She may be coughing in her sleep," he suggested.
+
+"Yes," Aurora said dubiously, after further listening, and hearing
+nothing more. "And if I should go in to see, I might wake her. The
+bell-rope is right at the head of her bed; all she has to do is pull it
+if she wants somebody to come. I was entertaining you with the story of
+my life, wasn't I? Where had I got to? Oh, yes. There in the hospital I
+just loved it. Perhaps you can't see how I could. I just did. I had lots
+of hard work. The training was sort of thrown in in my case with other
+duties, but there were the other nurses and the house-doctors, I grew
+chummy with them all. I had fun with the patients, too. You don't know
+how much good it does you to watch anybody get well; the majority get
+well. It's good for them, besides, to have you jolly."
+
+"Your gaiety of heart makes me think of the grass, Aurora, the blessed
+ineradicable grass, that will grow anywhere, that you see pushing up
+between the paving-stones of the hard city, and finding a foothold on
+the blank of the rock, and fringing the top of the ruined castle, and
+hiding the new-made graves."
+
+Aurora, always simple-mindedly charmed with a compliment, paused long
+enough to investigate Gerald's comparison, then resumed, with the effect
+of taking a plunge into deep waters:
+
+"But it was there I met the fellow who did me the worst turn of any....
+
+"They brought him in with broken ribs one rainy night, after he'd been
+knocked down in the street by a team and kicked by the horses. I wasn't
+his regular nurse, but I was in and out of his room, and if he rang
+while his regular nurse was at her meals, I'd go. Everybody knows that
+when a man's sick he's liable to get sweet on this or that one of his
+nurses.
+
+"How I could have been mistaken in Jim Barton I can't see now. Since
+knowing him, if I ever see anybody that looks a bit like him, I shun
+them like poison, because I know as well as I need to that however nice
+they may appear, you can't depend upon them. But before I knew him I'd
+never stop to distrust anybody.
+
+"It began with our setting up jokes together; he could be awfully funny
+even when he was swearing like a pirate about his luck landing him in a
+hospital. Bad language didn't seem so awful coming from him, because he
+was so light-complexioned and boyish-looking. He was only passing
+through the city, in an awful hurry to get West, when he got hurt, and
+he was madder than a hornet at the delay. But after a while he quieted
+down, because he'd got something else to think about, which was getting
+me to go along with him to California, where he'd bought a share in a
+mine. And me, star idiot of the world, it seemed the grandest thing that
+had ever happened. I'd never had anybody in love with me that way
+before. The boys had always liked me, but I'd been like another fellow
+among them, and I'd never more than just been silly for a week or two at
+a time over one fellow and another at a distance. And here was a solid
+offer from a perfectly splendid man who had everything, money included.
+They'd found several thousand dollars on him when he was picked up. And
+the yarns he told about gold-mines!... But it wasn't that, it wasn't the
+gold-mines, it was 'the way with him' that caught me. I guess when
+you're in love you're no judge of your man. We two, I tell you, seemed
+made for each other. He was as fond of a good time as I, and he loved
+fun, like me. We were going to California to make our everlasting
+fortune. You'd have thought there was no more doubt about it than the
+Gospels being true. And the good times we were going to have while doing
+it were nothing to the good times we'd have after, when I'd have my
+diamonds and he'd have his horses and things. As I said, the diamonds
+weren't needed; I'd have gone with him anywhere just for the fun of
+being together. I couldn't see what I'd done to deserve my blessings. I
+guess he was in love, too, as far as it was in him to be; I'll do him
+that justice.
+
+"Hattie and her ma, while they had nothing to say against Jim, wanted me
+to wait awhile. But Jim couldn't wait. The moment he was well enough he
+wanted to be off. And I didn't care much about waiting either. I felt as
+if I'd known him all my life. So they said nothing more and gave us a
+perfectly lovely wedding from their house. They didn't see through him
+any more than I did, and in a way it wasn't strange, because he wasn't
+hiding anything in particular or misrepresenting anything. He believed
+all he said about the big money he was going to make and the grand times
+we should have. He was born with the sort of nature that always believes
+things are going to turn out right without labor and perseverance on
+your part. He wasn't fond of work, that's sure. What we ought to have
+done was find out something about his past; but even that, I guess,
+wouldn't have opened our eyes, with him before us looking like one of
+ourselves. And it wasn't a very long past; he was young. He came of good
+folks, I guess. I never saw them, but there are ways of telling. Good
+folks, but not wealthy, and so as to get rich easily he had tried one
+thing after another. He was quick' discouraged, and the moment the thing
+didn't look so big or easy he wanted to throw it over and try something
+else. Then I've come to the conclusion he loved change for its own
+sake--go somewhere else, take a new name, and start a new business,
+talking big. It came out after he died that he'd been known under half a
+dozen names in as many States. There simply wasn't anything _to_
+him. I don't believe he meant to act like a skunk, but, then, he hadn't
+any principles either to keep him from acting like a skunk, or meaner
+than a skunk, when it came to getting himself out of difficulty. And I,
+for my sins, had to marry such a fellow as that! It was like there had
+stood the good times I'd always wanted, right before me in the body, and
+I took them for better, for worse, and got what my ma said I deserved to
+get when she tried to cure me of my fancy for good times!"
+
+"Don't!" protested Gerald, softly. "Don't regard as wrong what was so
+natural. All who have the benefit of knowing you must thank the stars
+which permitted your beautiful love of life to survive the dreadfulness
+of which you have given me a glimpse."
+
+"The dreadfulness, Geraldino! I haven't told you anything yet of the
+dreadfulness. I haven't come to it. I haven't come to what makes
+her"--she nodded toward the portrait,--"look like that."
+
+"Then tell me!" he encouraged her.
+
+"It isn't Jim. When I think of Jim, it only makes me mad. My heart is
+hard as stone toward him." She clenched her jaws and looked, in fact,
+rather grim. "That he's dead doesn't change it. I hope I forgive him as
+a Christian ought to who asks forgiveness for her own trespasses. I know
+I don't feel revengeful. There wasn't enough _to_ Jim for me to
+wish him punished in hell. But if you think I have any sentiment because
+I used to love him, or that I was sorry I woke up from my fool dream
+when I once had seen it was a dream--Not a bit of it. There was a time,
+though, when I first began to suspect and understand, that makes me
+rather sick to think of even now. I was so far from home, you see. I
+hadn't a friend, and I wouldn't for worlds have written back to my old
+friends that I'd made a bad bargain--not while I wasn't dead sure. And I
+kept on hoping.
+
+"At first we had a real good time. We lived in a miner's cottage, but
+that seemed sort of jolly. I'd been used to hard work all my life, so I
+didn't mind that, and I wanted him to have as nice a home as any man
+could on the same money. So I cleaned and contrived and baked and brewed
+and fixed up. I wanted him to be pleased with me and proud among the
+other men. But pretty soon I found I didn't care to make acquaintances,
+because I was ashamed of the way Jim did. He kept putting all his money
+into the mine, sending good money after bad, and let me keep house on
+nothing, and then was in a worse and worse temper because the mine
+didn't pan out and things weren't more comfortable at home. I began to
+wake up in the night and lie there in a cold sweat, clean scairt. I
+haven't told you that we were looking for an addition to the family.
+That's one reason I was so scairt. But I shut my teeth, and said I to
+myself, 'This baby's going to have a chance if his mother can give it to
+him by not getting excited or letting things prey on her mind.' So I
+kept a hold on myself and didn't let anything count except guarding that
+baby. I seemed to care more about it than all the rest of the world put
+together. Oh, I can't begin to tell you how much more than for all the
+rest of the world put together. I don't know that a man would
+understand."
+
+"Yes, he would; of course he would," spoke Gerald, gently reverent, yet
+a little impatient; then he qualified his assertion: "He could imagine,
+I mean to say, how you would have felt that way."
+
+"Well, that matter was going to be put safely through, no matter what.
+The first mistake I made was not making friends with my women neighbors,
+so that everybody in Elsinore supposed that Jim's wife was the same
+stripe as he,--or that's what I thought they supposed,--and when I
+needed friends I couldn't think of any to turn to except those at home.
+The other mistake I made was not to write them at home and tell them the
+truth and then wait for them to send me money to come. But I guess my
+mind stopped working when the shock came."
+
+Aurora appeared to brace herself, while decently considering how to
+minimize to her audience the brutality of her next revelation.
+
+"Jim cleared out one night while I was asleep, taking every cent we'd
+got and every last thing he could hope to turn into a cent," she said,
+hardening her voice and lips. Gerald was given a moment in which to
+visualize the situation, before she went on: "I guess, as I said before,
+that I wasn't in my right mind for a spell; all I could think of was
+getting home to my own folks, and I was going to do it somehow, though I
+hadn't a cent. I hadn't even my wedding-ring. I'd put it off because my
+finger had grown fatter, and he'd taken even that to go and try his luck
+somewhere else.--What do you think of it?" she mechanically added.
+
+She was pale, remembering these things. Gerald drew in a long, unsteady
+breath, oppressed.
+
+"I was going to get home somehow," Aurora repeated, "and I wasn't going
+to waste time waiting for anything. And how was I going to do it? I
+don't suppose I really thought; I followed instinct like an animal. I
+hid in a freight-car going East--"
+
+A definite difficulty here stopped Aurora. While she felt for words in
+which to clothe what followed, the images in her mind made her eyes,
+which were not seeing the things actually before them, more descriptive
+of the anguish of remembered scenes than her words were likely to be.
+
+"I'm going to skip all that, Gerald." With a gesture, she suddenly
+rolled up a part of her story and threw it aside. "But when I came to
+see and understand rightly again, weeks after, in a hospital at Denver,
+I cried, oh! how I cried, and didn't care what became of me. Because I'd
+lost him; they hadn't succeeded in saving him. He had lived, mind you,"
+she emphasized with pride--"he had lived a little while, he was all
+right, perfect in every way--a son."
+
+His due of tears was not withheld from the wee frustrated god. Aurora
+gave up talking, so as to have her cry in quietness.
+
+Gerald, holding back a sound of distress, twisted on his chair, not
+daring to recall himself to Aurora's notice either by speaking or
+touching her.
+
+"I'm plain sorry for myself," she explained her tears while trying to
+stop them. "You can't be sorry, for their own sakes, for the little
+children who go back to God without knowing anything of this life's
+troubles. It's for myself I'm sorry. I never can bring up those times
+without the _feeling_ of them coming over me again, and then, as I
+tell you, I'm sorry for that poor fool in her empty house, and then in
+the thundering freight-car, and then in the hospital. I see her outside
+of me just as plain as I would another person. Then, too"--she dried her
+eyes as if this time for good--"I feel a burning here"--she touched her
+breast--"like anger. Angry. I feel angry at being robbed, in a way I
+never seem to get over. To think I might have had him all my life, like
+millions of other women, and I never even saw him! And he was as real to
+me all those months before!... I don't see how I could have loved him
+more than I did. I'm hungry for him sometimes, just as I might be for
+food. And then I'm angry and rebellious. But I couldn't tell you against
+who. It isn't God, certainly. He's our best friend, all we've got to
+rely on. And He's been mighty good to me. There in Denver, when I hadn't
+a friend or a penny, He raised up friends for me and gave me the most
+wonderful luck.
+
+"I stayed right there in Denver till less than a year ago. I guess
+you've heard me speak of the Judge. The doctor in the hospital where
+they carried me was his son; that's how it all came about--friends, good
+luck, money, everything. When I say I found friends, let me mention that
+I found enemies, too, the meanest, the bitterest! I--but there"--she
+interrupted herself as, on the very verge of further confidences, a
+change of mind was effected in her by sudden weariness or by a deterrent
+thought, or both--"I guess I've talked enough about myself for one
+evening. I didn't have a soft time of it there in Denver," she summed up
+the remainder of her story, "but I'd got back to being my old self.
+You'd never have known what I'd been through. I was just about as you've
+known me here. Funny, isn't it,"--Aurora seemed almost ashamed,
+apologetic,--"how the disposition you're born with hangs on?"
+
+"Golden disposition," Gerald commented soothingly. Timid about looking
+directly at her just yet, he looked instead at the portrait, whereon lay
+the shadow of the events just related.
+
+After a little period of thought in silence Aurora said, with the
+shamefaced air she took when venturing to talk of high things:
+
+"I heard a sermon once on the text, 'Mary kept all these things in her
+heart.' The minister said that it wasn't only Mary who did this, but
+ordinary women, so often. And I know from myself how true it is. You see
+a woman all dressed up at a party, laughing with the others, dancing
+perhaps, and she'll be saying inside of herself, 'If baby had lived,
+he'd have been three years old.' Or thirteen, or thirty. I've no doubt
+it goes on as long as she lives. And she can see him before her just as
+plain, as he would have been.... My baby would have been five last
+October."
+
+Gerald remembered how sweet he had always thought it of her to wish to
+stop and fondle little children, often wee beggars, stuffing little
+grimy fists with pennies, not avoiding to touch soiled little cheeks
+with her clean gloves. He had attributed this propensity to a simple
+womanly talent for motherliness.
+
+"I've got this to be thankful for," she came out again from silence,
+farther down along the line of her meditations, "that he did live for a
+few hours. I've got a son, just as much as if he'd grown to be a man."
+She was dry-eyed, almost joyful in this.
+
+"Yes, yes," hurried Gerald, consolingly; "that's what you must always
+think of--that and not the other things. You must lay hold of that
+thought and feel rich in it. But hear me, dear friend--me, trying to
+suggest ways to you of being brave and cheerful! You, who do from
+god-given temperament what I can only see as a right aim of aspiration,
+by light of a certain philosophy arrived at in my own way, through my
+own experiences. Philosophy is not the right word, either; the feeling I
+have is mainly esthetic. In order not to be too unhappy in this world,
+in order to have a little serenity, we must forgive everything, Aurora;
+that is what I have clearly seen. It's the only way. We must forgive
+events just as we forgive persons. And we must love life. I who so much
+of the time hate life, yet know better. We must love it as we must love
+our enemies. The wherefore is a mystery, but peace of heart and beauty
+of life are involved with doing it. We mustn't mind being wounded,
+crucified. We mustn't mind anything, Aurora! We mustn't be angry, the
+gestures of it are ugly. I, who am always being angry, who sometimes
+groan aloud my thoughts are so blasphemously bitter, I am telling you
+what I at bottom know. The game is so unfair, it calls for magnanimity
+on our part to stake handsomely and lose patiently. Patience, that's it!
+We must be patient--patient as a cab-horse! Pride and dignity demand
+that we be patient, absolutely. For the sake of certain beautiful things
+and sweet people in the world, we must give it a good name. But hear me!
+Hear me giving counsels to you--you who without formulating these ideas
+act on them, whilst with me they are things which I see as fit to be
+done but can never hope to do."
+
+"You, too, Gerald, poor boy," was Aurora's simple reply--"you, too, have
+had lots to try you."
+
+He swept aside by a gesture the subject of his trials, removed it
+altogether from the horizon, unwilling really that the interest be
+shifted from her to him. She was equally determined, now that he had
+sympathized with her, to sympathize with him.
+
+"I know you have," she insisted; "I know you've had lots to try you,
+just as you knew that I'd had lots. And you're so high-strung, so
+sensitive ... I never knew anybody like you. But there are good times
+coming for you; I'm sure of it."
+
+"I don't in the least expect them." He laughed a little harshly. He had
+winced at her description of him as sensitive, high-strung. "Dear
+incurable optimist, I don't in the least expect them. It's not because
+there will be compensation that I hold it the decentest thing to put up
+with the _mechancetés_ of fate, fate's ingenious stabs in the
+tender, as they come, without giving the exhibition of one's
+vulnerability, or poisoning one's system with hate!"
+
+"But there will," she continued to insist, "there will be compensations.
+I know it just as well.... You have so much talent, it's perfectly
+wonderful, and it's only a question of time your having the success you
+deserve. I, of course, am not educated up to your paintings, but even I
+am beginning to see something more than I did at first. I can see, for
+instance, that almost any fine painter, with a command of his colors,
+could have done the picture down-stairs, but that only you in the whole
+world could have done this one here. But, I say again, my opinion isn't
+worth anything. But there's Leslie, who knows all about art and such
+things, doesn't she? Well, she 's told me how wonderful you are. From
+what she's told me I'm perfectly sure you'll make your mark in the
+world."
+
+Again Gerald swept her words aside like noxious obscuring cobwebs. "What
+is, few know, and what will be, nobody knows whatever," he said. "But of
+all things, I beg, I beg you will not think of me as a misunderstood
+genius! Art is not a passion with me, it is--an interest. And don't hold
+out for a lure that will reconcile me, my dear friend, anything so
+vulgar as success! The single hope I have, when I am the most hopeful,
+is that simply my metal, my resistance, may never quite fail. I shall
+not have success, dear lady, though in your kindness you predict it. I
+shall go on and on seeing with different eyes from other people, carving
+my cherry-stones in my own way, and made unsociable by the failure of
+others to see how superior my way is. I shall go on growing more
+eccentric and solitary, and call myself lucky quite beyond my merits if
+those particular snares which the devil Melancholy sets for the solitary
+may be escaped, that I may neither drink, nor drug myself, nor shoot
+myself, nor marry the cook!"
+
+"Don't talk like that, Gerald!" cried Aurora. "Don't say anything so
+awful! Now keep still while I talk, listen while I tell you. You're
+going on painting in your own way, but some one--see?--some one is going
+to arise bright enough to recognize how perfectly wonderful your
+pictures are. Keep still. You mustn't despise success, you know, success
+is what everybody needs and wants. You're going to succeed. Keep still.
+Stupid people will want to buy your pictures because the people who know
+about such things have told the public how wonderful they are. Then
+you'll grow rich and famous. You won't be either eccentric or solitary.
+You'll have hosts of admiring friends. I guess you could have them now,
+if you wanted to. You won't be melancholy. You'll be happy. In your home
+there will be a nice wife. Why are you supposing you'll never marry? A
+dear true beautiful girl who thinks the world of you and that you think
+the world of. And when you're an old gentleman with your grandchildren
+playing at your knee, you'll say to yourself, 'Aurora told me so!'"
+
+She was all cheering smiles and dimples again.
+
+"Be sure you remember now," she said, holding up a finger and shaking it
+to mark her bidding, "to say to yourself, 'Aurora told me so!'"
+
+It was a pity almost that Gerald should not have gone home at that
+point. He would have left with undividedly fond and approving feelings;
+he would have left tied to Aurora by a thousand sweet humanities in
+common, as well as impressed afresh by the depth and mysteriousness of
+woman. But he had either forgotten or was disregarding the hour--the
+clock on the mantelpiece, like most ornamental clocks, was not going;
+the bliss of being warm for the first time in days, warm through and
+through, warm to the middle of his heart, made him careless of
+correctness; and so he stayed on, to be rudely jarred by and by out of
+his contentment, and take with him finally into the night a renewed,
+even sharpened, perception of those exasperating faults which made Mrs.
+Hawthorne, as he named it, impossible.
+
+Because they seemed to be on such solid terms of friendship after the
+long evening before the fire, when they had sorrowed together and
+sympathized; when he had been permitted to hold and press her hands;
+when with a veritable mutual outgoing of the heart they had vied in
+prophesying for each other fair and happy days, Gerald found the
+boldness--and found it without much strain--the boldness to utter a
+request which had burned on his lips before, but which he had repressed,
+saying to himself that what Mrs. Hawthorne did was no affair of his.
+
+"Aurora," he said--she was after this evening Mrs. Hawthorne to him only
+in the hearing of others,--"Aurora, I want to ask a favor, a great
+favor."
+
+"Go ahead. I guess it's granted."
+
+"I wish I felt sure; but I'm afraid. Say you will not take part in the
+amateur variety show at _mi-carême_."
+
+"Sakes!" cried Aurora, staring at him with round eyes. "Ask me something
+easy! Ask me something else! I can't do that."
+
+"You can. Of course you can, if you wish to. You have only to give some
+excuse."
+
+"An excuse? Not for a farm! I don't want to. I've bound myself. They
+expect me as much as anything. I couldn't back out. It's so near the
+time, too. Why, it's to make money for the Convalescents' Home. I'm a
+big feature of the show."
+
+"I know you are, and I have a perfect horror of what you may do. I can't
+bear to think of the public sitting there gaping at you and laughing."
+
+"The public will be composed of friends. It's all private. Give it up?
+Not much! I tell you, it's nuts to me! I expect to have lots of fun.
+You've never seen, Geraldino, how funny I can be. You'll see that
+night."
+
+"The voice runs that you're going to appear as a nigger mammy and sing
+plantation songs."
+
+"Oh, does it? Well, that seems innocent. What objection do you see to
+that?"
+
+"I did not call my request reasonable, dearest Aurora. I begged a
+personal favor. You know the sort of nerves I have. It is like pouring
+acid on them to think of you making a show of yourself."
+
+She laughed, but would not yield; she treated his proposition like a
+spoiled child's demand for the moon, and, after condescending to tease
+like a boy, he woke suddenly to the fact of being ridiculous. He dropped
+the subject with the abruptness that causes the opponent nearly to
+topple over in surprise.
+
+He had sat for a long moment in silence when, realizing that this
+appeared ill-humored and a piece of effrontery, he started in haste to
+talk again, choosing the first subject that came into his mind, which
+was a thing he had meant to tell Aurora this evening, but had not
+remembered until this moment. The wide distance between the subject he
+dropped and the subject he took up would show, it was hoped, how
+definitely he washed his hands of her doings.
+
+"If you have wished for revenge on our friend Antonia," he said, "you
+can be satisfied. She is in the most singular sort of difficulty."
+
+"Oh, is she? I'm sorry," said Aurora. "Bless you! I never wished her any
+harm."
+
+"I went to see her yesterday. I had saved up my grievance and felt the
+need to lay it before her. I think one should give an old friend who has
+behaved badly the chance to make reparation, don't you? After being
+angry as you saw me, I yet did not want to break with her. She was very
+kind to me when I was young. At the same time I could not let her
+rudeness to you pass. But I found her in such trouble already when I
+went to see her yesterday that I said not one word of my grievance. It
+will have to wait."
+
+"You needn't think you must pick her up on my account. I don't care. But
+what was the matter?"
+
+"Two of her oldest friends, through an unaccountable mistake, turned
+into enemies. Both insist that under cover of a mask at the last
+_veglione_ she insulted them. Unfortunately, her best friends are
+not kept by their actual knowledge of her from thinking it just possible
+she might desire to amuse herself with getting a claw into them. She has
+more than once given offense to her friends by putting them into her
+books. But Antonia swore to me that she was innocent, and begged me to
+convince De Brézé. The villa she lives in is his property, and he has
+requested her to vacate it. The other aggrieved one, General Costanzi,
+she fears may succeed in preventing the publication of her next novel by
+threat of a libel suit."
+
+"Well, that sounds bad. But what do they say she's done?"
+
+"The poor woman doesn't even know what she is supposed to have said;
+insulted them is all she can gather. Both maintain that though she tried
+to alter her voice they recognized her, and will not accept her word for
+it that she wore no such disguise as they describe. Which reminds me
+that the offender, or the offender's double, for I have an idea there
+were two masked alike, came into your box early in the evening with a
+companion. You have not forgotten--that black domino with the crow's
+beak?"
+
+Aurora jumped on her seat with a cry of "Goodness gracious!"
+
+"What is it?" he asked, looking at her more attentively. She appeared
+aghast.
+
+She did not answer at once, tensely trying to think.
+
+"Well," she finally exclaimed, relaxing into limpness, "I've been and
+gone and done it!"
+
+And as he waited--
+
+"I guess I did that insulting," she added, and wiped her brow.
+
+He thought for a moment that she might be acting out a joke, but in the
+next accepted her perturbation as genuine.
+
+"Can't you see through it even now I've told you?" she asked.
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"Did you suppose I didn't really know those two who came into the box,
+the one who roared and the one who cawed? Well, I'm a better actress
+than I supposed."
+
+"But--"
+
+"And did you really suppose I was going home to bed just as the fun was
+at its height? There again you're simpler than I thought. Land! Don't I
+wish now that I had gone home!"
+
+"And you--"
+
+"We'd heard so much from everybody of the pranks they play at these
+vegliones of yours that we wanted to play one, too--we wanted to
+intrigue you and a lot of other people. The trouble seems to be we did
+it too well. Land! I wish I hadn't done it! I wish Heaven I'd consulted
+you, or some one--We hatched it all up with Italo and Clotilde."
+
+"Italo and Clotilde!"
+
+"They were the two who came into the box and didn't say a word, for fear
+of being known by their voices. Then, after you had so politely seen us
+off, Estelle and I in the carriage put on black dominos and crows'
+beaks, and after driving around a couple of blocks came back and found
+Italo and Clotilde waiting for us. Clotilde had put off her black domino
+in the dressing-room; she was dressed under it exactly like her brother.
+D'you see now how we worked it? Estelle took Clotilde's arm, and I took
+Italo's; we separated and kept apart, and it was as if there had only
+been one couple, the same as there had been since the beginning of the
+evening."
+
+"I see."
+
+"I've been dying to tell you about it ever since, but I just haven't
+told you. I don't know what I was waiting for. I guess I was enjoying
+letting you stay fooled. I had the greatest time, bad cess to it!
+talking to some people I knew and to a lot that I didn't. Italo would
+whisper to me beforehand what to say, and I'd say it. I didn't always
+know what it was about, but nothing was further from my mind than to
+wish to insult anybody. I was so excited I didn't always notice what I
+did say, it just seemed playful and funny and in the spirit of the rest.
+I went up to Charlie Hunt and spoke to him. I put a flea in his ear, and
+I'm positive from his face that he didn't know me. I came near going up
+to you when you were talking with that Mr. Guerra, but I was too much
+afraid you'd recognize me; you're so sharp, and, then, you're the one
+most particularly who has heard me talk with my English accent, which I
+put on on the night of the _veglione_ so as not to be known."
+
+"Your English accent? That explains."
+
+"What?"
+
+"Your English accent is a caricature of Antonia's."
+
+"I don't have to tell you, I suppose, that I had no idea of personating
+Antonia."
+
+"The very difference between the original and your imitation might seem
+the result of an effort on her part to disguise her speech."
+
+"I've been a fool, of course, and some of the blame is mine, but just
+let me get hold of Italo and watch me shake the teeth out of his
+confounded little head. I remember perfectly speaking to the old general
+that we saw at Antonia's that day and to the old viscount who came to my
+ball."
+
+"Do you remember what you said?"
+
+"Not exactly, but in both cases it seemed harmless. I wouldn't have said
+it if it hadn't seemed harmless. I couldn't have wished to insult them,
+how could any one suppose it? To the general it was something about a
+horse."
+
+Gerald gave a sound of raging disgust.
+
+Aurora waited, watching him.
+
+"Was it very bad?" she asked finally, and held her breath for his
+answer.
+
+"Just as bad as possible. Ceccherelli deserves to be flayed. Is the man
+mad? And what, may I ask, did you say to De Brézé?"
+
+"I only remember it was something about ermine. I forgot until this
+moment that I meant to ask Italo what the joke was about ermine. Was
+that too very bad?"
+
+"Just as bad as possible. No, rather worse. Both relate to ancient bits
+of scandal that no one would dare refer to--that would place a man
+referring to them in the necessity to fight a duel. Mind you, mean and
+discredited scandal. I won't resurrect it to enlighten you. You can
+interrogate Signor Ceccherelli, who has really distinguished himself in
+his quality of habitué of this house and your particular friend."
+
+"I know you're angry, Gerald; I don't wonder you're ready to call names.
+But the thing is simple, isn't it, after all, now that I understand. The
+harm done isn't such as can never be mended. All I have to do is write
+to Antonia and tell her I was the black crow, or, if you advise, write
+to the two gentlemen I've offended."
+
+"Heavens, no! you can't do that!"
+
+"Why can't I?"
+
+"You can't; that's all. You can't admit that that little vermin is on
+terms of intimacy with you permitting his prompting your Carnival
+witticisms, and you can't hope to make any one in Florence believe you
+didn't understand what you were saying."
+
+"Yes, I can, my friend; I can make them believe. I can speak the truth.
+I can, at all events, prove that Antonia had nothing whatever to do with
+it."
+
+"No, no, no, I tell you! You can do nothing whatever about it. Your name
+must not be allowed to appear in the matter at all. It would serve
+Ceccherelli right that his part in the disgraceful business should be
+known, dangerous little beast that he is. He would receive a lesson, and
+an excellent thing it would be; but that, again, might involve you. One
+couldn't trust him to keep your name out of it. Besides, it would very
+likely ruin him, disgusting little beggar."
+
+"You leave him to me! He roared his throat to a frazzle the other night,
+and can't make a sound, but he'll come round as soon as he's better, and
+then if I don't give it to him! Little cuss!... But I'm to blame, too,
+Gerald. You told me over and over that I oughtn't to encourage him to
+gossip as I did, but I went right on doing it because it was as good as
+a play to hear him tell his queer stories in his queer English. It
+amused me, I've no other excuse. I sort of knew all the time that it was
+wrong. And so he got bolder and bolder and finally overstepped the line.
+And now I've got my come-uppance. I'll settle him, trust _me_, and
+I'll write to Antonia, and I'll write the two gentlemen, if you'll just
+tell me where to write."
+
+"Must I tell you again that you are above all things to do nothing of
+the kind? Not certainly if you think of continuing to live in Florence.
+Leave the matter to me. I am well acquainted with everybody in question
+and shall be able to satisfy them, I hope, while leaving them completely
+in the dark as to the real culprit."
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne appeared to hesitate.
+
+"I really should feel better if I could confess," she said. "It would
+take a whole load off my chest. You see, I don't know your ways of doing
+over here; that would be my way. They might all forgive me and say I was
+just a fool. But if they didn't, and, as you seem to fear, made Florence
+too unpleasant to hold me, luckily I'm not tied down. I'm free. I can
+pull up stakes when I please and go pitch my tent elsewhere."
+
+"The delightful independence of riches! The grandeur and detachment of
+your point of view!" he spoke in a flare of excited bitterness. "What
+you have said is equivalent to saying that your friends of Florence are
+a matter of complete indifference to you!"
+
+"I _love_ my friends of Florence, and you know it, Gerald Fane! And
+I don't believe they'd ever turn against me, no matter what trouble I'd
+made for myself at that confounded veglione. So I don't look to leaving
+Florence just yet a while. You know I was only talking. I felt perfectly
+safe--But it's astonishing to me, dear boy, how ready you are to get mad
+at me. When you know me so well, too. You ought to be ashamed."
+
+"I am, dear. It's my temper that's bad. And you're so kind," he meekly
+subsided. "But you _are_ trying, you know," he added, after a
+moment, with returning vivacity, "what with the extreme bad taste of
+your masked ball adventures, and your obstinate determination to publish
+them, and then your insane obstinacy to make a show of yourself as a
+colored nurse in this vaudeville--But I forgot, I had sworn to myself
+not to speak of that again. May I count upon you at least to leave
+entirely to me the matter of exculpating Antonia to General Costanzi and
+De Brézé?"
+
+"Oh, very well, if you think best."
+
+"Will you promise solemnly to be silent on the whole matter?"
+
+"All right. But I don't like it, Gerald. If I've done wrong, I should
+feel lots easier in my mind if I could tell."
+
+"That feeling of yours is precisely what I wish to guard against. Do
+believe that in this matter the old Florentine I am knows better than
+you. Promise."
+
+"All right, I promise."
+
+After a moment, "There's no chance, is there, of your changing your mind
+about the other matter"--he asked sheepishly,--"the matter which I must
+not mention? No, I supposed not. I am perfectly aware of my presumption
+in making any suggestion to you on the subject. But if you knew how the
+thought of it torments me...."
+
+"You'll get over it when you see me. You'll just laugh with the rest."
+
+"Enough. Good night," he said stiffly, but it is doubtful that the word
+of leave-taking was anything more than a mode of expressing displeasure,
+or that departure would immediately have succeeded upon his rising from
+his chair, had not a sound of coughing from the neighboring room called
+up before him an image of Harriet Estelle, wide awake, with a stern and
+feverish eye fixed on the clock.
+
+He was startled into a consciousness of the lateness of the hour.
+
+"Good night!" he repeated in a guilty whisper. "I daren't look at my
+watch. I'm afraid I've kept you shockingly late."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+The night, when Gerald went out into it, was quieter and dryer. The
+streets were altogether empty. He had quite forgotten having felt ill
+earlier in the evening, and did not remember it even when he found his
+teeth chattering as a result of coming out into the penetrating night
+air after sitting so close to the fire. A thing he did remember, as he
+took out the large iron key to the door of home, was that after all
+Helen Aurora telling him her story he did not know how she came to be
+Mrs. Hawthorne. There must have been a second marriage there in Denver,
+one of those little-considered episodes in American life, perhaps, that
+are hardly thought worth mentioning. She sometimes spoke of "the judge."
+She had spoken to-night of a doctor, son of the judge. No, he decided,
+it could not be either of them. The second husband, whoever he had been,
+had clearly not been important, and he was dead, for Mrs. Foss had told
+him explicitly that Aurora was a real, and not what is called in America
+a grass, widow. From this second husband it must have been that she
+derived her wealth.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+
+Even had Aurora been able to apprehend the measure and quality, the fine
+shades, of Gerald's dislike to the thought of her doing a turn in the
+society variety-show, it is more than doubtful that she would have let
+it weigh against her strong desire to take part. It is fine to have such
+delicate sensibilities regarding the dignity of another, but it is
+foolishness to entertain anything of the sort regarding your own.
+
+"If there's one thing I love, it's to dress up and play I'm somebody
+else," Aurora had said when first the subject of the benefit performance
+was discussed.
+
+Mrs. Hawthorne was so certain to give generously to the cause of the
+convalescents that it was felt only fair to flatter her by seeking to
+enlist the service of her talents; but apart from this, the promise of
+her appearance was counted upon to create interest. She being obviously
+less restricted by conventions than other people, there existed a
+permanent curiosity as to what she might do next; and it could not be
+denied that she could, when she chose, be funny.
+
+With the exception of one peculiar and superfastidious man, nobody had
+the smallest objection to seeing her distort her fine mouth in comic
+grimaces, or lend her fine figure to clownish acts. There were those, of
+course, who called Mrs. Hawthorne vulgar; but too many persons liked her
+for the charge of vulgarity to go undisputed or become loud. A good many
+had reason to like her.
+
+Aurora felt so sure of the general friendliness that not the smallest
+pang of doubt, of deterring nervousness, assailed her while preparing
+her scene; and when she once occupied the center of the stage the spirit
+of frolic so possessed, the laughter of the people so elated and
+spurred, her, that she would have turned somersaults to amuse them, and
+done it with success, no doubt, for all that Aurora did on this occasion
+was funny and successful. Aurora, intoxicated with applause, was that
+night in her simple way inspired. Her state was, in fact, dangerous,
+discretion deserted her, and before the end, carried away by the desire
+to please further, make laugh more, she had done a foolish thing--a
+thing which she half knew, even while she did it, to be foolish, perhaps
+wrong. But not having leisure to think, she took the risk, and in time
+found herself, as a result of her mistake, to have made an enemy; yes,
+changed her dear and helpful friend Charlie Hunt into a secret enemy.
+
+In an old palace on Via dei Bardi a stage had been set, filling one
+fourth of the vast saloon. A goodly representation of Anglo-American
+society in Florence crowded the rest. Beautifully hand-written programs
+acquainted these, through thin disguises of name, with the personalities
+of the performers. Only one name was really mysterious--Lew Dockstader.
+
+After a lively overture by piano, violin, and harp, the three Misses
+Hunt, in Japanese costume, gave a prettily kittenish rendering of "Three
+Little Maids from School," selection from one of those Gilbert and
+Sullivan operettas latterly enchanting both England and America. The
+tub-shaped Herr Spiegelmeyer, dressed like a little boy and announced as
+an infant prodigy, played a concerto of prodigious difficulty and
+length. Lavin, of the tenor voice rich in poetry and prospects, humbled
+himself to sing, "There was a Lady Loved a Swine," with "Humph, quoth
+he"--s almost too realistic. Then came Lew Dockstader.
+
+Now, report had spread that Mrs. Hawthorne was to appear as a negress;
+no one was prepared to see her appear as a negro. The surprise, when it
+dawned on this one and the other that that stove-black face with rolling
+eyes and big red and white smile, that burly body incased in old,
+bagging trousers, those shuffling feet shod in boots a mile too large
+for them and curling up at the toe, belonged to Mrs. Hawthorne, the
+surprise was in itself a success. Then, as has been said, Aurora was
+undeniably in the vein that evening.
+
+She had seen Lew Dockstader, the negro minstrel, once in her life, but
+at the impressionable age, when you see and remember for good. It had
+been the great theatrical event of her life. "What, haven't seen Lew
+Dockstader! Don't know who he is!" thus she still would measure a
+person's ignorance of what is best in drama and song. She loved Lew.
+When she impersonated him she did not try to imitate him, she simply
+felt herself to be he.
+
+In this character she now told a string of those funny anecdotes which
+Americans love to swap. She sang divers songs, pitched among her big,
+velvety chest tones: "Children, Keep in de Middle ob de Road," "Fluey,
+Fluey," "Come, Ride dat Golden Mule." With the clumsy nimbleness and
+innocent love of play of a Newfoundland pup, she flung out her enormous
+feet in the dance.
+
+The crimson curtains drew together upon her retreat amid unaffected
+applause. Recalled, she gave the encore prepared for such an event.
+Recalled over and over, like singers of topical songs, to hear what she
+would say next, Aurora, a little off her head with the new wine of
+glory, exhausted her bag of parlor tricks to satisfy an audience so
+kind. Then it was that she made her mistake. Recalled still again, she
+invented on the spot one last thing to do. She recited a poem indelibly
+learned at public school, giving it first as a newly landed Jewish pupil
+would pronounce it, then a small Irishman, then a small Italian, finally
+an English child. To add the latter was her mistake, because her
+caricature of the English speech was very special.
+
+The sound of it started an idea buzzing in the head of one of her
+audience--Charlie Hunt, who sat well in front, and in applauding raised
+his hands above the level of his head so that actors and audience alike
+might be encouraged by seeing that he gave the patronage of his
+approval.
+
+He did not immediately connect Aurora's English with a rankling
+remembered episode, but the thing was burrowing in his subconsciousness,
+and an arrow of light before long pierced his brain. He reconsidered the
+conclusion upon which he had rested with regard to the black crow who at
+the _veglione_ had put to him an impertinent question. Could it be
+that not the particular lady whom he had fixed upon in his mind, as
+being fond of Landini, consequently jealous of Mrs. Hawthorne, had by it
+expressed her spite, but that--? He saw in a flash a different
+possibility.
+
+When the show was over and the performers had issued from the
+dressing-rooms in the clothes of saner moments, Charlie Hunt approached
+Mrs. Hawthorne, who, flushed with excitement, was looking almost too
+much like an American Beauty rose. He paid his compliments in a tone
+tinged with irony, all the while watching her with a penetrating,
+inquiring, ironical eye. But the irony was wasted. She was too
+pleasantly engrossed to perceive it.
+
+"Has anybody here seen Mr. Fane?" she asked after a time, when her
+glances had vainly sought him in every corner.
+
+Estelle told her that she had not set eyes on him the whole evening;
+and, which was more conclusive, little Lily Foss said he had not been
+there.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+
+Aurora, unable to see beyond the footlights, had never dreamed but
+Gerald was among the audience. Her capers had at moments been definitely
+directed at him. Discovering that he had kept away, she was not so much
+hurt as puzzled.
+
+"Who'd have thought he cared enough about it to be so mean!" she said to
+herself. "Well," she said further, "let him alone. He'll come round in a
+day or two."
+
+She really expected him that same day. When he did not come, or the day
+after, or the day after that, she tried to recall passage for passage
+their talk on the subject of the show. She did not remember his saying
+anything that amounted to giving her a choice between renouncing it or
+renouncing his friendship.
+
+Then she reviewed all she knew of him; and his present conduct, if he
+were by this avoidance trying to punish her for doing what it was the
+prerogative of her native independence to do, did not seem in accordance
+with his known regard for the rights of others.
+
+Aurora did not know what to think. From hour to hour she looked for a
+call, a message, a letter, and because the time while waiting seemed
+long, she neglected to note that the actual time elapsed was not more
+than Gerald had sometimes allowed to pass without her attributing his
+silence to offence. He had his work, he had other friends; Abbé Johns
+might be in town again visiting him. This silence, however, had a
+different value, she thought, from other silences. They had seemed so
+much better friends after their confidences that long evening over the
+fire; she expected more of him than she had done before it.
+
+At other moments she was disposed to find fault with herself. She
+supposed she was a big coarse thing, unable to appreciate the feelings
+of a man who apparently hadn't as many thicknesses of skin as other
+folks.
+
+It was at such a moment, when she made allowances for him, that she
+thought of writing, making it easy for him to drop his grouch and
+return. But here Aurora felt a difficulty. Aurora thought well, in a
+general way, of her powers as a letter-writer, and she was proud of her
+beautifully legible Spencerian hand; but for such a letter as she wished
+to send Gerald fine shades of expression were needed beyond what she
+could compass. She was fond of Gerald; in this letter she must not be
+too fond, yet she must be fond enough. What hope that a blockhead would
+strike the exact middle of so fine a line?
+
+She could obviate the difficulty by sending him a formal invitation to
+dinner. But suppose she should receive formal regrets?
+
+After that the whole thing must be left to him; the tactful letter meant
+to hurry him back would no longer be possible.
+
+"Oh, bother!" said Aurora, and formed a better, bolder plan.
+
+Aurora had not seen the plays, had not read the books, where the going
+of the heroine to visit the hero at his house for whatever good reason
+under the sun has such damaging results for her fair fame. Aurora was
+innocent of good society's hopeless narrowness on the subject. If she
+made a secret of her plan to Estelle it was merely because Estelle had
+permitted herself wise words one day, warnings, with regard to Gerald,
+in whom she specifically did not wish her friend to "become interested."
+
+"You're too different," Estelle had said. "You're like a fish and a
+bird. I won't say I don't like him. He's nice in a way, but it's not our
+way, Nell. You'd be miserable with him, first or last."
+
+"My dear," Aurora had replied, "if you knew the sort of thing we talk
+about when you're not there you wouldn't worry. If you can see Gerald
+Fane in the part of my beau you must be cracked. And if you think I'm
+soft on him, you're only a little bit less cracked. Can't you see we're
+just friends? It's nice for him to come here and it's nice for us to
+have him. We want friends, don't we?"
+
+"All I say is don't go ahead with your eyes shut till you find before
+you know it that you're landed in a case of, 'Mother, I can't live
+without him!' For, Nell, it won't do, you know it won't."
+
+"My dearest girl, of course I know, but not half so well as he knows!
+Bless you, Hat, do you forget all Leslie told us about him and his
+affair? And do you forget my little affair? Do you suppose either of us
+wants to try again?"
+
+"Indeed, I hope you will try again, both of you. But not together, Nell.
+I've got the man all picked out for you; you know perfectly I mean Tom
+Bewick. There's the one for you, Nell. Big, healthy, kind. Good sense.
+Good temper. Your own kind of person, Nell, and not a queer bird from a
+menagerie. Don't go and spoil everything by getting tangled up over
+here. You know as well as I do that Gerald Fane, take him just as a man,
+can't hold a candle to Doctor Tom."
+
+"I've never thought of comparing them. I don't see any use in doing it.
+Tom's Tom and Gerald's Gerald. So far as Gerald goes, you can set your
+heart at rest and bank on this: I know just as well as you do, and he
+knows just as well as I do, that we couldn't pull in harness together
+any more than--just as you say, a fish and a bird. Neither of us is
+thinking of such a thing. But why mustn't a fish and a bird have
+anything to say to each other? He might like the cut of her fins and she
+might fancy the color of his wings. They could sympathize together,
+couldn't they, if nothing else?" Aurora's eyebrows had with this tried
+to signify her entire capacity to take care of herself and her own
+business.
+
+But not wishing to rouse any further uneasiness in her friend, she no
+more after that spoke frankly of Gerald whenever he came into her mind.
+And when she declined Estelle's invitation to go with her to Mlle.
+Durand's, where she would hear the pupils of the latter recite Corneille
+and Racine, she did not tell her what she had planned to do instead,
+fully intending, however, to reveal it later.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Gerald meanwhile did not flatter himself imagining Aurora unhappy
+because he stayed away longer than had lately been quite usual. Time
+dragged with him, but the calendar told him that just so many days, no
+more, had passed. He pictured her going her cheerful gait, occasionally
+saying, perhaps, "I wonder what has become of Stickly-prickly?"
+
+He had not gone to the mid-Lent entertainment as a matter of course.
+Aurora had shown small knowledge of him when she thought he would
+consent to see her disport herself before the public as a negress. On
+the day after, when he learned that she had been the star of the evening
+as a negro, his frenzied disgust itself warned him of the injustice, the
+impropriety, of exhibiting it to her. He chose to remain away until it
+should have sufficiently worn down to be governable. By that time the
+poor man had developed an illness, that cold of which for some weeks he
+had been carrying around in his bones the premonition.
+
+With reddened eyelids and thickened nose, a sore throat and a cough, he
+felt himself no fit object for a lady's sight. He stayed in to take care
+of himself.
+
+Giovanna knew what to do for her _signorino_ when he was
+_raffreddato_. She built a little fire in the studio; she brought
+his light meals to him in his arm-chair before it. She administered
+remedies. His bed was warmed at night by her _scaldino_. Gaetano
+was sent to Vieusseux's for an armful of books. All day Gerald sat by
+the fire and read, and sometimes dozed and dreamed, and read again. And
+days passed, while his cold held on.
+
+He thought of writing Aurora to tell her. But if he told her, she would
+at once come to see him; of so much one could be sure. And he did not
+want her to come. The eccentric fellow did not want her to come
+precisely because he wanted her to come so much.
+
+"This is the way it begins," he said to himself, with horror, when he
+became fully aware that his nerves, now that he could not go to find
+Aurora when he chose, were suggesting to him all the time that the
+presence of Aurora was needed to quiet that sense of want, of
+maladjustment to conditions, haunting him like the desire for sleep.
+
+At sight of his danger he became very clear-headed. The man who sees a
+snare and walks into it deserves his fate, surely.
+
+"It is time to stop it," he said. And he laid down for himself new rules
+of life.
+
+Fortunately, he had at hand some absorbing books. Dostoiewsky's "Crime
+and Punishment" could effectively take him out of himself.
+
+But the print was fine and crowded, he was weakened by illness, he was
+forced now and then to stop and rest with swimming head. Then at once
+would return, like the demon in fair disguise tempting some hermit of
+the desert, the thought, "What is Aurora doing? If Aurora knew I was
+ill, she would come." And the imagination of her coming would shed a
+feverish gladness all along those petulant, ill-treated, starved nerves.
+"What have I to do with Aurora, or Aurora with me?" he would ask,
+furiously, the incongruity of what had happened to him calling forth
+sometimes a desperate laugh. But Nature laughs at man's ideas of
+congruity; remembering that, he could only hold his hands against his
+eyes and try to press the image of Aurora out of existence.
+
+Gerald, however, was much stronger than his nerves. He could see his own
+case, even with a pulse at ninety, as well as another man's. And his
+will was firmer than might have been thought. He knew something of a
+human man's constitution, how it can circumvent a man, or how a man,
+well on his guard, can circumvent it. He formed the project of
+interrupting his visits to the Hermitage.
+
+After this resolution he regarded those returns of earth-born desire for
+Aurora's balmy touch and tranquilizing neighborhood as a man who had
+taken an heroic and sure remedy against ague might regard the
+fluctuations in his body of heat and cold continuing still for a little
+while. As to how Aurora would take his defection, all should be managed
+with so much art and politeness that the most sensitive could not be
+hurt. By the time the new important work which he would make his excuse
+was accomplished, his cure would have been accomplished as well.
+
+Meanwhile, each time the door-bell rang--it was not often,
+certainly--his attention was taken from his book, and he listened. And
+so, on Mlle. Durand's French afternoon, Gerald, having heard the bell,
+was listening, but with his face to the fire and his back to the door.
+When Giovanna knocked, "Forward!" he said, without turning. The door
+opened.
+
+"_C'è quella signora._" "There is that lady," dubiously announced
+Giovanna.
+
+Gerald turned, and beheld that lady filling the doorway.
+
+Then it was as if a bright trumpet-blast of reality, breaking upon a bad
+dream, dispelled it; or as if a fresh wind, blowing over stagnant water,
+swept away the cloud of noxious gnats. All he had latterly been thinking
+and feeling seemed to Gerald insane, sickly, the instant he beheld
+Aurora's comradely smile. He was ashamed; he found himself on the verge
+of stupid, unexplainable tears.
+
+"Well!" said Aurora.
+
+At the sound they were placed back on the exact footing of their last
+meeting, before thinking and conjecturing about each other in absence
+had built up between them barriers of illusion.
+
+"Well!" he said, but less pleasantly, because he was mortified by the
+awareness of himself as an uninviting sight, with his old dressing-gown,
+neglected beard, and the unpicturesque manifestations of a cold.
+
+But Aurora's face was reassuring; she did not confuse him with the
+accidents of his dressing-gown and beard and cold. Aurora's face beamed,
+so much was she rejoicing in her own excellent sense, which had told her
+that one look at each other would do a thousand times more to make
+things right between them than innumerable letters could have done.
+
+"I didn't know what to think," she said, "so I came to find out. First
+I'd think you were mad at me, then I'd think you had gone away and
+written me, and the letter hadn't reached me, Gaetano had lost it on the
+road. Then I'd think you might be sick, and there was nobody to let your
+friends know. I don't know what I didn't think of. What made you not
+send me word?"
+
+"I did not know you would be uneasy. I did not rightly measure, it
+seems, the depth of your kindness. I should certainly have written to
+you before long in case I had continued unable to go to see you."
+
+"How long have you been sick?"
+
+"I am not sick, dearest lady. I only have a cold. In order to make it go
+away more quickly I have to remain in the house. But how good, how very
+good of you to come! Sit down, please do, and warm yourself. I will ring
+for Giovanna, and she will make us some tea."
+
+[Illustration: Gerald turned, and beheld that lady]
+
+Aurora, smiling all the time with the pleasure she felt in not finding
+him angry or estranged or in any way altered toward her, took the
+arm-chair from which he had just risen, while he drew a lighter chair to
+the other side of the chimney-place. His fires were not like hers. Two
+half-burned sticks and a form of turf smoldered sparingly on a mound of
+hot ashes; he eagerly cast on a fagot, and added wood with, for once, an
+extravagant hand. Then, looking over at her, he smiled, too.
+
+"Now tell me all about yourself," she commanded. "I want to know what
+you're doing for this cold of yours."
+
+"Please let us not talk about my cold," he at once refused. "Let us talk
+about something agreeable. Tell me the news. I have not seen any one for
+days. I have been living in Russia with a poor young man who had
+committed a murder, also with a most sympathetic being who found the
+world outside an institution for the feeble-minded too much for him." By
+a gesture toward the books on the table he gave her a clue to his
+meaning.
+
+"You say you haven't seen any one for days," she said. "Now the Fosses,
+for instance, who are your best friends, don't you let them know when
+you're shut in?"
+
+"You have no conception, evidently, of my bearishness, dear friend. They
+have. They never wonder when they do not see me or hear from me for
+weeks."
+
+"I know, and it seems funny; it seems sort of forlorn to me. I saw them
+the other day and asked if any one had seen you since the night of the
+show. They said no, but didn't seem to think anything about it."
+
+"It's not really long since then. How are they all?"
+
+"All right, and busy as bees. They've no time to come and see me, or
+anybody else, I guess. Brenda's coming back to be married in May, and
+they're flying round getting her things ready. All her linen is being
+beautifully embroidered...."
+
+They went on talking, without much thought of what they said. It was
+immaterial, really, what they said, or even whether they listened to
+each other, while they had in common the comfort of sitting together in
+front of the fire after a long separation filled with doubts and
+dismays. She told him about the Convalescents' Home, the sum they had
+raised for it. No word, prudently, was spoken by either of her share in
+raising it. He told her about the Russian novels. A third person might
+perfectly have been present, for anything intimate in their
+conversation. Gerald was scrupulously careful, for his part, that this
+should be so. The third person would never have divined how far for the
+moment that chimney-corner transcended, in the sentiments of the parties
+seated before it, any other corner of the earth.
+
+Aurora's attention became closer when Gerald related his interviews with
+De Brézé and Costanzi, both of whom he had succeeded in convincing that
+Antonia had had nothing to do with intriguing them at the
+_veglione_, and had left to digest as best they could their
+curiosity concerning the mysterious masker mistaken for her. He had been
+obliged to give his word that he knew on absolutely good authority who
+this person was.
+
+His attention, on the other hand, was complete when she told him how she
+had dealt with Ceccherelli; she was considerate enough to-day to make
+the effort to pronounce the gentleman's cognomen.
+
+"I was savage at him, you remember," she said. "I was going to take his
+head off. Then when it came to it, and I had told him what I thought of
+him and the whole disgraceful scrape he had got me into--Oh, I went for
+him, hammer and tongs! Incidentally, I made him tell me what it was I
+had said. Pretty bad, wasn't it!--Well, do you know, he cried, he felt
+so. He just cried on his knees, and didn't try to get rid of any of the
+blame. All he wanted was that I should forgive him. And what could I do?
+As long, particularly, as I knew that a good deal of the fault was my
+own.... So now he comes to the house with a look as if he'd just been
+baptized. And he tells me only stories fit, he says, for a convent. Here
+is a sample, if you'd like to hear. Mrs. X, as he called her, who lives
+in a palace not a thousand miles, he said, from Piazza degli Anti-nory,
+and who had given Mr. B. reasons for not liking her, was seen by him, in
+a suspiciously simple dress, going suspiciously on foot, in a little
+suspiciously out of the way street, at a considerable distance from
+Piazza degli Anti-nory. The gentleman followed her stealthily into a
+house he saw her enter, thinking, you know, he would find out something
+to her discredit. And what did he find out but that she was secretly
+visiting and relieving the poor! The brilliant society lady, whom he
+wished to be revenged on because, as I gathered, she had scorned his
+dishonorable love-making, was secretly the angel of the poor.... Don't
+you think that's a nice story? He tells me nothing now that's less nice
+than that. We're reformed characters. He has asked my permission to
+dedicate to me a beautiful piece of music he has just composed, and
+which is called--but in French--'Prayer of the Evening.'"
+
+Both of them were pleasantly aware of a tray placed on the table near
+them, as if descended from heaven, laden with teapot, bread and butter,
+jam. Neither of them really saw Giovanna, who brought it in, or was
+struck by the stern expression of her face.
+
+Aurora, never sorry of something to eat, turned her attention to the
+tray. Gerald wished to serve her, and she first noticed his weakness
+when she saw the teapot tremble slightly in his hand. She went on
+chattering, but she was observing him.
+
+"Is your carriage waiting before the door?" he suddenly asked, after a
+space during which she had suspected that he was not properly attending
+to what she said. Aurora's monogram, daintily executed, adorned the
+door-panels of her carriage.
+
+"Yes," she answered. "Why?"
+
+As if he had not heard, he changed the subject. After a while he asked,
+again irrelevantly:
+
+"How was it that Miss Madison did not come with you this afternoon?"
+
+"She was going to a different tea-party." Supposing that his question
+was a way of politely desiring news of Miss Madison, she went on to talk
+of her.
+
+"She was going to her French teacher's, who is having a French afternoon
+where they're supposed to talk nothing but French. What would I have
+been doing there? But Estelle is getting to talk the French language
+exactly as well as her own.... That reminds me. A thing I've wanted to
+tell you. If you should notice that Busteretto seems to be rather more
+her dog than mine, don't you say anything, or care. The fact is Estelle
+loves him more than I do. That's all there is about it. Which isn't
+saying that I don't love him. But Estelle's silly over him, in the
+regular old maid way, as I tell her. When he wouldn't eat his dinner
+this noon, I had all I could do to make her eat hers, she was so
+troubled. And nothing ailed him, I guess, but that he'd picked up
+something in the kitchen. What I wanted to say was, don't you think it's
+because I don't value your present, if you should notice by and by that
+I seem to have given up my claims to Busteretto. That sort of alive
+present has a will of its own. The little thing took to her from the
+first more than he did to me. Shall I tell Estelle that you wished to be
+remembered?"
+
+"Pray do."
+
+"She'll be sorry to hear you're sick. Don't say that again, Gerald," she
+silenced him, letting her anxiety at last plainly appear. "Don't tell me
+you aren't sick, for I know better. It's been taking away my appetite to
+see you make believe to eat, and choke over it. Your cough is so tight
+it sounds as if it tore your lungs. Give me your hand. It's as hot, dear
+boy, and as dry!... Wait, let me feel your pulse."
+
+He knew that his pulse was high, that his temples ached, that a
+disposition to shiver accompanied the volcanic heat of his blood.
+
+He laughed at her light-headedly while with serious concentration she
+counted the beats in his wrist.
+
+"I'm going to stop at Doctor Gage's on my way home," she said, letting
+go his hand, and not heeding what he said. "And I'm going to tell him to
+come and see you."
+
+"Please do not! If I need a doctor, there is my own, an Italian, the
+same for years."
+
+"An Italian? Do you think they're as good?"
+
+"Better for my own case."
+
+"Gerald, it's my advice to you to go right to bed and let your doctor
+come and prescribe. A cold is nothing in a way, but a neglected cold can
+grow into a mean sort of thing. Say you'll do it. Don't you know how
+good it will feel to you just to give in and go to bed and let some one
+else do all the looking after you? Oh, I wish I could speak Italian
+enough to have a talk with your Giovanna."
+
+"Giovanna has taken care of me and my _malanni_ for years. She
+gives me tar-water, and rice-water, and tamarind-water, and linden-tea,
+and cassia. She threatened me this morning with a sinapism if I were not
+better by evening. I shall be better. I do not wish for a sinapism."
+
+"Is that a poultice on your chest? I guess it's what you need. Now, if I
+have any influence with you, Gerald, if you love me one little bit,
+you'll promise to go right to bed, and you'll give me your doctor's
+address so that on my way home I can leave word for him to come."
+
+"You shall not take that trouble. I can send Gaetano."
+
+"You promise me you'll do it, then?"
+
+"I seem to have been left no choice, dear lady."
+
+"That's real sweet of you. You'll go to bed the minute I've gone?"
+
+"Yes. But don't go quite yet!"
+
+"With that temperature, I don't see how you can care who stays or who
+goes, or anything in the world but to lay your head down on a pillow. I
+won't stay any longer now. Go to bed like a good boy. To-morrow I'll run
+in and see how you're getting along."
+
+His last word was, after a moment of seeming embarrassment:
+
+"I hope Miss Madison will be able to come with you next time."
+
+"Yes, yes," said Aurora, lightly, taking it for a mere amiable message
+with which he was charging her for Estelle.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Fever no doubt colored all Gerald's dreams that night, and was in part
+responsible next day for his thoughts, as he passed from languor to
+restlessness, and from impatience back to the peace of the certain
+knowledge that before evening he should have visitors--fair visitors.
+
+When it seemed to him nearly time for them, he ordered Giovanna to make
+the room of a beautiful and perfect neatness, hiding all the medicine
+bottles and humble signs that one is mortal. She was directed to lay
+across his white counterpane that square of brocade which often formed a
+background for his portraits. She was asked to brush his hair and beard,
+and wrap his shoulders in an ivory-white shawl, thick with silk
+embroideries, which had been his mother's. In a little green bronze
+tripod a black pastille was set burning, which sent up, slow, thin, and
+wavering, a gray spiral of perfume.
+
+Keenly as he was waiting, he yet did not know when the ladies arrived.
+He opened his eyes, and they were there, shedding around them a
+beautiful freshness of health and the world outside. Estelle, in a soft
+green velvet edged with silver fur, held toward him an immense bunch of
+flowers. Aurora, in a wine-colored cloth bordered with bands of black
+fox, tendered a basket heaped with fruit. Both smiled, and had the kind
+look of angels.
+
+They sat down beside his bed. They talked with him; all was just as
+usual. They asked the old questions pertinent to the case, he made the
+old answers, and by an effort kept up for some minutes a drawing-room
+conversation with them.
+
+Then Aurora said:
+
+"Hush! You mustn't talk any more!" And when he thought she was going
+away, he wondered to see her take off her gloves.
+
+She stood over him; he wondered what she meant to do. She felt of his
+forehead with her cool hand. With her palms, which were like her voice,
+of a velvet not too soft, she smoothed his forehead and temples; she
+stroked them over and over in a way that seemed to draw the ache out of
+his brain. Her fingers moved soothingly, magnetically, all around his
+eye-sockets, pressing down the eyelids and comforting them.
+
+At first he resisted. Perversely he frowned, as if the thing increased
+his pain, annoyed him beyond words. He all but cried out to the
+well-meaning hands to stop.
+
+"Doesn't it feel good?" asked Aurora, anxiously.
+
+He relaxed. Without opening his eyes, he nodded to thank her, and as he
+yielded himself up to the hands it seemed to him that those passes drew
+his spirit after them quite out of his body.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+"I don't think I'll go up with you," Estelle said unexpectedly when on
+the next day they stopped before the narrow yellow door in Borgo Pinti.
+"I'll wait here in the carriage. I'm nervous myself to-day. Give my best
+regards to Gerald. I hope you'll find him better."
+
+Aurora did not take time to examine into the possible reasons for her
+friend's choice. She climbed the long stairs sturdily, managing her
+breath so that she did not have to stop and rest on the way.
+
+She followed the stern Giovanna, unsubdued by the latter's hard and
+jealous looks, to the door of her master's chamber.
+
+She went toward the bed, smiling at the sick man over an armful of white
+lilacs.
+
+He half rose in his bed and quickly, disconnectedly, impetuously, said:
+
+"My dear friend, this is most good of you. I'm sure I thank you very
+much. I'm very, very much better, as you can see. I shall be out again
+in a day or two." He was visibly trembling; his eyes flared with
+excitement. "That being the case, my dear lady, I earnestly beg you will
+not trouble to come like this every day." He stopped to choke and cough,
+then wrenching himself free from strangulation--"Aurora,"--he changed
+his key and tune,--"do let me be ill in peace! Here I am on my back,
+with a loosened grip on everything, and it's taking an unfair advantage
+to invade my privacy as you do. Take away those lilacs with you, won't
+you, please? We haven't any more vases to put them in; they'd have to be
+stuck in a bedroom water-jug. Giovanna won't let me have flowers in my
+room, anyhow; she says they are bad for me. Don't be offended! I know
+you mean nothing but to be kind, but the thing you are doing is
+devilish.... What do you think I am made of? I don't want you to be
+offended, but I have got to say what I can to keep you from coming to
+this house and troubling me in my illness. I have got to say it plainly
+and fully because you, Aurora, never understand anything that is not
+said to you in so many words. I might try and try my best to convey the
+same idea to you in a gentle and gentlemanly way, and not a scrap of
+good would be done. I've got to talk like a beast. I wish to be alone.
+Is that clear? I've just struggled and waded my way out of one quagmire;
+I do not wish to enter another. Is that plain? I wish to feel free to be
+ill as much and as long as I choose. It concerns nobody. It concerns
+nobody if I die. It would be an excellent thing, saving me the trouble
+later of blowing out my brains.... My God, Aurora, have you understood?"
+he almost shouted.
+
+"Yes," said Aurora in a voice that sounded pale, even as her face looked
+pale. "I have understood, and I won't come again. Just one thing,
+Gerald. Put your arms under the bed clothes and keep them there."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Whether he's better or worse I truly couldn't tell you," Aurora said in
+answer to Estelle's first question. After a moment she added, "I can't
+make him out."
+
+Estelle saw that she was deeply troubled, and, herself troubled at the
+sight, did not press her for explanations.
+
+During the drive home Aurora made only one other remark. It was
+delivered with a certain emphasis.
+
+"_One_ thing I know: I sha'n't go _there_ again in a hurry!"
+
+Her lilacs, after wondering a moment what to do with them, she had
+quietly deposited outside Gerald's entrance-door.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+It was unimaginable, of course, that the childhood's friend should so
+disregard the rules of the game as to leave her old playmate's curiosity
+long unsatisfied. Estelle accordingly learned before evening that Gerald
+had been guilty of an attack of nerves, in the course of which he had
+said something which Aurora did not like. What this was Aurora would not
+tell, saying it seemed unfair to repeat things Gerald had spoken while
+he was not himself and which he perhaps did not mean. From which Estelle
+judged that Aurora had already softened since she returned to the
+carriage looking as grim as she was grieved.
+
+That Aurora had something on her mind no observant person could fail to
+see, and Estelle was not unprepared to hear her say as she did on the
+third morning at breakfast, after fidgeting a moment with a pinch of
+bread:
+
+"I'm so uneasy I don't know what to do. That boy is much sicker than he
+knows," she went on to justify her disquietude, "and he's in a bad mood
+for getting well. I don't believe Italian doctors know much, anyhow.
+I've heard that they still put leeches on you. All he has to take care
+of him, day and night, is that old servant-woman What's-her-name, who,
+he told me himself, doctors him with herb-tea. I'm so uneasy! The sort
+of cold he has, I tell you, can turn any minute into something you don't
+want. He's all run down and a bad subject for pneumonia. I'm thinking I
+shall have to just go to the door and find out how he is."
+
+"You could send a servant to inquire," suggested Estelle.
+
+Aurora appeared to reflect; she might have been trying to find a reason
+for not taking the hint, but she said, "No; I should feel better
+satisfied to go myself."
+
+At the last moment, when they were ready to start, Estelle found
+Busteretto's nose hot, and decided not to go. She stayed at home and
+called a doctor. For some days the pet had not seemed to her in quite
+his usual form.
+
+Aurora, climbing Gerald's stairs this time, felt very uncertain and
+rather small. The street door, when she had pulled the bell-handle, had
+unlatched with a click, but no voice had called down, and when she
+reached the top landing the door in front of her stood forbiddingly
+closed. She waited for some minutes, wondering whether she were doing
+right. Suppose Gerald were enough better to be up again and, Giovanna
+being out, should himself come to open the door. How would she feel,
+caught slinking back, after she had been requested loudly and roundly to
+stay away?
+
+Well, set aside how she felt, the object of her coming would have been
+reached, wouldn't it? She would know that he was better. She rang and
+listened.
+
+Certain, as soon as she heard them, whose footsteps were on the other
+side of the door, she held in readiness her Italian. She counted on
+understanding Giovanna's answer to her question, for she had, as she
+boasted, "quite a vocabulary." But much more than to this she trusted to
+the talent which Italians have for making their meaning clear through
+pantomime and facial expression.
+
+As soon, in fact, as Giovanna opened the door, and before the woman had
+said a word in reply to "_Come sta Signor Fane?_" Aurora had
+understood.
+
+Giovanna's eyes, stained with recent weeping, looked up at the visitor
+without severity or aversion, seeking for sympathy; the unintelligible
+account she gave of her master's condition was broken up with sighs.
+
+Aurora felt her heart turn cold, and such agitation seize her as made
+her reckless of all but one thing.
+
+"I shall have to see for myself," she thought.
+
+With the haste of fear, she flew before Giovanna down the long hallway,
+around the dark corner, to the door of Gerald's room. It was half open.
+Checking herself on the threshold, she thrust in her head.
+
+He was so lying in his bed that beyond the outlined shape under the
+covers she could see of him only a dark spot of hair. And she felt she
+must see his face, whether asleep or awake, to get some idea.... She
+tiptoed in with the least possible noise. At once, without turning, he
+asked something in Italian, and speaking forced him to cough; and after
+he had finished coughing, Aurora, who was near, could hear his breathing
+rustle within him like wind among dead leaves.
+
+Giovanna had gone to the head of his bed and whispered a communication.
+Upon which he twisted sharply around, and Aurora, moved by an
+overpowering impulse, rushed to his side.
+
+"Hush!" she said at once. "Don't try to talk; it makes you cough. I just
+wanted to know how you were. It would be funny, now don't you think so
+yourself, if, such friends as we've been, I should stop caring anything
+about you because you were cross the other day? I had to come and see if
+there wasn't something we could do for you."
+
+The attempt to speak choked him again; he had to lift himself finally
+quite up from his pillow to get breath. Quicker than Giovanna, Aurora
+snatched up a gray shawl from a chair to put over his shoulders. The
+room felt to her stagnantly cold. He stopped her hand in the act of
+folding him in, and she knew that it was not the Gerald of last time,
+this one who, with an afflictive little moan, clasped and pressed her
+hand.
+
+She hushed him, every time he tried to speak, until his breathing had
+quieted down, when he came out despite her forbidding with a ragged,
+interrupted, but obstinate eagerness:
+
+"How can I ever thank you enough for coming, dear, dear Aurora? I have
+lived in one prolonged nightmare ever since I saw you, knowing I had
+behaved like a blackguard, and fearing I should never have a chance to
+beg your pardon. I thought I should never see you again. And here you
+are, so generous, so kind!"
+
+"Hush, Gerald! Don't make anything of it. Of course I came. Keep quiet
+now; you mustn't try to talk."
+
+"Dearest woman," he insisted, with his voice full of tears, "I don't
+even know what I said to you, but I know that the whole thing was
+atrocious. You standing there like a big angel, with your innocent arms
+full of flowers, and I barking at you like a cur!"
+
+"Nothing of the sort. You were sick. Who lays up anything against a sick
+man?"
+
+"Excuse it in me like this, Aurora, if you can: that having such regard
+for you, I had pride before you and could not endure that you should see
+me when I felt myself to be a disgusting object. So, mortified to the
+point of torture, I lost my temper,--I've got that bad habit, you
+know,--and insanely railed to keep you off."
+
+"And didn't succeed. Come, come; what nonsense all this is! Put it out
+of your mind and think of nothing but getting well. Now you--"
+
+"It is not nearly so important that I should get well," he testily
+persisted, "as that I should ask your forgiveness. It has been weighing
+upon me and burning like bedclothes of hot iron, the horror of having so
+meanly and ungratefully offended you."
+
+"Why should you feel so bad about it as long as I don't? Put it all out
+of your mind, just as I do out of mine. There, it's all right. Now keep
+still except to answer my questions. You've had the doctor?"
+
+"Yes, dear."
+
+"What's he giving you?"
+
+"You can see--there on the stand--those bottles."
+
+"And hot things on your chest?"
+
+"Yes; _semedilino_. I don't know what you call it in English."
+
+"Flaxseed, I guess. How can poor old Giovanna do everything for you?"
+
+"I don't know," he answered vaguely. "She does."
+
+Perceiving that by a reaction from his excitement he was suddenly
+fatigued to the point of no longer being able to speak at all or even
+keep his eyes open, she asked nothing more, but with a practised hand
+straightened his bolster, smoothed his pillow and drew the covers evenly
+and snugly up to his chin.
+
+"Don't you be afraid," he heard her say above him, as it seemed to him a
+long time after, at the same moment that he felt her give his shoulder a
+little squeeze to impress her saying: "I won't let anything happen to
+you."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+He entered a state which was neither quite sleep nor quite waking. He
+was not dreaming, yet the world within his eyelids was peopled with
+creatures and varied by incidents departing from the known and foreseen.
+Something malevolent pertained to the personalities, something
+disquieting to the actions; suffering and oppression resulted from his
+inability to get away from them. They came and went, one scene melted
+into another, sometimes beautiful, sometimes repulsive, a sickly
+disagreeableness being common to all, and the fatigue involved with
+watching the spectacle of them weighing like a physical burden.
+
+But yet beneath the unrest of fever dreams there was in Gerald, after
+Aurora's visit, as if a substratum of quiet and content. As a good
+Catholic, having confessed and received absolution, would be less
+troubled by either his symptoms or any visions that might come of Satan
+and his imps, so Gerald, with the weight of his sins of brutality and
+ingratitude lifted off him, could feel almost passive with regard to the
+rest.
+
+He had moments through the night of recognizing the deceptiveness of his
+senses. He knew, for instance, that the solemn clerical gentleman in a
+long black coat and tall hat whom he saw most tiresomely coming toward
+him down the street every time he opened his eyes was only a medicine
+bottle full of dark fluid, outlined against the dim candle-shine. And he
+knew that the tower of ice, solitary amid snows, lighthouse or tower of
+defense on some arctic coast, was nothing but a glass of water. And when
+it seemed to him, late, late in the night, that Aurora was in the room,
+he knew off and on that it was Giovanna, who through one of those
+metamorphoses common in fever had taken the likeness of Aurora. She
+lifted him to make him drink, and supported him while she held the glass
+to his lips, then laid him easily back. The delusions of fever had the
+sweet and foolish impossibility of fairy-stories: Aurora, as if it were
+the most natural thing in the world, placing upon his stiff and
+lacerated breast balsamic bandages of assuaging and beneficient
+warmth!...
+
+The night was full of torrid heat and fiery light, in which everything
+looked unnatural, shifting, uncertain, but daylight, when it finally
+came, was of a crude coldness; under it everything returned to be
+itself, meager and stationary, and he knew that it was no
+phantasmagorical Aurora making preparations to wash his face.
+
+He spoke no word to signify either pleasure or displeasure. He let it
+be, like a destiny too strong to withstand. With this acceptance there
+took place in him, body and spirit, a relaxing, as when supporting arms
+are felt by one who had been fearing a fall.
+
+In his not very clear-headed reflections upon himself and his state, he
+had passed into a different category of men, where what he did,
+particularly as regarded worldly proprieties, had little importance,
+because, ill as he felt, there seemed to him such a strong probability
+of his actions having no result. If, on the other hand, he could manage
+to pull through--and he found he cared to do this, cared so much more
+than he had supposed he ever could care, on such desperate days as those
+which had sometimes seen him re-examining his revolver--if he should
+recover, the gladness of his good fortune would outweigh any
+inconvenience created by his weakness now. Life is, and should be,
+dearer to man than anything else, except honor. He found it difficult to
+separate the idea of honor from life, and make it oppose letting this
+robust guardian angel fulfil her promise not to "let anything happen to
+him."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Gerald had too often heard those well-meaning lies which friends and
+nurses tell the sick, to place faith altogether in Aurora's cheerful
+asseverations from day to day that he was getting better.
+
+Yet Aurora was not feigning. She entertained no doubt that with proper
+care he would get well. And she was providing the care. Hence a
+confidence which she did not allow any of those chilly creepy fears
+which come at about three o'clock in the morning to undermine. She was
+so strongly resolved to get him well, and felt so capable of doing it,
+that it would not seem unlikely her very hands in touching him had
+virtue and imparted health.
+
+He said very little, even when the exertion of talking had ceased to
+make him cough. The fact that talk fatigued him was reinforced by his
+old fancy that talk was superfluous. One lived, one looked, one felt....
+
+She was glad he so willingly kept quiet, because as long as he had fever
+it was so much the best thing he could do. He did not have to tell her
+that he took comfort in having her there, that everything she did for
+him was exactly right, that her touch was blessed and had no more
+strangeness for him than that of a sister--nay, than his own. She too
+understood those wordless things which are shed from one person, like a
+radiance, and inhaled by another, like a scent.
+
+In the long silences, she sometimes read a little by the shaded
+candle--she had chosen the night watch for her share and let his devoted
+old Giovanna wait on her master during the day. But very often she sat
+in her easy-chair near the bed doing nothing, just thinking her
+thoughts, marveling at the queerness, the surprises of life. Who could
+have dreamed that first time she entered this big brick-floored,
+white-washed room, and nearly cried because she found it so dreary, that
+she would come to feel at home in it; that by her doing the brown
+earthenware stove in the corner, cold since Mrs. Fane's day, would again
+glow and purr; that over and over she would watch the row of flower-pots
+out on the terrace, with the stiff straw-colored remains in them of last
+year's carnations, grow slowly visible in the dawn; that from their
+pastel portrait the eyes of the mother would watch her placing
+compresses on the brow of the son!
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: Aurora's eyes, fixed and starry, rested upon the little
+flame]
+
+Before going for her rest, she always waited to see the doctor, who made
+an early visit. After they had reissued together from the sickroom, he
+was interviewed by her with the help of an interpreter, Clotilde, who
+was in and out of the house during all that period, making herself
+useful. Estelle instead came only for a moment daily, having a case of
+her own to nurse, who was down, poor crumb, with those
+measles-mumps-whooping cough of puppyhood, distemper.
+
+On the day when Doctor Batoni had agreed that with prudence there would
+be nothing more to fear, the patient might be regarded as having entered
+convalescence, Aurora covered him with a wide and warming smile.
+
+"_Je suis son bonne amie_," thus she translated the explanation of
+her unconcealed happiness, "I'm a good friend of his," nodding at the
+old man with the full sweetness of her dimples; blushing a little, too,
+with the pride of addressing him directly in French.
+
+That morning Aurora was so happy she could not hurry; humming an old
+psalm tune she dawdled about her room, the longer to enjoy her thoughts.
+
+When she finally slept it was more deeply than usual, and she woke with
+a start of fear that it was past the time. The line of sky showing
+between the curtains retained no remembrance of the day. It must be
+late, certainly. Then she heard a faint stirring just outside her door,
+the thing probably which had drawn her out of a sound sleep. It was the
+rustle of some person listening at the crack.
+
+She bounced from bed and went to open. It was as she expected, Giovanna;
+come, she supposed, to see if she were ready to go on duty. At
+Giovanna's first words, though she did not entirely understand them, she
+became uneasy, because Giovanna interspersed them with sighs. Her voice
+sounded as if she might have been crying.
+
+Aurora had grown accustomed to the fact that those hard old eyes of
+Giovanna's took easily to tears, and that she sighed by the thousand the
+moment she was in anxiety over her _signorino_. She knew she must
+not take Giovanna's fears at her own valuation. She gathered from her
+gestures now, combined with her talk, that Gerald, so quiet until
+to-day, had become restless. Giovanna impersonated him tossing and
+throwing his arms out of the bed-covers. Aurora, though not permitting
+herself to be alarmed, hurried with her dressing.
+
+"Ain't it always so," she questioned her own image in the glass, "that
+the moment you feel safe something goes wrong?"
+
+When she tiptoed into the big dim room where Gerald lay, she could not
+at first make out what it was that had troubled Giovanna to the point of
+tears. He seemed quiet enough. After she had taken his pulse and
+temperature, her heart subsided with a blessed relief.
+
+He could not tell her, because he did not himself know, that just
+because he was better he, paradoxically, was worse. Thoughts and
+responsibilities had begun to trouble him again.
+
+"Should you mind very much," he asked suddenly, "if I worked off my
+nervousness by singing? I have kept still, so as not to worry you,
+exactly as long as I can."
+
+"Certainly," she said, "go ahead. I never knew you were a singer. What
+are you going to sing?"
+
+She waited with a certain curiosity.
+
+He began chanting. "B, a, ba; B, e, be--babe! B, i, bi--babebi! B, o,
+bo--babebibo! B, u, bu--babebibobu!" Then he went on to the letter C,
+"C, a, ca! C, e, ce--cace! C, i, ci--caceci!" and to D, and so on, one
+after the other, through all the consonants in the alphabet.
+
+"The queerest rigmarole you ever heard!" Aurora called that simple
+Italian spelling-exercise for little beginners. It might have been funny
+to hear him, only it was disquieting, he did it so earnestly and so
+obstinately kept it up.
+
+When he had finished, Aurora held a sedative powder all nicely wrapped
+in a wet wafer ready for him. He knew what it was and gratefully gulped
+it, composing himself after it to wait in patience and self-control for
+its operation. Aurora, reposing on the magic of drugs like a witch on
+the power of incantations, watched for the drooping of his eyelids and
+relaxing of his frown.
+
+He had lain still for so long that she was congratulating herself upon
+the result thus easily obtained, when he opened his eyes, twice as
+wide-awake as before, and began to talk, as if really the object of an
+opiate were not to stupefy a man, but to rouse him fully. Under its
+influence he was almost garrulous. His vivacity partook of delirium. All
+that passed through his mind pressed forward indiscriminately into
+utterance, as if the sentinels placed on guard over his thoughts had
+been taking an hour off.
+
+Aurora heard him in wonder and perplexity. He was not incoherent, he was
+not extravagant. He was merely talkative, expansive, and this in his
+case was obviously pathological. She wondered also to see how handsome
+he could look, with his eyes alight; his cheek-bones burning, pink as
+paint; his hair, grown long, lying in dark locks over a luminous
+forehead.
+
+She tried to think of something that would abate all this. She was
+searching her nurse's memory for some further sedative by which to
+counteract a first one gone wrong, when the thread of her medical
+meditation snapped, her attention fastened upon what Gerald was saying.
+Because she had a suspicion that it was about Violet he was talking. And
+she had from the first been curious about Violet and his feelings with
+regard to her. As curious as if she had been jealous.
+
+"There is a person--" he said, in the suppressed voice of one
+communicating a secret, "of whom I used to dream very often. Not because
+I wished to. In the days when I wished to, she came seldom. But when I
+dreaded it, she began to come, and do what I would, oppose to her what
+hardness I could, she could be so sinisterly dreadful and unkind that it
+was like a knife in me. Try to shut her out as I might, she would force
+her way in and make me suffer. Why? Why did she want to?... I will tell
+you what I believe. Some women feel their beauty to depend upon their
+power to create suffering. If not happy suffering, then the other kind.
+If men grow indifferent to it, they feel their beauty passing, and if it
+goes there is nothing left that they care for. The unremitting quest of
+their lives therefore is to feed the blood of men to their beauty, and
+if they can not do it in any other manner they pick the locks of sleep
+and get at them in that way. But the last time this person came, a
+surprise awaited her. And the same, I will confess, awaited me. My heart
+was like so much sawdust, so far as one drop of blood that she could
+wring from it. And now she won't come again, I believe, for why should
+she come? She will look a little anxiously in the glass, very likely, to
+see if she has begun to fade. I should be sorry to know that the least
+of her golden hairs had faded--they were so lovely. It's wrong all the
+same to practise sorcery. You don't, Aurora, that is one reason why I
+like to be with you. Women as God made them are strong enough, He knows!
+It's unfair to use sorcery besides, to make themselves beautiful to the
+point of distraction, and desired to the point of pain. And then their
+barbarous methods! That low game of using a man's weakness for the
+increase of their own glory, making a jealous fool wilfully out of a
+decent fellow, and a baby out of a self-respecting man. You, Aurora, you
+are good as good bread, you are restful as a bank of moss. You would
+never do what the others do. Would you, Aurora? You needn't answer me. I
+know."
+
+"If what you mean is that I'm not much of a co-quette," she came in
+quickly, to prevent his continuing, "I guess you're right. Take it since
+I was born, I've been called a good many things, but in all my life I
+don't remember anybody calling me that,--a co-quette. But you're talking
+lots more than is good for you, brother. Now I want you to quiet down
+and give those sleepy-drops a chance to work. Here I've fixed you
+something else that will help them. It's just a drink with nothing in it
+but something nice and cooling. Smells pleasant, doesn't it? This'll do
+the trick."
+
+Slipping an arm under his neck, she lifted him, propped him against
+herself, and held the glass to his mouth. Instead of words pouring out,
+the calming draught flowed in. It was a slow process; he drank by small
+swallows and wished after each one to stop, but she gently forced him to
+go on. When it was finished and he turned his head away from the glass,
+he found it resting on her shoulder. He settled his cheek warmly against
+it, like a child burying his face in the pillow. With a long sigh he
+relaxed.
+
+"Now, Aurora," he said solemnly, "be per--fect--ly still."
+
+He was very still, too. After a long moment he half lifted his head and
+with a long soft sigh replaced it, as if to renew his sense of a
+resting-place so sweet. With all her heart Aurora lent herself to this,
+glad to witness, as she thought, the belated effect of the soporific. In
+a few minutes he would be asleep.
+
+"Aurora," he suddenly said, wakeful as earlier, but without moving his
+heavy head or opening his eyes, "do you remember the first evening I
+ever saw you? You came down the middle of the room all by yourself, like
+something in the theater, where the stage has been cleared for the
+principal character to make an effect. You were a fine large lady in a
+sky-blue frock with bursts of pink, your hair spangled with diamonds, a
+fan in one hand, a long pair of gloves in the other. That at least is
+what everybody else saw that looked at you. But me, what I seemed to see
+was America coming toward me draped in the stars and stripes. Now you
+know how I feel about my dear country. If I loved it why should I have
+fixed my abode once and for all over here? And yet when I saw it coming
+toward me across the room, with your eyes and smile and look of Home, I
+felt like the tiredest traveler and exile in the whole world, who wants
+nothing, nothing, but to get Home again. It was like a moment's
+insanity. I almost wonder that I resisted it, the desire to lay my head
+on your shoulder and cry, Aurora, and tell you about it, then never move
+again, or say another word."
+
+Aurora readjusted her position so as to make his leaning on her even
+easier. She brought a warm cover safe-guardingly around him.
+
+"Poor Geraldino!" she pitied him in the lonely past.
+
+"Then do you remember the first time I went to see you," he asked, "and
+you introduced me, dearest woman, room by room, to the somewhat gruesome
+mysteries of your house? You walked before me holding a lamp. In the
+ball-room, hazy with vastness, you held the lamp high, like a torch. And
+I had a vision of you as America again, or Liberty, or Something,
+lighting the way for me.... But I treated the fancy as one treats
+fancies. I did not in the least intend to cultivate the acquaintance
+begun with your picking me up by the loose skin of the neck and plumping
+me down on the little seat of your victoria."
+
+"Why--Gerald!" she drawled in a tone of reproach purposely funny.
+"Didn't you want to come?"
+
+"I wanted _not_ to come!" he answered, with normal spirit. "But you
+kept saying Jump in. When a lady has said Jump in three times it acts
+like a spell, a man has got to jump."
+
+"But when it came to the hot bread and syrup, brother, you know you were
+glad to be there. You kept your superior look, but you ate all I
+buttered for you. It did me good to see you."
+
+"Yes," he grew dreamy again, "it took me back. It took me back to so
+many things I had nearly forgotten. And when at the end of the evening I
+was leaving, do you remember, Aurora, wrapping in paper some pieces of
+maple-sugar and forcing me to take them home in my pocket? I felt
+absurdly like a little boy and again you seemed like big America;
+something exhaled from you that made me think of slanting silver-gray
+roofs and the New England spring of appleblossoms and warbling robins;
+yes, and of October foliage intolerably bright, and Fourth of July
+celebrations. Not things I dote on, exactly, but things I was born to,
+and restful to me after my years of chasing what is not to be caught,
+wanting what is not to be had, seeking all the time to adjust myself, to
+adjust myself, to the harshness of life, the treachery, the
+unaccountability, the relentlessness--restful as this heavenly shoulder,
+on which I have wished how many hundred times to lay my head like this
+and not move again, or speak again, or have anything ever change.
+Aurora, don't say a word, dear. Particularly, kindest Aurora, don't make
+any of your little jokes. Keep perfectly still, like a good darling, and
+let me forget everything except where my head is, and be perfectly
+happy."
+
+As seriously as if a god had commanded it, Aurora preserved the silence
+and immobility requested of her, only making her shoulder as much wider
+and softer and more comforting as she could by wanting it to be so.
+
+When by and by she felt him slip a little as he began to lose himself in
+sleep, she clasped her hands around him supportingly and held him in
+place.
+
+A single candle burned in the room, with a book to shade it. Aurora's
+eyes, fixed and starry, rested upon the little flame where it was
+reflected in a mirror on the wall opposite, but she did not see it at
+all, so absorbed was she in her thoughts. In her feelings, too. In the
+wonder of the hour. This remarkable Gerald, with his head packed full of
+knowledge, with his speech that charmed you as whistling does an adder,
+with his capacity to paint pictures that the rest could not even
+understand, and then his rarity, the sweetness of his manners, the
+fascination of all that unknown in him which came, she had concluded,
+from his foreign bringing-up--he had wanted ever since he first saw her
+just to lay his head on her shoulder and rest....
+
+Her common ordinary shoulder. What did he see in her? Taking for granted
+that he saw something, Aurora attributed this unknown quality in herself
+to God, and thanked Him. She tightened her clasp about Gerald, the
+better to feel him there. The power of the sleeping-potion had overtaken
+him completely. Thoughts that moistened her eyes resulted from feeling
+her arms full of the breathing warmth of a beloved form. Those defrauded
+maternal arms! That other, who would have been five years old at this
+time, and would have been called little Dan, after Dan, her big father,
+how she would have nursed him through his childish ailments, how she
+would have held him and rocked him! No, she would never stop yearning
+over him. One must suppose that God knows best.
+
+Gerald's breathing was deep and quiet. When sure that it could be done
+without waking him, she let him gently down on to the pillow.
+
+She stood beside the bed for a few minutes, in her soft garment of
+cashmere and swansdown which made no more sound when she moved than did
+her velvet shoes; she watched him sleep with emotions of gratitude
+beyond possibility of expression to any one but that old intimate, God.
+He was getting well so surely and fast. He would shortly be as well as
+ever.
+
+Confident that he would want nothing more for the rest of the night, she
+arranged herself in her easy-chair for a good sleep, too.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+On the next day she divined from his half troubled look at her, and the
+shy modesty of his manner, that he was wondering whether he had actually
+babbled last night, or in a mild delirium dreamed the whole thing. Not
+from her might he find out. Her easy, matter-of-fact way made any such
+passage seem at least unlikely.
+
+Having slept during the night she did not retire to rest during the day,
+but let Giovanna go about her long neglected affairs and in her place
+looked after Gerald, who had waked from his deep sleep immensely
+refreshed. He would not need a constant watcher beside him after this,
+during night or day.
+
+"What shall I do to amuse you?" she asked him, to make an interruption
+after she had felt him watching her through half closed lids for some
+time. "Don't you want me to read to you?"
+
+"I think not, Aurora. Thank you just as much."
+
+"Well, then, how shall I entertain you? Do you want me to be a gold-fish
+for you?"
+
+"How do you 'be a gold-fish,' Aurora?"
+
+"Look!" But the instant she changed her face into a gold-fish's and
+waggled up through imaginary water, opening and shutting her mouth like
+a rubber valve, he hid his eyes, crying sharply, "Please stop! I don't
+want to see it."
+
+The gold-fish personality was dropped.
+
+"Very well, then," she said, with unimpaired serenity, "shall I do a
+squirrel gnawing a nut? Every family its own circus."
+
+"If you do it, I will not look. How can you endure, lovely as you are,
+to make yourself ugly--grotesque?"
+
+"Aren't you rather hard to suit to-day, mister? Shall I be a hen, then,
+scratching for her chicks? That's mild."
+
+"No, no, no. Yes. No. I don't know about the hen. Let me have a sample."
+
+He watched her, critically and provisionally, while with comfortable,
+motherly, half-suppressed chest-sounds, and a round eye cocked for finds
+among the dirt, remarkably altogether the appearance of a pensive white
+hen, she made believe to scratch up the earth with her feet. A rather
+sympathetic performance, he allowed, her imitation of the hen, calling
+up before one the vision of a farmyard, a brood of downy yellow chicks,
+a duckpond, sunshine, green things.
+
+He let her do it as long as she would, or rather until to vary the thing
+she increased the comic beyond the line he fixed. When midday found him
+grudgingly laughing at her cackling, it seemed improbable certainly that
+midnight had seen him sleeping in her arms. But underlying their
+laughter was a consciousness in each that day of a thing uniting them
+which had not been there before.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Sitting bolstered up in bed to eat his first real meal, he looked, with
+his long hair parted in the middle and brushed down over his hollow
+temples, like one of those old masters in the Ewe-fitsy, Aurora told
+him. A St. John the Baptist, she specified.
+
+She chipped the top off his egg and cut finger sizes of bread for him,
+so that he might have it in the foreign way he preferred.
+
+While he languidly ate, yet with pleasure, the door softly swung inward,
+revealing faces of women,--Estelle, Clotilde, Livvy, Giovanna,--all
+equally kind, all craning for the delight of a peep at him eating his
+soft-boiled egg.
+
+Because he was still weak, tears came into his eyes, and because he
+could not permit them to be seen, he waved and haggardly smiled toward
+the smiling and nodding faces without inviting them nearer.
+
+Women! women!... What a great deal of room they had occupied in his
+life! How much he owed them for affection,--mother, sister,
+servant-girl, friends....
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+He had known from whispers and rustlings, from a sort of instinct,
+latterly from Giovanna's own lips, that his house since the coming of
+"that lady" to undertake the government of his sickroom had been full of
+people, making practical and easy the carrying out of her plots.
+Abundance of people and abundance of money. Old Giovanna grumbled
+bitterly at this invasion, but she did it inside of herself, sanely
+recognizing that she had subject for gratitude. Her hot dark eye looked
+all she thought, and her lips moved as she soundlessly said all she
+felt; but when she dropped into the dark church of Santa Maria degli
+Angeli for a moment's devotion she did not fail to ask Maria to bless
+"that lady" and give her great good. After which she begged Her by the
+seven swords of Her sorrow to hasten the day that should clear the house
+of the whole horde of strangers, and permit her to resume the quiet life
+with her signorino.
+
+Gerald, whose nature felt the oppression of material benefits as much as
+Giovanna felt jealousy with regard to her rights and loves, resolved
+that the sole seemly return for generosity in this case would be an
+equal generosity, consisting in an acceptance pure of every shadow,
+either of obligation, or reserve, or regret.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Since the doctor said it would do the invalid no harm to admit a visitor
+or two, Aurora wrote to Mrs. Foss. She came at once with Leslie. Both on
+the occasion of this call were perfect, in tact, in warmth, in
+friendship. And yet with them, and the sense of the World and the
+World's point of view which they inevitably brought, change entered the
+house.
+
+The vacuous, almost happy languor of the sick was replaced in Gerald by
+an irritable gloominess, decently repressed, but unconcealable.
+
+"There's no mistake; you're getting well," remarked Aurora, when the
+unrest of a mind troubled by many things expressed itself in indignation
+against innocent inanimate objects, a drop of candle wax for burning, an
+ivory paper-cutter for snapping in his impatient hand. "You're getting
+well. I guess I can go home and feel easy about you."
+
+And sooner than Giovanna had dared to hope when most fervently she
+invoked the Holy Mother, lo! the intruders, mistress and maids, bag and
+baggage, had left in their places room and silence. So much sooner than
+expected that Giovanna, clasping in her hands an incredible fee, almost
+found it in herself to feel regret.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+
+On their last day together Gerald had asked Aurora to find the key of a
+certain desk-drawer and to bring him the miniature strong-box locked in
+it. He had taken out one by one, to show her, the little store of
+trinkets once belonging to his mother and given her from among them the
+one he thought most charming, an old silver cross studded with amethysts
+and pearls.
+
+Her own house, when she reëntered it, looked faintly unfamiliar, as if
+she had been away much longer than she had by actual count. But her big
+soft bed looked good to her, she told Estelle, after the bed of granite
+framed in iron she had lately occupied.
+
+She was in high good spirits. Gerald out of the woods, the amethyst
+cross, Estelle and her beautiful commodious house returned to, vistas
+ahead of good times and heart satisfactions, a sense of success and the
+richness of life--Aurora was in splendid spirits.
+
+Estelle and she slept together on the first night, so as to be able to
+buzz until morning, as they had used to do in their young days, when one
+of them was allowed to go on a visit to the other and stay overnight.
+There ensued a very orgy of talk, a going over of all that had happened
+since their separation, quite as if they had not once seen each other in
+the interval.
+
+It might have been thought, when their remarks finally became far
+spaced, as they did between two and three of the morning, that this
+happened because the streams were running dry as well as because the
+talkers were growing sleepy; but no such thing. Each had loads more that
+she might have told; but each, as had not been the case in the old days,
+was keeping back something from the other. Each locked in her breast a
+secret.
+
+There had naturally been talk of Gerald. Estelle was immensely nice
+about him, and Aurora appeared immensely frank, but yet both knew that
+he was to be a delicate subject between them thenceforward, and that
+thoughts relating to him could not be exchanged without reserve.
+
+There had been laughter over Estelle's subterfuges in order not to let
+it be learned from her, and this without directly lying, that Aurora was
+actually living at Gerald's. "It's a case of a cold," she had explained
+her friend's non-appearance upon one occasion, without mentioning whose
+cold.
+
+The details of Busteretto's illness and danger had caused him to be
+reached for in the dark and kissed and cuddled anew.
+
+"My, but it's nice to have you back!" Estelle said in the morning,
+fixing a bright, fond gaze upon her friend across the little table in
+the bedroom, where they sat in their wrappers eating breakfast. "A penny
+for your thoughts, Nell. What are you thinking about?"
+
+Nell smiled rather foolishly, then, putting Satan behind her in the
+shape of a temptation to prevaricate, said:
+
+"I was thinking what they were doing over there. Whether Gerald has had
+a good night, and about Giovanna, and what it's all like without me.
+It's hard for me now to think of the place without me. I miss myself
+there."
+
+"I suppose you'll be driving round to inquire sometime in the course of
+the day," Estelle said, with true generosity; at which Aurora tried to
+look as if she were not sure; she would think about it.
+
+With arms around each other's waists they went through all the rooms for
+Aurora to renew her pleasure in them after absence. They came to a
+standstill before her portrait in the drawing-room.
+
+"There's no mistake, he's talented," Estelle admitted good-humoredly,
+after a considerable silence. "That's a fine portrait."
+
+Aurora did not say she thought so, too. Alone in her room later, while
+Estelle was dressing to go out together, she looked at the other
+portrait to see if she were "any nearer educated up to it." It seemed to
+her she was, a little bit.
+
+She started to dress. Being given to homely rather than poetic fancies,
+she subsequently thought of herself as having been, during the process
+of making herself fine for the afternoon drive and call, like some Cape
+Cod young one trotting happily along with her tin pail full of
+blueberries, just before a big dog sprang out of the roadside tangle and
+jostled the pail out of her hand, so that all the berries were
+spilled....
+
+Even as she was buttoning her gloves a letter came for her with a
+parcel. All rosy with delight, she quickly found in her purse a reward
+for Gaetano, the bringer. Without too much hurry, like a person not
+eager to shorten a solid enjoyment, she opened the letter. It did not
+strike her as surprising, certainly not as ominous, that Gerald should
+write when he might expect to see her so soon. She read:
+
+This is the fourth letter, dearest Aurora, that I have written you since
+waking, after a very bad night, in such a black humor that you would
+know I am quite myself again and life has resumed for me its natural
+colors. I destroyed those letters one after the other because, although
+written with the effort of my whole being to be what you call sweet,
+they sounded to me insufferably disagreeable. And now whatever I write I
+shall have to send because if I destroy this letter also I shall not
+have time to write another before you come to see me as you promised.
+And the reason for my wretched night was that I was haunted by all the
+reasons there are why you should not come. They are so difficult to put
+into words that I despair, after three attempts, of doing it in any but
+an offensive manner. Pity, Aurora, the plight of your poor patient;
+permit him not to go into them. Just--don't come.
+
+Alas! that cannot be all. I have the vision of your puzzled face. Well,
+then, it is for yourself, in part. I have no excuse for profiting by a
+kindness that may be harmful to you. It is my duty to regard for you the
+conventions you are big-heartedly willing to disregard. I deplore the
+fact that I was ever so weak as to forget it.
+
+But it is also for myself, who must not further be demoralized and
+spoiled.
+
+I must not, moreover, be laid further under obligations of gratitude,
+the less, my dear Aurora, that gratitude is not precisely what I feel.
+No. I so little dote upon life that I should be glad if a merciful
+angel's attention had not been drawn to me, and I perhaps might have
+escaped the dreary prolongation of years. I am sorry, but so it is.
+
+Pray do not conceive any relation between what I have just written and
+the request that follows. Will you be so kind as to return the object
+belonging to me which I miss from the little table-drawer at the head of
+my bed? You had no right to take it.
+
+Vincent Johns is coming in a day or two. Do not think of me, therefore,
+as lonely or neglected.
+
+I find I must hurry or be too late. This letter is beastly and ought to
+be torn up like the others. It simply cannot; it must go. I can only
+pray, Aurora, that you will understand.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Aurora went back to the beginning and read the letter a second time.
+Then she turned to the accompanying parcel and noticed that it was done
+up in a shabby piece of old newspaper. It contained a pair of fur-lined
+velvet shoes, a bow-knot of blue satin ribbon, and a bottle of almond
+milk, things of her own which through carelessness had been left behind.
+She could not know that the honest Giovanna alone was responsible for
+this return of her property. Coming at that moment, it formed the
+occasion for two stinging tears rising to the edge of Aurora's eyes. She
+swept them away with the back of her glove, and forbade any more to
+follow. To prevent them she took her lips between her teeth, and with
+all her strength called upon her pride.
+
+She read Gerald's letter over again, really trying to understand, to be
+fair, to interpret it in the high-minded way he would wish.
+
+"When all is said, it amounts to this,"--she reached the end of that
+exercise by a short cut,--"he wants to be let alone."
+
+And after every allowance had been made for him, and all due deference
+paid to his excellent reasons, still it seemed to her what she couldn't
+call anything but a poor return. Because his letter was bound to hurt
+her, and he must have known it. His sending it, therefore, argued a lack
+of any very deep affection for her. After she had come, just from his
+own words and actions, to supposing....
+
+"This is what you get for not remembering that if a person is
+practically a foreigner you can never expect to know them except in
+spots," she admonished herself.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+After they had driven in the Cascine and around the Viali for the
+sunshine and air, Aurora asked suddenly:
+
+"Haven't we had enough of this?" and ordered the coachman to go home.
+
+"Why!" exclaimed Estelle, astonished, "I thought we were going to Gerald
+Fane's to see how he's getting along!"
+
+"No, I guess we won't. I think it's time, after living with him for
+three weeks, that I began to look after my reputation, don't you?" said
+Aurora, with a forced lightness of rather bitter effect.
+
+"I had a note from him, anyhow, just before we came out," she added
+after a moment. "He's doing all right."
+
+Estelle understood that something was wrong. Aurora could not
+successfully pretend with her. Aurora's transparent face, as she now
+took note of it, betrayed hidden perplexity and chagrin. Estelle asked
+no questions, not needing to be told that Gerald's note had worked the
+change. Despite her affection for her friend, indeed, just because of
+that affection, Estelle was quietly glad of it. Her thought caressed the
+secret which has been referred to, a scheme which for some weeks had
+given her an excited feeling of having between her fingers the thread of
+the Fates.
+
+After Estelle had gone to her own room for the night, Aurora sat down to
+compose an answer to Gerald's letter. She had reflected a good deal
+since receiving it, and out of confusion and complexity singled one
+clear and simple thought or two.
+
+Gerald had never said or intimated that she had forced herself upon him
+when he was too ill to help it; but the truth was she had done that,
+after all his shying rocks at her, too, to keep her off. Nor had Gerald
+suggested that one of his reasons for wishing her not to haunt his
+bedside was a fear of her becoming inconveniently fond of him. A hint
+could be found, if one chose, that he feared becoming too fond of her,
+but of the other no vestige, no shadow, or ghost of a shadow. Yet by
+those two points the spirit of Aurora's reply must be inspired.
+Centuries of civilization have ground into the female of the species one
+particular lesson.
+
+So the irascible man's nervous, hurried and harried scrawl, written with
+sputtering pen that at several places tore clean through the paper, and
+written under the compulsion of his soul and his good sense, received
+from the best of women an answer in her calmest hand, deliberately
+calculated to give him pain, at the same time as to convey to him
+unambiguously that, as far as she was concerned, he was freer than the
+birds of the air. She wrote:
+
+    My dear friend Gerald,
+
+    What I want principally to say is just _don't worry_. Don't
+    worry for fear I'll come, and don't worry for fear I won't
+    understand, and don't worry because you think my feelings may be
+    hurt. And above all the rest, don't worry about
+    _gratitude_, for I don't feel you owe me any at all. Don't
+    you think for a moment that I saved your life. You were not as
+    sick as you imagine, I guess. It was a very light case, or how
+    would you have got over it so soon? You were not near as sick,
+    according to all accounts, as poor Busteretto, who has been
+    having what they call here the _cimurro_. I took you in
+    hand because _I am a nurse_ and I couldn't keep my hands
+    off, just as an old fire-engine horse will start to gallop when
+    he hears a fire-alarm even if he isn't on the job. If it had
+    been Italo Ceccherelli who was sick I would have been tempted in
+    just the same way; so you see there is no occasion for
+    gratitude. Put it out of your mind.
+
+    Now about the thing I took from the drawer of your night-stand.
+    I am very sorry I can't give it back, because I flung it out in
+    the middle of the river. That is what I did with it, and I am
+    not sorry either. You know that we at home don't look upon
+    certain things as you apparently do over here. We think it a
+    disgrace for a man to kill himself. I myself am old-fashioned
+    enough to think that that door leads to hell. I have been
+    astonished to find that over here it is thought quite
+    respectable, that some Italians look upon it as an honorable
+    way, for instance, of paying their debts, and a natural way of
+    getting over an unhappy love-affair. As I know you have a good
+    many foreign ideas, and as you have once or twice made a remark
+    that showed me you thought of that solution of difficulties as a
+    possible one, I grabbed your nasty old pistol when I found it in
+    the little drawer, and it reposes now at the bottom of the Arno.
+    Don't get another, Gerald. No burglars are going to enter your
+    house to steal your Roman tear-bottle or your books. When you
+    are so blue you feel like killing yourself, say your prayers. I
+    am very glad your friend the abbé is going to come and stay with
+    you. He is a _good influence_, I feel sure, and a good
+    friend.
+
+    I suppose I shall see you again some time, even if I don't do
+    the visiting. But don't be in any hurry, not on my account. I
+    hope that in the meantime you will get back your strength
+    quickly. Remember that you will have to be very careful for
+    quite a long time, because a relapse is _an awfully mean
+    thing_.
+
+    Good-by, my dear Gerald. Please accept the very best wishes of
+
+                                        Yours sincerely,
+                                                Aurora Hawthorne.
+
+    P.S. I did not write four letters and tear three of them up,
+    like you. I wrote one and corrected it, and here I have copied
+    it out for you, hoping that in it I have made my meaning as
+    clear to you as you made yours clear to me in your letter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+
+When the latter occurrences had shaken down in Aurora's mind, Gerald's
+letter, which she from time to time re-read, impressed her as a most
+gentle and reasonable production of his pen, while her own letter,
+preserved in the original scribble, appeared to her horrid, cutting, and
+uncalled for.
+
+But there was now nothing to do about it. The state of mind created in
+her by the whole episode prepared her to welcome with open arms any
+diversion, any event which would restore to her self-conceit a little
+vitality or lay on her heart a little balm; and so when, at the
+psychological moment, Doctor Thomas Bewick surprisingly turned up in
+Florence,--it may be remembered that he was Estelle's choice for
+Nell,--Nell fell on his neck quite literally, and gave him a full,
+sonorous kiss.
+
+"Tom! Tom!" she cried in delight, "how good it is to see you!"
+
+This happened in her formal drawing-room, whither she had gone on the
+servant's announcement that a gentleman from America, who had given no
+card or name, asked to see her.
+
+Their greeting over, she ran out into the hall, screaming joyfully:
+
+"Hat! Hat! Come down this minute! Hurry up! You'll never guess who's
+here!"
+
+In reply to which summons Estelle came hurrying down the stairs with an
+innocent, expectant air.
+
+"If it isn't Doctor Bewick!" she exclaimed, without giving herself away
+by one false inflection. "Why, Doctor Bewick, this is simply too awfully
+nice! What _are_ you doing over here? Who _would_ have
+expected to see _you_?"
+
+"Tom," said Aurora, "I was never in my life so glad to see any one. I
+didn't know how much I'd missed you till I saw you. You good old thing!
+You nice old boy! Aren't you a brick to have come! My soul, my soul! I
+didn't know till this minute how tired I am of foreigners and
+half-foreigners and quarter-foreigners and all their ways. I was hungry
+for home-folks and didn't know it. Now, please God, we'll have some talk
+where we know that when we use the same words we mean the same thing,
+and aren't wondering all the time what's really in the other's mind!"
+
+The man to whom this was said absorbed it with a face fixed in smiles of
+pleasure. He was a big blond man, disposed to corpulence, and looking
+somewhat like a fresh-faced, gigantic boy until his eye met yours and
+gave the note of a fine, mature intelligence, open on every side, and
+unobtrusively gathering in what it had no strong impulse afterward to
+give out again in any open form of self-expression.
+
+Tolerant, not from any vagueness of judgment; easy to get on with, but
+not to drive or to deceive, he looked strikingly the good fellow, yet
+kept you in respect. An air of capability, a consciousness of definite
+achievements, went coupled in him with the humor that would prevent
+bumptiousness however great the matter for pride. A quiet carelessness
+of other people's opinions formed part of his effect of poise; the
+opinions of dukes would have affected him as little as those of
+rag-pickers, unless they recommended themselves to that judicial spot in
+his brain at which he tried them. He was level-headed, unsentimental,
+but kind, of a kindness that like good-humor seemed almost physical, and
+made him stop to stroke the kitchen cat as well as see to it that the
+negress's baby had the right milk for its orphaned stomach.
+
+He looked at Aurora with smiling scrutiny, and facially expressed a vast
+appreciation. She looked back at him with eyes of laughing tenderness.
+Avoiding to speak directly to her the compliments rising in his mind, he
+turned to Estelle.
+
+"Hasn't she blossomed out!"
+
+"Isn't she wonderful?" chimed in that friend, enthusiastically.
+
+Aurora, with a comedy of pride, threw up her chin, lifted her arms, and
+turned as if on a pivot, to show herself off in her elegance. She had on
+the wine-colored street-dress bordered with black fox; over its white
+satin waistcoat embroidered with gold hung in a splendid loop her pink
+corals. The restraining Paris corset gave to her luxuriant form a
+charming modish correctness of line.
+
+"Oh, Tom,"--she sank happily on the sofa beside him,--"we're having the
+time of our lives! Just wait till you see me in company, and hear me put
+on my good English, when, instead of calling things lovely or horrid, I
+call them amusing or beastly or impossible. But your turn first. Give us
+the Denver news."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+After dinner that evening, in the midst of Italo's brilliant
+performance, a caller came,--a thin, oldish, English-speaking lady whose
+black dress made no pretense of following the fashion.
+
+Aurora had met her at Mrs. Satterlee's during a meeting appointed to
+raise funds for the Protestant orphanage. When this philanthropist,
+after a little talk of other things, mentioned the relict of a mason,
+left with five young children, Estelle and Dr. Bewick took it as a hint
+to withdraw beyond earshot. The two ladies were left talking in
+undertones; after a minute they found themselves alone in the room.
+
+Estelle preceded Dr. Bewick across the hall to the dining-room, deserted
+and orderly, where the drop-light rained its direct brightness only on
+the rich and variegated tapestry cover of the table beneath it. From the
+sideboard--whence the marble fruit had for some time been missing--she
+brought a bottle of aërated water and a glass to set before him; she
+found him an ash-tray, and seated herself beside the table near him in
+such a way as to get, through the parted half-doors, a glimpse of the
+visitor when she should leave.
+
+Before speaking, she exchanged with the doctor a look of intelligence.
+
+"You see what I mean?" she asked little above a whisper.
+
+[Illustration: Aurora, with a comedy of pride, threw up her chin,
+lifted her arms, and turned as if on a pivot, to show herself off
+in her elegance]
+
+Dr. Bewick looked all around the room with leisurely appraising eyes,
+then nodded understanding. There was no intimation that he was not ready
+to listen, but he did not seem quite ready to talk. His white
+shirt-bosom was remarkably broad as he leaned back in his chair in the
+slightly lolling fashion of large, good-humored men. For all the
+nonchalance of his attitude, he looked, from evening tie to thin-soled
+dress-boots, beautifully spruce, as Aurora had remarked, and made an
+appropriate pendant to her in her Parisian finery.
+
+Approval of him was written large on Estelle's pleasant, alert
+countenance; a quiet, comprehensive liking for her sat as plainly in the
+eyes reflecting her slim person and evening-frock of beaded net. Being
+Nell's friends made them friends, a thing not so common as one wishes.
+Through her they felt almost on the familiar terms of old friendship,
+although Estelle had never met Dr. Tom Bewick before he came to New York
+to see them off on their great four-stacked ocean-steamer.
+
+"You see what I mean?" she asked, and, not expecting a regular answer,
+did not wait for it. "Now that woman won't leave until she has secured
+support for the mason's five children, and she'll do this without the
+smallest difficulty. In a day or two some one else will come, with the
+sad case of a poor father out of work who is going to have to sell his
+blind daughter's canary unless Nell steps in to relieve their wants. And
+Nell will step in. Word has been passed, just as they say a tramp at
+home marks a house where he's been given a meal, and every case of want
+in this town, it seems to me, is hopefully brought to Nell. And she
+listens every time; she doesn't get sick of it. And you know, Doctor,
+that her circumstances don't warrant it."
+
+Bewick, as Estelle stopped for some comment on his side, made a slight
+motion of chin and eyelids that partly or deprecatingly agreed with her.
+He took the cigar out of his mouth, but having knocked the ash off,
+replaced it, to listen further and not for the moment speak.
+
+"It's positively funny, the things Nell has been doing with her money,"
+Estelle went on, in a tone that did not disguise the fact of her
+glorying in this prodigality while being justly frightened by it. "It's
+not just the ordinary charities, churches, hospitals, etc.,--all of
+those send in their regular bills, as you might say. It's a Swiss
+music-box for the crippled son of the _spazzaturaio_, or
+street-cleaner; it's a marriage-portion for this one and funeral
+expenses for that one; it's filling the mendicant nuns' coal-cellar,
+it's clothing a whole orphan-school in a cheerfuller color! Clotilde and
+Italo call her attention to every deserving case, and are guided in this
+by the simple knowledge that Nell can't hold on to her money. Of course
+it's her good heart. She's done a lot for them and their family, too,
+I've discovered. I don't know just how much, but I can guess by their
+look of licking their chops. I'm not saying they aren't all
+right--honest, sincere, and so forth--or that I don't like them. It's
+Nell's own fault that she's imposed on. I don't doubt that they're as
+devoted as they seem, it's only right they should be. It's right the
+whole city of Florence should be. I was thinking only the other day as
+we drove through Viale Lorenzo the Magnificent that it would be
+appropriate for a grateful city to rechristen our street Viale Aurora
+the Magnificent."
+
+Tom Bewick laughed, nodding to himself with an effect of relish. He
+murmured, "Aurora the Magnificent!"
+
+"Aurora the Magnificent--Aurora the Magnificent is all very well,"
+Estelle took up again with animation, "but she's already spending her
+capital."
+
+Bewick did not allow himself to appear startled or troubled; still, he
+was made pensive by this. His look at Estelle invited her to go on and
+tell him the rest, just how bad it was. She was leaning forward, with
+her elbows on the table, one hand slipping the rings on and off a finger
+of the other, in her quick way.
+
+"You know what her income is. It would have provided for all this,"--she
+took in the luxury around them by a gesture of the head,--"but no income
+can suffice to set up in housekeeping all the picturesque paupers in
+Florence. That's why I was so anxious for you to come, and wrote you as
+I did. You can curb her; I can't. I have no influence with her in that
+way, and I simply can't sit still and see her throw away all this good
+money that was intended to provide her with comforts for the rest of her
+life. Unless somebody looks after it, she won't have a penny left. You
+must talk to her, Doctor Bewick. Don't let her know, though, that I put
+you up to it. You can ask a plain question, as it's right and natural
+for you to do, then when she answers you can lecture her. She'll take it
+from you."
+
+Bewick, with his sensible face, looked as if he saw justice and reason
+in all Miss Madison had said to him; yet he did not go on with the
+subject. It might be that he felt delicate, in a masculine way, about
+uttering to a lady's best friend any criticism of that lady's mode of
+doing or being--criticism which he might feel no difficulty perhaps in
+voicing to herself. Estelle took this into consideration and, his
+reticence notwithstanding, relied on him to do his duty.
+
+A diversion occurred in the shape of a knock at the door--the door
+leading to the kitchen-stairs. It was but the scratch of one fingernail
+on the wood. Tiny as the sound was, it did not have to be repeated
+before Estelle ran to open. A small four-footed person entered, the
+bigness of a baby's muff and the whiteness of a marquis's powdered wig.
+Estelle caught him up from the floor and with a coo of affection, "What
+um doing in the kitchen, little rogums?" set him on the table, under the
+lamp, for Doctor Tom to see how utterly beautiful he was and have the
+points and characteristics of a Maltese terrier explained to him.
+
+Busteretto was reaching dog's estate, his shape had taken on a degree of
+subtlety, his hair was growing long and straight and like leaves of the
+weeping willow. Estelle lifted the white fringe depending from his brow,
+and exposed to the light two great limpid brown eyes, incredibly sweet
+and intelligent. It was as wonderful, in its way, as if a blind beggar,
+insignificant and easy to pass by as he stood at the street-corner,
+should take off black goggles suddenly, and you should perceive that he
+was a masking angel come to test the hearts of men.
+
+"Did you ever see such a little sweetheart?" gasped Estelle.
+
+"A pretty little fellow," spoke the doctor commendingly. With the
+instinct to relieve discomfort he raised the veil of hair again as soon
+as Estelle had let it drop, and looking further into the beautiful eyes,
+that with the neat nose made a triangle of dark spots effective as
+mouches on Columbine's cheek,--"Why don't you tie up his hair like this
+to keep it out of the way?" he asked.
+
+"We mustn't! Mr. Fane, who gave him to Nell, says it would be bad for
+him, he might go blind. They're that kind of eyes and need the shield
+from the light. Mr. Fane knows all about this Maltese breed of dogs."
+
+"Is he the same one who painted her portrait?" Dr. Tom deviated from the
+subject of the dog, over whose eyes the curtain was allowed to drop
+again.
+
+"Yes, he's an artist."
+
+"And the same one she nursed through an illness?" asked Dr. Tom after a
+moment, with the mere amount of interest apparently of one asking for a
+topographical detail, so that he may get his bearings.
+
+"Yes. You'd know, wouldn't you, that she'd have to, if she thought he
+wasn't getting the right care and didn't see any other way of providing
+it."
+
+"Well, Skip," Dr. Tom returned his attention to the dog, "you're a fine
+little fellow. Yes, sir." He held out a large pink hand and received in
+it immediately a wee gentlemanly hand of fur and horn, rather smaller
+than any of his fingers. "Good dog," he said, and regarded their
+friendship as sealed. But next minute, because Estelle had whispered to
+him, "Make believe to strike me," he lifted his fist menacingly against
+her, and on the instant, with the courage of a David, there dashed
+against him a little wild white flurry, not to bite--the skin of man is
+sacred--but by a show of pearly teeth and the growlings of a lion to
+frighten the giant off.
+
+"Good dog!" cheered Tom and leaned back laughing, "Well done!"
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Because it was very late when Dr. Bewick left the ladies to return to
+his hotel they immediately repaired to their respective rooms; but
+before Estelle had got to bed, Aurora, half undressed, came strolling
+into her maidenly bower of temperate green and white.
+
+A vague depression of spirits had overtaken Aurora, reaction, perhaps,
+from the excitements of the day, and she sought her friend with the
+instinct to make herself feel better by talking it off.
+
+She dropped on a chair, and in silence continued to braid her hair for
+the night.
+
+"Isn't he the nicest fellow!" began Estelle, setting the keynote for
+joyous confidences.
+
+"Isn't he just!" replied Aurora. "I want him to have the best time in
+the three weeks he's going to spend here. We've got to show him all the
+beauties of Florence, and then I want him to know all our friends. We
+must have some tea-parties and some dinners. I want it to be just as
+gay. Who is there I ought to lay myself out for, if not Tom Bewick?"
+
+"I quite agree with you. Let's plan."
+
+"No, to-morrow'll do. It's too late. I'm tired." The motions of Aurora's
+fingers were suspended among the strands of her hair. She fell into a
+muse. "Seeing Tom"--she came out of it again, and went on braiding--"has
+brought back, along with some things I never want to forget, such a lot
+of things I don't want to think of!"
+
+"I suppose it would."
+
+"His sisters, for instance. He doesn't look a bit like them,
+really--nasty bugs, godless, gutless pigs--but yet he brings them up
+before me. Idell rather more than Cora, and Idell was the meanest of the
+two, and her husband the miserablest, sneakingest cuss. Oh, how I hate
+the bunch of them! And I oughtn't, you know. You oughtn't to go on
+hating your enemies after you've got the better of them. But the moment
+I think of that trio, Cora Bewick--sour-bellied old maid!--and Idell
+Friebus, and her rotten little pea-green husband--pin-headed insect!
+flap-eared fool!--I get mad. If you could really know, Hat, the
+cold-heartedness and wicked-mindedness of those people! How they ever
+happened in Tom's family Goodness only knows. And such a fine father!
+The Judge was as good as any of those old fellows in the Bible, I do
+believe. _That_ patient, _that_ considerate, and _that_
+just! More than just; what he did was more than just, and those girls of
+his simply couldn't stand it. They couldn't stand it, after they had
+neglected him all through his illness so that it was a scandal, that he
+should treat the person who had done their daughters' duty for them the
+same as he treated them, no better and no worse, but just the same. The
+things those people did to me, Hat, the things they said about me--"
+
+"I know, I know; you've told me," said Hattie, soothingly and
+deterringly.
+
+"The things those people did to me, and the things they said about
+me,"--Nell, not to be deterred, repeated intensely,--"if I'd ever wanted
+to give up my share, those things they did and said would have made me
+hold on like grim death just to spite them. Oh,"--she broke off, and
+flung her finished braids back over her shoulders,--"why do I let myself
+think of them? I grow so hot! It's the sight of Tom that has started me
+back to thinking of all that excitement and disgustingness. Dear good
+Tom, who stood by me like a trump! I do wish, Hat, I didn't hate so hard
+when I hate. We've taken pride in my family, I'm afraid, in being good
+haters, as if it were part of the same trait that makes you loyal and
+true to your friends. But perhaps it's a mistake. I know that Gerald
+said once"--she yielded to the obscure desire to hear the air vibrate,
+as it had not done for some time, with the syllables of his
+name--"Gerald said once, when we were talking of things, 'We must
+forgive everything,' he said; 'we must forgive happenings the same as we
+must people.' And Gerald, you know, when he's in sober earnest, has some
+good ideas."
+
+"Talking about Gerald," Estelle came in quickly, glad of a change from
+the other subject, "did Livvy tell you that our cook met Giovanna at the
+market, and Giovanna told her that her master was doing finely; that he
+hadn't yet been out of doors, but that he sat at the open window in the
+sunshine? I'd been meaning to ask you."
+
+"Oh." Aurora quietly took it, and thought it over a minute. "No, she
+hadn't told me. I suppose those long stairs would keep him from going
+out till he was good and strong. Did she say anything else?"
+
+"Only that Giovanna was buying a chicken, and the abbé, she said, was
+still staying with them."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+The ladies of the Hermitage did the honors of Florence with modest pride
+and a certain glibness. Before the early old masters, Aurora said to
+Tom:
+
+"At first I couldn't stand them. I guffawed at the idea of there being
+anything to admire in them. Even now I can't pretend I like them; but I
+keep still and pray for light. Isn't that the beginning of polish?"
+
+Tom was taken to make calls. Aurora took upon herself to explain
+Florentine society to him.
+
+"There are little stories about most everybody," she said, "so you have
+to be pretty careful. If a certain General is present, for instance,
+whom I may have a chance to point out to you, you don't want to talk of
+_horses_, because his fiery steed bolted with him during an
+engagement once and his enemies caricatured him running away. Then if a
+certain viscount is present, whom I may have a chance to introduce to
+you, you don't want to talk of _ermine_, because that little animal
+is a feature in his coat of arms, and his coat of arms along with his
+title of nobility, scandal says, came as a reward from a royal personage
+for marrying the lady who was his first wife. So you'll have to look
+out, Tom, or you may be called upon to fight a duel."
+
+The most splendid dinner that could be planned in council with Clotilde
+and the cook was prepared to honor the friend from home. To this were
+bidden the Fosses, Aurora's best friends; the Hunts, her next best;
+Manlio, whom she wished Tom to see as a truly beautiful specimen of
+Italian; and Landini, because she was curious to know what Tom thought
+of him.
+
+Aurora had not seen the latter since the night of the _veglione_.
+Finding that he had not called during the interval, she had been glad to
+hope that his suspected mysterious project for making her his own had
+been dropped. That being the case, she was not at all averse to seeing
+him. On the contrary.
+
+Charlie Hunt she had not seen since the variety-show. Learning that he
+also had not once come during her absence, she thought that this
+admitted of some simple explanation which he would give on the night of
+the dinner.
+
+Charlie, receiving the invitation, pondered a while before accepting. He
+considered himself to have been insulted, rather, by Mrs. Hawthorne.
+Still, he could not be absolutely sure. If, anyhow, she did not know
+that he knew the black crow to have been none other than herself there
+would be nothing in his going to her dinner-party which laid him open to
+scorn. And he felt more disposed to go than not. The dinner would be
+festive, costly, succulent. Then he desired before breaking with her--if
+breach there must be, which would depend upon the subtlest
+circumstances--to persuade her that two enormous porcelain jars owned by
+a dealer of his acquaintance were the very thing needed in that
+bare-looking ball-room of hers. There was a third reason. A lady whose
+friendship had latterly--since the night of the _veglione_, in
+fact--taken on the glow of roses and the warmth of wine, had taken it
+into her charming head to be jealous, fantastically, of Mrs. Hawthorne.
+Charlie, whose manly vanity his good fortune had, not unnaturally,
+reinforced; Charlie, who if he were loved much must always love less
+than the other, felt a certain stimulation in exhibitions of jealousy
+with regard to himself. He thought well of the results of saying, "I
+cannot come this evening, _cara_, I am dining at the Hawthorne's."
+So he accepted Aurora's invitation.
+
+The dinner was superlative, but it was written he should leave the house
+finally in a bad humor. The feasted guest was a big Western American, of
+the immensely rich and not very interesting type, whom he had seen once
+or twice at the bank. Aurora's fond esteem for this man was open and
+shameless. Whether he were a "has been," an "is," or a "to be," Charlie
+could not determine, but only in the character of suitor could he see
+him in the picture.
+
+The dark face of Landini, his Chief, across the dinner table, when his
+eyes sought it was indecipherable to him; but, shut as it was, he was
+reminded by it, not to the improvement of his spirits, of a little
+personal hope, a just and rational hope, which might have to be
+relinquished. After dinner he got his hostess into a quiet corner for a
+chat.
+
+"Where's Gerald?" pure curiosity made him ask, with that impertinence
+which his friends were accustomed to and took lightly, because curiosity
+and impertinence were part and parcel of Charlie, and if you cared
+sufficiently for his attractive smoothness and flashing smile to wish
+them near you, you must put up with the bad breeding underlying his good
+manners. "Where's Gerald?" he asked familiarly.
+
+"Gerald isn't well enough yet to be out," Aurora answered him, with
+imperfect candor. "You didn't know he'd been ill? Why, how funny! He's
+been having what you call here a 'fluxion of the chest.'"
+
+This ignorance of Charlie's comforted her by proving that the news of
+her nursing Gerald had not spread over the town like wildfire, as she
+had been warned it would. Florence was not so bad or nimble a gossip as
+she had feared.
+
+"I was as nice to Charlie Hunt that last evening as ever in my life,"
+she afterward declared, "and I thought he seemed all right."
+
+When he spoke of the precious porcelain jars, however, she did cut short
+his appetizing description with:
+
+"Don't speak of it. I daresn't, Charlie. I've been lectured so much for
+extravagance, I daresn't buy a toothpick. If these jars you speak of
+cost nine francs instead of nine hundred, I couldn't, I tell you. I
+guess Florence has got all she's going to out of me. I've turned over a
+new leaf."
+
+Aurora had all evening been so entirely her kind and jolly self that
+Charlie had almost forgotten the black crow. At this check, and the
+barren prospect opening out beyond, he remembered it, and felt a vicious
+little desire to pay her back for the pin she had stuck into him under,
+as she idiotically supposed, an impenetrable disguise. He went away, as
+has been said, in a bad humor.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+
+The loveliness of Florence at this point of the year, while inspiring
+poets, made the rest feel helpless before the task of finding words for
+it. Even Aurora, who could not be called contemplative, or highly
+susceptible to influences of form and color, was heard to heave an
+occasional great sigh, so was her heart oppressed, she could not think
+why, during their drives among the hills around Florence, by the sight
+of the spring flowers,--tulips, narcissi, fleur-de-lys, imagine it,
+growing wild, as if gold pieces should lie scattered in the road for
+passers to pick up!--and by the sight of the warm and tender tones of
+the sky, and by the silver sparks of windows flashing back the sun where
+the hazy city houses huddled around the Duomo's brown head and
+shoulders, majestically lifted above them.
+
+It was something in the air, Aurora thought, which forced her to sigh
+with that half-sweet oppression and fatigue: the air was fragrant with a
+scent which seemed to her upon sniffing it analytically to be the breath
+of hyacinths; and the air was warm, it "let her down," she said.
+
+Why, instead of delicious contentment, is a sort of melancholy, of
+unrest, created in us by the beauty of spring, will somebody tell?
+
+Aurora, when she thought she could do it without attracting the notice
+of the other two, would slip from their presence sometimes, so as to
+have a few minutes by herself and stop pretending to be so everlastingly
+light of heart. For nothing in the world would she have had Tom know but
+that his visit made her happy to the point of forgetting every subject
+of care or annoyance.
+
+Estelle, too, she would have preferred to deceive. She did her best, and
+for hours at a time appeared serene and merry. During these periods she
+sometimes did actually lose the sense of anxious suspense; but it kept
+itself alive as an undercurrent to her laughter.
+
+When she saw how well Tom and Estelle got along together, she became
+less timid about arranging little absences from them; she even--such a
+common feminine mind had Aurora--saw in the congeniality which permitted
+them to remain for half an hour in each other's company without boredom
+the foundation of a dream, dim and distant, it is true--the dream of
+seeing Estelle one day settled in a fine home of her own. She feared,
+though, there might be bridges to cross before that event. She dreaded
+the bridges. She wished Tom might be diverted from what she feared was
+his purpose. How satisfactory, if Estelle might prove the diversion.
+Estelle would really have suited Tom much better than the person of, she
+feared, his actual choice.
+
+Of all this she was somewhat disconnectedly thinking when she ran away
+from them one evening after dinner, leaving him still at the table
+smoking his cigar, while Estelle hunted up in a guide-book for his
+benefit some little matter of altitudes. A flash of good sense showed
+her the previousness of her calculations, and she mentally withdrew her
+hand from meddling. Fate would take its own way, anyhow.
+
+She had gone upstairs with the excuse of wanting a fan. Her fan had
+easily been found, but instead of returning to her guests, "They won't
+miss me if I do stay away for ten minutes," she said, and walked to the
+end of the broad hallway, out through the door that stood open on to the
+portico roof--once glassed over for a party and dedicated to Flirtation.
+
+How long ago that seemed! Here Gerald, a quite new acquaintance, had
+told her about Manlio and Brenda. Poor young things, so unhappy then,
+and now exultant. Brenda was just back from America. The wedding was set
+for the ninth of May. Only eight days more to wait.
+
+As Aurora, leaning over the balustrade and letting her eyes rest on the
+garden, thought of their assured and perfect happiness, she remembered a
+gross fly in the ointment. She had been told that Brenda would have to
+agree to bring up her children in the Catholic church. The thing had
+seemed to Aurora appalling. Upon her dropping some hint of her sentiment
+to the caller who had communicated the fact, she had been further told
+that very likely Brenda too would in time become a Catholic--as if that
+made it any better. A descendant of the Pilgrim Fathers to become a
+Roman Catholic! Any one but a heathen to change his religion!...
+
+The figure of Abbé Johns rose before her mind. She refrained from
+judgment in his case. His case, for intangible reasons, seemed separate
+and different. But fear, as of formless bugaboos in the dark, burned in
+her heart at the idea of his influence perhaps being able, creepily,
+stealthily, to convert Gerald.
+
+She turned her face upward to the sky of May and sent forth a little
+prayer into the crystal clearness of the space lying between her and the
+ear which she conceived of as receiving it, the ear of a Baptist God, as
+opposed to a Roman Catholic God surrounded by saints and candles and
+incense and tin flowers.
+
+As she did this a high pink cloud caught her eye. Embers of sunset were
+glowing over the river at the other side of the house. The sight of the
+pink cloud, so pretty and far away, comforted Aurora like a good omen.
+She felt better and, her reverie borrowing a ray from the cloud, went on
+to rejoice in the pleasantness of the garden which she might for the
+time being call hers. So different from the gardens at home, but in its
+set way how attractive it was, how suited to people with leisure, and a
+certain stability of taste, and a liking for privacy!
+
+Why, in that garden--which wasn't very large, either--you could almost
+get lost among narrow paths bordered with shrubs. Even if the wide
+wrought-iron front-gate were open, and the carriage-gate at the side
+open as at this moment, you could be just as much shut off from outside
+as in your own room, if you took your sewing or your book to that little
+open air round with walls of smooth-trimmed laurel, and a stone table in
+the middle, and stone seats.
+
+Old Achille down there, still busy watering,--Achille who belonged to
+the garden and was hired along with it, was a regular artist, thought
+Aurora. The great oval bed in front of the house was at this season like
+a huge bouquet, all arranged in a beautiful pattern. Then he had edged
+every path with a band of pansies just inside the band of ivy
+overrunning the mossy border stones--the sweetest thing. His pride was
+pansies, he had planted them everywhere, the finest she had ever seen.
+He had taken a prize once at a horticultural show, for his pansies.
+
+The light died out of the pink cloud, and Aurora's pleasure in her
+garden gradually died out too, while the quality of irony in her many
+blessings smote her. For what is the use of having everything money can
+buy or the bounty of spring afford if you at the same time are troubled
+with a toothache? All this, so grand in itself, was like a good gift
+wasted, as long as she was in a state of quarrel with her friend. It was
+full two weeks since their exchange of letters. Two weeks of absolute
+silence. Could it be possible that she should never see or hear from
+Gerald again?
+
+No, it could not, she said. It was part of having faith in him to deny
+the possibility of his remaining furious forever at her hateful letter.
+No, she would not believe it of him; she thought better of him. She was
+much mistaken if he could be so mean. She would be willing to bet--
+
+There, in fact, he was, at this very moment, entering the carriage-gate.
+
+After one mad throb of incredulous exultation, Aurora's thoughts and
+feelings were for a long minute limited to an intense and immobile
+watchfulness. He walked over the gravel with his eyes on the door under
+the portico. You would have thought his purpose set, and that he would
+not pause until he had rung the bell.
+
+But you would have thought wrong. Half-way between the gate and the
+house he stood still and looked at the ground. He was holding the
+slender cane one knew so well like a weapon of defense, as if ready to
+make a resolute slash with it to vindicate his irresolution.
+
+After a moment he turned, grinding his heel into the earth. It was then
+that a voice called out above him, "Hello, Gerald!"
+
+He turned again and removed his straw hat. He and the lady leaning from
+the terrace looked at each other for the space of a few heart-beats with
+mechanical, constrained smiles. Then she asked:
+
+"Aren't you going to come in?"
+
+Instead of making the obvious answer and setting about the obvious
+thing, he appeared to be debating the point within himself. At the end
+of his hesitation, he asked:
+
+"Could I prevail upon you to give me five minutes in the garden?"
+
+"Why, certainly," answered Aurora, appreciating the fact that Estelle
+would be superfluous at the peace-making that must follow.
+
+She went very lightly down the stairs. She could hear Estelle's and
+Tom's voices still in the dining-room. Instead of going out by the usual
+door, too near to their sharp ears, she turned with soft foot into the
+big ball-room and passed out through that.
+
+The great oval mound of flowers spread its odoriferous carpet before the
+steps leading down from the house. She turned her back upon it and
+followed a path bordered with pansies and ivy till Gerald saw her and
+came to take her hand, saying:
+
+"How good of you!"
+
+"Well," she sighed, put by the bliss of her relief into a mood of
+splendid carelessness as to how she, for her part, should carry off the
+situation,--looking after her dignity and all that. "How jolly this is!
+And you're all right again, Gerald. You're well enough to walk on your
+legs and come and tell me so. Yes, you're looking quite yourself again.
+Well,"--she sighed again heartily,--"it's good for sore eyes to see you.
+You're sure now it's all right for you to be out of doors after sunset?
+Hadn't we better go in?"
+
+"This air is like a warm bath. I must not keep you long, anyhow."
+
+"Oh, I haven't got a thing to do," she precipitately assured him. "Come,
+we'll walk up and down the path,--hadn't we better?--so as not to be
+standing still. Go ahead, now; tell me all about yourself. How do you
+feel? Have you got entirely rid of your cough? And the stitch in your
+side?"
+
+He would only speak to answer, she soon found; the moment she stopped
+talking silence fell. Had he nothing to say to her, then? Or did he find
+it difficult somehow to talk? She was so determined to make the
+atmosphere cozy, friendly, happy--make the atmosphere as it had used to
+be between them--so determined, that she jabbered on like a magpie, like
+a mill, about this, that, and the other, sprinkling in little jokes in
+her own manner, and little stories in her own taste, accompanied by her
+rich--on this occasion slightly nervous gurgle.
+
+"Aurora dear," he said at last, with an effect of mournful patience as
+much as of protest, "what makes you? I am here to beg your forgiveness,
+and you put me off with what Mrs. Moriarty said to Mrs. O'Flynn. Do you
+call it kind?"
+
+A knot tied itself in Aurora's throat, which she could not loosen so as
+to go on. If she had tried to speak she would have betrayed the fact
+that those simple words had, like a pump, fetched the tears up from her
+heart into her throat. He had his chance now to do all the talking.
+
+"Couldn't we sit down somewhere for a minute? Should you mind?" His
+gesture vaguely designated the green inclosure, where the stone table
+stood, pale among the dark laurels.
+
+But when they were seated, he only pressed his hands into his
+eye-sockets and kept them there.
+
+"I am ridiculous!" he muttered and shook himself straight. After an
+ineffectual, suffocated attempt to begin, "I am ridiculous!" he said
+again, and without further concession to weakness started in: "I ought
+to have written you, Aurora. But I had seemed to be so unfortunate in
+writing I did not dare to try it again. Heaven knows what I wrote. I
+don't; but it must have been a prodigy of caddishness to offend you so
+deeply. It doesn't do much good to say I am sorry."
+
+"Your letter was all right," broke in Aurora. "I only didn't understand
+at first. Afterwards I did. I tell you, that letter _was all
+right_."
+
+"It was written in a mood--a perplexity, a despair, you have no means of
+understanding, dear Aurora. When your answer showed me what I had done,
+I could have cut my throat, but I could not have come to tell you I was
+not the monster of ingratitude I appeared to be. Not that a man can't
+get out of bed, if there is reason enough, and take himself somehow
+where he wants to be, but because of a sick man's unreasonable nerves,
+which can start him raving and make him a thing to laugh at. I had the
+common sense, thank Heaven! to see that I must wait. Then, as the days
+passed, it all quieted down. Vincent was with me, a tranquilizing
+neighborhood.
+
+"It seemed finally as if it might be almost better to let things rest as
+they were, to let that be the way of separating from you. I had almost
+made up my mind to do it, Aurora. Vincent has had me out for various
+airings, I have gone on several walks alone, but till to-day I avoided
+to take the road toward this house. I am so used to pain that I've grown
+stoical, you know, Aurora. I can stand any pain. I shut my teeth and
+say, 'It will have to stop some time.' But all at once it became too
+strong for me--not the pain, or the wish to see you, but the feeling
+that I could not bear to have you thinking me ungrateful. I, who hate
+ingratitude as the blackest thing in the wide world, to pass with you,
+with you, for an ungrateful beast!"
+
+"Don't! don't, Gerald!" Aurora hushed him. "I can't let you talk like
+that. You know you couldn't be ungrateful, nor I couldn't think it of
+you."
+
+"No, I'm not ungrateful. I'm not, dear," he caressingly asseverated, and
+closing her two hands between his treasured them against his cheek. "I
+want you to be altogether sure of it. If I did not recognize the
+enormity of my debt to you, Aurora, what a clod I must be! Not, mind
+you, because, it is just possible to think, I owe you my life. Not that,
+but because you were so kind. Because you were so kind, so kind--" he
+reiterated feelingly, "and I a troublesome, cantankerous, distinctly
+unappetizing object in his helpless bed. Don't think there was one touch
+or gesture of these dear hands that take away headaches that I do not
+remember with gratitude."
+
+"There was nothing to be grateful for, nothing at all," insisted Aurora.
+
+"And so when I wrote you in that brutal manner, dear,--"
+
+"That letter was all right," Aurora vigorously snatched away from him
+the turn to talk, in order to defend him from this misery of
+compunction. "It was prompted by the most gentlemanly feelings, by real
+unselfishness and consideration for me. You didn't want me talked about
+on your account, and you put it as delicately as possible. Only I was a
+fool; I went off the handle, and wrote while I was mad and hurt and
+wanted to hurt back. But, bless you, I understand it all perfectly now.
+You needn't say another word. I understand the letter, Gerald, and I
+understand you."
+
+"I am afraid," he said, letting go her hands and drawing a little apart,
+as if the most complete misunderstanding, after all, separated them,--"I
+am afraid you do not entirely. But this much at least is clear to you,
+isn't it, dear, that whatever I may be, I am not ungrateful? Whatever I
+may do, you are to remember that I couldn't be ungrateful to you,
+Aurora. If I should seem to be behaving ever so, ever so shabbily, still
+you must know that behind it, under it, I am the very contrary of
+ungrateful." He pressed his hands to his eyes again, and was still for a
+minute, before announcing, "I shall not come to see you for a long
+time."
+
+The astonished and acute attention of her whole being was indefinably
+expressed by the silence in which she now listened.
+
+"I am going to keep away from you," he went on, "till I feel out of
+danger."
+
+"Why, what's the matter now?" she asked, with the vehemence of her
+surprise and disappointment.
+
+"A trifle, woman dear. Oh, Lord, I see I shall have to go into it!
+Haven't you the imagination to see, you unaccountable person, how an
+unhappy mortal might be affected by such circumstances as destiny so
+lately prepared for your poor servant's trying? Day by day, night after
+night, that insidious kindness, that penetrating gentleness, that
+stupefying atmosphere of a woman's care and sympathy.... Didn't you tell
+me once yourself--" Gerald's voice stiffened, and he pulled himself up
+again, discarding weakness,--"Didn't you once tell me yourself--in your
+impossible English, almost as bad as mine--that a sick man is 'liable to
+fall in love with his nurse?' And, dear girl, I will not do it. I
+categorically refuse. It is too horrible. I have done with all that. I
+have just managed to creep up on to the dry sand, and you ask me to
+embark again on those same waters. I will not do it. It is finished.
+That slavery! that unrest! and fever! and jealousy! No, not again. I
+have served my sentence. Too many times I have waked in the black of
+night and waited for daylight, wishing I had been dust for a hundred
+years. I know now that in order to have a little peace a person must not
+want anything. That is the price. We mustn't want anything, Aurora. We
+mustn't want anything, we mustn't mind anything, we mustn't care about
+anything, we must submit to everything!" This counsel of perfection came
+from Gerald almost in a sob. "We sha'n't be happy like that, naturally,
+but we sha'n't be too wretched for expression, either. It's the lesson
+of life. I have learned it, and I will not expose myself to the old
+chances again. 'He who loves for the first time is a god,' says the
+poet, 'but he who loves for the second time is a fool,' he goes on to
+say. And so, Aurora--"
+
+"You make me laugh!" exclaimed Aurora in a snort of simple scorn.
+
+"And so, Aurora, I am going to keep away from you for--I am not at the
+present moment quite able to say how long."
+
+"You're going to do nothing of the sort! There now!" burst from Aurora.
+"I'm not going to permit any such foolishness." She firmly proceeded to
+pile up a barricade against his preposterous intention. "Now, Gerald,
+you pay attention to what I say, child. Can't you see for yourself, now
+you've put it into words, what nonsense all this is? You could no more,
+in your sane and waking moments, be sentimentally in love with me, and
+you know it, than, I guess, I could with you, fond of you as I am. No,
+that isn't putting it strongly enough," she gallantly amended; "you
+couldn't do it, it stands to reason, even so easily as I could. What you
+felt was just the result of you being so weak, all full of fever dreams
+and delusions. And you still believe in it a little because you aren't
+yet good and strong. I thought you were, just at first, because you come
+so near looking it. But I know that condition. After a sickness you
+plump up, you get back your color, and all the while you can be so weak
+you could burst out crying if any one pointed a finger at you. You're
+trembling with nervousness this minute. You're all sunk together, as if
+your backbone couldn't hold you up. It's because the weakness of your
+illness is still on you, as anybody could see. Now you listen to what
+I've got to say. The wisest thing you can do, young man, instead of
+keeping away and having ideas and waiting till these gradually wear
+off--the best thing you can do, I say, is to stay right at my side and
+get sobered up by contact with things as they actually are. Not only the
+best thing, but a lot fairer to me, doesn't it seem so to you? How do
+you think I like to have you go kiting off the moment I've got you back
+again? When I've missed you so! Now, Geraldino, rely on Auroretta. Let
+her manage this case. Don't you be afraid; she'll cure you in two
+frisks."
+
+"It just might be, you know, that you were right," said Gerald,
+dubiously, with the modesty of tone that would beseem a girl after a
+bucket of cold water had quelled her hysterics. "The truth is you do not
+appear to me this evening at all as I have been carrying you in my
+remembrance."
+
+Aurora laughed and reinforced her expression of jolly
+matter-of-factness, looking into his eyes with eyes of sanative fun.
+
+He looked back at her with meditative scrutiny, one eyebrow raised a
+little above the other.
+
+She had reigned in his thoughts very largely in her appearance of his
+nurse, with her soft, loose robes, the blue of pensive twilights, her
+fair hair in easy-feeling braids, her white hands bare of ornaments. She
+sat near him now in a snug satin dinner-dress full of whalebones and
+hooks and eyes. It had elbow sleeves terminating in full frills of
+Duchess lace; a square-cut neck, likewise be-laced, framing an open
+space in part obscured again by a jeweled medallion on a gold chain. She
+had on rings and bracelets, a bow-knot in her hair. She had in fact
+"dressed up" for Tom Bewick, wishing him to see with his eyes what good
+she got out of the fortune with whose origin he was acquainted.
+
+"Gracious goodness!" She bounced to her feet. "Here I was forgetting!
+Gerald," she said in haste, "I'm sorry, but we'll have to go indoors.
+They'll be wondering where I am, and starting the hunt for me."
+
+"They? You have guests?"
+
+"Only one. Come in, Gerald. I want you to meet him. You've heard me
+speak of Judge Bewick in Denver, where I lived so long. Well, this is
+his son, Doctor Thomas Bewick. He's in Florence just for a visit. It's a
+wonder, come to think of it, that you haven't heard of his being here.
+We've been going everywhere and seeing everything and giving
+dinner-parties. Well, never tell me again that news spreads so fast in
+Florence! Come on. I want you to know each other. You'll be sure to like
+him."
+
+"I don't think I will. I mean that I don't think I will go into the
+house with you, Aurora."
+
+"Now, Gerald," she said in a warning voice, at which black clouds of
+impending displeasure loomed over the horizon, "this isn't the way to
+begin. Don't be odd and trying. I should feel hurt, now truly, if I had
+to think your regard for me wasn't equal to doing such a little thing
+for me as this. Tom's one of my very best friends, and he's heard us
+talk so much of you. He's seen your painting of me. I do want you to
+know him, and I want him to know you. Then, too, Gerald dear, and this
+is the main reason, I want you to get good and rested, and to take a
+little wine before you start for home. Though you say the air is like a
+warm bath, your hands are cold, I notice."
+
+Too tired from the emotions of the evening to make any valid resistance,
+emptied in fact of all feeling except a flat sort of bewilderment,
+Gerald followed, like a little boy in fear of rough-handling from his so
+much bigger nurse.
+
+They found Estelle and Tom in the parlor.
+
+"Well, I was wondering what had become of you!" cried Estelle as Aurora
+appeared in the doorway, and behind her shoulder the shadowy, unexpected
+face of Gerald.
+
+"Tom," said Aurora, "this is my friend Mr. Fane that you've heard us
+talk so much about, the painter, you know, who painted that picture of
+me up there. And this is Doctor Bewick, Gerald, to whom I am under a
+thousand obligations, besides the obligation of his having probably
+saved my life out in Denver, not so many years ago, when I was
+dangerously ill."
+
+Aurora was luminous with gladness. Aurora was so glad that she had not
+the concentration or the decency to attempt to hide it. She did not know
+of the flagrant betrayal of her feelings; she was not guarding against
+it, because her delight itself absorbed all her powers of thought. She
+stood there, a monument unveiled. And all the reason for it that one
+could see was that pindling, hollow-eyed young fellow who had entered
+the room in her wake.
+
+Those who have not quarreled with a loved one, and known the pain of the
+fear that he may be lost to them, will surely never know the keenest
+joy. It takes the escape, the contrast, to make happiness shine out as
+brightly as it is capable of doing.
+
+The two men, after conversation had engaged between them, promoted and
+helped along by the greater lingual readiness of the ladies, observed
+each other. This they did indirectly and as if doing nothing of the
+kind. But Estelle, as profoundly uneasy as if she had foreseen already
+the fate of the fat to end in the fire, was aware of it. She noted in
+Gerald's stiffly adjusted face the unself-conscious eyebrows, formidably
+different one from the other; she noted how Doctor Tom, sturdy and
+self-collected as he was, kept knocking the ashes of his cigar into an
+inkstand full of ink.
+
+It struck her whimsically that she had seen before something kindred to
+what was taking place under her eyes: in a barnyard at home, two
+crimson-helmeted champions, with neck-feathers slightly risen on end,
+standing opposed, ocularly taking each other's measure.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+
+The Brenda who came back from America was not quite the one who had gone
+there. Gerald saw it in the first instant. She had gained in
+definiteness, assurance, even in beauty. But a silver haze, a fairy
+bloom, an aureole, was mysteriously departed from her. She had left her
+teens behind.
+
+Yet in her stainless white, her bridal veil, a slender coronal of orange
+blossoms on her dark hair, and the light of love in her dark eyes, how
+wonderful she was! That Manlio, pale as a statue with the force of his
+emotion, should wear a look of almost superhuman beatitude was only
+natural and proper. Of those who assisted at the ceremony many were
+deeply moved, and few altogether untouched: to be in the church at that
+moment gave one the importance of being accessory to a high romance.
+
+At the wedding reception something of this quality of emotion continued
+still to possess the invited guests as long as Brenda and Manlio,
+beneath their arch of flowers, stood smiling response to congratulations
+and compliments.
+
+It was in the general experience not unlike that part of the opera
+where, to a matchless music, the god of flame and the glowing hearth
+lauds the loveliness of woman and the strength of man's pursuit; and the
+other gods, uplifted, look at one another with washed eyes, feeling anew
+how wonderful they all are, how wonderful it all is.
+
+The heart of Leslie, nevertheless, as she bustled about, seeing to it
+that every one was provided with refreshment, confessed a point of
+bitterness. In a way, it was envy of Brenda. Not of her happiness, or
+her husband, of course. But she did wish the man lived and would present
+himself who could inspire her with such feelings as Brenda's. The kind
+of man who cared for her she somehow never cared for--a serious barrier
+to experiencing a _grande passion_. And on this day of
+wedding-bells it seemed a pity. The girl of many offers felt sad.
+
+Mrs. Foss smiled a pleased, incessant smile, not "realizing" the thing
+which was happening, as she told her sister-in-law who had come over
+from America with the bride. Her chick had developed tendencies unknown
+among the breed, taken to the water and swum away with a swan. But the
+mother had confidence. She believed in marriage. The institution had
+been justified by her example and Jerome's. Her eyes sought him out, a
+little anxiously, to peruse his face. The idea could not for a moment be
+admitted that he had a favorite among his children, but yet it was
+acknowledged that Brenda had always in a very special way been near to
+her father's heart. From his calm and serenity in conversation with that
+nice big Doctor Bewick, Mrs. Foss was able to hope that he too did not
+"realize."
+
+Aurora watched the bride and groom with fairly fascinated eyes, but from
+a certain distance. They had been nice, they had thanked her handsomely
+for her handsome present, but nothing could modify her regretful
+certitude that Brenda did not care for her. And it might so easily have
+been she and not the good Aunt Brenda who secured for the _sposo_
+his career of silver lace and sabre.... And Brenda, innocently
+unknowing, would just the same not have liked her. But there! Beautiful
+Brenda didn't go about loving everybody. She had the more glory to
+confer upon the one. Oh, harmoniously matched, high-removed pair! Oh,
+hymeneal crowning of tenderness and truth!... Aurora in a kind of awe
+wondered what elevated things those pale rose lips of the bride would
+say to the bridegroom when, the turmoil of festivity ended, they were in
+nuptial solitude. Impossible to imagine! It must be something altogether
+beyond other brides; and his words must make those of all other lovers
+sound common and poor.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+When the arch of flowers was empty and the happy pair had left for the
+train, Lily and Gerald went strolling about the garden hand in hand.
+
+Lily had been a bridesmaid, Gerald an usher. Both were in the fine
+apparel of their parts; thoughts of weddings hummed in both of their
+heads.
+
+"Well, Lily," said the young man idly, in their walk between odorous
+lines of wall-flowers and heliotrope, "I suppose you too will soon be
+getting married."
+
+"Oh, no!" Lily shook her head. "There is nobody I could marry."
+
+"Why, I thought, Lily," he said, "that you were going to marry me!"
+
+"No, Gerald," she replied promptly, but with gentleness and regret, so
+as not to hurt his feelings.
+
+"I might come and live with you," she added, after a second, "and keep
+house for you. A cottage in the country, with beehives and ducks and a
+little donkey.... Gerald, do you know about Sir William Wallace?"
+
+Though a chasm appeared to divide this subject from the last, Gerald
+shrewdly supposed a connection between them.
+
+"Very little. You tell me."
+
+"You haven't read 'The Scottish Chiefs'? I took it without permission
+and kept it out of Fräulein's sight. It grows light early now, you know,
+and I read it for hours before getting up. Then whenever I could, I read
+it in the daytime. And after they had left me at night, I read it with
+the pink candles of my birthday cake. I cried so much that when I
+finished I was ill with a fever and had to be kept in bed for three
+days."
+
+"Why, when was this?"
+
+"Two weeks ago."
+
+"My poor little Lily, how came I not to be told of it? And you sent me
+such a beautiful remembrance when I was ill!--Well, Lily, I know now why
+you won't take me. I'm not much like Sir William Wallace, that's a fact.
+I might grow like him in courage and prowess, perhaps, to please you,
+but I know that I should never be beautiful in kilts. It shall be as you
+say, dear. We'll be brother and sister instead. And now tell me more
+about this book, these Scottish.... Lily, do you see Mrs. Hawthorne on
+the doorstep? Do you gather that the signs she is making are meant for
+us? We came up together and I think she may wish to say she is ready to
+go, and will give me a lift back to town...."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+"We came up together!" With great frequency in these days Gerald was
+going somewhere with Mrs. Hawthorne, not alone with her, but making one
+of four in an amiable party. Sometimes it was his fate to make
+conversation by the hour with Estelle, while Doctor Tom monopolized
+Aurora; on the other hand, he sometimes would succeed in getting his
+fingers among Occasion's hair, and secure Aurora for his share, while
+Dr. Tom was apportioned with the slenderer charmer. But the behavior of
+all was civilized and urbane, and if a thorn pricked or nettle burned,
+the sufferer concealed his pain and spoiled nobody's fun.
+
+Gerald would in reality have preferred to stay away, almost as much as
+Estelle and possibly Doctor Tom would have preferred him to do so. But
+just there the incalculable, the ungovernable, in human nature came into
+play. A golden thread, a mere hair, strong as a steel cable, drew him to
+the place where he could expect to find no comfort, and had no object to
+accomplish except just to be there, with his eyebrows one higher than
+the other.
+
+Either Estelle liked to annoy him, or she was unfortunate in doing it
+without malice.
+
+"Don't they make a noble-looking couple?" she asked him, gazing at
+Aurora and Tom outlined side by side against the light of the window.
+
+"Yes," he felt obliged to say, and followed it quickly, without apology
+for the indiscretion of the question: "Are they going to marry?"
+
+"That remains to be seen," she said in a way which made one desire to
+set the dog on her. "I cherish the hope. May I offer you another
+cigarette?"
+
+He sometimes remained scandalously late in the evening after dining, in
+spite of--oh, by so much!--knowing better. He would wait, with an
+artist's beautiful air of time-forgetfulness, for Dr. Tom to get up to
+go. He would instantly, as if remembering himself, get up to go, too,
+and walk with the doctor as far as his hotel, they talking together like
+men with respect for each other's brains, and appreciation of each
+other's character and company, no subject of contention in the world.
+
+Gerald pushed courtesy so far as to go with the doctor, by themselves,
+on certain visits to hospitals, to certain games of pallone, certain
+monasteries which ladies are not permitted to enter, Aurora rejoicing in
+the opportunities to "get good and acquainted" which she saw these two
+dear friends of hers take.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+After the drive back from the wedding, Gerald resisted Aurora's
+suggestion that he enter the house with them and remain to dine. This he
+did with well-masked resentfulness. As it was not Dr. Bewick's last
+evening, but the evening before his last, Gerald did not see that
+delicacy strictly demanded his sacrifice. But Estelle had without so
+many compliments informed him that he was not to accept. She had
+particular reasons, she darkly enlightened him, for the request.
+
+So, with a paltry excuse, he jumped out of the carriage before it
+reached the gate, and stood looking after it, holding his hat--the
+glossy _tuba_ which Giovanna had with her elbow stroked and stroked
+the right way of the silk, when she laid out her signorino's outfit for
+the wedding.
+
+Earlier than usual after dinner Estelle retired, "to write up her
+diary," she said. Tom was left to have with Aurora that conversation
+which Estelle had besought him to have, and of which by a significant
+motion of the face she had reminded him before leaving the room. He came
+to the point very soon, the sooner to get it over.
+
+"Nell," he said, and, leaning back, with one arm flung along the top of
+the sofa, the other offering to his lips a thick cigar, waited long
+enough for her to wonder what was coming, "you spend too much money."
+
+Without shadow of attempt at evasion, she said:
+
+"Tom, I do."
+
+"You've got to retrench, girl. You've got to be more careful."
+
+"Yes, I suppose I've got to."
+
+"Let's be practical. How are you going to do it?"
+
+"I don't know, Tom. It's so easy to spend and so hard to hold on to your
+money! If any one had told me a year ago I could get rid of as much
+money in one year as I have done, I shouldn't have known how I could do
+it without opening the window and throwing it out."
+
+"Well, I'm glad you don't deny a bent toward extravagance."
+
+"I don't deny anything that means I spend a lot of money. I have more
+sense. The facts are there."
+
+"You've already broken into your capital, haven't you?"
+
+"Did Hattie tell you that or did you guess? It's true, I have; but--"
+she tried to place the harm done in a harmless light--"it isn't so bad
+but that if I saved for a little while I could make it up again."
+
+"If! True; but are you going to, Nell? That's the question."
+
+"Oh, Tom, I never ought to have been given any money if I was to hold on
+to it!" Aurora almost groaned. "I didn't know at first. I was pleased as
+Punch. I lay awake nights just to gloat and feel grand. I tell
+_you_, I meant to hold on to it! I tell _you_, it wasn't going
+to get away from me after that good fight we made for it! But--" the
+effect of a mental groan was repeated--"the whole thing isn't as I
+thought it would be, not a bit."
+
+She stopped, and while she tried to coordinate her ideas, Dr. Tom
+quietly waited for explanation or illustration of her meaning.
+
+"I don't like money, there's the whole of it!" she gave him the sum of
+her attempt in one cast.
+
+Dr. Tom continued to wait, smoking.
+
+"In fact, I hate it."
+
+Dr. Tom continued to wait, without interrupting, or trying to help her
+disentangle her thought, of which he had in truth no inkling.
+
+"I hate it, and I love it, both. That's truer, I suppose. But I can't be
+at rest with it."
+
+"Never fear, girl,"--his tone was humorous,--"you'll get used to it.
+Just from watching you, I should have fancied you were pretty well used
+to it already."
+
+"When I was a child it was just the same way with candy," she went on
+with her own train of thought, not minding his; "I loved it--and gobbled
+it right up. Some of the girls made theirs last and last. I ate mine at
+once. And it wasn't only because I was a pig with no self-control. I
+wanted to have done with it and go back to a sensible life. With this
+money I have the same feeling--and then another feeling that I sort of
+can't account for, as if I wanted to get rid of it because there was
+something wrong in me having it."
+
+"That money? You sure earned it!" he came out vigorously. "Don't be a
+goose, Nell."
+
+"I wasn't thinking of what you think. But I'm afraid I am a goose, Tom,
+an awful goose, and I'm ashamed of it. I somehow can't feel it
+right--there!--to have more than the rest. Come right down to it, I feel
+mean in having something the rest haven't got, and keeping it from them,
+like a nasty fat boy stuffing pie with a lot of hungry ragamuffins
+looking on. I know it isn't good common sense, or how could rich people
+be so all right and calm in their minds as they are, and have
+everybody's respect? Rich people are all right, I've always sort of
+looked up to them, with their advantages and things. I haven't a bit of
+fault to find. But Tom, I suppose the amount of it is I was born poor
+and I go on having the feelings of the poor. If any one asks me for
+anything and appears to need it, I've got to give it or feel too mean to
+live. Me, Nell, who was poor myself for so long, how would I look
+hardening my heart against any one who came and wanted to borrow? I'd be
+ashamed to look them in the eye."
+
+"With that view of it, of course I can see why your money wouldn't last
+long."
+
+"Oh, I'm extravagant besides, I'll own to that; that's the _real_
+trouble. I want to buy everything that takes my eye, I want to make
+everything run smooth, like on greased wheels, and to have all the faces
+around me look pleased, and everybody liking me. I love the feeling of
+luxury and festivity, and oh, I just love a grand good time! That's what
+the money was given to me for, wasn't it, so that I could have a grand
+good time? But when I've indulged myself, Tom, I wouldn't have the face,
+if I had the heart, to say no to anybody that came along and wanted me
+to indulge them, too. Now, I don't want you to go thinking this is
+generosity, Tom, or a good heart, or that I have any sneaking idea in my
+own bosom that it's anything of the sort. I'd be a
+regular--low-down--soggy--sinful sowbug, I'd be too dirt-mean to live,
+if I pretended it was that. When I was poor I never was generous; I
+never thought of it. I worked hard for what I got; and was in the same
+boat exactly as the rest; I was entitled to the little bit I'd worked
+for. But now it's different. It's like I'd won the big prize in the
+lottery. I can't be stingy with it and not blush. I can't sit there like
+a swollen wood-tick and be rich all by myself."
+
+"All right, Nell; all right. It's a perfectly understandable way of
+looking at it, if it is rather far-fetched. But good-by to the
+hard-earned thousands. You won't have a smitch of them left."
+
+"Good-by, then, and good riddance!" cried Aurora violently, almost
+pettishly. "I don't really like them, anyhow. It's too easy just to
+write your name on a check. At first I thought I was living in a
+fairy-tale; but once you've got used to it, it doesn't compare with the
+fun you get the old-fashioned way, working hard for a thing, and
+planning, and going to price it, and saving, and finally getting it, and
+that proud! People who haven't been poor simply don't know. Why, that
+one poor little silver bangle I had when I was fifteen did more to give
+me pure joy than any of the beautiful things I've bought this whole last
+year. I'm sorry if it seems ungrateful to my bloated bank-account, but
+it's true. Another thing, Tom. I was brought up to work. I won't say I
+liked it. I don't think many people who've got to work do like it. But
+since I gave it up, nothing I've found has really filled its place to
+give me an appetite and the feeling I'd a right to a good time. To sit
+back and let others work while you fan your face--I can't help it, I
+feel a sort of disgrace in it. I know better, it's just the way I
+_feel_. I know all the while that's the way the world was planned,
+some to be rich and some to be poor--Think how rich King Solomon was!
+And your dear father!--some to work and some not, with changes round
+about once in a while, like in my case, and crosses and trials and
+temptations belonging to every state, and the love of God and a quiet
+heart possible in every state. And I've always had such respect for
+moneyed people and their refined ways.... But if you want me to start in
+now and do differently from what I've been doing, I tell you truly, I
+don't know how I'm going to do it, Tom. I'd rather not have the money at
+all."
+
+"You won't have it, Nell, dear. You've only to keep on, and you won't
+have it."
+
+"All right. Then I'll go back to work and never happier in my life. I'm
+strong and able, I've got years of work in me. And if you think I've
+grown so devoted to all these frills that I couldn't give them up,
+you'll see!"
+
+"Of course I haven't the faintest right to control your use of your
+money--"
+
+"But of course you have, Tom,"--her tone changed at once, and was
+eagerly humble,--"every right. You can take it away from me any moment
+you please. Who has a right, I should like to know, if not you?"
+
+"Well, then, Nell, I'm going to make a suggestion. What you have said
+shows me that simple advice would be of no use in this case. Don't
+think, girl, that I don't get at your way of seeing the matter. If I
+appear cold toward it, if I don't seem to sympathize, it's because the
+logical results would land you in a hole from which I'd feel a call by
+and by to try to pull you out. See?--As a promise to keep inside of your
+income would apparently embitter life to you, I won't ask for it, merely
+suggesting the fitness of trying to observe such a restriction. Even as
+regards your power to throw it away, there'll be a lot more of it to
+throw if you respect your capital. However, the money is yours, to do
+exactly what you please with, but this I ask: empower me to turn some
+part of it into an annuity, unalienable and modestly sufficient."
+
+"An annuity? What's that?"
+
+"A sum of money so fixed that you receive the interest as long as you
+live and have no power over the sum itself. It's not yours to use, to
+transfer or yet to bequeath. In your case the one safe investment, the
+single way I see to keep you out of the poorhouse."
+
+"Do you say so! All right, Tom; do what you think best. But see here.
+Whatever you arrange for me that way, you've got to arrange for Hattie,
+too, or it wouldn't be fair. I won't think of it unless you'll do the
+same for both. If I hadn't a penny left in the world, you know the
+Carvers would take me in in a minute. Then if you do it, don't you see,"
+she brought in slyly, "when I've spent my money, there'll always be
+Hattie's for me to fall back on. Don't let her know you're doing it,
+Tom, but fix it."
+
+"All right. Two comfortable little annuities, enough to be independent
+on, and be taken care of if you're sick."
+
+"That's it, Tom. Then everybody's mind will be set at rest. And this I
+promise: I'll try to be a good girl."
+
+That subject being dropped, there was silence for a minute or two, while
+Tom thoughtfully smoked.
+
+Aurora's face was a living rose with the excitement of their discussion.
+She put her hands to her cheeks to feel how they burned, then turned to
+Tom to laugh with him over it. The pink of her face enhanced the
+blueness of her eyes. It was not unusual for persons sitting near
+Aurora, women as well as men, to feel a sudden desire to squeeze her in
+their arms and tell her how sweet she was. Tom found himself saying a
+thing he had taken a solemn engagement with himself not to say.
+
+"I had hoped"--his utterance was slow and heavy--"to find a different
+solution to the difficulty."
+
+Her face questioned him, and at once looked troubled.
+
+"I was going to try to take over all your difficulties and bundle them
+up with my own; but," he continued, after a moment, with force, "I'm not
+going to do it."
+
+"That's right, Tom," she came out eagerly, without pretending not to
+understand. "If I know what you mean--don't do it! Oh, I'm so grateful,
+I can't tell you, that you've made up your mind that way. Because, dear
+Tom, whatever you wanted me to do, seems to me I'd have to do it. I
+don't see how I could say no to anything you asked me. It would break my
+heart, I guess, if I had to hold out against a real wish of yours. I
+couldn't do it. All the same, I know we wouldn't make just the happiest
+kind of couple--'cause why, we're too like brother and sister, Tom. It
+would be unnatural. I feel toward you, Tom, just like an own, own
+sister--not those mean old things, Idell and Cora, who are your
+sisters--but I feel toward you as I would to my own brother Charlie.
+There's nothing I wouldn't do for you. But if I had to marry you,
+there'd be something about it--well, I don't know. I can't explain.
+Haven't you seen how there are things that are perfect for one use and
+no good at all for another? I'm a pretty good nurse, ain't I, Tom? But
+what would I be as a bareback circus-rider?"
+
+"We aren't going to talk about it, Nell. I told you I had given it up.
+But," he went on after a heavy moment, unable entirely to subjugate his
+humanity--"but I wish now I had asked you before you left home."
+
+She was too oppressed with misery to speak at once, so he amplified.
+
+"But it seemed rather more--I don't want to call it by any such big word
+as chivalrous,--it seemed rather whiter not to urge it, when
+circumstances might have seemed to lay a compulsion on you. Then it
+seemed better to let all the talk, the unpleasantness, in Denver die
+down first. Then, too, I wanted you to see the world; I liked the
+thought of you having your fling. But," he reiterated, "I can't help
+wishing I had followed my instinct and asked you before I let you go.
+Tell the truth, Nell. Wouldn't you have had me then?"
+
+"I suppose, Tom, that I should have you now if you asked me. But then or
+now," she brought in quickly, "it would be a mistake. I couldn't love
+you more dearly, Tom, than I do, good big brother that you've been. Dear
+me, all we've been through together! Then all the fun we've had! We
+couldn't change to something different without all being spoiled. You
+don't seem to know, but I do, that I'm not the woman for you in that
+way. We're too much alike, Tom. What you want is a little dainty woman,
+delicate, quick, bright-minded, something, to find an example near at
+hand, like Hattie Carver. A big fellow like you wants someone to cherish
+and protect. How would any one go to work protecting and cherishing a
+little darling big as a moose!"
+
+"I might have known"--Doctor Tom made his reflections aloud,--"that a
+good big husky man wouldn't have a chance with a good big husky girl
+while a sickly, sad-eyed, spindle-shanked son of a gun was hanging
+round!"
+
+"There's nothing in that, I should think you'd know," said Aurora,
+quickly. "I like him, of course, and I like to have him round. Haven't
+you found him good company yourself? But that's just friendship.
+Friendship like between a fish and a bird, and no more prospect of a
+different ending than that. If that's troubling you, you can set your
+mind at rest, Tom."
+
+"It's none of my business, anyhow," said the doctor, brusquely, flinging
+down his cigar and walking away from her to the mantelpiece, where he
+stood looking up at her portrait, but thinking of that other portrait of
+her, with its wizardry and strange truth, which she had not failed to
+show him.
+
+"Tom, if I thought you could feel bitter, I should die, that's all,"
+cried Aurora, jumping up and following. "You've been such a friend to
+me! Do you suppose I forget? Never was there such a friend. And you
+know, now don't you, Tom, that I think the whole, whole world of you?"
+Arms were clasped around his neck,--large arms, solid and polished as
+marble, but tender as mother birds; a head was pressed hard against his
+shoulder. "There never could anybody take your place with me. You'd only
+have to call over land and sea, and I'd come flying to serve you, to
+nurse you in sickness or help you in sorrow. Give me a good hug, Tom.
+Give me a good kiss, and say you know I mean every word!--Now, isn't
+this better than to see me across the table at breakfast, with my hair
+in curlers, and to have me snooping round being jealous of your female
+patients?"
+
+"No, it's not better; but it's pretty good."
+
+"Do you mean to tell me, Tom, that you'd be any more likely to cut my
+name in a tree, or kiss my stolen glove, than I'd be to wish on the
+first star you loved me or write poetry about my feelin's?"
+
+"Nell, I'm not telling; the subject is closed. But any time there's
+anything I can do for you, anything in this world, Nell, you know you've
+only got to sing out."
+
+"You'll marry, Tom dear, by and by."
+
+"Very well. If you say so, I'll marry. But what I said will hold good if
+I do. It will hold good, too, if you marry, Nell. Oh, let's talk about
+something else."
+
+The change of subject could hardly be effected in less time than it
+takes to reverse engines; a minute or two passed before Aurora inquired
+concerning the number of hours' travel between Florence and Liverpool,
+then about his steamer, his stateroom and the exact time of his
+starting.
+
+"Nine o'clock in the evening. I see, so as to have daylight for the
+Alps. You'll dine here of course and we'll take you to the station."
+
+He judged it more prudent to dine at his hotel and meet them afterwards
+at the station near train-time.
+
+"Then--" sighed Aurora, sorrowfully, "this is our last evening! For I
+heard you and the consul planning for to-morrow evening together, and he
+to read you some chapters of his book. A compliment, Tom. He's never
+offered to read _us_ any of it. I'm only sorry the idea didn't
+ripen sooner, so that we needn't be robbed of your very last evening. We
+must make the most of our time, then. Suppose we go into the garden,
+Tom, and walk across the street to the river--I don't have to put
+anything on for just that step. It's so pretty, looking upstream at the
+bridges, and across at the hills your pa was so fond of. Wasn't the
+Judge just crazy about Florence! For the longest time after I came I
+couldn't see why, but I'm beginning."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+
+A tired look overspread Estelle's face, when, returning home after
+seeing Dr. Bewick off on his way to Paris, they found Gerald waiting.
+
+She said to herself, in tempestuous inward irritation, that it was
+inconceivable a young man so well up in the ways of the world shouldn't
+know any better.
+
+It could not be said that Estelle did not like Gerald Fane. Considered
+by himself, she did like him, much more, she believed, than he liked
+her. His odd distinction, too subtle and complex to describe, aroused in
+her a vague hunger of the mind. But considered in relation to Aurora, he
+"was on her nerves," she said.
+
+"That he shouldn't know any better--" she mentally scolded, behind her
+tired look, "than to obtrude himself the very first minute after Doctor
+Tom's departure!"
+
+But Gerald was not thinking he showed a horrid want of tact. The other
+way, rather. He saw himself as the intimate old friend who comes to call
+right after the funeral, and by his presence console a little, and
+brighten, the bereaved.
+
+Aurora's red eyes smote him at once. Aurora was still in tearful mood.
+The sense not only of her dear friend going, but going with a secret
+weight on his heart that it had been in her power to prevent, made her
+own heart miserably heavy, too. For the moment Tom counted for her more
+than all else, and she reproached herself that when he had done so much
+for her she had not been willing to do such an ordinary little thing for
+him as to marry him; and she reproached herself because it was a relief,
+despite her great wish to be loyal, to think they should not meet again
+until all that was well in the past.
+
+Estelle hoped to hear her friend say to Gerald something to the effect
+that she was in no mood for a social call; but Aurora welcomed the
+visitor with unaffected warmth and sat down in her hat to talk with him.
+So Estelle said primly that it was late, and she was tired; if they
+would excuse her, she would go to bed.
+
+Aurora talked about Tom and nothing but Tom. Sweetly, sighfully, she
+spoke, as more than once before, of those many things he had done for
+her, but spoke of them this evening more amply; his care of her, a
+penniless patient, in that hospital where she woke up after a space of
+unconsciousness; his unremitting kindness when she lived in his house
+and took care of his father, the dear old judge, who was sick three long
+years before he died; the proof of goodness more remarkable still which
+he gave after that.
+
+A tremulous hope flickered up in Gerald that she would go on and tell
+him about the latter, perhaps filling in some of the lacunæ which her
+history had for him. Much had come out in their many hours of talk, but
+he had found her circumspect with regard to certain parts of her life,
+and had never put a question. In one so frank, her avoidance appeared a
+result of dislike to remembering those unmentioned links in the chain of
+events.
+
+But this evening again she stopped short of telling him what he would
+have liked to know--how Bewick was connected with her wealth. For it had
+come to her from no second husband: she had not been twice married.
+
+She broke off with the words, "Oh, some time I'll tell you the whole
+story. I don't feel like it now. It always makes me so mad!"
+
+If Aurora had been pledged to Bewick, thought Gerald, the most natural
+thing would have been to tell him of it this evening. In her expatiating
+upon all she owed to Bewick, Gerald felt a wish to explain how it was
+that without being engaged to him she could commit the impropriety of
+publicly weeping over his departure.
+
+It seemed to Gerald rather late in the day for him to seek an excuse to
+call at the Hermitage; yet on the afternoon following Dr. Bewick's
+departure he sought for one--one having reference to Estelle. He took
+with him a propitiatory little volume containing translations of
+well-known poems by one Amiel. Estelle was regarded as being immensely
+interested in French; she daily translated themes back and forth from
+her own language into that of Molière. These singularly neat and exact
+productions of Amiel's should delight--and disarm her.
+
+Gerald did not dislike Estelle, far from it. He did justice to her as a
+good, true-hearted, self-improving American. Taken by herself, he felt
+for her decided regard; but taken in connection with Aurora he would
+sometimes have liked delicately to lift her between finger and thumb and
+drop her into a well.
+
+When he entered the red-and-green room, the very least bit timidly, with
+his book in his hand, he perceived almost at once that something unusual
+was in the air, and the shades of feeling between himself and Estelle
+became for the moment of no importance.
+
+Nothing was said at first of the cause for Aurora's air of repressed
+excitement, as she knit on a pink and white baby-jacket, or the cloudy
+annoyance puckering Estelle's brow as she stitched on her silk tapestry.
+The ladies might merely have been quarrelling, thought the visitor, and
+made himself as far as he could a soothing third, chatting with Estelle
+about Amiel and with Aurora about young Mrs. Sebastian, whose baby was
+to rejoice in the little garment half-finished between her hands.
+
+"Gerald," Aurora interrupted him in the middle of a sentence, letting
+her hands and work drop in her lap, "something so queer and unpleasant
+has happened!"
+
+He raised both eyebrows in solicitous participation, and mutely
+questioned.
+
+"It's about Charlie Hunt. I never would have imagined--you wouldn't
+either."
+
+"My imagination, dear friend, is more far-reaching in some ways than
+yours," he quickly corrected her, "and has had more practice than yours
+in ways of unpleasantness. But do tell me what it is that has happened."
+
+"Charlie Hunt! Charlie Hunt!" she repeated, like one unable to make
+herself believe a thing. "Charlie Hunt to turn nasty like that from one
+day to the next!"
+
+"To turn----"
+
+"He was here to dinner just two weeks ago and perfectly all right. We
+had a nice, long chat together on the sofa. But he didn't make his
+party-call quite as soon as he usually does, so when I saw him at
+Brenda's wedding I thought of course he'd come up and tell me how busy
+he'd been or some other taradiddle. But he didn't come near me. I was
+sort of surprised,--still, there were so many people there that he knew,
+and we didn't stay quite to the end, you remember. I didn't even think
+enough about it to mention it to Estelle. Well, this forenoon I went to
+the bank, and when I'd got my money, I happened to catch sight of
+Charlie, in the side-room, you know, where his desk is. I thought I'd
+like to speak to him. He's always wanted me to ask for him when I went
+to the bank, and I've done it more than once, and we've had five
+minutes' chat. I was just going to tease him a little bit about coming
+to see me so seldom nowadays, when he used to come so often, and ask
+about the lady in the case. There really is one, I guess. Italo told me.
+So I asked the old boy--you know the one I mean, the old servant of the
+bank, who's always there, to tell Mr. Hunt that Mrs. Hawthorne would
+like to speak with him, and then I took a seat, and in a minute in came
+Charlie, with just his usual look.
+
+"Now, I want to tell you that I've never had one unpleasant word with
+Charlie Hunt; I've always liked him real well. I put down my foot
+against letting him run me and my house, but there never was a word said
+about it. I balked, but I didn't kick. All along I've been just as nice
+to him as I know how, except just one moment, when I stuck a little pin
+into him the night of the _veglione_, not supposing that he'd ever
+know who did it.
+
+"Well, I was sitting there at the table with the newspapers, and he came
+and stood near, without taking a chair, as if he hadn't much time to
+spare. I began to talk and joke about his cutting me dead at the
+wedding, and he listened and talked back in a common-enough way, only I
+noticed that he once or twice called me Mrs. Barton instead of Mrs.
+Hawthorne. Now I must go back and tell you that some time ago when I was
+at the bank he casually asked me if I knew of any Mrs. Helen Barton in
+Florence, and he showed me two letters in the same handwriting, one
+addressed to the English bank, and the other to the American bank,
+Florence, that had been there at Hunt & Landini's for some time, and no
+one had called for and they didn't know what to do with. Now, the
+instant my eye lit on those letters I knew who'd written them, what was
+in them, and who they were meant for. All letters for Estelle and me,
+you know, are first sent to Estelle's house in East Boston, to be
+forwarded to us wherever we might be in Europe; but that letter had
+escaped. That letter was from a queer kind of sour, unsuccessful woman
+called Iona Allen, who boarded once at the same house with me on
+Springfield Street,--the languishing kind of critter that I never could
+stand, who hadn't the gumption of a half-drowned chicken, who'd never
+stuck to anything or put any elbow-grease into the work on hand, and
+whined all the time, and was looking out for some one to support her. I
+guessed she'd heard of my money and was writing me a sweet letter of
+congratulations, along with a hard-luck story. I'd have liked to get
+hold of her letter, but didn't exactly see how I could. I said to
+Charlie, 'Let me take it; perhaps I can find the one it's meant for
+among my acquaintances.' But he didn't seem to think that could be done;
+so there the matter dropped. I didn't care much. Iona Allen can look for
+some one nearer home to support her.
+
+"Well, to go back. When Charlie Hunt had called me Mrs. Barton for the
+third time I realized from his way of doing it that it wasn't a slip of
+the tongue, and I stopped him short and said:
+
+"'What makes you call me Mrs. Barton all of a sudden?'"
+
+"'It's your name, isn't it?' he said, with a queer look.
+
+"'No,' I came right out strong and bold. And I wasn't lying either. It
+isn't my name. I don't really know what my name is. It's Hawthorne as
+much as it's anything. Jim changed his name half a dozen times, and the
+name he married me under I found out wasn't his real name.
+
+"Charlie Hunt stood there a moment as if thinking it over, looking at me
+with the meanest grin; then he said with that hateful, sarcastic look of
+a person who thinks he's being smart in getting back at you:
+
+"'Is that as true,' he said, 'as that you never indulged in carnival
+humor masked as a crow?' Then I knew he'd somehow got on to the truth
+about that night at the _veglione_. But I wasn't going to give it
+away.
+
+"'You know what you're driving at better than I do,' I said. And then I
+said: 'What's it all about? What's your game?' And he said, as if I'd
+been a common swindler that he'd found out:
+
+"'What's yours?'
+
+"Then I felt myself get mad.
+
+"'You're a mean little pest,' I said, but between my teeth, and not so
+that any one but he could hear me. And 'You're an evil-minded little
+scalawag,' I said. 'You certainly don't know me if you think I've done
+anything in this world to be ashamed of. Go ahead,' I said; 'do what you
+please. Don't for one single instant think that I'm afraid of you or
+that you can do me any harm.' And I left him standing there, with his
+grin, and flounced out. But what do you think of it, Gerald? Why should
+Charlie Hunt behave like that to me?"
+
+"I could judge better if I knew what you said to him at the
+_veglione_."
+
+"It wasn't very bad. It might provoke him for a minute to know that it
+was I who said it, but it oughtn't to make him mad enough to bite. I
+went up to him, and I said close to his ear, in my good English:
+
+"'You amusing little match-maker,' I said, 'what do you hope to get from
+your dusky friend marrying that _absard_ American? How much do you
+know about her?' I said. 'Are you even sure she's as rich as she seems?'
+Then he said, polite but stiff:
+
+"'You have the advantage of me, madam, in knowing what you're talking
+about. Pray go on with your tasteful pleasantries,' he said; 'I'm
+thinking I've heard your voice before.' Upon which I shut my mouth and
+dusted down the opera-house on Italo's arm. I was crazy that evening, I
+guess, with the crowd and excitement and all. When I get to training, I
+can't resist the impulse; I don't know where to stop. But that wasn't
+enough to make him want to stick a knife in me, was it? It was only fun.
+It was true. He had seemed to be trying to manage me so's I'd take a
+fancy to Landini, and I couldn't for the life of me see what it mattered
+to him."
+
+"I tell Aurora," came in Estelle, "that a little joke like that would
+rankle terribly in any but a real goodnatured man."
+
+"My dear Aurora," said Gerald, excited and darkly flushed, "your little
+joke would not have had to contain a sting nearly as sharp to rouse
+against you such vanity as Hunt's, unless, let me add, there were some
+counterweight of self-interest to keep him back. It is known that
+Charlie has only some parts and habits of a human being, not all. One
+almost, in pure justice, cannot blame him. But scorn him--oh, as for
+that!... He could be with you day after day, and take all you would
+give, and at the end of a year feel no tie; he could hear you slandered,
+and not take your defence; he could make a joke at your expense, if one
+came into his mind that he thought sufficiently witty, and never have a
+sense of meanness! He would have had nothing to overcome. He would only
+learn better if he perceived some loss of consideration, and consequent
+advantage to himself. That would make him more cautious, but not make
+him more aware. And you cannot call him wicked any more than upon any
+occasion you could call him good. But he's damnable!"
+
+Consuming anger lighted up Gerald's face, his voice trembled with
+intensity of feeling, his vehemence now and then by jerks lifted his
+heels off the floor. "He is not properly a man at all," he went on to
+characterize his old schoolmate; "he is just an insect _en grand_.
+He satisfies his instincts precisely as an insectivorous insect
+does--the rest are there to furnish something to his life. Nothing else,
+he knows nothing outside. Now that you have offended him he probably
+won't do you any great harm. He's not a devil, and the world he lives in
+does not tolerate anything very black. He'd injure himself in trying to
+injure you. But he'll do you what harm he easily and safely can. He's
+nothing big, he could do nothing big, he hasn't a passion in him. He's
+like this: from the moment he had ceased to get any good of frequenting
+your house, even if you had not done the smallest thing to vex him, he
+would pass on a bit of gossip harmful to you for the simple glory of
+appearing for one moment a little better informed than the rest. No more
+than that. He would be capable of that; he wouldn't even have to hate
+you. For Charlie Hunt, as Leslie once perspicaciously said--Charlie Hunt
+has no real inside!"
+
+Both women sat staring at Gerald, impressed by his heat. When he
+stopped, they continued for a minute in blank silence, revolving his
+words and readjusting their estimates, while their eyes traveled up and
+down, up and down the room, drawn after his figure that wrathily paced
+the floor.
+
+"How do you suppose he found out about the black crow? For I'm perfectly
+sure he didn't know me at the time," said Aurora presently.
+
+"That might easily enough happen in some roundabout way," said Estelle,
+"as long as Italo and Clotilde both knew it. They might let the cat out
+of the bag without intending to. He talks so much. Never knew such a
+talker. But what I want to know is how he knew your name was Barton."
+
+"I've told you what I think. He's heard you call me Nell. Tom, too,
+called me Nell. That may have given him the hint. Then he simply opened
+Iona Allen's letter and read it. Something was in it, no doubt, that
+enabled him to put two and two together. Perhaps the name Bewick. Iona
+would have heard of that. She would write to say now I'd climbed out of
+poverty and hard work she knew I wouldn't mind lending a hand to an old
+friend not so fortunate. Something like that. She'd be sure to whine and
+beg. And Charlie Hunt, little bunch of meanness! would imagine he could
+hold over me the fact that I was poor once and what he would think low
+in the scale, because he thought I'd be ashamed of it. But no such
+thing. If I changed my name coming here, it wasn't on any such account
+as that. I'm gladder than ever now that I told Mrs. Foss all about it. I
+did, Gerald, quite soon after we first came, and she said, though it was
+in a way a mistake, she didn't see any real harm in it. As long as I'd
+begun that way, she said, better not make a sensation by changing back
+or saying anything about it. She thought my reasons were very natural.
+It wasn't as if I were misleading anybody, or anybody were losing money
+by me. I'd have told you too, Gerald, in a minute, as far as wanting
+just to conceal anything goes. But Gerald and I"--she seemed to place
+the matter before an invisible judge and jury--"never talk together of
+ugly things, do we, Gerald? He's more delicate-minded by a good deal
+than I am. With him particularly, though we've been such intimate
+friends, I shrank from it. There's not much poetry about me, I know
+that, but there'd be even less if I had to have it known all I've been
+through. And since the first of our association we've always lived in a
+sweet sort of world, haven't we, Gerald? I'd be ready, just the same, to
+tell you the whole story any moment you wanted to hear...."
+
+At Gerald's swift instinctive gesture, she went on without further
+considering the proposition she had made. "As I said before, I don't
+know what my own real front-door name is. I was born Goodwin. I married
+Barton, but Barton wasn't Jim's real name. Aurora Hawthorne is what I
+called myself when we were young ones and played ladies, Hat and I. I
+came over here to cut loose from all the bothers that had made the last
+year in Denver a nightmare. I didn't want to be connected with that
+dirty mess any more in anybody's mind or my own. I wanted it to be like
+taking a bath and starting new, feeling clean. Then, if I was Aurora
+Hawthorne, Hattie had to be Estelle Madison, which was her name in our
+old play-days. Neither of us thought of anything when we planned it but
+its being a grand lark. And at first, in hotels, what did it matter? But
+since we've been here and had friends, we've felt sorry more than once,
+because it seemed like telling a lie. And then we were afraid of things
+that might come up--just like this that has, in fact. But there wasn't
+anything to do about it. Because if we confessed now most anybody would
+think our reason for changing names must have been something
+disgraceful, just as it happens if a person who kills another by
+accident goes and hides the corpse, everybody takes it for granted it
+was murder. So, if Charlie Hunt tells--"
+
+"I'm not nearly as much afraid of his telling that you are here under an
+assumed name," said Estelle, "as that you were the black crow, and it
+getting to the ears of Antonia and Co."
+
+"Well, what could they do?"
+
+"Spoil Florence for us pretty thoroughly, I'm afraid, Nell."
+
+"Oh, nonsense!" cried Aurora, but after a moment added in a tone of
+lessened assurance, "Bother!" and after another moment burst forth, with
+one hand clapped to her curly front hair: "To think that Tom was here
+yesterday, and this had to happen to-day, when he's half-way to Paris! I
+wish he hadn't gone. I wish I had him here to back me up."
+
+"Why don't you telegraph for him?" suggested Estelle, eagerly.
+
+"Oh, no, I wouldn't do that,"--Aurora's vehemence subsided,--"it's not
+important enough for that."
+
+"My dear Aurora," said Gerald, stopping in front of her, his whole
+person expressing hurt and remonstrance little short of indignation, "if
+your wishing for Doctor Bewick signifies that you do not feel you have
+friends near you on whose attachment you can count, surely you do wrong
+to some of us!"
+
+Though his tone scolded Aurora sharply for her lack of faith, Estelle's
+ear caught a trembling edge to his voice expressive of deep feeling.
+Estelle had the good sense to see that Gerald must inevitably desire to
+make more exposition of his allegiance, and the good feeling to know
+that this could be done better if she were not present. Gerald, with his
+little peace-offering, was at the moment in favor with Estelle. His
+explicitness, his righteous violence, his entire adequacy on the subject
+of Charlie Hunt, had charmed her. She also wanted Aurora to have any
+comfort the hour might afford. She on the spot feigned to understand
+Busteretto's pawing of her dress as an expression of desire to go into
+the garden and see the little sparrows. She swept him up from the floor
+with one hand and, tucking him under her arm, slipped out of the room.
+
+Gerald stood grasping his elbows. He had a look like that of some man,
+known so far as a harmless retiring burgher, about to make a public
+confession which will change all, bringing his head perhaps to the
+block; or the look of a man on the verge of a precipice, still half
+resisting the desire to jump, yet knowing that he will jump, nothing can
+save him from it; the look of a man, in fine, pregnant with intention,
+but walking in a dream.
+
+There was silence for a minute after Estelle left the room. Then Gerald
+said very stiffly, very formally:
+
+"If you would do me the honor, dearest Aurora, the very great honor, of
+consenting to take my name, the right I should have to defend you would
+be--would be--part of my great happiness."
+
+Aurora stared at him. Beneath the frank investigation of her eyes his
+own dropped in modesty and insuperable embarrassment.
+
+There was another silence before he added:
+
+"I would try very much to make you happy."
+
+Aurora repressed the first words that came to her lips,--and set aside
+the next ones that rose in her mind to say. Silence again reigned for a
+moment. Then, with the serious face, almost invisibly rippling, that
+betokened in her a secret and successful fight against laughter, she
+said in what she called her good English, faintly reminiscent of
+Antonia's:
+
+"I am aware, my dear Gerald, of the honor, the very great honor, you do
+me. I thank you--for coming up to the scratch like a little man. But the
+feeling I have that I could never be _warthy_ of so much honor
+deceydes me to declane. Gerald," she went on, discarding her English,
+"don't say another word! You dear, dear boy! The things you want to
+defend me against don't amount to a row of pins when all I've got to do
+if it comes to the pinch is pack my grip and clear out. Thank you all
+the same, you pet, for your kindness. Don't think of it again. I am sort
+of glad, though, you've got that proposal out of your system. Now we can
+go back to a sensible life."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+
+Aurora, of the excellent three-times-a-day appetite, Aurora of the good
+sound slumbers, picked at her food and slept brokenly for part of a week
+at that period, such was her impatience at the dragging length of time,
+the emptiness of time, undiversified and unenhanced by the presence in
+her house of any man devoted to her. No odor of tobacco smoke in the
+air, no cane in the corner; Tom on his way to America, Gerald hurt or
+cross or both. But, the ladies agreed, when Aurora had told Estelle the
+latest about Gerald, her refusal could not possibly occasion a cessation
+of relations, since his offer, chivalrous and unpremeditated, had been
+at most a cute and endearing exhibition of character. His sensitiveness
+could not be long recovering, and everything would be as before.
+
+Aurora had been half prepared for his staying away all Saturday; but
+having been justified in that, she the more confidently looked for him
+on Sunday. It is simply incredible, as almost everybody has felt at
+least once in his life, how long the hours can be when you are waiting
+for something.
+
+At the end of a singularly unprofitable day, Aurora sat in the red and
+green room with all the windows open to the sweet airs and odors of May,
+and no lamp lighted that might attract night-moths, or, worse, the
+thirsty, ferocious Florentine _zanzara_. She just sat, not doing a
+thing. Estelle after a while left her, to retire to her own quarters,
+close the windows and make a light.
+
+Aurora watched the dark blue velvet sky over Bellosguardo, and thought.
+
+A tinkling of mandolins, a thrumming of guitars, informed her of
+street-singers stationed under her windows. A tenor voice rose in the
+song she was so fond of, _La Luna Nova_, mingling at the end of the
+verse with other male voices that repeated the second half of it. It
+sounded infinitely sweet out in the warm spring night.
+
+After _La Luna Nova_ they sang _Fra i rami_, _fulgida_,
+and _Vedi_, _che bianca Luna_, and _Dormi pure_, all
+things she particularly liked. The voices struck her as being nearer
+than the garden railing; she thought the singers must have found the
+carriage gate open and slipped in without noise. She bent forth a
+little, and as she could not see them imagined them standing among the
+shrubs. She propped her elbows on the window-rail and listened, grateful
+for this bath of sweetness to her spirit after the day's profound ennui.
+
+Estelle came softly into the dark room and joined her; they leaned side
+by side.
+
+_Mi sono innamorato d'una stella_, _Sognai_, _Io
+t'amerò_, one sweet and sentimental song succeeded the other.
+
+Clotilde had entered too, on tiptoe, and stood listening, just behind
+the others.
+
+"It is a serenade," she whispered. "It is a compliment."
+
+A serenade!... Aurora thrilled with a pleasant surmise. There was only
+one person in Florence of whom she could conceive as offering her the
+compliment of a serenade. She listened with a new keenness of pleasure.
+
+After the concert had prolonged itself through some dozen pieces--
+
+"You must invite them to enter," whispered Clotilde, presumably versed
+in the ceremonial of such adventures, "and offer them something for
+their tired throats, a little wine...."
+
+"Oh, you think we ought...?"
+
+"But yes, it would be courtesy."
+
+"Go you, then, Clotilde, and show them in and order up the wine. We'll
+be down in a minute."
+
+As they entered the dining-room, Clotilde burst into a peal of delighted
+laughter at the well-managed surprise, while Italo hastened forward to
+take Aurora's hand and bow over it half way to the floor.
+
+It was within Aurora's breast as if in the dark one had clasped as she
+thought a sweetheart, to find when the light came that her arms were
+entwined around the dancing-master, or the tailor. But only for an
+instant. She was really touched and charmed. She became more and more
+eloquent in expressing delight.
+
+The singers were presented to her individually, dark-eyed and smiling
+young Italians of the people, who knew no language but their own
+Florentine and spoke to Aurora in that, not expecting to be understood
+or to understand, except through smiles.
+
+Clotilde, busy, bustling, poured for them wine which she knew to be
+excellent, and there was a bright half hour for all. Italo wore an air
+relating him to all the successful heroes that have been, to Cæsar as
+well as to Paganini, who also had a great nose. To manage a thing well
+in small justifies pride, giving earnest as it does that a large thing,
+such as a siege, or a symphony, would by the same capacity be managed
+equally well. Italo that night carried his head like one who respects
+the size of his nose. He was quick, he was witty, he was amiable. He had
+about him something a little splendid, even, due to his feeling of
+having been splendid--or nothing--in his tribute to the patroness from
+whose horn of plenty so much had overflowed into his hands.
+
+Aurora beckoned Clotilde aside to say in her ear, "Will you run upstairs
+like a good girl and get my porte-monnaie?... Would it be all right, do
+you think?"
+
+Clotilde made the face and gesture of one in doubt, and if anything
+averse, but not insuperably. The bounty of royalty, or of rich
+Americans, is not felt as alms.
+
+"Go, then," whispered Aurora, "and get the purse that you'll find under
+some silk stockings in my second drawer, the little purse with gold in
+it."
+
+One of the petty difficulties of life to Aurora since she had lived in
+foreign lands had been the so often arising necessity to think quickly
+what it would be proper to give. As the amount of the gratuity did not
+much matter to her she had felt a desperate wish often for the power of
+divination, by which to know what would be expected. On some occasions
+it had seemed to Aurora that it would be more delicate not to offer
+money; but experience had taught her that if she offered enough no
+offense would be taken. These singers were all poor young fellows,
+Clotilde had told her, musically gifted, but plying ordinary trades.
+This one was a wood-carver, that one a gilder. They had been taught by
+her brother the fine songs composing that magnificent serenade.
+
+The gold pieces distributed among them with words and smiles of thanks
+were received with such charming manners that the giver--for the first
+moment faintly embarrassed--was soon set at her ease. When it came to
+the promoter and leader of the serenade, Aurora felt no more
+uncertainty. Money had so often gone from her hand to his. She with
+generous ease, as if passing a box of candy to children, tendered him
+some three or four times as much as to the others.
+
+But there Italo showed what he was made of. He took a step backward and
+stood with soldierly rigidity, one hand held with the palm toward her,
+like a shield and defense against her intention to belittle him and his
+token of homage by a reward. His look said, and said dramatically, that
+her thought of him did him wrong; it said that he was ashamed of her for
+not knowing better. Yet there was no real dissatisfaction in it, since
+her want of delicacy permitted the exhibition of his delicacy, and
+afforded him the opportunity to make that gesture....
+
+Her hand dropped, her whole being drooped and confusedly apologized.
+Then the hand that had interposed between them, uncompromising as a hot
+flat-iron, changed outline and pointed at a half faded rose pinned on
+her breast. Quickly she unfastened it and held it toward the
+outstretched hand. It was taken, it was held to Italo's lips while he
+made one of those deep bows that bent him double; then the stem of the
+rose was pulled through his buttonhole and secured with a pin from
+Aurora's dress. The great little man shook his locks and went on to the
+next subject.
+
+Aurora was impressed. She was pleased with Italo in a new way, and said
+to herself that she must make him some rich little, but unobjectionable
+little, gift to remember this occasion by, a gold pencil, or a pearl
+scarf-pin, or a cigar case to be proud of.
+
+She went to bed with her head full of serenade and serenaders, her head
+all lighted up inside with the glory of having been the object of a
+tribute so flattering. When after reading her chapter she blew out the
+candle, she knew that to-night she should sleep, and make up for the two
+bad nights just passed. If Gerald were so foolish as to feel annoyed and
+wish to stay away, he would just have to feel annoyed and stay away
+until he felt different. His mood couldn't help wearing off in time. But
+it did seem to her extraordinary that even now, after knowing him so
+long, she could tell so little of the workings of Gerald's mind. All, of
+course, because he was--such a considerable part of him--a foreigner.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Aurora was one of those healthy sleepers who have no care to guard
+themselves against the morning light. Her windows stood open, her bed
+was protected from winged intruders by a veil of white netting gathered
+at the top into the great overshadowing coronet.
+
+She was in the fine midst of those sweetest slumbers that come after a
+pearly wash of dawn has cleaned sky and hilltops from the last
+smoke-stain of the night, when a sense of some one else in the room
+startled her awake. There stood near the door of her dressing-room an
+unknown female, wearing intricate gold ear-pendants and a dingy cotton
+dress without any collar.
+
+"_Chi è voi?_" inquired Aurora, lifting her head.
+
+"I am the Ildegonda," answered the woman, whose smile and everything
+about her apologized, and deprecated displeasure. She must be the
+kitchen-maid, fancied Aurora, engaged by Clotilde, and not supposed to
+show her nose above the subterranean province of the kitchen.
+
+"There is the _signorino_ down in the garden," Ildegonda acquitted
+herself of the charge laid upon her by the donor of the silver franc
+still rejoicing her folded fingers, "who says if you will have the
+amiability to place yourself one moment at the window he would desire to
+say a word to you."
+
+The _signorino_. That had become the informal title by which the
+servants announced a guest who was let in so very frequently. Aurora
+understood _finestra_, window, and _dire una parola_, to say a
+word, and then that the signorino was _giù in giardino_.
+
+"All right." Aurora nodded to the Ildegonda, inviting her by a motion of
+the hand to go away again.
+
+Aurora rose and softly closed the door which, when open, made an avenue
+for sound from her room to Estelle's. She slipped her arms into a
+sky-blue dressing-gown, and with a heart spilling over with playful joy,
+eyes spilling over with childish laughter, went to look out of the
+window, the one farthest from Estelle's side of the house.
+
+"Good morning! Good morning!" came on the instant from the waiting,
+upturned face below. "Forgive me for rousing you so early," was said in
+a voice subdued so as to reach, if possible, no other ears, "but you
+promised you would go with me one day to Vallombrosa, and one has to
+start early, for it is far. Will you come?"
+
+"Will I come? Will I come? Wait and see! Got your horses and carriage?"
+
+"Standing at the gate. How long will it take you to get ready?"
+
+"Oh, I'll hurry like anything."
+
+    "'Wash, dress, be brief in praying.
+    Few beads are best when once we go a Maying.'"
+
+"I won't pray, I won't put on beads. But, see here, what about what they
+call in this country my collation? You know I'm a gump on an empty
+stomach."
+
+"We'll have our coffee on the road, at a little inn-table out of doors
+in the sunrise."
+
+"Fine! By-by. See you again in about twenty minutes."
+
+Every fiber composing Aurora twittered with a distinct and separate glee
+while she hurried through her toilet, a little breathless, a little
+distracted, and mortally afraid Estelle would hear and come to ask
+questions. From her wardrobe she drew the things best suited to the day
+and her humor: a white India silk all softly spotted with appleblossoms,
+of which she had said when she considered acquiring it that it was too
+light-minded for her age and size, but yet, vaulting over those
+objections, had bought and had made up according to its own merits and
+not hers; a white straw hat with truncated steeple crown, the fashion of
+that year, small brim faced with moss-green velvet, bunch of green
+ostrich-tips, right at the front, held in place by band and buckle.
+
+Her parasol was a thing of endless lace ruffles, her wrap a thing of
+vanity.
+
+She passed out through the dressing-room, she crept down the stairs,
+laughing at her own remark that it was awfully like an elopement. The
+house was not yet astir; only the Ildegonda sweeping out the kitchen,
+and old Achille out in the garden picking early insects off his plants.
+
+At the door she greeted Gerald with all the joy of meeting again a
+playmate. He had on the right playmate's face. She gave him both hands,
+and he clasped them to the elbow, shaking them with satisfactory fire,
+while their eyes laughed a common recognition of the adventure as a
+lark.
+
+At the gate waited the open carriage, a city-square cabriolet, but clean
+and in repair, drawn by two strong little brown horses, with rosettes
+and feathers in their jingling bridles, ribbons in their whisking
+braided tails, and driven by a brown young man of twenty, with a
+feather, too, in his hat, which he wore aslant and crushed down over his
+right ear. To make the excursion pleasanter to himself, he was by
+permission taking along a companion of his own age, who occupied the low
+seat beside his elevated one, and in contrast with his vividness, the
+pride of life expressed by his cracking whip, the artistically singular
+sounds he made in his throat to encourage the horses, was a washed-out
+personality, good at most to do the jumping off and on, to readjust
+harness, to investigate the brake, or to offer alms from the lady in the
+carriage to the old man breaking stones in the roadside dust.
+
+They were off; they sped through the gate of the Holy Cross, the fresh
+young horses making excellent time. Out of the city, along the river,
+across it, past hamlets, past villas, past churches and
+_camposanti_, past vineyards and _poderi_ and peasants'
+dwellings....
+
+It seemed to Aurora that never had there been such a day, so fresh and
+unstained and perfect, a day inspiring such gladness in being. The sense
+of that priceless boon, the freedom of a whole long day together, elated
+her with a joy that knew only one shadow, and that unremarked for the
+first half of it--the shortness of the longest earthly day.
+
+Now the horses slowed in their pace; the ascent had begun among the
+shady chestnut-trees. The driver's friend scrambled down and plodded
+alongside the horses; the driver himself descended and walked, cheering
+on his beasts with noises that nearly killed Aurora, she declared.
+
+As it took them between four and five hours to reach their destination,
+and as Aurora chattered all the time, with little intervals of talk by
+Gerald, to report their conversation is unfeasible. Aurora, wanting in
+all that varied knowledge which those who are fond of reading get from
+books, had yet a lot to say that some unprejudiced ears found worth
+while. The dwellers upon earth and their ways had for her an immense and
+piercing interest. In vain had circumstances circumscribed her early
+life: neighbors, Sunday-school teacher, minister, village drunkard,
+fourth of July orator, had furnished comedy for her every day. The human
+happenings falling within her ken became good stories in their passage
+through a mind quick in its perception of inconsequence, faulty logic,
+pretense, all that constitutes the funny side of things. Aurora's love
+of the funny story amounted to a fault. Aurora was not always above
+promoting laughter by narratives no subtler than a poke in your ribs.
+Aurora, in the vein of funny stories, could upon occasion be
+Falstaffian. But only one half of humanity had a chance to find out the
+latter. When in company of the other sex, by instinct and upbringing
+alike she minded her Ps and Qs.
+
+Gerald said that Aurora on that day regaled him with over a thousand
+comic anecdotes, this being the expression of her frolicsome and
+exuberant mood. He furnished her with a few to add to her store, Italian
+ones, proving that he was not wholly without some share of her gift in
+that line; but he now and then politely stopped her flow and led her to
+admire with him the beauties of the road, natural or architectural, a
+distant glimpse, a form, a fragrance. He would explain things to her,
+impart scraps of pertinent history, which she would appear trying to
+appreciate and imprint on her memory.
+
+As he leaned back in the carriage at her side, bathed in the wavering
+green and gold light of the chestnut-trees among which the road wended,
+a recent description of him, which she had said over to herself, to
+qualify it by mitigating adjectives, seemed to her to have become
+altogether unfair. Gerald's face, beneath the brim of his pliable white
+straw, bent down over the eyes and turned up at the back, Italian style,
+did not look sickly. On the contrary, it looked better and stronger
+since his illness; he even had a little color. He was not sad-eyed,
+either, that she could see, though his eyes must always be the
+thoughtful kind. As for spindle-shanked, he filled his loose woolen
+clothes better than before.
+
+He had made himself modestly fine for the day to be spent in company of
+the fair: he had on a necktie which, if expressive of mood, declared his
+outlook on life to be cheerfuller: it was a vibrant tone of violet that
+accorded agreeably with his gray suit. A rose-geranium leaf and a stem
+or two of rusty-gold _gaggia_, odors that he loved, occupied at his
+buttonhole the place of those decorations which distinguished elderly
+gentlemen are sometimes envied for, and which--it is a commonplace--are
+not worthy to be exchanged for the flower Youth sticks at his coat to
+aid him to charm.
+
+It grew very warm; the way, though pleasant, was beginning to seem long
+when they arrived. The old monastery, now a school of forestry; the
+Cross of Savoy, where pilgrims rest and dine, gleamed white in the
+cloudless noon, amid the century-old trees that long ago, before Dante's
+time even, earned for the spot its beautiful name of Vallombrosa,
+Umbrageous Vale.
+
+Aurora was by this time starving again, and Gerald knew the pleasure of
+purveying to the demands of a stomach as untroubled by any back-thought
+relating to its functioning as that of a big bloomy goddess seated
+before a meal of ambrosia. He suggested that she accompany her artichoke
+omelet, her cutlet with the sauce of anchovy, parsley and mustard, by a
+little red wine. But she would not, even to be companionable. She could
+never bring herself to touch wine, any more than to use powder on her
+cheeks, which in truth did not need it, or a pencil to her eyebrows,
+which would have looked better for that accentuation.
+
+In a state of physical and mental well-being such as can be bought only
+by an early rising, an inconsiderable breakfast, a long ride in the
+warmth of Tuscan mid-May, an abundant and repairing repast, taken, amid
+sweet conventual coolness, in company which leaves nothing to wish for
+beyond it, they went forth to spend the time that must be granted the
+horses for rest before the return to Florence.
+
+[Illustration: "Come, let us reason together, Aurora"]
+
+After loitering in the inn garden, they went to look at the memorials
+relating to Saint John Gualberto, founder of the monastery. She listened
+to the picturesque history of his life, death, and miracles, but was not
+to be rendered sober-minded by any such thing. In the midst of Gerald's
+instructive account of the holy abbot's endeavors to purify the monastic
+orders from the stain of simony, her hand clutched his, and doing a
+delicate cake-walk she compelled him along with her, announcing, "The
+Hornet and the Bumble-bee went walking hand in hand!" Fancying this
+prank not to have been without success, she next performed an improvised
+_pas seul_ illustrative of the text, "The mountains shall skip like
+little lambs!"
+
+There was artfulness, as has been suspected, in Aurora's frequent jests
+upon her size. Their gross exaggeration was fondly counted upon to make
+her appear sylphlike by comparison with the images she raised.
+
+To relieve the seriousness of Short Lessons on Great Subjects she
+presently invented interrupting them at intervals to introduce Gerald
+and herself to some rock or tree or mountain, as if it had been a poor
+person standing by neglected. "Jack Sprat," she said, "and The Fat!" "A
+busted cream-puff," she said, "and a drink of water!" Further, "Dino and
+Retta!" Finally, with imagination running dry, "Gerry and Rory!"
+
+Yes, by such little jokes--what Leslie called Jokes of the First
+Category, Aurora sought to enliven the hour for Gerald. He never omitted
+to laugh, without being able to enter enough into her fun to join her in
+the same species. An incapacity. Still, there was no disguising the
+basking enjoyment possessing him, his love of her gaiety, if not at all
+moments of the form it took.
+
+Finding it entrancing up there, they decided not to start for home till
+the last minute possible. A limit was set to the time they might linger
+by the necessity for some degree of daylight in making the descent. From
+the edge of the curving road the mountain dropped away without the
+protection of any parapet.
+
+When they had found their ideal place in which to sit on the warm earth
+in the shade and look off over valleys and mountains into azure space,
+Aurora at last consented to be still. She became dreamy, appeared
+sweetly fatigued, and was for a long time mute.
+
+Though the mere quality of her voice still had power to stir Gerald's
+heart to pleasure, yet to be silent with Aurora was pleasure of a
+different order from hearing her voice of rough velvet recount
+preposterous events or propound humorous riddles.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+It looked from where they sat as if the land had at some time been
+fluid, and been tossing, green and purple, in a majestic storm, when
+some great word of command had fixed it in the midst of motion, and the
+waves became Apennines; then in an hour of peculiar affection for that
+plot of the earth a faultless artist from the skies had been set to
+oversee nature and man at their work there, and prevent the intrusion of
+one note not in harmony with his most distinguished dream.
+
+"If Italy should perish and all else remain," said Gerald, whose eyes
+had been feasting on beauties of line and color such as he conceived
+were not to be found outside this land of his idolatry, "the world would
+be irreparably impoverished. If all the world besides should perish and
+Italy remain, the world could still boast of infinite riches."
+
+Aurora gave a nod of at least partial assent. She was growing accustomed
+to the thought that Italy was the fairest of countries and Florence the
+fairest of Italian cities. She found herself beginning to like this
+creed.
+
+In the quiet that descended upon them the native piety in each groped
+for some acknowledgment to make of his consciousness at the moment of
+unusual blessing. In him it took the form of a renewal, more devoted
+perhaps than ever, of the determination to maintain an uncompromising
+purity of aim in his work. The incomparable scene stimulated within him
+a sense of power to produce things rivaling what lay under his eyes; he,
+atom, rivaling his Maker in the creation of beauty. In her it was a
+determination of greater loyalty toward the Provider of undeservedly
+happy days to man, whose heart is wicked from his birth, as her mother
+had been wont to tell her.
+
+Hearing her hum very softly to herself, he asked what she sang. She
+said, her mother's favorite hymn, and gave it aloud, with the words:
+
+    Father, what e'er of earthly bliss
+    Thy sovereign will denies,
+    Accepted at Thy throne of grace
+    Let this petition rise:
+
+    Give me a calm, a thankful heart,
+    From every murmur free;
+    The blessings of Thy grace impart
+    And make me live to Thee.
+
+Like one with an impeccable ear, but with small esteem for his gifts as
+a singer, Gerald murmured the melody after her, just audibly, to show he
+cared to have his share in her memories.
+
+But mainly the two of them thought of each other.
+
+Gerald, regarding Aurora's hands as they lay in her
+lap--innocent-looking, loyal-looking, rather large hands, which during
+his illness he had liked to think were Madonna hands, but when seen in
+health they were not, really--was amazed to remember the day when their
+making passes over his face had filled him with perverse repugnance.
+
+And Aurora, remembering the first time she had seen Gerald and nicknamed
+him Stickly-prickly, while feeling him more than three thousand miles
+removed from her, was amazed....
+
+So they sat, two little dots, two trembling threads, against the screen
+of the universe and eternity, and their two selves, under the spell of a
+world-old enchantment, loomed so large to each that the universal and
+the eternal were to them two little dots, two threads.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Gerald saw how the afternoon was mellowing toward sunset.... And the
+important things of the day had not been touched upon.
+
+Our hero had traversed great spaces in the region of sentiment during
+the two days allowed the Hermitage to stand or crumble without him. The
+first of them had been spent far from it, even as Aurora supposed, for
+the sake of letting the impression of having been laughed at wear off a
+little. Already for some time before that forced climax Gerald had been
+haunted by the feeling that he ought to offer himself to Aurora, as it
+were to regularize his status in her house. After hanging around as he
+had been doing, one might almost say that good manners demanded it. Her
+fashion, on that evening in the garden, of treating the idea that he
+could be enamoured of her assured him that she would refuse. He would
+have done his duty, and they would continue to drift, he shutting his
+eyes to the penalty awaiting his self-indulgence, the taxes of pain
+rolling up for the hour when her necessary departure would involve the
+uprooting of every last little flower in that wretched garden of his
+heart. With such a mental pattern of the future he had gone to bed at
+the end of the first day.
+
+On the next morning something perhaps in deep dreams which he did not
+remember, or in the happy manner of the new day lighting a scarlet
+geranium on the terrace ledge, or simply perhaps the whisper of an
+angel, had effected a change. A heart-throb, a stroke of magic, had so
+lifted him up that over the top of the wall edging the road of life for
+him he had seen a thrilling garden outstretched, smiling in the sun, a
+sight that so enkindled him with the witchery of its promises that he
+felt he should seek for a way into that garden till he found it; should,
+if necessary, demolish the wall.
+
+That day he went walking on the hills beyond Settignano, and the new
+light, the intoxication, persisted--the vision of himself as Aurora's
+lover. Why not? An escape from the past, a different adventure from all
+prefigured in his dull expectations before.... In his theory of living
+Gerald had always admitted the gallant advisability of burning ships.
+There was room in his theory of living for just such a divergence from
+design as he now meditated. When the call comes, summon it to never so
+improbable places, the poet and artist obeys. He had gone to bed on the
+second night with these thoughts and a plan for the morrow.
+
+Now that morrow was wearing to an end and all the floating splendid
+courageous thoughts and feelings, brave in the assurance, along with the
+determination, of victory, must be somehow caught and compressed and
+turned into the language--how poverty-stricken, how stale!--of a
+proposal of marriage; even as a great variegated, gold-shot,
+butterfly-tinted, cloud-light tissue of the Orient is drawn into a
+colorless whipcord twist that it may pass through a little ring.
+
+As he revolved in his mind what he should say to start with, Gerald saw
+appropriateness for the first time in the methods of the historic Gaul,
+who seized by her hair the charming creature whom he felt allied to him
+by deep things, seated her on the horse before him, and rode away. But
+what he would have liked so much the best would have been to lay his
+head in Aurora's willing lap, embrace her knees tenderly, and have her
+understand all without a word being spoken.
+
+Now he cleared his throat, took a reasonable air, a tone almost of
+banter, to say what, influenced by the long precedent of their converse
+together, he could say only in that manner, covering up as best he could
+the fact that his heart trembled and burned.
+
+"Shall we resume our conversation of last Friday?" he asked, with a fine
+imitation of the comradely ease which had marked all their intercourse
+that day.
+
+He was looking over the valley, as if still preoccupied with its beauty
+rather than with her.
+
+Thus misled, she did not guess right. She said:
+
+"About Charlie, you mean? Just fancy, I haven't thought of him once all
+day! Little varmint! Don't I wish I had the spanking of him! But I guess
+it would lame my arm."
+
+"Not about Charlie. I asked would you marry me, and you said you would
+not. Will you to-day?"
+
+"Not for a farm!" she answered, with emphasis equal to her
+precipitation.
+
+"Why not?" he asked, undisconcerted.
+
+"Because."
+
+"Come, let us reason together, Aurora." He changed position, arranging
+himself on his elbow so as to be able to look at her. His eyes were
+steady. "For a man to ask a woman to marry him is of course the greatest
+piece of impertinence of which he could be guilty. But from such
+impertinences, Auroretta, has been derived every beautiful thing that
+has blessed our poor world from the beginning. No man is good enough for
+any woman, let that stand for an axiom. But there again, Auroretta, it's
+not according to merit that those rewards, gentle and beautiful ladies,
+are dispensed. I have rather less to offer than any man in the world,
+but I am bold because you, dear, are just the one to be blind."
+
+"Oh, it's not _that_, of course," said Aurora, hurriedly.
+
+"Don't suppose for a moment that I am troubled by the size of your
+fortune or the size of my own. You haven't any money, dear. Others have
+your money. I have almost to laugh at the splendid speed with which that
+open granary of yours will be eaten clean by all the birds coming to
+pick one seed at a time."
+
+"You needn't laugh, then. Some of it is going to be pinned to me solid,
+so that nothing can get it away from me, not even I myself."
+
+"I am sorry to hear it. The other was so complete. Well, if you had
+nothing, I should still have just enough to keep us from hunger, though
+perhaps not from cold in these dear old stone houses of Italy. And
+you--I know you well enough to be sure of it--you are exactly the one to
+learn how much there can be in life besides its luxuries. Since my
+illness, too, Aurora, let me confide to you, there have been in me
+reawakenings.... I have felt the beginning--I am speaking with reference
+to my work,--I have felt intimations--No, it is too difficult to express
+without seeming to boast, which is horribly unlucky. In short, I have
+felt that I might do the turn still of forcing a careless generation to
+pay attention."
+
+"Oh, Gerald, how nice it is to have you say that!" she warmly rejoiced.
+"I'm so glad to hear it!"
+
+"Now tell me why it is you won't marry me. Stop, dear. Don't say because
+you are not in love with me. I have difficulty in seeing how any one in
+her right senses could be in love with me. It would be enough, dear,
+that you should be to me as you were during those happy, happy days when
+I was so beastly ill. You are so generous, it would be merely fulfilling
+your nature. And I, upon my word, dear, would try to deserve it. I would
+give you reason to be kind. I am not without scraps of honor--wholly; I
+would do my best to make you happy."
+
+"No,"--she shook her head decidedly,--"no, Gerry," she added, to take
+the sharp edge off her refusal, "no, Gerry; Rory won't."
+
+"You have only to lose by it, that is obvious, and I to gain, and
+nothing could equal the indecency of insistence on my part; but I feel
+that I am going to persist to the point of persecution. You are fond of
+me, you know. I only dare to say you are fond of me because you have
+said it yourself more than once. And you are always sincere, and I
+wouldn't be likely to forget. Now, if you are fond of me,--very, very
+fond, you have said repeatedly,--why do you refuse? I wouldn't be a bore
+of a husband, I promise. I would leave you a great deal of liberty."
+
+"No, Geraldino; no."
+
+"You needn't tell me there's somebody else. I don't believe it. Though
+you feel only fondness for me, I know that you are not in love with
+anybody else. When one is in love, there is no room in life for such
+warm and dear friendship as you have frankly shown me. It's that, after
+all, which has given me courage."
+
+"No, no; there's nobody else."
+
+"Well, then, why can't you? Why won't you?"
+
+"I--" She hesitated, as if to think. There was a silence. Then she asked
+slowly, like one who finds some difficulty in laying her tongue on the
+right words: "Do you remember all those things you said that evening in
+the garden, the night you came in to meet Tom for the first time? How
+you wouldn't for anything in the whole world let yourself get tangled up
+again with caring for a person?"
+
+"Perfectly. I could only picture it as meaning more of trouble and
+unrest. But things change, dear. We change. There has taken place in me
+since that, no matter for what reason, an increase of self-confidence
+and confidence in fate such as turns men into nuisances or makes them
+successful. In the last twenty-four hours particularly. Now, as I look
+at the inconvenience of getting tangled up again with caring for a
+person, I find I don't mean at all to suffer. I mean to bother you until
+you say yes, and then to be happy. You could never wilfully torment me,
+I know; you are incapable of it. Then, when you have graciously
+consented to marry me, I feel as if I might build up my life on new
+lines."
+
+"I can't, Geraldino; I can't."
+
+"You can't. So you have said. And I have asked you to tell me your
+reasons, that I may combat them one by one."
+
+"It's no use. We're too different."
+
+"That we are different, thank God! is a reason for and not against."
+
+"No, no; not when it's such a huge difference. We're like--a bird and a
+fish."
+
+"Don't call me a fish. I object."
+
+"We don't think the same about hardly anything."
+
+"But we feel alike on everything of importance."
+
+"There's hardly a thing I do that's quite right as you see it. No, don't
+take the trouble to contradict me; let me do the talking for a minute.
+You're so critical and so conventional and so correct! No matter how
+much you say you aren't, you _are_. And while we're like this I
+don't have to care. I rather enjoy shocking you. And while I'm none of
+your business, you don't have to care what I do or what I'm like. We can
+have our fun and be awfully fond of each other, and it's all serene and
+right. But if I were Mrs. Gerald Fane, all my faults and shortcomings,
+my not knowing the things that everybody in your society knows, my not
+having any elegant accomplishments, would show up so glaring that I
+should know you must be mortified. You couldn't help it."
+
+"Stop, dear! You enrage me. You put me beside myself. You are so
+superficial. And dense. And you hold me up to myself in the features of
+a beastly cad! I won't have it. For one thing, let me tell you that if I
+were the Lord Ronald Macdonald of that song we've heard Miss Felixson
+sing, and you were that canny lass Leezie Lindsay, I should know jolly
+well that after I'd carried you off to the Hielands my bride and my
+darling to be, it would be a very short time before Lady Ronald
+Macdonald had all the airs and tricks of speech of my sisters and
+cousins. That, however, is neither here nor there. Who wants you to be
+different? Aurora, if you only knew yourself! Ceres, or Summer, or Peace
+sitting among the wheat-sheaves, what would it matter that she had not
+been educated at a fashionable boarding-school? Let her just breathe and
+be,--beautiful, benign, and any man not utterly a fool will prefer to
+lie at her knees, keeping still while her silence appeases and
+reconciles him, to hearing the most brilliant conversation of a lady
+novelist."
+
+"You can talk beautifully, Gerald, that's one sure thing; but talk me
+over you can't. Seems to me I should have to be crazy to forget all in a
+moment what I've said over and over to myself, and drilled myself not to
+lose sight of. After you asked me the other day, though I knew it was
+just on the spur of the moment, I thought it all out in the night as
+much as if it had been serious, and I saw what would be the one safe
+course for little me. I mustn't; that's all there is to it. Everything
+is wrong for it to turn out happy in the end. I'm terribly fond of you,
+but I should be scared to death of you, simply scared to death, as a
+husband. We're not the same kind. If I could forget it on my own
+account, I have only to remember how it would strike Estelle. And
+Estelle's got no end of horse sense. It's according to horse sense we
+must act when it comes to settling the real things of life. I
+expect"--she had the effect of turning a page or a corner; she dropped
+from heights of argument to low plains--"I expect I shall be big as a
+mountain by and by. I don't see any help for it. I starve myself, I
+drink hot water, I take exercise,--nearly walk my legs off,--and the
+next time I get weighed I've gained three pounds! What's the use? Then,
+I'm older than you."
+
+"Not at all. I'm older than the everlasting hills; you are the youngest
+thing that lives."
+
+"That's all right, but you were twenty-eight your last birthday, and I'm
+thirty. I'm afraid my character's already pretty well fixed in its
+present form. When it comes over me, for instance, to play the clown,
+I've got to do it or burst. And you're naturally a tyrant, you know."
+
+"I am. I am critical, carping, conventional, and a tyrant, everything
+you say, but just because I am those things, you ought to be able to
+see, dear Aurora--because I am those things and know it, they are the
+things least to be feared in me. Do you suppose Marcus Aurelius was
+really calm and philosophical? Because he, on the contrary, was anxious
+and passionate, he wrote those maxims to try to live by. When you
+_would_ go and be a negress, did I make a scene? I gnashed my teeth
+and gnawed my knuckles, but when I saw you afterward, wasn't I decently
+decent?"
+
+"Yes, but you took to your bed. If I were Mrs. Gerald, and the Pope of
+Rome sent for me to do Lew Dockstader for him and his cardinals, you
+know you wouldn't let me go."
+
+"You are wrong. I should make a point of it. I should only ask to be
+permitted to retire into solitude until all the vulgar people had
+stopped talking about it."
+
+"Ah, you're a dear, funny boy; but put it out of your mind, Geraldino,
+do, dear, when we're so happy as it is. Let's go on just as we've been
+going; you know yourself that it's the wisest, and what really you would
+prefer. If you've asked me to-day--mind, I don't say you _have_;
+but if you have--to save my vanity and back up the proposal you didn't
+really mean the other day,--because you're always such a gentleman;
+you'd rather die than not behave like a gentleman,--let it go at that.
+But if you should feel now that you've got to back up your declaration
+that you're going to persist and follow this up, just ask me over again
+every few days to show there's no unkind feeling, and I promise it will
+be safe; I'll refuse you every time. It'll be our little standing joke.
+For don't you go dreaming that I'm going to let go of you! You can call
+me pudgy if I let you get away. I love you too dearly. Wasn't everything
+all right and lovely until the other day when you came out with that
+stilted speech, 'doing you the honor'? We'll take up again just where we
+left off, and bimeby make fun of all this. You who've read all the books
+ever written, don't you know of cases where two like us went on being
+just friends, and taking comfort in each other on and on to the end of
+the tale?"
+
+"There have been examples, yes, a very few, and not on the whole
+encouraging."
+
+"You know we never thought of anything else until three days ago, and
+were perfectly contented. Let's call all this in between a mistake, like
+taking the wrong road and having to turn back to be where we were
+before. Let's go back."
+
+"Yes, let's go back. I won't bore you any more."
+
+He had all in an instant changed to cool dryness. They would get no
+further along with talk on this occasion, that was clear. And to clasp
+her knees, laying his head on her lap, and penetrate her in silence with
+the conviction that they belonged together in a manner that turned all
+the sensible things she said into folly, could not be done outside the
+world of dreams and fancies. He jumped to his feet.
+
+"I meant, you know, let's go back to Florence. I'm afraid it's high
+time. We ought to have daylight at least until we get to the foot of the
+mountain."
+
+"Cross, Geraldino?"
+
+"Not at all."
+
+"Good friends as ever?"
+
+"Assuredly."
+
+"Oh, I've had such a beautiful day!" she sighed, getting up by the help
+of his two hands, and brushing down her dress. "I certainly do love to
+be with you!"
+
+With the inconsequence of a woman she wanted, in order to console him
+for rejecting him, to make him sure she loved him deeply nevertheless;
+and so she said, turning upon him eyes of sweetest, sincerest affection,
+"I certainly do love to be with you!"
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the carriage they were silent, like people tired out by the long day,
+talked out, and certain of each other's consent to be still.
+
+The two young fellows on the box were quiet, too. The horses now needed
+no encouragement to go; the scraping of the brake gave evidence rather
+of the need to hold them back. The driver's friend, named appropriately
+Pilade, sat hunched with chilly sleepiness; but Angelo, the driver, was
+kept visibly alert by the responsibility of making a safe descent in the
+fast-failing light. Owing to the dilatoriness of the _signori_ they
+had been later in starting than was prudent.
+
+When they emerged at last from the shadow of the chestnut-trees and the
+brake blessedly was released, it was accomplished evening. The dome of
+the firmament spread above them so wonderful for darkly luminous
+serenity that the signori behind in the carriage arranged themselves to
+contemplate it comfortably, with their feet on the forward bench, their
+heads propped on the back of the seat.
+
+Thus they passed through glimmering hamlets, between high walls of
+orchards, past iron gates opening into cypress avenues with dim villas
+at the other end, terraces of vine-garlanded olive-trees, all of a dark
+silvery blue, and did not vouchsafe a look at anything but the inverted
+cup of the nocturnal sky.
+
+Even this they did not see more than in a secondary way, for the
+interposing thoughts and images.
+
+The eyes of both were wide, and in their fixity the lights of heaven
+were glassed. The face of the one burned with a red spot on the
+visibly-defined cheek-bone; the cheeks of the other were, for a marvel,
+pale.
+
+Aurora, uplifted on a great wonder and pride and illogical happiness,
+was thinking of the days to come, the immediate to-morrows, rich in a
+tenderness profounder still than that which had linked her before to the
+companion staring at the stars beside her; she thought of how she should
+through a wise firmness and God's help steer their course into ways of a
+safer and longer happiness than that which he had tendered.
+
+"It would seem rather unnecessary--" came from him through the
+transparent darkness in what was to the young driver's ears a monotonous
+bar of insignificant sound, "it would seem to me almost imbecile, to say
+to you that I love you, when for months I have been hovering around you,
+as must have been evident to the dullest, like the care-burthened
+honey-fly, possessed with the fixed desire to hide his murmurs in the
+rose. When for months I have been, in fact, like a dog with his nose on
+your footprints, asking nothing but to lie down at your feet with his
+muzzle on your shoe."
+
+She impulsively felt for his hand, and pushed her own into it. "Don't
+say another word, Gerald. I daresn't do what you wish, I just daresn't.
+I'm plain scared to! And I'm such a fool that I'm nearer to it this
+minute than I like to be by a long sight. I'm fond enough of you for
+almost anything, and you know it, but I must keep my level head. It
+can't be done--a greyhound tied down to a mudturtle. I know what I'm
+like,--no disparagement meant, Mrs. Hawthorne,--and what you're like,
+and I won't let myself forget. I'm looking out first of all for myself,
+but I'm looking out for you, too, dear boy. Don't say any more about it
+to-night, Gerald, please, with the stars shining like that, and the air
+so sweet that all the fairy-tales you ever heard seem possible. I want
+to keep solid earth under my feet."
+
+Gerald was not so devoid of the right masculine spark as not to
+recognize the moment for one of which advantage should be taken by any
+creature capable of growing a mustache. The thing to be done was to put
+his arms around her like a man, and lay his head on her shoulder like a
+child, and treat as not existing the barriers which she described as
+dividing them.
+
+Often enough in his life Gerald had wished he might have been a
+masterful man, capable of the like things. But already a vague sickness
+of soul had succeeded his momentarily dominant mood. Distrust filled
+him--of his own character, his aims, his talent, his health, and his
+destiny. His dreams had but recently taken the form in which he had that
+day expressed them; he had not grown into them. Under the depressing
+effect of failure he was no more sure than she had professed to be that
+the proposed union would not be a rash mistake. He saw the wisdom of a
+return to his gray policy of wanting nothing, asking nothing. Heaviness
+possessed him; he made no motion.
+
+Signs of the nearing city came thicker and thicker; the street lamps
+became frequent and consecutive. Aurora sat up and composed her
+appearance. The lighted house-fronts threw back the skies to
+inexpressible altitudes.
+
+She continued aloud for Gerald to hear a conversation she had been
+holding mentally:
+
+"Estelle says we must go away somewhere for the summer, because it's
+awfully hot down here in Florence, we're told. We're thinking of taking
+some sort of place at the seashore for the bathing season. You'll be
+coming down to visit us, won't you? Then by and by, when I've had pretty
+near enough of the kind of life I'm leading, tell you what I'm thinking
+I'll do. Give up the house I've got and take another, different, and fit
+it up for a children's hospital, a small one, of course, to be within my
+means, and run it myself, and do what I can of the nursing. I've been
+thinking of it for some time as a good thing to do instead of spending
+my money and nothing to show for it. It would be something to do for the
+sake of little Dan, to make it so it wouldn't be the same as if he never
+had passed through the world. Then I shall have my work just as you have
+yours, Gerald. And so we'll live on, each so interested in all the other
+does. And you'll come to see me, and I'll go to see you--chaperoned, if
+you insist, though I understand a studio can be visited without
+impropriety, and--"
+
+"You can leave me out of your plans for the future. I am going away to
+forget you."
+
+"Oh, no, you're not. You're coming to see me to-morrow. Five o'clock at
+the very latest, hear?"
+
+"I'm afraid you will have to excuse me."
+
+"You wouldn't break my heart like that for anything, Gerald Fane! You
+wouldn't let the foolish doings of this day destroy all the months have
+built up! You're not so mean. When I tell you it'll be all right and
+just as it was before--"
+
+But he stubbornly would not agree, and they quarreled, as so often, half
+in play, half in real exasperation, each calling the other selfish.
+
+But at her door, when he took her hands to thank her for the day she had
+given him, he dropped quite naturally, "Until to-morrow, then," and she
+entered her great white hall with a happy, shining face.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+In the half-light of the solitary hall-lamp the white-and-gold door
+between the curving halves of the stairway stood open on to the
+blackness of the unlighted ball-room. At the threshold appeared Estelle,
+and stood with folded arms until the servant who answered the bell had
+been heard retreating down the back stairs. She came forward with a
+tired, troubled, pallid, and severe face.
+
+"Well, I'm glad you've got back!" she said, as much as to say that she
+had given up looking for her. And as Aurora unexpectedly cast
+mischievous, muscular arms around her and tried to squeeze the breath
+out of her, she gasped amid spasms of resistance: "Stop! Don't try to
+pacify me! I'm in no mood for fooling! I'm as cross with you as I can
+be!"
+
+"You little slate-pencil! You little lemon-drop, you!" said Aurora,
+squeezing harder, then suddenly letting go.
+
+"I'm in no mood to be funny, you--you county-fair prize punkin! I've
+been worried half to death. Where've you been so long, 'way into the
+night, long past eleven o'clock?"
+
+"Didn't you find my note on the pin-cushion? That informed you where
+I've been."
+
+"I thought you must have met with an accident, to make you so terribly
+late, or else made up your mind to go off with that young man for good
+and all. Tell you the truth, I didn't quite know which I should prefer,
+which would be better for you in the end."
+
+"Do you mean to tell me you've been sitting here all day stewing and
+fretting about that? Didn't you ever in your life go buggy-riding with a
+feller, and did it always ends with the grand plunge? You know it
+didn't. You know you could ride from Provincetown to Boston, with the
+moon shining, too, and not even exchange a chaste salute."
+
+"Nell, there's one thing I know, and it's that my scolding and warning
+and beseeching will do exactly as much good as an old cow mooing with
+her neck stretched over a stone wall. You know what I think. I've had
+plenty of time for reflection, walking up and down the floor in there in
+the dark; and long before you finally got home I'd made up my mind not
+to be an idiot and make myself a nuisance trying to influence you. It's
+your funeral. What you choose to do is none of my business. What I said
+when you came in just escaped me.--Stand off and let me look at you."
+
+While making the request, she herself drew off to get a more
+comprehensive view of her friend.
+
+Something of the sunshine, the mountain sweetness, the unpolluted
+breezes and wide perspectives of the heights, the dreams of the starlit
+homeward ride, the triumph in man's love, was shining forth from Aurora,
+with her fresh sunburn, her untidied hair, and softly luminous eyes.
+Estelle felt herself suddenly on the point of tears. But she stiffened.
+
+"Well, you do look as if you'd had a good time, you crazy thing!" she
+said dryly. "What made you put your best dress on if you were going to
+sit round on the ground? You've got it all grass stains. Oh, Nell," she
+melted, "while you've been off gallivanting, I've just about worried
+myself sick over a paper Leslie left. I've been longing for you to get
+back to see what you make of it."
+
+"A paper? What do you mean?"
+
+"A newspaper. Come on upstairs. I left it on the desk. Leslie called in
+the forenoon, but I had gone out. Then she came again in the afternoon,
+so I knew it must be something special. But I simply couldn't bring
+myself to see her and let her know you'd gone off for the whole day with
+Gerald Fane. So I got the maid to tell her we were both out. Everybody
+does that over here. Anyhow, I went and stood on the terrace while the
+maid was delivering my message. So Leslie went off, but she left this
+Italian paper for the maid to give us. And, my dear,--now don't
+faint,--there's a long piece in it about you."
+
+"For goodness' sakes! About me? Why? Where?"
+
+"There. It isn't marked, and I was the longest time trying to discover
+why Leslie had left the paper. After I'd gone all over it hunting for a
+marked passage, I thought it must be a mistake and that she'd simply
+left it because she was tired of carrying it round, and the maid hadn't
+understood. But going over it column by column, I at last saw the word
+Hawthorne and those other names. '_Una Americana_'--'An
+American'--the article is entitled. It looks to me, Nell, as if your
+whole life's history might be printed there."
+
+"For the land's sake! Now, who do you suppose can have done that? What
+on earth would anybody want to--"
+
+"I've been puzzling over it and puzzling over it till I'm about played
+out trying to make sense of it, and my head aches like fury. Oh, never
+mind my head! Now you've got back I don't care."
+
+"And your French doesn't help you to translate it?"
+
+"Yes, it does help--some. I can pick out lots of words, and here and
+there a whole sentence; but what I can't get at is the spirit of the
+whole, whether it's meant to be friendly or not."
+
+"Have you tried with a dictionary? Where's the dictionary? Get it, and
+we'll pick it out if it takes all night."
+
+"Indeed, I wish I had a dictionary. Mine's French-English. I asked
+Clotilde if she had an Italian-English or an Italian-French, and she
+said yes, but at home. Isn't it provoking? I certainly wasn't going to
+show this to her, and get her to translate it for me before I'd
+consulted with you."
+
+"Bother!" said Aurora, thoughtfully, with her eyes on the cryptic print.
+Estelle sat close, examining the sheet over her shoulder. "_Elena_
+means Helen, doesn't it? I guess it must, as it comes here before
+Barton. They've got my old name. And there's Bewick--Bewick, and here's
+Colorado. They've got the whole thing, fast enough. It's the doing of an
+enemy; there can be no doubt of that."
+
+"I know who you're thinking about."
+
+"Charlie Hunt, of course. Scamp! Worm! Cockroach! Low down, ungrateful,
+pop-eyed pig!" Nor did the reviling stop there. For the space of about
+forty seconds Aurora was unpublishable.
+
+"But how on earth did he get at it?" wondered Estelle.
+
+"After he'd opened that letter of mine, he wrote to the amiable writer
+thereof and asked for information."
+
+"Honestly, Nell, I don't think he's had time."
+
+"I guess he has--just time. The languishing Iona hurried for once. Well,
+I don't care!" Aurora folded the paper tight and flung it from her.
+"Enemies may do what they please; I've got friends. If everything comes
+out as it really happened, I haven't anything to fear, except that it's
+mighty unpleasant. It's only lies, and people believing them, that could
+do me harm. I've got friends in Florence. Oh, not many true ones, I
+don't suppose. It's paying my way that has made me popular, I'm not such
+a gump as not to know that. But some true friends I've got, and their
+backing will be my stay. One friend I've got--" Pride and a sudden
+battle-light flashed in Aurora's eye. "One friend I've got, who if I
+gave the word would kill Charlie Hunt for this, or put him in a fair way
+to dying. I do believe, Hat, that Gerald Fane would call Charlie Hunt
+out to fight a duel to punish him for a slur on me. Oh, he can fence
+just as well as the Italians he was brought up with. I've seen the
+fencing-swords in his studio. But"--she calmed down--"I wouldn't permit
+that sort of thing. It's ridiculous. I don't believe in it."
+
+Cooling to normal, she laughed, with a return to the light of reality.
+"He doesn't believe in it, either, I shouldn't suppose."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+
+Leslie, arriving early next day, read off the newspaper article, making
+a free translation of it, as follows:
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+When a thing is too successful, it is seldom natural; and so when there
+appeared in our city a _signora_, blond of hair, azure of eye, with
+the complexion of delicate, luminous roses, red and white, whose name
+was at once Aurora and _Albaspina_,--Hawthorne,--floral counterpart
+of dawn, we should have had suspicions. That we had none does not
+prevent our feeling no very great surprise when we learn that the bearer
+of the poetic and more than appropriate name is called in sober truth
+Elena Barton. The more beautiful name was adopted by a child acting out
+its fairy-stories; it was remembered and re-adopted by a woman when she
+wished to detach her life from a past which neither charity, fidelity,
+nor devotion to a sacred duty had succeeded in keeping from sorrow and
+the deadly aspersions of malignity.
+
+The _gentilissima_ person of the irradiating smile, which, however
+briefly seen, must be long remembered, whom we have grown accustomed
+this winter to meeting in the salons where assembles all that is most
+distinguished among foreigners, whose name we have grown accustomed to
+finding foremost in every work of charity, has a title to our esteem far
+beyond the ordinary member of an indolent and favored class. To
+alleviate suffering has been the chosen work of those hands that
+Florence also has found ever open and ready with their help. It was in
+effect the extent of their beneficence which brought about the black
+imbroglio from which Elena Barton chose to flee and take refuge in the
+City of Flowers under the _soave_ and harmonious name by which we
+know her.
+
+Her life had been for several years devoted to the care of an old man
+afflicted with a most malignant and terrible cancer in the face. She had
+filled toward him so perfectly the part of a daughter that his gratitude
+made her upon his death an equal sharer in his fortune with the children
+of his blood. Thence the law-case Bewick _versus_ Barton, which for
+a period filled the city of Denver in Colorado of the United States as
+if with poisonous fumes. The literal daughters, two in number, who had
+shown no filial love for the unfortunate old man, in trying to annul
+their father's will, left nothing undone or unspoken that could help
+their _turpe_, or evil, purpose, even attempting to prove that not
+only had the devoted nurse been their father's _amante_--[You can
+guess what that is, Aurora. They are much simpler here than we at home
+about calling things by their names, and much more outspoken on all
+subjects], but had likewise been the _amante_ of the son, sole
+member of the family who supported her claim to the share of the fortune
+appointed by the father. Justice in the event prevailed, but a tired and
+broken woman emerged from the conflict. What to do to regain a little
+of that pleasure in living which blackening calumnies and rodent
+ill-will, even when not victorious, can destroy in the upright and
+feeling nature? The imagination which had prompted in childhood the
+acting out of fairy-stories here came into play: Leave behind the scene
+of sorrows, take ship, and point the prow toward the land of orange and
+myrtle, of golden marbles and wine-colored sunsets; change name, begin
+again, do good under a beautiful appellation which the poor should learn
+to love and speak in their prayers to the last of their days....
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+"The rest, Aurora dear, is pure flattery, which it becomes me not to
+speak nor you to hear. I won't read it."
+
+"Well, I never!" breathed Aurora. "Who did it?"
+
+"We did it! My father and your Doctor Bewick and Carlo Guerra and I. We
+did it to be before anybody else, set the worst that could be brought up
+against you in a light that explains and justifies. We did our best to
+fix the public mind and show it what it should think. You know what the
+mind of the public is. We've hypnotized the beast, I hope; it has taken
+its bent from us."
+
+"But--"
+
+"This was the way of it, my dear. The day after Brenda's wedding I was
+at the Fontanas,--she was a Miss Andrews, you know, of
+Indianapolis,--and there was Charlie, too, and there was likewise Madame
+Sartorio, who is Colonel Fontana's niece by his first marriage. We were
+talking in a little group when something, I forget what, was said about
+you, Aurora. Charlie--for what reason would be hard to think, unless one
+had a sharp scent for what goes on under one's nose--Charlie
+interrupted, to introduce as a sort of parenthesis, 'Mrs. Hawthorne,
+whose real name, by the way, is Helen Barton.' The others were naturally
+taken aback, except Madame Sartorio, who could not quite disguise a
+cat-smile. For a moment none of us knew what to say, and Charlie went
+on, with his air of knowing such a lot more than anybody else--
+
+"'Yes. It seems that all winter we have been warming in our bosom, so to
+speak, the heroine of a _cause célèbre_ at a place called Colorado
+in America.'"
+
+"That was enough for me. I stopped him.
+
+"'Don't say any more, Charlie. All I wish to know about Mrs. Hawthorne
+is what she cares to tell me herself,' and I insisted that the
+conversation should return to other things.
+
+"When I got home I told mother, and she repeated to me what you, Aurora,
+confided to her when we first knew you. We told father, and when Doctor
+Bewick came that evening to say good-by we consulted, and here in this
+newspaper you have the result, put into Italian journalese by Carlo
+Guerra, whom we called in to aid us. He likes you so much, Aurora; did
+you know it? He met you at Antonia's. So there you have the whole story.
+I'm bitterly ashamed of Charlie, my dear, and I'm sorry about him, too.
+One never looked upon him as a particularly fine fellow, still, one
+liked him. He had never done anything that disqualified him for a sort
+of liking, and we've all grown up together." Leslie wrinkled her
+forehead in puzzlement. "It's curious, somehow, to think of him, who, we
+have said so often, has no real inside, as being sufficiently under the
+dominion of a passion to care to please his lady by offering up you, who
+have, after all, been to him a source of a good many pleasures, with
+your open house, invitations to dinner, and so on. I don't quite
+understand it."
+
+"Never mind about him!" Aurora flicked him aside. "I don't care. And you
+say Tom helped. And he never told me, or wrote me a word about it. I had
+a letter from him this morning. Well, well. You certainly did make a
+good-sounding story of it, among you. And the main facts are true, far
+as they go; I can't say they aren't. But, oh, my dear Leslie, there was
+a lot more to it than that. I've got to tell you, so's not to feel like
+a fraud. You're so sharp; you know me pretty well by this time, and I
+guess you don't suppose in me any of those awfully 'fine feelin's' that
+could make a blighted flower of me because, while innocent as a babe
+unborn, I'd been dragged through the courts by wicked enemies. My
+enemies were pretty wicked; I stick to that. Cora Bewick, off living
+abroad studying some strange religion, while her kind old pa was dying
+at home, and she never once coming near him till he was under ground;
+Idell Friebus, never coming into his room except with her nose wrinkled
+up with disgust at the smell of disinfectants--or disgust at him, it was
+none too plain which. They made a fine pair of daughters. But when it
+came to fighting over the will, the lawyers on the Bewick side gave out
+just what it was that a perfectly noble woman would have done in my
+place of the old man's nurse. And my lawyers would have it that
+everything that didn't accord with that ideal simply must be kept dark,
+or public feeling would go against us. It's that that made it so
+nasty--pretending, and avoiding this, and keeping off the other. It
+amounted to lying, no matter what they said. But they told me if I
+didn't do as my counsel instructed me, the result would be the worst lie
+of all. I should be believed guilty of just that undue influence I was
+accused of, and lose the money into the bargain. So I had to hedge and
+shuffle and mislead.... And me under oath to tell the truth! You needn't
+wonder if I'm sick still at the thought of it, or wonder that I'd like
+to forget it. The truth was I _did_ know beforehand the Judge meant
+to leave me one fourth of his money, and I was tickled to death. I
+gloried in it. I loved to imagine the rage it would throw his wicked
+daughters in, and his mean little miserable son-in-law. I was glad,
+besides, out and out, to think I should have the money. I plain wanted
+it, I did. Maybe a real noble woman wouldn't have. Maybe it showed a
+degraded nature. Well, that's the way it was. Sometimes I feel disposed
+to be ashamed of it, but mostly I don't. For one thing, I felt then and
+I feel now, I deserved that money by a long sight more than those
+bad-hearted girls of his. I was a comfort to Judge Bewick. I won't say I
+earned the money, it was too much: but there were some hours of my
+tending him, poor soul, when it did seem to me a nurse came pretty near
+earning anything the patient could afford to pay. All the same, I would
+have done what I did for the old boy if he hadn't had a cent, I had so
+much respect for him, as much as for my own father, and I felt I owed so
+much to his son. Then about his son, the doctor. If Cora's old
+nurse-girl, who was kept on in the house as a servant, though she was
+past her usefulness, lied in court when she said she saw Tom and me
+kissing at such an hour, in such a place, still, the truth was that I
+had at different times kissed Tom. You can't tell why it seems all right
+to you to kiss one man when it would seem a very queer thing to do to
+kiss another. When Tom had been away for any length of time, I always
+kissed him when he came back; it seemed natural to both of us. But there
+in court I had to try to appear as if I never could have descended to
+committing such an immoral act, as well as to give the impression that
+if I'd known the old man had any notion of making me co-heir with his
+own children I would have strained every nerve to stop it, called them
+all in to help me curb him if necessary. Pshaw! the humbug of it turns
+my stomach now. Leslie, my verdict is, you can't come through a law-suit
+_clean_. I'd give a good deal to cut that page out of my life."
+
+Aurora's eyes, filled with the shadows of the past, and her face, with
+the dimples expunged, were to Leslie almost unfamiliar. Aurora,
+oppressed in her moral nature, gave a glimpse of herself that would
+change and enlarge the composite of her aspects carried in Leslie's
+mind.
+
+"There, stop thinking of it!" said Estelle. "You always work yourself up
+so."
+
+"The point of my coming bright and early like this," Leslie nimbly
+managed a diversion, "was, as you have guessed, to catch you before you
+could possibly go out. My mother desires you, dear ladies, to accompany
+me back to lunch--a triumphal lunch, Aurora, to grace which she has
+collected those special pillars of society whose countenance and support
+ought to make you scornful of any little weed-like growth of gossip that
+might sprout up from seed of Charlie's sowing. You know them all more or
+less, having been associated with every one of them in some form of
+beneficence. I might more accurately describe it: having donated largely
+to each of their pet charities. It is not a very admirable world--"
+Leslie's young face took that little air of knowing the world which
+sometimes amused old gentlemen so much, "it is a selfish society, not
+indisposed, or, I am afraid, altogether displeased, to believe evil of
+its neighbor, and not always disinclined to turn and rend its favorites.
+But it would be a pity, really, if you should have poured forth upon it
+as you have done, Aurora, money and smiles, bouquets and banquets and
+sunbeams, good-will and baby-socks and knitted afghans, and it did not
+rise up when you are attacked and say, 'No. An exception has to be made
+in this case. We have all been bought!'"
+
+Aurora, who had been listening with expanded, gathering-in eyes, cheeks
+flushing deeper and deeper, turned her head sharply away to try to keep
+from falling or being seen two unaccountable tears half blinding her.
+
+The sight of her, by infection, moistened the eyes of the other women.
+
+Estelle sought a quick way out of the emotional silence.
+
+"Nell," she said, albeit with cracked voice, "if we're going out to
+lunch, I guess we ought to be dressing. Go along, child, put on your
+best bib and tucker."
+
+"Oh, my best bib and tucker!" wailed Aurora. "Sent to the cleaner's this
+morning, all green stains at the back!"
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+If Leslie had not called it a triumphal lunch, it might not have
+appeared so very different from any other women's lunch at the season of
+roses. Leslie herself, though, found in it the flavor of old-fashioned
+romance, just faintly platitudinous, in which poetic justice is done.
+Mrs. Foss, the more simple-minded organizer of it, felt that she should
+remember it as an occasion when she had risen to the level, placed the
+right cards in the fist of destiny, and created an event worthy to take
+rank at least with those little triumphs of good housewives at whose
+home the president of their husband's company arrived one night unlocked
+for and was entertained with brilliant credit.
+
+To the heroine of the feast, no need to say it was an inexpressibly
+exciting, grand, and memorable occasion. Aurora hardly knew herself, so
+much the object of attention and graciousness. She was in the mood to
+give half of her goods to the poor. After the hostess had risen and made
+a little speech, Aurora, unexpectedly to herself, and as if under
+inspiration, responded by a little speech of her own, composed on the
+spot. It was drowned at the end by hand-clapping all around the table.
+Aurora seemed to herself to be living in a fairy-story.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+As it was after five o'clock when she reached home, she was sure she
+would find Gerald waiting for her. She had the whole day long been
+looking forward with a sweet agitation to the moment of being with him
+and telling him all about it.
+
+She was more disappointed than she remembered ever being, even as a
+child, not to find him or any word from him. She did not allow it to
+become later by more than half an hour before she scratched a line and
+sent the coachman to his house with it.
+
+The man came back with nothing but the barren information, received from
+Giovanna, that the _signorino_ was absent, having gone to Leghorn.
+
+"Well, here's a pretty howdydo!" thought Aurora, sore with surprise and
+the smart of injury. "If every time I refuse him he's going off like
+this to stay away for days and days, what am I going to do?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+
+"If this is the way it was going to be, and I'd known it before, I'd
+have kept better watch over my affections," said Aurora to herself,
+reflecting upon Gerald in Leghorn, where he was bending his will
+industriously, no doubt, to the work of forgetting her.
+
+Beside the large sharp thorn of this thought, she was troubled by what
+was a small, merely uncomfortable thorn: the knowledge of Gerald exposed
+so closely to the influence of Vincent, that persuasive young man of
+God, who bowed to images and believed in the Pope. At the end of every
+wearisome day she gave thanks that for still another twenty-four hours
+she had by grace of strength from on high been able to fight off the
+temptation to write to Gerald.
+
+This for nine days--the nine days it takes for a wonder to become a
+commonplace or a scandal to lose its prominent place in conversation.
+Then, in the way once sweetly habitual, there came a rapping at the
+door, the entrance of a servant, and the announcement, "_C'è il
+signorino_."
+
+Aurora for a second either did not really grasp the import of the words
+or did not trust her senses. She asked:
+
+"What _signorino_? _Signorino_ What?"
+
+"The _signorino_ who has come back," said the servant, unable on
+the instant to recall the foreign name. And if he had felt interest in
+the complexion of one so far removed from him as his mistress, he might
+have seen her turn the hue of a classic sunrise.
+
+On her way down the stairs Aurora rejected the idea of a tumultuous
+reproachful greeting, such as, "Where have you been so long, you mean
+thing?" Or of a cool and cutting one, such as, "You're quite a
+stranger." She decided to behave like a nice person, and show respect
+for her friend's freedom, after having so explicitly left it to him.
+
+The Italians performing the service of the house arranged it according
+to their own ideas of fitness, and on this warm afternoon the
+drawing-room was in soft-colored twilight, the Persian blinds being
+clasped, and their lower panels pushed out a very little so as to let in
+a modicum of the whiteness of day.
+
+Gerald stood, very collected, if a trifle pale, holding, like a proper
+votary, a bouquet--starry handful of sweet white hedge-roses,--which he
+offered as soon as Aurora entered, saying he had picked them for her
+that morning in the country near Castel di Poggio.
+
+The meeting, in Aurora's jubilant sense of it, went off beautifully. She
+said in a pleasant, easy tone and her company English,
+
+"So you've got back. It's awfully nice to see you again. How well you
+are looking. I was sure a change would do you good."
+
+And Gerald said yes, he had found the sea air tonic. He had been staying
+with the Johns, Vincent's mother lived in Leghorn. He had worked a
+little, made a few drawings. Digressing, he mentioned a trifling gift he
+had brought her, and produced a small brass vessel, fitted with two
+hinged lids, meant to contain grains of incense for the altar. He said
+he had found it in an antiquarian's shop and thought she might care for
+it to drop her rings into; he supposed she took them off at night. Its
+shape seemed to him to possess more than common elegance.
+
+Aurora called it adorable, and his giving it to her sweet. They talked
+as if they had been making believe, for the benefit of an audience, to
+be the most ordinary friends.
+
+And each of them meanwhile, with heart and head gone slightly insane in
+secret, was considering a marvel. The long separation--it had been long
+to them--had recreated for both something of the capacity to receive a
+fresh impression of the other. The marvel to Aurora was that this choice
+being, with his intellectual brow (that was her adjective for Gerald's
+brow) his difference from others, all in the way of superiority to them,
+the indescribable fascination residing in his every feature, mood, or
+word, should be walking the world unclaimed and unattached, for her to
+take if she were so minded. Her to take! It was vertiginous.
+
+And the marvel to him was, in beholding that bounteous temple of a soul,
+with its radiance of life, its share, so rich, of the mysterious
+something which made the earliest men care to build homes; its gifts, so
+large, of comfort and warmth--the marvel was that he should have dared
+aspire to conquer it, should have set that to himself as a thing he was
+going to persevere in trying to do until--until he had done it, he,
+puny, poor in inducements, light of weight.
+
+The two of them, there could be no doubt of it, had passed within the
+portals after which a change comes over the eyes, and those who enter
+see each other endowed with qualities raising the capacity for wonder to
+an ecstasy: so much engaging beauty, so much dearness, are not to be
+believed!... It can never be established whether the eyes only see truly
+when under this charm, or whether then more than at other times illusion
+makes of them its fool.
+
+If he had been analytical on the subject of his sentiment for Aurora, as
+so often on other subjects, and said to himself that he saw this woman
+in a golden transfiguring light because he was in good primordial
+fashion in love with her--because, that is to say, obscure affinities of
+flesh and blood united with the esteem created by her virtues to make of
+him a candle which the touch of her finger-tip miraculously could
+light--he would have felt it as a blessed and not a base secret at the
+bottom of his attachment.
+
+While they talked of the weather, as they fell to doing when they had
+disposed of the subject of the little incense-holder; and, after that,
+while they talked of Leghorn and the various seaside places which Aurora
+had to choose from for her summer sojourn, a vastly deep conversation
+was taking place between them, which we think it not amiss to report,
+because by the nature of things the words they would say aloud on this
+occasion would be meager and colorless by comparison with the things
+they would feel and to some extent convey to each other through mere
+proximity.
+
+"O Aurora," exhaled from Gerald, while, looking not far from his usual
+self, he said that Ardenza by the sea, a mere three miles from Leghorn,
+was a very pretty place, "Aurora, you are warmth, you are shelter, you
+are rest. I have no hearth or home except as you let me in out of the
+desperate cold of loneliness, and grant me to warm myself at your big
+heart. You should see, woman dear, that my thankfulness would make you
+happy. Nature, the divine, so formed you that my love would kindle
+yours. And when you had given your hand into mine I should find paths of
+violets, enchanted paths, for us to walk in which you could never find
+without me, nor I find for myself. Put up no petty shield against me,
+Aurora; fight me with no petty lance, for I verily am that guest you
+were awaiting when on balmy spring evenings you felt, and knew not why,
+that your life was incomplete."
+
+And Aurora, mechanically pulling off her rings and putting them into the
+brass receptacle, then taking them out of it and putting them back on
+her fingers, while she chattered, describing the advantages of a
+furnished villa at Antiniano, to be preferred because they were some
+Italian friends of Leslie's who desired to let it, was in her inmost
+speaking to the inmost of Gerald. The hardly self-conscious meanings
+within her bosom made as if an extension of her in the air, comparable
+to the halo around the moon on a misty night; and this atomized radiance
+had language, it said: "Oh, to draw your head down where it desires to
+be! To warm and comfort you! To be to you everything you need! I lean to
+you, I cling to you like a vine with every winding tendril. But I am so
+afraid of you! so afraid! I am of common, you of finest, clay. How can I
+give into any hand so much power to hurt me? If I were to dare it, then
+find I could not make you happy, your disappointment would be my
+heart-break, and my tragedy might spoil your life. But this know,
+Gerald, dearer to me for having been so unhappy, nothing my life could
+contain without you would seem to me so good as life with you in a poor
+workman's attic, under falling snow, and I to make it home for you!"
+
+While two souls thus trembled and gravitated toward each other, bathing
+in each other's light, it is almost mortifying to have to show to what
+degree that which took place at the surface was different and inferior;
+to what degree the fine abandon of words spoken and actions performed in
+thought was replaced by a shivering prudence keeping guard on one side,
+and on the other a deplorable timidity trying awkwardly to be bold.
+
+Heard through the door, the scene that ensued between these two curious
+lovers, when they had worked their way through preliminaries and come to
+the point at which they had parted after the day at Vallombrosa, must
+particularly have seemed lacking in purple and poetry; for then the soft
+light in Aurora's eyes would not have been seen, nor the deep flash in
+Gerald's, as he by a point scored felt himself nearer to the goal.
+
+"Now, what made you run off like that, I want to know," Aurora asked in
+the flowing American which she reserved for real friends and sincere
+moments, "after you'd said when you left me at the door, 'Good-by till
+to-morrow'?"
+
+"My reasons were several, all simple," he replied, with a faun-look up
+from the corner of his eye, which watched her expression. "First, I
+wished to flee from that newspaper article--dreadful!--till the danger
+of any reference to it in my hearing was greatly reduced. Then, aside
+from a slight natural need to recover myself, I felt I must for manners'
+sake allow a little time to pass before I approached you again on the
+subject of marrying me. One scruples to make himself a bore. It
+therefore would be better not to see you, and, in order not to see you,
+better not to be in town. Lastly, Auroretta, I conceived the infernal
+ambition to make you suffer from absence the minutest fraction of what I
+should suffer myself."
+
+"Don't say a word! I've missed you so my bones felt hollowed out!"
+
+"Reflect then, my dearest, upon the sufferings you are preparing for
+yourself if you haven't a kinder answer for me than the other day to the
+same question. All the reasons you gave for saying no were such bad
+ones, founded upon a bad opinion of me. I can't take your refusal for
+final, don't you see, without first being sure I have convinced you at
+least that you are wrong in thinking me a fish or a mudturtle, and wrong
+in attributing a lack of intelligence to me which could betray me into
+confusing great things with little, little with great."
+
+"Oh, Gerald, you oughtn't to keep on trying! I do wish you wouldn't! No!
+Don't say any more about it!" she pleaded in weak anguish. "You oughtn't
+to go on battering against the little bit of common sense I've got
+left."
+
+"Common sense! I advise you to speak of it!" he affected to jeer,
+remarkably braced by her misery. "Common sense, as represented by a
+decent concern for your good name, ought to prompt you enter as quickly
+as you can into an engagement with me. I met our dear Doctor Batoni in
+the street yesterday on my way home from the station, and he amiably
+asked how was my _fidanzata_, or betrothed? It was a difficult
+moment for me, because he told me that _you_ had told him you were
+that."
+
+"I told him nothing of the sort! I said I was your friend, in French."
+
+"A friend, in French, may mean a good deal. Save your reputation, dear;
+I give you the chance."
+
+"What nonsense! I explained to him as well as I could, in French, that I
+was there taking care of you because I was your friend."
+
+"You are hopelessly compromised. Look to me to set you right."
+
+"Gerald, I shall do nothing of the kind."
+
+"Ah, I see that your prejudices hold firm. I was afraid of it when I
+came." His mask of flippancy slipped for a moment; deep feeling made his
+voice uncertain. "I am not that hardy and masterful man, Aurora, who
+could break them down and clutch you above their ruin. But you will find
+me very faithful to a hope--which, in fact, to relinquish now would be
+beyond what I can expect of my courage." He resumed bluffness. "I told
+Vincent he might look for my return to-morrow."
+
+"No, sir!" she came out with lively directness. "You're not going back
+to Leghorn if I can help it! I--I have a plan."
+
+"You have a plan? From your face I am afraid not a good one. You look so
+dubious."
+
+"Perhaps it isn't a good one, but it's the only way I can see. Listen."
+She looked down at her hands, and kept him waiting. "One evening last
+winter at a party a young Italian naval officer got talking to me in a
+green bower under a pink paper lantern away from the rest. Something in
+the atmosphere, I guess, made him want to talk to somebody of his
+love-affairs, and he chose me, though we scarcely knew each other. He
+told me he had been very much in love with an American girl, but they
+hadn't the money to marry on or the hope of ever having it--like Brenda
+and Manlio at first. Yet they couldn't keep apart, and so they just
+became engaged, knowing it couldn't end as an engagement is supposed to
+do. In that way they could see each other all they wanted, and be seen
+together without anybody making a remark. And then when she was obliged
+to go home and it had to end, it looked merely like a broken
+engagement."
+
+"And you propose--"
+
+"We might try it, Gerald. Then if it didn't work well, if I found I was
+all the time outraging your sensibilities, and you hurting my feelings,
+we'd call it off. In any case we'd give ourselves plenty of time to
+realize our foolishness. And you'd promise that when the time came you'd
+go like a lamb, with a pleasant face, not saving up anything against me.
+Make up your mind, now, that it'll have to be a long, _long_
+engagement--if we don't repent and break it off inside a week. But as it
+seems so likely we will, let's don't tell the others right off, Gerald;
+not, anyhow, for a week or ten days."
+
+"Admired Aurora, it surely is the most immoral proposition that ever
+came from fair lady so well brought up as you!" cried Gerald, in a
+proper state of excitement. But yet, such were his limitations, nothing
+in any proportion with the throbbing fire inside him, the immensity of
+his incredulous joy, appeared on his outside, where merely the mollified
+lines of his face gave him a look of greater youth, and his cool-colored
+eyes let through a faint testimony of the inward light. "I accept
+without hesitation. I promise whatever you ask. From this moment onward
+we are _fidanzati_, then. And, my blessed Auroretta, you who are
+such a hand at calling names, have your servant's permission to call him
+all the names you can think of that signify an ineffable blunderer on
+the day when you succeed in freeing yourself from him!"
+
+Many more things were said, not worth recording. But at last devout
+silence reigned. In the twilight room, with all the bad pictures and
+trivial ornamentation, to shut out the offense of which he had once
+closed his eyes, Gerald now closed them again to concentrate more
+perfectly upon the rapture of feeling Aurora's shoulder beneath his
+cheek.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+
+The servant who opened the door for Leslie on this softly brilliant June
+morning, being well accustomed to admitting her, obligingly anticipated
+her question, "Are the ladies at home?"
+
+"The _signorina_ is in the _salottino_," he said. From which
+Leslie understood that the person whom she chiefly had come to see was
+out. It did not really matter, for she had time to wait. Aurora was
+likely to come back for lunch.
+
+She released the man from attendance by a little wave of her hand,
+"Never mind announcing me!" and directed her footsteps toward the tall
+white-and-gold door standing partly open.
+
+On her way to it she picked up off the floor a small lawn handkerchief.
+
+The ball-room impressed her anew as being very vast, very empty,
+furnished almost solely as it was by the sparkling chandeliers, every
+pendant of which to-day was gay with reflections of the green and
+flowery and sun-washed outdoors.
+
+She turned toward the _salottino_, remotely wondering by what
+chance Estelle was preferring it to the favorite red and green
+sitting-room upstairs. The _salottino_ had utility when a party was
+going on, but to sit and embroider or study French surrounded by all
+those fountains of love....
+
+A sharp bark preceded the tumbling out through the _salottino_ door
+of a little white mop on feet. Upon recognizing Leslie, this performed
+evolutions expressive of great joy.
+
+She had stopped to pat the excited little swirl of silk when Estelle
+came forward to see who was there.
+
+With delighted good mornings the women exchanged the foreign salute,
+which Leslie had adopted and Estelle submitted to, a mere touching of
+cheeks while the lips kiss the air.
+
+They sat down on the rococo settee to talk, Leslie, quick of eye,
+wondering what had happened to give Estelle that unusual air, an air
+of--no, it was indefinable. Excitement had a share in it, and possibly
+chagrin, and, it almost seemed, exaltation. The chief thing about it,
+however, was that she was trying to conceal it; doing her best, but it
+was a poor best, to appear natural. Leslie graciously allowed her to
+suppose she was succeeding, and entered at once upon the reason for her
+early call.
+
+"I really think, Estelle, that the villa at Antiniano would suit Aurora.
+As for you, I am positive, my dear, that you would adore it. It is a
+little out of the thick of things, but has a very fine view of the sea,
+also a very pretty garden. Certain conveniences, of course, it hasn't,
+but, then, you mustn't expect those of an Italian villa. I saw Madame
+Rossi yesterday, and she said she wished you would make an excursion to
+Antiniano to see for yourselves. She is sure you would be charmed. One
+request she would make: that the peasant family be allowed to continue
+in their little corner of the house, where they wouldn't be the least in
+your way, and then that the little donkey should be allowed to remain in
+the stable. But in return you could use him, she said."
+
+"Ride him?"
+
+"Yes, or harness him. For the country, why not, my dear? They are ever
+so strong little beasts."
+
+Estelle began to laugh, presumably at the picture of Aurora on
+donkey-back, or, with herself, exhilarating the country-side by the
+vision of them drawn in a donkey-cart. Leslie joined in her merriment,
+but expostulatingly, and, warned by a note in Estelle's laugh, watched
+her with suspicion while it developed into a nervous cackle. She saw her
+cover her eyes with one hand, and with the other vainly feel in her
+pocket. She was crying. Leslie tendered the little handkerchief found on
+the floor, and knew then that it had dried tears before on that same
+day. She waited, tactfully silent, merely placing a condoling hand over
+her friend's.
+
+"I might as well tell you," Estelle got out, when her crying fit
+permitted her to speak, "that Aurora isn't going to take any villa at
+Antiniano this summer.... She's gone away."
+
+"Gone away? What do you mean?" asked Leslie, surprised into a very
+complete blankness of expression.
+
+"What I say." And in her incalculable frame of mind Estelle again was
+laughing. "Oh, I don't know which to do, whether to laugh or cry!" she
+explained, with eyes bright at once from laughter and from tears. "One
+moment I laugh, next moment I cry. I feel as if I were walking in my
+sleep. I guess what I need is a nerve-pill."
+
+"You say that Aurora has gone away. Where?"
+
+"Where Gerald pleases, I guess. She's gone with him."
+
+"With Gerald? Now, my dear friend, please explain. You laugh, you cry.
+You say Aurora has gone away with Gerald. Please collect yourself and
+tell me what it means. 'Gone away with Gerald.' How do you mean gone
+away with him?"
+
+"I mean they have eloped, or as good as."
+
+"No, no; people don't elope when there is neither an inconvenient
+husband, nor unamenable parents, nor any possible reason why they should
+not have each other if they wish to."
+
+"I wonder what you would call it, then. As late as twelve o'clock last
+night I didn't know a thing about it, and this morning early they left
+together in a carriage, with her trunk strapped on the back."
+
+Leslie lifted her hands to her temples and pressed them as if to keep
+her head from a dangerous expansion with the size of the new idea that
+must find a home there.
+
+"So it was in earnest!" she said aloud, yet as if speaking to herself.
+"Mother has won her bet, and I have lost. Well,"--she tossed her head
+and faced Estelle,--"I am glad of it. We knew, of course, that there was
+something, and we felt that nothing nicer could happen than that they
+should make a match of it. Mother prophesied they would. But I did not
+believe it. I was afraid of Gerald--that disposition in him to consider
+too finely, to halt on the brink, that negative, renunciatory way he has
+settled into. I thought the thing would end in mere philandering. I am
+glad"--she threw the weight of conviction on the word,--"glad it hasn't!
+I don't see, my dear Estelle, what you can find to cry about."
+
+"Is that the way it strikes you?"
+
+"My dear, I couldn't say which I thought the luckier, Gerald to get
+Aurora, or Aurora to get Gerald."
+
+"You surprise me. To me it seems just about the riskiest combination
+that could be imagined. I have felt it all along. Those two have no more
+in common, I have said, than a bird and a fish."
+
+"Nonsense, my dear girl! Nonsense!"
+
+"I have heard him get so impatient with her because simply she didn't
+pronounce a word right. I've seen him so annoyed he nearly trembled
+trying to choke it down."
+
+"But did she mind? I mean, his impatience?"
+
+"I can't say she did; but--"
+
+"There you have it. They are marvelously suited. Listen and let me talk
+to you for your comfort. This, do you hear, is exactly the most
+delightful thing that could have happened. Haven't you noticed that
+complex natures are rather given to uniting with simple ones, and
+finding happiness with them? An artist--how often!--marries his model, a
+philosopher marries a peasant."
+
+"Go on!" sighed Estelle. "Go on! I love you for making me feel better!"
+Her eyes moistened again in an almost luxurious melancholy.
+
+"One of the reasons for mother and me wishing for this consummation was
+the broadening of life it would afford Gerald. Gerald doesn't think
+about money. Aurora's money, all the same, will do a lot for him in
+making possible his getting away from here, where the truth is he
+stagnates. Then, too, she will cure him of his morbidness. He sees red
+if one so much as breathes the suggestion that his art is morbid. But of
+course it is."
+
+"Aurora said they might go to live in Paris, because she thought it
+would be good for his art."
+
+"Now that's what I want to hear about. Go on and tell me what Aurora
+said and what happened between midnight and their extraordinary
+elopement, as you call it. But, first of all, why, in the name of common
+sense, did they elope? From what did they elope?"
+
+"From me, I guess. I don't see what else. Oh, yes, I do. From the talk
+there would be. But principally, I suspect, he hurried her into it to
+make sure of her, for she, too, had her moments of doubting the wisdom
+of what she was doing. That much I know. They had only been engaged two
+weeks, and all that time I didn't even know they were engaged. I hadn't
+been nice about Gerald, I feel bound to confess, so she thought best not
+to tell me. She didn't want to hear how I would take it, we've been so
+used to speaking our minds to each other. He came oftener than ever and
+stayed longer, till it got so I made a point of getting up and making an
+excuse to leave the room. It was my way of being spiteful. But Nell
+didn't take it up with me in private, as I expected she would. They were
+tickled to death to have me leave the room, I can see now. She went
+around the house singing an Easter carol and fixing flowers in the
+vases, with a look of cheerfulness apart from me that made her seem like
+a stranger. I was pretty sore, I can tell you, but I wouldn't speak of
+it. I don't know how I thought it would end. Funny, I can't remember how
+everything looked so short a time ago as yesterday, but I know I was
+eaten up with mean thoughts. I went to bed last night thinking to
+myself, 'Well, Nell Goodwin, if you think I'm going to stand much more
+of this, you're mistaken. There'll be some plain talk before long.' And
+I fell asleep. First thing I knew I was awake, looking to see who'd come
+into my room. And there was Nell in her night-dress, holding her hand
+round the candle so it wouldn't shine in my eyes. I simply can't tell
+you what it was like,--the candle lighting nothing but her made her seem
+like a vision in the middle of a glory. Nobody can know how fond I am of
+Nell, what friends we've been since little bits of girls. All I could
+think of was that she'd come to make up with me, she couldn't wait
+another minute. It would have been just like her. And while I waited for
+her to speak first, I thought with my heart just melting what a lovely
+big thing she is, with that sort of fair look to her neck, and those
+warm cheeks, and something so kind about her from head to foot. She put
+down the candle and, instead of going into explanations, bent over and
+gave me a good hug. And I said, hugging back: 'You better had, you
+horrid thing! You better had!' Then she sat down on the bed. 'Hat,' she
+said, 'I was going to do a mean thing, but I'm not going to do it. I was
+going to slip away without a word, but I'm going to tell you the whole
+story. I'm going to marry Gerald,' she said.
+
+"Then she went on to tell me, and what do you think, I didn't say one
+word in objection, not one! Because I could see she was dead in love,
+and what was the use except to spoil her happiness, and I didn't want
+to. She told me how they'd decided it would be just as well not to wait,
+but take a short cut. If they stayed in Florence, she said, she'd feel
+they must have a big wedding and ask all their friends, and then she
+should have to have a trousseau; it would all take lots of time, and
+Gerald would so hate the fuss and the chatter. So they'd made up their
+minds to go off to Leghorn without a word to anybody,--whose business is
+it anyhow but their own?--and be married just as soon as it could be
+done, where they wouldn't get so much as the echo of any remarks on
+their haste or the way they preferred to do. She'll be staying with Mrs.
+Johns till the ceremony. She said she should write your mother from
+there. Then she showed me Gerald's ring that she'd been wearing on a
+chain round her neck where I wouldn't see it, and she talked about
+Gerald's wonderfulness. She's perfectly wrapped up in him. All I hope is
+he appreciates it."
+
+"His inducing her to elope with him would seem to indicate some warmth
+of feeling on his part. The suggestion can hardly have come from her."
+
+"You're right. I guess it's as bad with him as with her. She talked
+about the wonderfulness of his love, such as she never could have
+believed, and never could deserve. She said she could be happy with
+Gerald in a garret that let the snow leak in. Oh, they're both crazy.
+What do you think she gave as one reason for this haste? 'Life is
+short,' she said, 'and love is long!' Gerald must have said it to her
+before she said it to me, but what do you think of it? 'Life is short
+and love is long!'"
+
+"Do you mean"--asked Leslie, with the least touch of severity,--"that I
+ought to share in a cynical view of that saying? I can't, my dear
+Estelle. There are my father and mother, you know. In their quiet way
+they bear out the idea that love may be as long as life."
+
+"Yes, of course," said Estelle hurriedly, with a faint air of shame. "My
+father and mother, too, make a united couple."
+
+"My belief is that when two people marry who are in love as they ought
+to be, and who in addition are good--By good I think I mean people--"
+Leslie, with her look of wisdom beyond her years, paused to take a
+survey of life, "--people who have a sense of the other person's rights,
+and, as a matter of heart, not principle, feel the other's claims just a
+little more strongly than their own--in the case of such people, when
+the passion they marry on dies out with their growing older, as we
+generally see it do, something takes its place that deserves the name of
+love every bit as much."
+
+"Aurora is good," said Estelle, from her soul. "You would never know how
+good unless you had stood in need of kindness."
+
+"Gerald is good, too," said Leslie, with an effect of more impartiality
+but no less positiveness. "He would disdain to be anything else."
+
+"What is wrong with me is that I'm selfish, I guess," said Estelle,
+looking contrite, "and don't like having to give her up to him, after
+all the beautiful things we'd planned together. What I ought to feel is
+nothing but thankfulness for her having such a chance of happiness, and
+then thankfulness for all she did, trying to make up for her desertion."
+
+Without transition, Estelle went back to the story of the past night.
+"You can imagine there wasn't any more sleep for that spell. I got up,
+and we went to her room, where she had all the lights lighted and was in
+the middle of packing her trunk. She only took one, and about a quarter
+of her things. Gerald's going to design wonderful costumes for her, the
+style he prefers. I could see she's ready to do just anything to please
+him. I'd already noticed how she'd altered her way of doing her hair,
+but wasn't smart enough to recognize the signs!... While she was at work
+packing she planned for my summer,--that I'm to invite Mademoiselle
+Durand to go traveling with me, so I can improve my French at the same
+time as give that poor hard-working creature a real vacation and treat.
+Then when they go to Venice, she wants me to join them, and the three of
+us have a regular jamboree. Then next winter, after I've got home, she
+wants me to go to Colorado to visit the Grand Cañon and see the great
+sights of my native country before settling down again in East Boston.
+She made me a present of Ami."
+
+"Ami?"
+
+"I've changed his name from Busteretto. Don't you like it better? Little
+Tweetums! He's the only darling I've got left!" She pressed a kiss on
+the warm top of his head. "She made me a present of all the clothes and
+things she wasn't taking with her. She made me a present of everything
+in this house that we didn't find in it when we took it--turned it all
+over to me to do what I please with. And I'm sure I don't know what I
+shall do with it all unless I set up a store. Anything you see and think
+you'd like to have, please say so."
+
+"She gave you all these things? Do you mean it?" asked Leslie, surprised
+despite what she had already known of Aurora.
+
+"Yes, and along with the things, of course, the responsibility of
+settling up everything, dismissing the servants, sending Livvy back to
+New York. Such a job! Luckily, there's no hurry; the lease doesn't
+expire until October. When you came I'd been sort of looking round. I
+was just wondering what to do about this Fountain of Love. Nell paid a
+frightful lot for these four panels. I'd been trying to see if they
+could be carefully peeled off and the wall behind restored, and while I
+was looking the sight of that winter scene broke me all up. It doesn't
+tell a very cheerful tale, you know, this series of pictures. After what
+I'd just been through, saying good-by to them, it worked on me like a
+bad omen."
+
+"Don't be foolish. Then you saw Gerald, too, before they left?"
+
+"Yes. I could have done without, but she'd have been hurt. So I shook
+hands, and managed to wish him joy. He was nice, but, then, Gerald
+always is that. I've never for a moment said anything different. He said
+he wanted me to feel that I hadn't lost a sister, but acquired a
+brother. Just as they were driving off I remembered something, and
+called after Nell, 'What about your portrait?' for I couldn't think she
+meant to give me that along with the rest. Gerald said before she could
+speak, 'Take it away!' And Nell said right off, 'Oh, yes. Keep it,
+Hattie; keep it!' That lovely portrait he painted of her! I don't see
+how she could bear to part with it. But, of course, now she has him she
+can have as many portraits as she wants. Come and tell me what you
+think, whether it would be safe to pack it, frame and all, or better to
+unframe it, or, better still, to take the canvas off the stretcher and
+roll it."
+
+Accordingly, they left the room of the cupids and garlands, traversed
+the vasty ball-room where the chandeliers, like two huge ear-rings,
+divided up the light into twinkling diamond and rainbow showers, entered
+the drawing-room of the dignified sixteenth-century chairs, which from
+the first had suffered an undeserved neglect, and passed thence into the
+familiar parlor of the multitudinous baubles and the grand piano and the
+portrait; performing in the contrary direction the pilgrimage on which,
+at a period which seemed so immemorably far as to have become legendary,
+Gerald had followed Aurora walking before him with a light.
+
+They stood beneath the portrait, and with the image present to their
+minds of painter and sitter hasting on their way to be wed, saw this
+equivocal masterpiece with a difference. Not Aurora alone looked forth
+from the canvas,--throat of lily, cheek of rose, heaven-blue eyes, smile
+and ringlets of immitigable sunniness. Gerald, self-depicted in every
+subtle brush-stroke, looked, too.
+
+"It takes sober, solid, careful people to be interesting when they
+commit a rashness," thought Leslie. Then, with a little surge of envy in
+her well-regulated breast, "To be swept off one's feet," she thought,
+"how educative it must be, how enlarging."
+
+But a doubt fell, shadow-like, across her vision of future fortunes. If
+a person never found it possible to fall in love with those who fell in
+love with her, would it necessarily follow that the Some One she should
+someday love would regard her with coldness?
+
+Estelle gazed upward at the portrait with a wistful, well-nigh solemn
+look. Not being able, hampered by a dog in her arms, to clasp her hands,
+she expressed the same impulse by clasping the dog close to her breast
+in token that her wishes for her dearest friend's good were more than
+wishes, were a prayer.
+
+She felt a hand laid lightly on her forearm.
+
+"You needn't be afraid," said Leslie, "they'll be happy."
+
+THE END
+
+[Transcriber's Note: As originally published, this book had two
+consecutive chapters labeled as "CHAPTER XV." Chapter numbers have
+been resequenced in this text.]
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Aurora the Magnificent, by Gertrude Hall
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